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#1 Psychedelics are drugs that reliably produce a unique state of mind in which you see visions and hear voices. They reliably produce a state of mind in which you feel ecstasy and terror, or nothing at all. The history of human beings using these drugs stretches back thousands of years, but their use reached its height in the 1960s and 1970s. During those two decades, hundreds of thousands of people used psychedelics at least once. Opium, the first ever drug to be used for its mind-altering qualities rather than its painkilling properties, was first used by Chinese emperor Shen Nung more than five thousand years ago. It was then cultivated by Indian physicians and used to treat depression and headaches. It would eventually become one of the most popular drugs in the history of human civilization. During the nineteenth century, it was often smoked in water pipes, and it was often combined with cocaine and alcohol, creating a powerful cocktail known as jimsonweed tea. The first American to use LSD was most likely a self-experimenter named Albert Hofmann. He accidentally ingested himself one hundred times the dose he intended to use on his friends. His life was never the same again.

#2 Psychedelics are drugs that reliably produce a unique state of mind in which you see visions and hear voices. They reliably produce a state of mind in which you feel ecstasy and terror, or nothing at all.

#3 LSD, the first ever drug used for its mind-altering qualities rather than its painkilling properties, was first used by Chinese emperor Shen Nung more than five thousand years ago. It was then cultivated by Indian physicians and used to treat depression and headaches. It would eventually become one of the most popular drugs in the history of human civilization.

#4 The history of humankind using psychedelics stretches back thousands of years. During the 1960s and 1970s, hundreds of thousands of people used psychedelics at least once.

Summary of Rick Strassman's The Psychedelic Handbook

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