>"Speaking of Carhart-Harris’ overenthusiasm for psychedelics running a little ahead of the evidence, the paper ends with a weird section comparing the hierarchial structure of the brain to the hierarchical structure of society, and speculating that just as psychedelics cause an “anarchic brain” where the highest-level brain structures fail to “govern” lower-level activity, so they may cause society to dissolve or something:<p><i>Two figureheads in psychedelic research and therapy, Stanislav Grof and Roland Griffiths, have highlighted how psychedelics have historically “loosed the Dionysian element” (Pollan, 2018) to the discomfort of the ruling elite, i.e., not just in 1960s America but also centuries earlier when conquistadors suppressed the use of psychedelic plants by indigenous people of the same continent. Former Harvard psychology professor, turned psychedelic evangelist, Timothy Leary, cajoled that LSD could stand for “Let the State Dissolve” (Pollan, 2018). Whatever the interaction between psychedelic use and political perspective, we hope that psychedelic science will be given the best possible opportunity to positively impact on psychology, psychiatry, and society in the coming decades—so that it may achieve its promise of significantly advancing self-understanding and health care.</i>"<p>I wonder how many people are aware that Timothy Leary was a fan of Socrates! He mentions him in an interview as being "his model" (idol?), and "the cause of all the trouble". There's another video made late in his life where he mentions providing material related to Socrates to a group of college students (with not-so-much emphasis on psychedelic drugs to the best of my memory, though Socrates wasn't the main subject matter either).<p>Socrates, as presented by Xenophon and Plato, considered the state, defined as a group of individuals that cooperate for their mutual benefit, to be a noble thing that he would have no interest in dissolving, merely improving. I think this is likely the intent of the authors as well (notice they say, "... the best possible opportunity to <i>positivity</i> impact..."), and I would wager the late Leary himself if pressed (note that despite everything, in the end American society tolerated him).