Silk Road forums
Discussion => Philosophy, Economics and Justice => Topic started by: fiendish on August 19, 2013, 10:32 am
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10 Famous Geniuses and their Drugs of Choice:
1. Sigmund Freud — Cocaine
2. Francis Crick — LSD
3. Thomas Edison — Cocaine Elixirs
4. Paul Erdös — Amphetamines
5. Steve Jobs — LSD
6. Bill Gates — LSD
7. John C. Lilly — LSD, Ketamine
8. Richard Feynman — LSD, Marijuana, Ketamine
9. Kary Mullis — LSD
10. Carl Sagan — Marijuana
For those interested here is the ***CLEARNET**link:
http://www.salon.com/2013/08/16/10_famous_geniuses_who_used_drugs_and_were_better_off_for_it_partner/
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very true, It seems LSD is up there in the top ranks :D
Richard Feynman's experiences with LSD are very interesting to read about, If you read the book, Surely your joking mr feynman, goes into some detail on his trips and I loved reading every minute of that book. Actually the whole book itself is fascinating, I might just get it out and have a read of it I think.
thanks for reminding me ;)
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I find it interesting that this list completely ignored heroin users.
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I find it interesting that this list completely ignored heroin users.
Name to cover the injustice.
Number 9 is the man, any of you ever read Dancing Naked in the Mind Field? here is chapter 11, their isn't really an order to them. I also couldn't find more of the book. http://globalwebpost.com/farooqm/study_res/mullis/method.html
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- Adolf Hitler - Mescaline
- Friedrich Nietzsche -- I don't know if it influenced his writings, but he was addicted to hashish, opium, potassium bromide, chloral hydrate, and a mysterious "Javanese" preparation
- Philip K. Dick - marijuana, mescaline, LSD, amphetamine, and PCP
- Roald Dahl - LSD
- Aldous Huxley - LSD, mescaline
- Ken Kesey - LSD
- J. D. Salinger - LSD
- Ernst Jünger - LSD, hashish
- William James - mescaline and nitrous oxide
- Helena Blavatsky - hashish and opium
- Havelock Ellis - mescaline
- Richard Burton -- hashish
- Lord Byron -- opium (in the form laudanum)
- Coleridge -- opium and nitrous oxide (like de Quincey, he later regretted his opium addiction, but he continued to regard nitrous oxide as "the most unmingled pleasure"). His ''Kubla Khan'' was inspired by an opium-induced dream
- Percy Shelley -- opium; said that it freed his mind and influenced his poetical images
- Keats -- opium
- de Quincey -- opium
- George Crabbe -- opium
- Théophile Gautier -- hashish
- Bayard Taylor -- hashish
- Baudelaire -- opium, hashish
- Lord Buckley (genius comedian) - hashish
- Stanislav Grof - LSD
- Alan Watts -- LSD
- Edgar Allan Poe -- opium
- Rossetti -- opium
- Robert Louis Stevenson - opium, cocaine
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- Adolf Hitler - Mescaline
- Friedrich Nietzsche -- I don't know if it influenced his writings, but he was addicted to hashish, opium, potassium bromide, chloral hydrate, and a mysterious "Javanese" preparation
- Philip K. Dick - marijuana, mescaline, LSD, amphetamine, and PCP
- Roald Dahl - LSD
- Aldous Huxley - LSD, mescaline
- Ken Kesey - LSD
- J. D. Salinger - LSD
- Ernst Jünger - LSD, hashish
- William James - mescaline and nitrous oxide
- Helena Blavatsky - hashish and opium
- Havelock Ellis - mescaline
- Richard Burton -- hashish
- Lord Byron -- opium (in the form laudanum)
- Coleridge -- opium and nitrous oxide (like de Quincey, he later regretted his opium addiction, but he continued to regard nitrous oxide as "the most unmingled pleasure"). His ''Kubla Khan'' was inspired by an opium-induced dream
- Percy Shelley -- opium; said that it freed his mind and influenced his poetical images
- Keats -- opium
- de Quincey -- opium
- George Crabbe -- opium
- Théophile Gautier -- hashish
- Bayard Taylor -- hashish
- Baudelaire -- opium, hashish
- Lord Buckley (genius comedian) - hashish
- Stanislav Grof - LSD
- Alan Watts -- LSD
- Edgar Allan Poe -- opium
- Rossetti -- opium
- Robert Louis Stevenson - opium, cocaine
This is more the list I was thinking.
Ginsberg belongs there somewhere I'd say.
I would also suggest Syd Barret, Lou Reed, and a few other musicians.
Sherlock Holmes, though fictional, basically considered any alternative view on a situation helpful... which included many, many of the things from his time. Oddly enough, Arthur Conan Doyle it seems - at least, as far as information on him is concerned, doesn't appear to have participated.
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Philip K Dick also used heroin. A lot of heroin.
Really, Hitler used mescaline? Hard to believe, where did you find that? I want to read!
:)
All I can find is religious nut rags on google talking about it, and a couple of 3rd Reich conspiracy theory sites that talk about Al Crowley and some other guy making it part of thule society rites, and then they say Hitler probably participated.
Any historic articles anyone?
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Philip K Dick also used heroin. A lot of heroin.
Really, Hitler used mescaline? Hard to believe, where did you find that? I want to read!
:)
All I can find is religious nut rags on google talking about it, and a couple of 3rd Reich conspiracy theory sites that talk about Al Crowley and some other guy making it part of thule society rites, and then they say Hitler probably participated.
Any historic articles anyone?
Philip K Dick was definitely one of those participants. You can see a lot of the heroin imagery in Electric Sheep - the dream machines. At least, that is what they represented to me.
Re: Hitler
It's not the first time I've heard of something like it mentioned. During that time though, a lot of drug use was little recorded, as it wasn't "drug use" by modern definitions. That's why its frequently seen in wartime movies that people do cocaine - they did, openly.
Famous users of such substances like mescaline and LSD are usually pretty well identified. The earliest public figure I can really see is that guy from the BBC show that got buried. Mayhew I think? He was some english bigwig. The BBC had to hide it.
That being said, mescaline and LSD are new on the relative timescales. LSD was only discovered shortly before the invasion of poland. Mescaline was only 20 years before that. I suppose its possible that mescaline was, like heroin and cocaine, made into wonder drugs and sold openly on the market before it became the ire as well. Though that wouldn't make sense, its not nearly as easy or plentiful as the latter two.
Hitler was an artist though - I would probably believe it better if he experimented with it before the third reich era, in the twenties perhaps, when he was younger and it was first discovered.
Again, no records that I know of exist on it though.
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Hitler was very into meth. Never heard of him doing mescaline before. Interesting stuff.
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I would also suggest Syd Barret, Lou Reed, and a few other musicians.
No, don't list any more musicians (at least of that time). The list would be far far far too long! Almost all the people doing great music in those times did drugs as well. It would be more interesting to know which ones of the musicians who created music that we still listen to did NOT do any drugs? Ian Anderson I think? And maybe Robert Fripp? And Sun Ra, I heard he was very anti-drug person. Well, he was from Saturn, so maybe that explains it :D.
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William Burroughs was a hardcore heroin addict.
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A few things id like to point out, on the second list it says "was addicted to hashish" which is not possible. Was a user, yes, but addict nope.
As for Hitler and his drug use, its documented he used mescaline in his artist days yes. during the final era of his life, end of WWII, it was reported by his doctor that he was using Perpantine (speed) in the morning and Barbituates and opiates at night...may be a partial explanation to his increasingly psychotic and aggressive behavior. that and him being a total nutter anyway!
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I would also suggest Syd Barret, Lou Reed, and a few other musicians.
No, don't list any more musicians (at least of that time). The list would be far far far too long! Almost all the people doing great music in those times did drugs as well. It would be more interesting to know which ones of the musicians who created music that we still listen to did NOT do any drugs? Ian Anderson I think? And maybe Robert Fripp? And Sun Ra, I heard he was very anti-drug person. Well, he was from Saturn, so maybe that explains it :D.
While I might accept that for Lou Reed, Barret as a musician was probably his least longest position. He's an amazing artist. One of my dreams is to one day own an original piece of Barret's artwork. He get's a bad rap... for how quickly and intently he disconnected from what he was with Floyd and his other bands. In reading about him I've occasionally thought if he'd been a part of a different generation, had he ever become a musician. I have somewhat come to the conclusion that he would have more likely ended up as a poet a few decades earlier... and an artist a decade or two later.
A few things id like to point out, on the second list it says "was addicted to hashish" which is not possible. Was a user, yes, but addict nope.
Just because it doesn't alter any receptors and cause a chemical addiction does not make it any less habitual. There are plenty of posts, including a thread entirely about addiction, with people who have noted this. You can argue semantics all you want, but non-functional without a high is pretty much a basic sign.
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what's the source of Hitler doing mescaline ? It seems unlikely he used any psychedelics at all, seeing what he did to human beings. He did meth for sure. Also, I'm not sure he was a Genius. Just a guy with an awesome presence, a talent for persuasion and public speaking, and most of all, a handful of excellent counselors.
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Let's not forget that alcohol is also a drug; many famous (and some infamous, like Joseph McCarthy just off the top of my head) historical figures were addicted to alcohol or abused it. It would be impossible to make a list of all the famous geniuses that were alcoholics!
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Very interesting thread, thanks!
No wonder LSD seems to have a good impact.
I would guess that 80%+ of the musicians have done some drug in the past. Especially cannabis, and for good reason because cannabis alters the way of music being interpreted by you. There was a very good lecture about this topic at the cultiva 2011. I forgot the name of the prof. :(
It's very scientific so maybe it's not for everyone, also it is in German. ;)
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Someone mentioned how practically every musician has taken drugs, but I reckon a fairly large percentage (larger than general public) of scientists will have tried some kind of drug (probably LSD/shrooms/peyote/marijuana/speed/coke/MDMA). In fact, a resent study showed that people who had tried drugs were more intelligent on average than people who had not (though, obviously would still be represented by the usual bell-curve distribution). I heard recently on this TYT segment:
CLEARNET
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOdrj3EdzAA
But according to another couple of articles I've found, this info seems to have been around for a while, as these are from 2011 & 2010:
CLEARNET
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-scientific-fundamentalist/201010/why-intelligent-people-use-more-drugs
http://www.nhs.uk/news/2011/11November/Pages/intelligent-children-illegal-drug-use.aspx
So it would make sense that academics of all kinds, inc. scientists, are more likely to have used drugs. Probably they're just cleaver enough to know they should keep it to themselves less face professional disgrace, unless you've already made a name for yourself (like Feynman).
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[...] In fact, a resent study showed that people who had tried drugs were more intelligent on average than people who had not [...]
Until they did too much of them. ;D
People how are willing to try drugs are often more open and they can and want to make their own opinion instead of being taught that everything is bad. That can be interpreted as a form of intelligence I would say. Building their own opinion, questioning the information that they got and then deciding for themselves.
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A few things id like to point out, on the second list it says "was addicted to hashish" which is not possible. Was a user, yes, but addict nope.
As for Hitler and his drug use, its documented he used mescaline in his artist days yes. during the final era of his life, end of WWII, it was reported by his doctor that he was using Perpantine (speed) in the morning and Barbituates and opiates at night...may be a partial explanation to his increasingly psychotic and aggressive behavior. that and him being a total nutter anyway!
More than that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodor_Morell
This fragmentary list of representative ingredients would have seemed somewhat less shocking during the 1940s: amphetamines, Atropa belladonna, Atropine, caffeine, chamolile, cocaine via eyedrops, E. Coli, enzymes, Eukodol (a trade name for Oxycodone), Glyconorm, Mutaflor, methamphetamine, morphine, strychnine, Oxedrine Tartrate, potassium bromide, Prophenazone, proteins, and lipids derived from animal tissues and fats, sodium barbitone, sulfonamide, testosterone, and vitamins.
Cocaine eyedrops, how cool is that?
One should also note that even this insane list of drugs didn't kill him in the end. ;-)
I'd also like to note that Thomas Edison (from topicstart) was not a genius, he was a douchebag as proven conclusively by this page: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla
More importantly it talks about Nikola Tesla, who was a true genius. I can't find anything about Tesla doing drugs, but since at the end of his life he fell in love with an imaginary laser pigeon, perhaps he didn't need any.
In the scope of this thread it's perhaps also interesting to note that many doctors and scientists use prescription drugs like methylphenidate and modafinil. Without any condition, obviously.
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"amphetamines, Atropa belladonna, Atropine, caffeine, chamolile, cocaine via eyedrops, E. Coli, enzymes, Eukodol (a trade name for Oxycodone), Glyconorm, Mutaflor, methamphetamine, morphine, strychnine, Oxedrine Tartrate, potassium bromide, Prophenazone, proteins, and lipids derived from animal tissues and fats, sodium barbitone, sulfonamide, testosterone, and vitamins"
Awesome. What can I say, it's good to be the king.
Not to be Hitler though - he was a fuckhead.
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Edison was a fuck, indeed