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10 famous geniuses and their drugs of choice
http://www.salon.com/2013/08/16/10_famous_geniuses_who_used_drugs_and_were_better_off_for_it_partner/
1. Sigmund Freud — Cocaine
To Freud, cocaine was more than a personal indulgence; he regarded it as a veritable wonder drug, and for many years was a huge proponent of its use in a wide array of applications. In a letter written to his fianceé, Martha, Freud wrote: “If all goes well, I will write an essay [on cocaine] and I expect it will win its place in therapeutics by the side of morphine and superior to it … I take very small doses of it regularly against depression and against indigestion and with the most brilliant of success.”
***SNIP
2. Francis Crick — LSD
Francis Crick — of the DNA-structure discovering Watson, Crick and Franklin — reportedly told numerous friends and colleagues about his LSD experimentation during the time he spent working to determine the molecular structure that houses all life’s information.
***SNIP
3. Thomas Edison — Cocaine Elixirs
In 1863, French chemist Angelo Mariani invented “Vin Mariani,” a Bordeaux wine treated with coca leaves, the active ingredient of which is none other than cocaine. The ethanol content in the Bordeaux could extract cocaine from the coca leaves in concentrations exceeding 7 mg per fluid ounce of wine. Thomas Edison — the prolific American inventor and notorious insomniac (though perhaps not surprisingly) — was one of many people of the period known to regularly consume the cocaine-laced elixir.
4. Paul Erdös — Amphetamines
Paul Erdös — well known for his hyperactivity; his habit of working 19-hour days, even well into his old age; and his tendency to show up on his colleagues’ doorsteps demanding they ”open their minds” to mathematical dialogue — was one of the most prolific mathematicians who ever lived, publishing more peer-reviewed papers than any other mathematician in history.
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LuvNewcastle
(16,847 posts)Doing LSD and some other hallucinogens is like a spiritual experience to me. I think it's a wonderful drug as long as you're in a safe place when you do it.
Cocaine has never done a lot for me. The longing for more of it is stronger than the actual high. An old friend of mine used to say that, "Cocaine is God's way of telling you that you have too much money."
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)nt
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)Not many people are prepared to experience the reality of the Universe in its entirety over the course of an hour or two. Nothing will ever be as simple once one has had that total expansion of comprehension, and over such a brief span of time.
Coming down again is often intensely confusing and problematic, disorienting to say the least.
LuvNewcastle
(16,847 posts)I always feel like I'm accessing knowledge that was previously hidden, and in some way, I think I do. Yeah, the coming down can be hard. I usually drink beer during that phase; it seems to kind of even things out for me and makes the transition back to my usual reality a lot easier.
randome
(34,845 posts)[hr][font color="blue"][center]No squirrels were harmed in the making of this post. Yet.[/center][/font][hr]
LuvNewcastle
(16,847 posts)which is the Divine. That kind of talk isn't for the reality-based community.
Le Taz Hot
(22,271 posts)Best answer evah! 
RKP5637
(67,111 posts)another_liberal
(8,821 posts)I'm afraid you would not understand.
Though, let me be perfectly clear about one thing: I would never suggest someone try LSD if they have not done so. It is not a recreational drug, not at all.
randome
(34,845 posts)But apparently no one can tell me what they 'learned' from their drug experience. I've learned -without drugs- that we are all related to one another and that society is a gestalt to which each individual forms a part just as individual drops of water form an ocean.
If anyone can add to that outlook, I'm listening.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]“If you're not committed to anything, you're just taking up space.”
Gregory Peck, Mirage (1965)[/center][/font][hr]
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)When it comes accessing the "God Head," or awareness of the universe and true nature of one's existence, meditation under the guidance of a trusted "Master" is probably the better way to go. It takes much longer, but you get there with control and under your own power.
Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)or more accurately, I forgave. I also learned that guitar string vibrations have colors. COLORS!
also, that grass moves, and I don't mean with the wind.
Definitely one of the best experiences of my life.
randome
(34,845 posts)Although, I'll grant you that our senses are imperfectly attuned to understand the Universe. And synthesia or a 'trip' in a sensory deprivation chamber can definitely lead to insights we might not ordinarily have.
But there is just as much to see and learn, IMO, without taking risks of damaging one's mind or, worse, becoming addicted to something.
I'm really not trying to discount your experience. I simply feel some caution is always wise because too often the idea is that if we legalize all drugs, society would magically be transformed into something approaching Paradise.
Is moving from one reality to another because we found the first one too difficult to deal with?
[hr][font color="blue"][center]A 90% chance of rain means the same as a 10% chance:
It might rain and it might not.[/center][/font][hr]
Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)I, personally, won't get synesthesia any other way. I didn't take a risk of damaging my mind (that's just silly and you know it). And no one gets addicted to LSD.
I've taken Adderall by prescription, and took it less than prescribed because I know it is a methamphetamine and therefore can become addicted. And frankly, my worry was that because I loved it so much, I might be at risk. Then again, it was easy for me not to do it - so I think that says something about the nature of me? drugs? Adderall had a wonderful positive, creative, energizing effect on me, but it did not fix my ADD/mental organization problems (though maybe helped a little?). I think it would be a wonderful drug against depression for me. I also think I'd be more productive if I did it regularly.
randome
(34,845 posts)Thanks for the reply.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Aspire to inspire.[/center][/font][hr]
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)Yes, I do remember that.
Mojo Electro
(362 posts)It's the fact that human language fails at that point. There are no reference points that you could relate to somebody who has never been there. The psychedelic experience is something that can truly only be understood by firsthand experience. Human language lacks the ability to convey such things. There really are no roadsigns or waypoints you can use to give directions.
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)And the experience is a source of profound "hidden" knowledge, though not always exclusively good news.
bemildred
(90,061 posts)There is magic we understand and can explain and predict things about: science.
And everything else that we can't.
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)I accept it as a word which defies a common definition of any real meaning or usefulness. Its essence is more in the realm of the poetic than in that of the concrete.
bemildred
(90,061 posts)But in modern terms you are right, it's mainly a pejorative, somewhat equivalent to unscientific or irrational.
yardwork
(61,650 posts)Bad headache, felt hyperactive, mildly paranoid, no revelations whatsoever.
LuvNewcastle
(16,847 posts)people I know very well who like to trip and make their own. Good acid is hard to find these days, from what I've seen, ecstasy too. You have to be careful where you get it.
yardwork
(61,650 posts)another_liberal
(8,821 posts)If it was LSD at all.
RobinA
(9,894 posts)was less than magical also. Among other weird and banal changes in perception my hand seemed like it belonged to someone else. Not much godhead stuff, although I think it is a valuable experience. You'll never take sanity for granted again.
Bonobo
(29,257 posts)LSD is more like a train compared to it.
another_liberal
(8,821 posts)Having never been there myself.
hobbit709
(41,694 posts)And I still want to know who was the first person that ate enough peyote and kept it down long enough to get off.
As soon as the taste hits your tongue your stomach says "Don't you dare put that shit down here"
Bonobo
(29,257 posts)As for DMT, maybe 45 minutes tops, but it's really just 5 minutes for the crazy shit. After that, you're rapidly descending.
Eleanors38
(18,318 posts)I can't say it gave meaningful insights into the human condition, or provide a backdoor to the mind, but it did make a night time drive through Austin as colorful as drifting through a cheap kaleidoscope.
Ah, yes Eeyore's Birthday is approaching, one of the remaining old school acid drops in the U.S.
Helen Borg
(3,963 posts)These drugs were the reason why these men (righto) were geniuses. Of course, had they not taken these drugs, perhaps they would have been even more brilliant and productive. We just do not know.
bemildred
(90,061 posts)Erdös is my favorite, one of the, if not THE, most productive mathematicians in history, used amphetimines to stay alert and keep cranking it out to the day he died (well, almost). Travelled all over the world, stayed in other peoples houses, on other peoples dime, classic nerd.
Maybe all drugs are not necessarily bad for all people?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Erd%C5%91s
randome
(34,845 posts)There is never any way to know if drugs enhanced an individual's life or detracted from it. But in general, drug use of the kind listed is, for the the vast majority of people, a detriment, not an enhancement.
The same can be said for wearing bicycle helmets or seat belts. Society looks at the common denominator and sets its laws accordingly.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]No squirrels were harmed in the making of this post. Yet.[/center][/font][hr]
bemildred
(90,061 posts)Doesn't the government have a lot of other problems? Overcrowded prisons, poverty, education, health care, and so on, that are crying for attention, unlike these poor benighted addicts? I mean it's easy and fun to dump on people, but does it really make your life better? And I would wager addressing those issues would make the drug problem go away too.
randome
(34,845 posts)And making rehab the 'penalty' for using drugs. But making those drugs legal? No way. We don't need a ten-fold increase in the number of dangerous addicts on the streets.
And the idea that they would all voluntarily go to a rehab center is naive.
But putting people in prison for drug use? For pushing drugs, yes, but for using? No.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Sometimes it seems like the only purpose in life is to keep your car from touching another's.[/center][/font][hr]
TheKentuckian
(25,026 posts)interferes with your rights, you should utilize them to contain and remove those who break the peace.
Unless your name for a dispensary is "The Treatment Center" (which is a little school on Saturday, there are people with real problems) then you are just slightly less on the wrong side of history as your full on lock them away siblings. Kinda like the set that thought the gays needed therapy rather than an ass kicking and the inside of prison.
Just as wrong but now with 33% less cruelty!
randome
(34,845 posts)Someone gets injured or killed. Or someone slides ever more into willful addiction. Sorry, I think it's too easy to say we'll take care of those problems when they occur. The price of that 'wait and see' attitude will 'only' be a relatively few dead bodies and ruined lives.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]"There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in."
Leonard Cohen, Anthem (1992)[/center][/font][hr]
Schema Thing
(10,283 posts)
Mariana
(14,858 posts)Dead bodies and ruined lives - lots of them.
randome
(34,845 posts)Although, like Frank Zappa, I've told them that they may want to experiment with either drugs or alcohol when they're young and that won't be such a bad thing if they approach it with their eyes and mind open.
But if drugs were legalized, we would have people pushing drugs to those who aren't mature enough or knowledgeable enough to know what they are getting into. The result, I have no doubt, would be more ruined lives than we have now.
Decriminalize, yes. But legalize? I'm against that.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Aspire to inspire.[/center][/font][hr]
Mariana
(14,858 posts)the biggest drug markets were the high schools, public and private alike. My teen daughter assures me that illegal drugs and users of them are plentiful in both of the high schools she has attended. It seems like the thing you're worried about is already happening.
randome
(34,845 posts)There is nothing my daughters and I cannot discuss and they know that. None of us has the slightest idea how we would go about obtaining illegal drugs because of the kind of people we know and hang out with. And we're agreed, even if we felt safe in asking someone, there would be no guarantee that we'd end up with a useful or non-dangerous product.
Keeping hard drugs illegal make it less likely that the majority will 'find' them. Keeping them illegal means many will think about the consequences. Deterrence works to a certain extent. Obviously not completely or equitably (re: Phillip Hoffman, Mitch Hedberg, etc.). But it works.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Aspire to inspire.[/center][/font][hr]
Mariana
(14,858 posts)A lot of the deaths that have happened wouldn't have if the drugs were available in standard dosages and weren't cut with poisons or combined with other powerful drugs. There would still be some, of course. Hundreds of people die every year from Tylenol overdose, after all. There will always be some who go too far.
I understand what you're saying, though.
TheKentuckian
(25,026 posts)basic civil liberties into a joke.
You have created a militarized police force, you have turned the drug cartel's into rulers, exacerbated gangs by orders of magnitudes creating more death, violence, and deteriorating poverty.
The cure does far more harm than the disease and pointing to the harm of the disease plus the cure is woefully ineffective to the point that it is probably safer to say that that the "problems" are now worse than they would be without intervention. The "treatment" doesn't even half ass work except to justify greater and greater law enforcement budgets and an explosion of corporate run private prisons.
The War on Drugs is a fraudulent scam that has introduced far greater entropy than what it was supposed to fix.
Time to admit failure, swallow foolish pride, quit endangering democracy, and move along to harm reduction before misguided fear mongering does further harm.
randome
(34,845 posts)[hr][font color="blue"][center]You have to play the game to find out why you're playing the game. -Existenz[/center][/font][hr]
hobbit709
(41,694 posts)People have used mind altering substances for thousands of years.
randome
(34,845 posts)But this article is nothing but advocating drug use with no way to know if drugs enhanced these people's lives or detracted from them. See my list below of famous people whose lives were ruined by drugs. It's a much more extensive list than that in the OP.
As I've also stated, I don't have much to refute LSD or marijuana. But I will always mock the belief that sticking a weed between your lips and setting it on fire is somehow 'natural'.
I don't see myself as 'better' than anyone else but I would refute the use of drugs with the idea that you can get 'high' by watching a sunset or taking a long walk on a new Spring day.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Treat your body like a machine. Your mind like a castle.[/center][/font][hr]
hobbit709
(41,694 posts)Reformed sinners and the ones that are afraid they might actually have a good time by sinning.
randome
(34,845 posts)Unpleasant truths?
[hr][font color="blue"][center]A ton of bricks, a ton of feathers, it's still gonna hurt.[/center][/font][hr]
yardwork
(61,650 posts)The idea that heavy drinking is required to be a great writer, for instance, has caused a lot of tragedy and shortened lives. My father was one of the victims of that particular myth. It is perilous.
bemildred
(90,061 posts)Mariana
(14,858 posts)if they had all been locked up for their drug use?
RainDog
(28,784 posts)directly credited LSD with allowing him to think in dimensional space and visualize the structure of DNA.
The point of any such experience is the setting, the mind set of the user and the intent for use. If you're not a trained PhD level biologist, you are not going to get the same thing out of the experience that Crick did - because of the time he had spent already working on that problem.
It is just ridiculous to pretend that what Crick did in any way harmed his intelligence.
Do you know anything about drugs from personal experience, or is all your "knowledge" gained from those who have an interest in arresting and imprisoning people for a victimless crime?
Helen Borg
(3,963 posts)about why he had those ideas. Nobody has a clue about how ideas form. It is more likely that those ideas were due to interactions he had with Rosalind Elsie Franklin, than to any drugs he took!
RainDog
(28,784 posts)than what you think about his experience.
Yet you are here denying his own understanding of his life and mental processes.
It is not more likely the VISUALIZATION came from Franklin.
Obviously you are so close-minded you cannot accept this brilliant scientist's statement about his experience because you know so much more than he does - except it is obvious that you do not.
You sound like a creationist who has been indoctrinated - only in your case, it's you telling Crick you know more about his life than he does.
smgdh.
7962
(11,841 posts)Did the drugs make them kill?
bemildred
(90,061 posts)Those are the ones I worry about.
paleotn
(17,931 posts)...but I wouldn't include Jobs and Gates on the same list as Crick and Feynman. Looks like a list of super-geniuses, geniuses and a smattering of pseudo-geniuses.
bemildred
(90,061 posts)randome
(34,845 posts)[hr][font color="blue"][center]If you don't give yourself the same benefit of a doubt you'd give anyone else, you're cheating someone.[/center][/font][hr]
1000words
(7,051 posts)We all have our own way to live ... and die.
randome
(34,845 posts)He made choices that he later regretted. He didn't 'choose' his manner of death. He ignored reality. Not the behavior of a 'genius', IMO.
http://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2011nl/nov/jobs.htm
Unfortunately, he spent the remainder of his life believing he could have been cured if he had not delayed his surgery for nine months. “According to Steve Jobs’ biographer, Walter Isaacson, the Apple mastermind eventually came to regret the decision he had made years earlier to reject potentially life-saving surgery in favor of alternative treatments like acupuncture, dietary supplements and juices. His early resistance to surgery was apparently incomprehensible to his wife and close friends, who continually urged him to do it.” “We talked about this a lot,” says his biographer. “He wanted to talk about it, how he regretted it. … I think he felt he should have been operated on sooner.” This falsehood was repeated to the world shortly after Jobs death in a 60-minutes interview with Mr. Isaacson.
Admittedly, we all have our flaws. My point is that just because Jobs is listed as a 'genius' in the article doesn't mean he was any different from the rest of us. So his drug use is, IMO, irrelevant. Or even a refutation of drug use.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]There is nothing you can't do if you put your mind to it.
Nothing.[/center][/font][hr]
1000words
(7,051 posts)I'm sure when it comes time for you to stare into the abyss and face your own mortality, you'll be the picture of rationality and grace.
does not mean "all knowing." I knew a genius who couldn't operate his cable remote.
- Capitalism wouldn't work as well if you let people be happy and eliminate stress from their lives. They need people worried about losing their jobs. Their houses. Their cars. Their health.
Because when you have people in that state, you can get them to do anything. They'll believe anything. They'll even give away their rights, one by one if you ask them nicely and tell them how sorry you are that you have to do it.
And besides, they make so much money from their ''treatments'' -- and all those diseases such a lifestyle causes, they couldn't stop now if they wanted to.
[center]
[/center]
LuvNewcastle
(16,847 posts) mountain grammy
(26,625 posts)Le Taz Hot
(22,271 posts)I've ever read. And dead on. 
mucifer
(23,553 posts)Sir Arthur Conan Doyle stories.
stevenleser
(32,886 posts)bemildred
(90,061 posts)Edit: a link: http://www.librarything.com/topic/9454
Mariana
(14,858 posts)Watson heartily disapproved, but it wasn't illegal at the time the stories were written.
In the new BBC incarnation of Sherlock, they have him using nicotine patches as a stimulant, three at a time.
bemildred
(90,061 posts)I've tried them, I snorted meth once, scared the crap out of me, never went back. Caffeine is as far as I go in that direction. And I don't like any kind of sedatives. Edit: though to be fair I used to drink to get to sleep. Coffee in the morning to get you going, beer in the evening to get some sleep. Yeah, I know, it sucks.
Mariana
(14,858 posts)than they have on most people. Lots of energy, keeps me awake, don't want to be still, etc. Not really a good thing after having surgery, when you're supposed to be resting so you can heal!
I can't drink beer or wine, I developed an allergy and get hives if I have so much as a sip. 
bemildred
(90,061 posts)So I believe you. And for some it seems to be the door to nirvana or something. Hmmm ...
Sort of liked it, the Tramadol, but not enough to do it again. I keep a few around for colds, but I don't get too many colds since I retired and stopped drinking and smoking and all that.
Bluenorthwest
(45,319 posts)morphine upon occasion but is negative toward the smoking of opium.
stupidicus
(2,570 posts)and not letting the drugs do you -- another concept the non-user will never be able to understand like those with the experience.
malthaussen
(17,204 posts)Marijuana? That's not a drug, that's a sleep aid.
-- Mal
MisterP
(23,730 posts)LiberalEsto
(22,845 posts)LSD was wonderful for me. It opened my eyes to the holiness of everything, the sky, the clouds, the trees, the grass, people.
I stopped for good when my brother took some and totally flipped out while under the effects of it. He was okay afterward, but it was terrifying to witness.
bkanderson76
(266 posts)Interesting yes, but it is of no difference to me these 'Geniuses' may have been influenced by their dabbling in drugs. Maybe we could put a spin on this bit of information and just wonder that if these guys weren't using drugs, would they be the 'Geniuses' they are known as today?
PoliticalPothead
(220 posts)And, in my experience, completely accurate.
...
There is a very nice self-titering aspect to cannabis. Each puff is a very small dose; the time lag between inhaling a puff and sensing its effect is small; and there is no desire for more after the high is there. I think the ratio, R, of the time to sense the dose taken to the time required to take an excessive dose is an important quantity. R is very large for LSD (which I’ve never taken) and reasonably short for cannabis. Small values of R should be one measure of the safety of psychedelic drugs. When cannabis is legalized, I hope to see this ratio as one of he parameters printed on the pack. I hope that time isn’t too distant; the illegality of cannabis is outrageous, an impediment to full utilization of a drug which helps produce the serenity and insight, sensitivity and fellowship so desperately needed in this increasingly mad and dangerous world.
http://marijuana-uses.com/mr-x/
SalviaBlue
(2,917 posts)randome
(34,845 posts)[hr][font color="blue"][center]It made sense when we were children. Not so much now.
Talk to a stranger today. You might learn something. You might help someone.[/center][/font][hr]
retread
(3,762 posts)marijuana deaths.
randome
(34,845 posts)But the OP was about drugs in general and some that the 'geniuses' used are not such 'nice' drugs. I think the list I linked to is a pertinent counterpoint to the OP.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Birds are territorial creatures.
The lyrics to the songbird's melodious trill go something like this:
"Stay out of my territory or I'll PECK YOUR GODDAMNED EYES OUT!"[/center][/font][hr]
retread
(3,762 posts)Point me to the acceptance of "drugs in general".
I think this op is more of a "doors of perception".
And is certainly open to a ton of valid criticism on that basis alone.
RainDog
(28,784 posts)The experience of LSD in the brain is sometimes compared to a religious experience (and we know religious experience has a material basis in the brain - witnessed in people with bipolar disorder and epileptics.) Those with terminal illnesses have been able to come to terms with that experience in safe settings under therapeutic care.
The guy who founded Alcoholics Anonymous used LSD to stop drinking and the use of the same has been touted recently to help heroin addicts as well - the effects for some are immediate cessation of heroin use over months and months without any physical cravings for these addictive drugs.
People have found that psilocybin mushrooms, used every few months, stops cluster headaches (also called "suicide headaches" because they are so painful some people have resorted to suicide to stop them.)
There is a valid therapeutic use for psychotropic natural and chemical substances and the scheduling of these is as false as is the scheduling for marijuana.
While the idea of the "doors of perception" is grounded in the counter culture movement of the mid-20th century, there are, in fact, perceptual changes that can and do occur for people within the western scientific materialist mindset of value, not just the use by someone attending a Grateful Dead concert (tho far be it from me to say that religious experience is any less valid than the one someone may have within church walls - the experiences are coming from the same place.)
Why is George W Bush not on this list?
randome
(34,845 posts)Or an aneurism.
[hr][font color="blue"][center]Stop looking for heroes. BE one.[/center][/font][hr]
Vashta Nerada
(3,922 posts)I'd probably be happy and tolerable.
The Midway Rebel
(2,191 posts)Drugs are bad mmmmkay.
RainDog
(28,784 posts)Margaret Mead, one of the most famous anthropologists in American history and President of both the American Anthropological Association and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She also testified before Congress on the legalization of marijuana, and popularized "multi-culti" through her work.
Susan Blackmore, psychologist and author of at least 40 books and 60 scholarly articles on subjects ranging from "memes" to the study of issues like ESP and out-of-body experiences. Blackmore smoked marijuana during a BBC documentary about cannabis use in GB, as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Susan_Blackmore
I posted about many of the above in the OP recently too: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017170178
Aerows
(39,961 posts)was notorious for opium addiction.
Demeter
(85,373 posts)Sissies!
kentauros
(29,414 posts)Hunter S. Thompson - everything 
Nikola Tesla - nothing! 
