3 ms·

Here we go again, promoting unregulated substances for medical purposes.

by jokoon 2y ago

amanaplanacanal 2y ago
It’s illegal almost everywhere. How much more regulation would you like?
- jokoon 2y ago
  I don't care about the regulation, I want people to stop saying psychedelics are better than antidepressants. I want people to listen to their doctors and stop having wishful ideas that ruins people's brains.
  - mbeddedartistry 2y ago
    I’m confused. Are you saying that the studies being done and showing positive results should just be ignored? Why are these studies viewed as wishful thinking?
    - jokoon 2y ago
      1. The article doesn't say the sample are diagnosed with depression, that rings an alarm, that should be an important parameter. 2. The article says SEVERAL times that the results should be taken with caution and a grain of salt, for several reasons explained. 3. psilo, AS IS, doesn't have good pharmacodynamics, meaning it doesn't stay very long in the bloodstream, which doesn't make it suitable as a REAL TREATMENT like prescribed AD, that mean you would have a spike of an effect and a fast come-down. That's bad. Of course it works in a controlled environment, but it's not an everyday treatment, that leads to point 5. 4. So as always, this shows a road for synthetic "copies" of that substance that would imitate the active effect, but psilo cannot compete with classic AD. This is still good, but to me, it's not worthy news about AD, I would still hold my breath. 5. I am bothered because those headlines can be read by people with depression who might seek psilo as a medicine if AD aren't enough. People with depression are already quite vulnerable, and there are many stories of people having permanent side effects.
  - tharne 2y ago
    Relative to the amount of money and research that has gone into antidepressants over the last four decades, they have performed very very poorly with respect to their intended goal. They are not highly effective for most people, and even when they do help people, there are a large number of unpleasant side effects, including sexual problems, weight gain, and fatigue, just to name a few (also, feeling fat, tired, and impotent is a great way to continue being depressed). Many commonly-used antidepressants also cause mild to severe withdrawal systems when people go to stop or change medications. So the reason we have people exploring psychedelics is not wishful thinking, but a reflection of the fact that we don't have effective treatments for depression that help most people, which most doctors will freely admit off the record.
  - manuelmoreale 2y ago
    If it turns out in 10 or 15 years that psychedelics are in fact a better anti depressant than current drugs, and you were to—hope not—suffer from depression yourself, would you take them?
    - jokoon 2y ago
      1. The article doesn't say the sample are diagnosed with depression, that rings an alarm, that should be an important parameter. 2. The article says SEVERAL times that the results should be taken with caution and a grain of salt, for several reasons explained. 3. psilo, AS IS, doesn't have good pharmacodynamics, meaning it doesn't stay very long in the bloodstream, which doesn't make it suitable as a REAL TREATMENT like prescribed AD, that mean you would have a spike of an effect and a fast come-down. That's bad. Of course it works in a controlled environment, but it's not an everyday treatment, that leads to point 5. 4. So as always, this shows a road for synthetic "copies" of that substance that would imitate the active effect, but psilo cannot compete with classic AD. This is still good, but to me, it's not worthy news about AD, I would still hold my breath. 5. I am bothered because those headlines can be read by people with depression who might seek psilo as a medicine if AD aren't enough. People with depression are already quite vulnerable, and there are many stories of people having permanent side effects.
      - manuelmoreale 2y ago
        All fair points. You didn’t answer the only question I posed you though.
        jokoon 2y ago
        If they are approved by the FDA and prescribed by a doctor, yes. Because it's normal for me that I trust institutions who have their reputation and exist for the good of the public, not because I can just find a few vocal experts who disagree. Again, like I said: pharmacodynamics. It's unlikely there is going to be a pill of psilo, it would rather be an alternate, similar, synthetic molecule that last longer in the bloodstream. Microdosing would not work, or would require to be taken every 6 hours. I would gladly have one of those "session" where you take psilo while being supervised, if a doctor (or 3, since one doctor can be biased) can recommend it to me as being relevant. I am not even legitimate to diagnose what sort of depression I would have, so right away, I trust doctors, because that's how medicine works.
  - Gormo 2y ago
    Doctors are service providers with lots of expertise on the empirical/technical side of the question, and no relevant expertise whatsoever on the normative side of the question. Doctors are a great resource to consult if you want to understand the expected probability distribution of any particular course of treatment [1], but whether that treatment is worth the costs/risks is a value judgment, subjective to each individual, for which the technical expert's opinion has no special weight. Doctors -- and regulatory agencies -- are doing their jobs when they do their best to provide enough information for patients to make an informed decision. They are doing something profoundly immoral and unconscionable when they attempt to usurp their patients' decision-making agency by confusing their technical expertise with normative authority. ---- [1]: And it's worth noting that expertise consists entirely of having valid knowledge of the relevant science. Properly understood, they are aggregators of scientific data, not sources of validity or authority in their own right. Any attempt to substitute their own opinions or value judgements for valid science is a breach of fiduciary duty. And if there are valid, replicable studies that are relevant to a patient's decision, but which they are unfamiliar with, then their expertise is incomplete, and their conclusions are insufficient to rely on.
    - jokoon 2y ago
      1. The article doesn't say the sample are diagnosed with depression, that rings an alarm, that should be an important parameter. 2. The article says SEVERAL times that the results should be taken with caution and a grain of salt, for several reasons explained. 3. psilo, AS IS, doesn't have good pharmacodynamics, meaning it doesn't stay very long in the bloodstream, which doesn't make it suitable as a REAL TREATMENT like prescribed AD, that mean you would have a spike of an effect and a fast come-down. That's bad. Of course it works in a controlled environment, but it's not an everyday treatment, that leads to point 5. 4. So as always, this shows a road for synthetic "copies" of that substance that would imitate the active effect, but psilo cannot compete with classic AD. This is still good, but to me, it's not worthy news about AD, I would still hold my breath. 5. I am bothered because those headlines can be read by people with depression who might seek psilo as a medicine if AD aren't enough. People with depression are already quite vulnerable, and there are many stories of people having permanent side effects.
  - lambdas 2y ago
    Well, at risk of causing you ire, I won’t regale anecdotally how that one course of mushrooms was somehow better than 15 years of boner weakening, orgasm preventing, suicide ideating, hunger spiking, ever rotating slurry of anti-depressants. Just can’t put my finger on why they didn’t make me feel better, you know.
    - jokoon 2y ago
      Personal anecdote are not science
Gormo 2y ago
This is a scientific study. Whether a particular chemical alleviates the experience of depression symptoms is an empirical question, and if the evidence indicates that it does, then this is relevant and useful information. I'm not sure this is right audience for promoting the medieval mentality of deference to political/ideological authority as being more important than dissemination of valid scientific data.
SkyPuncher 2y ago
If this study is a problem then the entire medicine industry should cease to exist.

Here we go again, promoting unregulated substances for medical purposes.

by jokoon 2y ago

Here we go again, promoting unregulated substances for medical purposes.

amanaplanacanal 2y ago

It’s illegal almost everywhere. How much more regulation would you like?

jokoon 2y ago
I don't care about the regulation, I want people to stop saying psychedelics are better than antidepressants. I want people to listen to their doctors and stop having wishful ideas that ruins people's brains.
- mbeddedartistry 2y ago
  I’m confused. Are you saying that the studies being done and showing positive results should just be ignored? Why are these studies viewed as wishful thinking?
  - jokoon 2y ago
    1. The article doesn't say the sample are diagnosed with depression, that rings an alarm, that should be an important parameter. 2. The article says SEVERAL times that the results should be taken with caution and a grain of salt, for several reasons explained. 3. psilo, AS IS, doesn't have good pharmacodynamics, meaning it doesn't stay very long in the bloodstream, which doesn't make it suitable as a REAL TREATMENT like prescribed AD, that mean you would have a spike of an effect and a fast come-down. That's bad. Of course it works in a controlled environment, but it's not an everyday treatment, that leads to point 5. 4. So as always, this shows a road for synthetic "copies" of that substance that would imitate the active effect, but psilo cannot compete with classic AD. This is still good, but to me, it's not worthy news about AD, I would still hold my breath. 5. I am bothered because those headlines can be read by people with depression who might seek psilo as a medicine if AD aren't enough. People with depression are already quite vulnerable, and there are many stories of people having permanent side effects.
- tharne 2y ago
  Relative to the amount of money and research that has gone into antidepressants over the last four decades, they have performed very very poorly with respect to their intended goal. They are not highly effective for most people, and even when they do help people, there are a large number of unpleasant side effects, including sexual problems, weight gain, and fatigue, just to name a few (also, feeling fat, tired, and impotent is a great way to continue being depressed). Many commonly-used antidepressants also cause mild to severe withdrawal systems when people go to stop or change medications. So the reason we have people exploring psychedelics is not wishful thinking, but a reflection of the fact that we don't have effective treatments for depression that help most people, which most doctors will freely admit off the record.
- manuelmoreale 2y ago
  If it turns out in 10 or 15 years that psychedelics are in fact a better anti depressant than current drugs, and you were to—hope not—suffer from depression yourself, would you take them?
  - jokoon 2y ago
    1. The article doesn't say the sample are diagnosed with depression, that rings an alarm, that should be an important parameter. 2. The article says SEVERAL times that the results should be taken with caution and a grain of salt, for several reasons explained. 3. psilo, AS IS, doesn't have good pharmacodynamics, meaning it doesn't stay very long in the bloodstream, which doesn't make it suitable as a REAL TREATMENT like prescribed AD, that mean you would have a spike of an effect and a fast come-down. That's bad. Of course it works in a controlled environment, but it's not an everyday treatment, that leads to point 5. 4. So as always, this shows a road for synthetic "copies" of that substance that would imitate the active effect, but psilo cannot compete with classic AD. This is still good, but to me, it's not worthy news about AD, I would still hold my breath. 5. I am bothered because those headlines can be read by people with depression who might seek psilo as a medicine if AD aren't enough. People with depression are already quite vulnerable, and there are many stories of people having permanent side effects.
    - manuelmoreale 2y ago
      All fair points. You didn’t answer the only question I posed you though.
      - jokoon 2y ago
        If they are approved by the FDA and prescribed by a doctor, yes. Because it's normal for me that I trust institutions who have their reputation and exist for the good of the public, not because I can just find a few vocal experts who disagree. Again, like I said: pharmacodynamics. It's unlikely there is going to be a pill of psilo, it would rather be an alternate, similar, synthetic molecule that last longer in the bloodstream. Microdosing would not work, or would require to be taken every 6 hours. I would gladly have one of those "session" where you take psilo while being supervised, if a doctor (or 3, since one doctor can be biased) can recommend it to me as being relevant. I am not even legitimate to diagnose what sort of depression I would have, so right away, I trust doctors, because that's how medicine works.
- Gormo 2y ago
  Doctors are service providers with lots of expertise on the empirical/technical side of the question, and no relevant expertise whatsoever on the normative side of the question. Doctors are a great resource to consult if you want to understand the expected probability distribution of any particular course of treatment [1], but whether that treatment is worth the costs/risks is a value judgment, subjective to each individual, for which the technical expert's opinion has no special weight. Doctors -- and regulatory agencies -- are doing their jobs when they do their best to provide enough information for patients to make an informed decision. They are doing something profoundly immoral and unconscionable when they attempt to usurp their patients' decision-making agency by confusing their technical expertise with normative authority. ---- [1]: And it's worth noting that expertise consists entirely of having valid knowledge of the relevant science. Properly understood, they are aggregators of scientific data, not sources of validity or authority in their own right. Any attempt to substitute their own opinions or value judgements for valid science is a breach of fiduciary duty. And if there are valid, replicable studies that are relevant to a patient's decision, but which they are unfamiliar with, then their expertise is incomplete, and their conclusions are insufficient to rely on.
  - jokoon 2y ago
    1. The article doesn't say the sample are diagnosed with depression, that rings an alarm, that should be an important parameter. 2. The article says SEVERAL times that the results should be taken with caution and a grain of salt, for several reasons explained. 3. psilo, AS IS, doesn't have good pharmacodynamics, meaning it doesn't stay very long in the bloodstream, which doesn't make it suitable as a REAL TREATMENT like prescribed AD, that mean you would have a spike of an effect and a fast come-down. That's bad. Of course it works in a controlled environment, but it's not an everyday treatment, that leads to point 5. 4. So as always, this shows a road for synthetic "copies" of that substance that would imitate the active effect, but psilo cannot compete with classic AD. This is still good, but to me, it's not worthy news about AD, I would still hold my breath. 5. I am bothered because those headlines can be read by people with depression who might seek psilo as a medicine if AD aren't enough. People with depression are already quite vulnerable, and there are many stories of people having permanent side effects.
- lambdas 2y ago
  Well, at risk of causing you ire, I won’t regale anecdotally how that one course of mushrooms was somehow better than 15 years of boner weakening, orgasm preventing, suicide ideating, hunger spiking, ever rotating slurry of anti-depressants. Just can’t put my finger on why they didn’t make me feel better, you know.
  - jokoon 2y ago
    Personal anecdote are not science

Gormo 2y ago

This is a scientific study. Whether a particular chemical alleviates the experience of depression symptoms is an empirical question, and if the evidence indicates that it does, then this is relevant and useful information. I'm not sure this is right audience for promoting the medieval mentality of deference to political/ideological authority as being more important than dissemination of valid scientific data.

SkyPuncher 2y ago

If this study is a problem then the entire medicine industry should cease to exist.