Weekend Thoughts - 12.30.17

Image by Pexels, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Happy Saturday y'all! Below, I have rounded up some things for you to think about this weekend:

1. The UK has been attempting to significantly reduce its carbon emissions, and it had a series of successes in 2017. In April, the country went without coal-generated power for an entire day, which was the first time that had been accomplished in 135 years. By June, more than half of the UK's energy was being generated by renewable sources like solar, wind, hydropower, and biomass. And when looking back on the entire year, renewable energy sources outperformed coal plants on 315 days of the year (as of December 12th). Even with those successes, the country could still stand to use less natural gas, which was still used quite heavily throughout the year. Ultimately, the country is aiming to close down all of its coal plants by 2025, and it's doing a great job so far at getting there!

That's all for this week's edition of Weekend Thoughts. Until next week, keep thinking wilder.

This Week in Psychedelics - 12.29.17

Image by Dahtamnay, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Cannabis

• These States Are Likely To Legalize Marijuana In 2018 (Forbes)
• The Top 10 Cannabis Stories of 2017: Canada & Jeff Sessions Lead the List (Leafly)
• Federal Medical Marijuana Protections Temporarily Extended (NORML)
• Will Legal Cannabis Thrive Or Get Shutdown? 2018 Will Tell (Forbes)
• How were Americans looking for weed (or "marijuana" or "cannabis") in 2017? (The Cannabist)
• Adult Use Retail Sales To Commence In California (NORML)
• Nevada's Recreational Marijuana Market Hits $38M, Soars Past Colorado (Forbes) 
• Warning: Don't Bring Your Legal Marijuana Through Internal Checkpoints in California (Reason)
• People Are Successfully Replacing Vicodin, Xanax and Ambien With Marijuana (ATTN:) 
• New state law to prohibit drivers, passengers from smoking cannabis while driving (KIEM)
• Raring to buy recreational pot in Los Angeles? (Not so fast) (Los Angeles Times)
• Part 1, The Top CBD Cannabis Studies of 2017 (Leafly)
• Marijuana Stops Boy's Seizure in 30 Seconds (ATTN:)
• Dear Prime Minister: 'Tis the Season to Discuss Cannabis Advertising (Leafly)
• Man gets into police car carrying 1,000 cannabis joints because he thought it was a taxi (The Independent)
• Your Regional Guide to Growing Healthy Cannabis Plants Outdoors (Leafly)
• With the groundwork laid, the cannabis business likely to take off in 2018 (Wicked Local Natick)
• Grandmother says cancer has almost gone after taking cannabis oil - now she wants the Government to act (Derby Telegraph)
• Elderly Couple Busted With 60 Pounds of Christmas-Present Cannabis (The Drive)
• Does Religious Freedom Mean You Can Smoke Pot? (World Religion News)
• 'No Rush' to legalise medical cannabis (The Daily Telegraph)

LSD

• 'Wormwood' Is an LSD-Soaked True Crime Masterpiece (Motherboard)
• These Troops Were Ordered To Take LSD (Inverse)
• The Grateful Dead, with a side of LSD-laced venison stew (Salon)

Psilocybin/Magic Mushrooms

• The Grand Humbling of the Third Eye: A Review of Adam Strauss's One Man Show "The Mushroom Cure" (Reality Sandwich)

MDMA/Ecstasy

• Man high on ecstasy ends up stranded in the middle of a lake, cops say (Fox 32 Chicago)
• Boy, 17, dies 'after taking ecstasy tablets' days before Christmas as police launch warning over drugs (Mirror)

Ayahuasca/DMT

• WATCH: Oddball Artist Explains What Painting On DMT Is Like (Trill)
• Ayahuasca: A Skeptic's Notes (Psychedelic Frontier)
• Exotic Hallucinogen Has Everyday Israelis Tripping. But Is It Legal? (Haaretz)

Iboga/Ibogaine

• An End to the Opioid Epidemic? New Study Suggests Ibogaine Treatment Could Be a Game Changer (Psychedelic Times)

Dissociatives

• New Ketamine Findings Give Hope To People Seeking Relief From Suicidal Thoughts (The Fix)
• Would You Try This Party Drug To Relieve Depression And Suicidal Thoughts? (Alternative Daily)

Opiates/Opioids

• Portugal Ended Their Heroin Epidemic Through Treatment and Decriminalization (ATTN:)
• India concerned at record opium production in Afghanistan (United News of India)

Kratom

• Letter: Tell DEA to leave kratom alone (Asheville Citizen-Times)
• MOH to initiate ban on Ketum starting next year (MIMS General News)

Kava

• Warning not to take Kava into Poland (Radio New Zealand)
• Appeals for Vanuatu to seek dialogue with Poland on kava ban (Radio New Zealand)

Khat

• Global Khat (Plant) Sales is Growing at 6% CAGR to 2019 - Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast (Island Post Gazette)

Miscellaneous Psychedelics/Psychoactives/Drug Policy

• Pineapple Fund Donated 60 Bitcoin to MAPS in Delicate Time for Crypto and Psychedelics (Psychedelic Times)
• Ross Ulbricht Files Appeal to the Supreme Court on His Life Sentence Without Parole (Reason)
• Party drugs such as Molly, Meow Meow more popular but ganja most seized in India (Hindustan Times)

Disclaimer: "This Week in Psychedelics" does not censor or analyze the news links presented here. The purpose of this column is solely to catalogue how psychedelics are presented by the mass media, which includes everything from the latest scientific research to misinformation.

Weekend Thoughts - 12.23.17

Image by nyochi, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Happy Saturday y'all! Below, I have rounded up some things for you to think about this weekend:

1. Using some new facial recognition technology, Facebook has begun to automatically identify users in newly-uploaded photos and send them a notification each time a picture of them has been added to the service. This will now happen even if your Facebook friend hasn't tagged you in the photo. It will allow users to know about pictures of themselves that have been added without their knowledge, although they will only be notified if the image's privacy settings are configured to allow them to see the picture in the first place. And of course, it'll increase ad impressions for Facebook, which will in turn generate more ad revenue for the company.

That's all for this week's edition of Weekend Thoughts. Until next week, keep thinking wilder.

This Week in Psychedelics - 12.22.17

Image by Dahtamnay, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Cannabis

• Legal Pot: Mexico to Sell Space Cakes, Cannabis Drinks and Marijuana Lipsticks (Newsweek)
• World Health Organization clashes with DEA on marijuana compound CBD (Ars Technica)
• The Safety of Dabbing: An Honest Terpene Story (Psychedelic Times)
• Bitcoin offers the cannabis industry an alternative to banks (CNBC)
• Cannabis ingredient holds promise as antipsychotic medicine (Reuters)
• Move Over California -- Canada's Opening Its Own $5B Cannabis Market In 2018 (Forbes)
• DEA Releases Report Citing No Deaths From Marijuana (ATTN:)
• Study: CBD Effective As Adjunctive Therapy For Psychosis (NORML)
• Mass. Recreational Pot Industry Won't Just Line Pockets Of Big Businesses, Regulators Say (WBUR)
• Cannabis as a Tool to Fight the Opioid Epidemic (Reality Sandwich)
• New Policy Lets V.A. Docs Talk to Veterans About Medical Marijuana Use (Reason)
• An 11-Year-Old Is Suing the Government Over Medical Marijuana Legalization (ATTN:)
• A marijuana salve won best in show at a cannabis convention this weekend (Boston Globe)
• Portland Companies are Fighting a Secret Plot to Monopolize Cannabis (The Potlander)
• Massachusetts May Leap Ahead on Cannabis Cafes (CT Post)
• Even Without the Rider That Protects Medical Marijuana, a Pot Crackdown Is Unlikely (Reason)
• These Kids Prove Marijuana Is Medicine (ATTN:)
• Cannabis and Mental Health: Cause, Cure, or It's Complicated? (Yes) (Leafly)
• Here's how marijuana does, and doesn't, affect your health (The Mercury News)
• Universities Are Offering Marijuana Business Classes (ATTN:)
• This cannabis-infused wine promises to prevent hangovers (Moneyish)
• A Utah Grandma Explains Why She Gave Her Grandson Medical Marijuana (ATTN:)
• Part 1, Leafly's Faves 2017: Our Strain, Product, and Brand Picks (Leafly)
• EnviroGrow expands reach in cannabis industry (CT Post)
• Jury Rejects Damages for Victims of Pot Raid Based on Wet Tea Leaves (Reason)
• How to Make the Most of Cannabis Plant Count Grow Limits (Leafly)
• Cannabis Regulators Busy Rolling Out the Rules for Legal Pot (U.S. News & World Report)
• NORML "Rolls Out" New Rolling Papers (NORML)
• Cannabis Crunch – Arizona MMJ Battle Ends, Denver Closes 26 Legal Dispensaries And WHO Ok With CBD (Psychedelic Times)

LSD

• How Dock Ellis, Player Who Pitched a No-Hitter on LSD, Is Misremembered (Rolling Stone)
• Errol Morris talks about teaming up with Netflix to delve into the LSD-laced mystery of a CIA scientist's death (Business Insider)
• Government staffer's LSD work 'pick-me-up' (NT News)

Psilocybin/Magic Mushrooms

• Santa Is a Psychedelic Mushroom (The New York Times)
• Are Modern Religions All Modeled Off Amanita Mushroom Trips? (Disinfo)
• After Cannabis is Legal, Could Magic Mushrooms be Next? (Good Times)
• 7 mind-bending facts about magic mushrooms (Brinkwire)

MDMA/Ecstasy

• Anonymous Bitcoin philanthropist donates $1m to prove health benefits of ecstasy (International Business Times)
• Can the use of MDMA to help treating alcohol addiction make an impact in psychiatric treatment methods? (MIMS)
• Flamefest raver Steven Graves 'took lethal MDMA dose' (BBC)

Ayahuasca/DMT

• Ayahuasca Retreats Offers Magical Healing Sessions Based on Sacred Plant Medicine (MilTech)
• 5-Methoxy-N,N-Dimethyltryptamine (5-MeO-DMT): Patterns of use, motives for consumption, and acute subjective effects (ResearchGate)
• 'HAMILTON'S PHARMACOPEIA' Digs into the Origins of DMT (VICE)

Peyote/San Pedro/Mescaline

• Huachuma: Healing Medicine For Modern Times (Reset.me)

Iboga/Ibogaine

• The Ibogaine Conversation Pt 7: Former underground provider, Dimitri Mugianis, on the regulation of ibogaine (Psymposia)
• The Ibogaine Conversation Pt 8: How Not to Do Ibogaine 101 with Juliana Mulligan (Psymposia)
• The Avante Institute Pioneers Ibogaine Plant-Based Therapy for Addiction in a Beautiful and Tropical Environment in the Bahamas (Digital Journal)
• Johnny Tabaie Explains How the Holistic Sanctuary Got a 90% Addiction Recovery Rate (Newswire)

Dissociatives

• Ketamine Relieved Suicidal Thoughts Within Hours in Hospital Study (Gizmodo)
• Who Laced The Titanic Cast's Chowder With The Hallucinogen, PCP? (Refinery29)
• Synthesis of methoxetamine, its metabolites and deuterium labelled analog as analytical standards and their HPLC and chiral capillary electrophoresis separation (Royal Society of Chemistry)
• Oklahoma City woman believed to have passed out on PCP arrested for child neglect (KFOR)

Opiates/Opioids

• Experimental Heroin Vaccine Triggers the Immune System So Mice Can't Get High (Gizmodo)
• Tech Alone Can't Solve the Opioid Crisis (Wired)
• Why is Big Pharma Raising Prices on Naloxone? (The Fix)
• What's the Difference Between Opiates and Opioids? (Pain News Network)
• Afghanistan has Reached a Record on the Production of Opium Poppy (Novinite)
• The Opium Wars still shape China's view of the west (The Economist)
• Vermont's U.S. Attorney Says Injection Sites Encourage Illegal Drug Use. The Research Shows She's Wrong. (Reason)

Kratom

• Findings suggest kratom's potential to treat opioid addiction (Medical Xpress)
• Kratom: An old plant sparks a new challenge (Capital Gazette)
• Why Banning Kratom May Make the Opioid Epidemic Even Worse (MSN)
• Polis asks FDA to lift public health warning on Kratom (Jared Polis)

Kava

• Stressed New Yorkers Take to Kava, 'Nature's Xanax' (The New York Times)

Miscellaneous Psychedelics/Psychoactives/Drug Policy

• Gordon Wasson's Hidden Ties to the Vatican: Interview with Jerry Brown (Psychedelic Times)
• Ben Carson Admits War on Drugs Conflicts with War on Poverty (Reason)
• Microdosing LSD and Mushrooms: Guide To A Better Life (Psychedelics Daily)
• These Ten Foods Can Trigger Hallucinations if Over-Consumed (Netralnews)

Disclaimer: "This Week in Psychedelics" does not censor or analyze the news links presented here. The purpose of this column is solely to catalogue how psychedelics are presented by the mass media, which includes everything from the latest scientific research to misinformation.

Weekend Thoughts - 12.16.17

Image by brenkee, courtesy of Creative Commons licensing.

Happy Saturday y'all! Below, I have rounded up some things for you to think about this weekend:

1. If you've ever gotten stuck on a train or bus after your intended stop, you may find Google Map's new feature that will tell you when it's time to get off to be helpful. Essentially, the app will be able to guide you through every step of your ride, including alerting you when you need to get off at your stop. It's unlikely that you would need this level of detail in your daily commute, but it may be helpful when you are traveling to new places.

2. Net Neutrality has been a huge topic for the past several months (and years), at least in the technological and political circles that I run around in. An article describing the FCC's decision in the Carterfone case from more than 50 years ago makes for an interesting read. I also learned that the word "modem" comes from the words "modulate" and "demodulate", something I didn't know prior to reading the article. Although the current heads of the FCC voted to repeal Net Neutrality this week, it's still nice to take a look back on our history and see how the FCC sided with the American people instead of the corporations—at least back in the day.

3. And finally, some more cryptocurrency news—an armed robber allegedly stole $1.8 million of ether. Ether is the name of the cryptocurrency of the ethereum network. It turns out that the suspect knew the victim and also knew that he owned a lot of this cryptocurrency. Apparently he was held up at gunpoint and told to turn over his cell phone, wallet, and keys. The suspect then allegedly went to the victim's apartment where he stole the ethers. Although this is certainly a tragedy for the victim, it is a good time to remind owners of cryptocurrency that it is imperative to keep private keys securely locked away and to never tell others how much money you are holding onto.

That's all for this week's edition of Weekend Thoughts. Until next week, keep thinking wilder.