William James rolls over in his grave as England bans Laughing Gas
an open letter to Steve Taylor, author of 'The Genius of William James'
by Ballard Quass, the Drug War Philosopher
January 27, 2023
ear Mr. Taylor:
I just read your enjoyable and informative article in Psychology Today on "The Genius of William James," and would like to share a few thoughts with you on this topic, should you find the time to read them.
1. Regarding your fascinating thoughts on time, I have recently read similar observations in works by Wolfgang Smith, who points out how Cartesian conceptions force us to think of time in ways that do not square with the ways that we actually experience it.
2. I share your views on human consciousness. I like to look at the brain as a radio receiver for consciousness, as one of many ways of interacting with consciousness, so to say. If the brain is damaged, it need not mean that consciousness is "damaged," any more than damaging a single computer will damage the Internet or damaging a TV will damage the national television networks.
3. Regarding warfare, you write: "human societies need to find an equivalent activity that brings the same collective and individual benefits of war—without causing death and devastation." The fact is that ravers have already found such an activity: it is the use of MDMA, or empathogens in general. The use of Ecstasy in the 1990s brought together every race in color in unprecedented harmony on the British dance floors. The problem is that Drug War ideology holds the anti-scientific notion that criminalized substances can have no positive uses, for anyone, anywhere, at any time, for any reason, ever.
Speaking of the Drug War, I would like to end with a sort of call for action, please. As you may know, England is getting ready to outlaw nitrous oxide, as America has already effectively done. Not only does this deny godsend medicine to millions, but it effectively outlaws philosophical investigations about the nature of consciousness and reality itself. For as you know, the use of nitrous oxide strongly influenced William James' ontology. In fact, that ontology would be very different had William James been obliged to refrain from using that substance.
Therefore I would humbly encourage you to join me in protesting the Drug War's ongoing attempts to outlaw all substances (like laughing gas) that give us hints of a non-materialistic world. This is one reason why materialism has such staying power: because the Drug War has outlawed precisely those substances whose use tends to cast doubt on our materialist premises. This Drug War is surely a war on science and human progress and, in my view, it is our duty to denounce it as such.
Thank you for your time and your consideration of my ideas!
PS If there are problems with the use of NO2 or any other substance, we need to educate people, not criminalize use and thereby end our investigations of ultimate reality. The money we spend on law enforcement should be spent on sending healthcare workers into affected communities and spreading the news about safe use practices. The alternative is scientific censorship.
Laughing gas is the substance that inspired William James' philosophy about human perception and the nature of ultimate reality. "No account of the universe in its totality," wrote James, "can be final which leaves these other forms of consciousness quite disregarded." And yet disregard them we must because the drug war has outlawed all substances that help create such states. This is a veto on human progress. It is also psychological common sense that laughing gas could be used to prevent suicides and treat depression -- but materialist science ignores common sense. This is why they need to butt out when it comes to psychoactive medicine. They are no experts on emotional states, except in their own dogmatic materialist minds. It is a category error to place materialists in charge of our thoughts and feelings. We actually know what works for ourselves. And if there are any experts in the field, they are not materialists, they are pharmacologically savvy empaths, what the indigenous world calls shaman.
Materialist scientists collaborate with the drug war by refusing to see glaringly obvious drug benefits. They acknowledge only those benefits that they believe are visible under a microscope. The Hindu religion would not exist today had materialist scientists held soma to such a standard. But that's the absurd pass to which prohibition eventually brings us: scientists are put in charge of deciding whether we are allowed to imagine new religions or not.
Check out the conversations that I have had so far with the movers and shakers in the drug-war game -- or rather that I have TRIED to have. Actually, most of these people have failed to respond to my calls to parlay, but that need not stop you from reading MY side of these would-be chats.
I used to be surprised at this reticence on the part of modern drug-war pundits, until I realized that most of them are materialists. That is, most of them believe in (or claim to believe in) the psychiatric pill mill. If they happen to praise psychedelic drugs as a godsend for the depressed, they will yet tell us that such substances are only for those whose finicky body chemistries fail to respond appropriately to SSRIs and SNRIs. The fact is, however, there are thousands of medicines out there that can help with psychological issues -- and this is based on simple psychological common sense. But materialist scientists ignore common sense. That's why Dr. Robert Glatter wrote an article in Forbes magazine wondering if laughing gas could help the depressed.
As a lifelong depressive, I am embarrassed for Robert, that he has to even ask such a question. Of course laughing gas could help. Not only is laughter "the best medicine," as Readers Digest has told us for years, but looking forward to laughing is beneficial too. But materialist scientists ignore anecdote and history and tell us that THEY will be the judge of psychoactive medicines, thank you very much. And they will NOT judge such medicines by asking folks like myself if they work but rather by looking under a microscope to see if they work in the biochemical way that materialists expect.
Q: Where can you find almost-verbatim copies of the descriptions of religious experiences described by William James? A: In descriptions of user reports of "trips" on drugs ranging from coca to opium, from MDMA to laughing gas.
Richard Evans Schultes seems to have originated the harebrained idea (since used by the US Supreme Court to suppress new religions) that you have no right to use drugs in a religious ritual if you did not grow up in a society that had such practices. What tyrannical idiocy!
Drug warriors abuse the English language.
To oppose the Drug War philosophically, one has to highlight its connections to both materialism and the psychiatric pill mill. And that's a problem, because almost everyone is either a Drug Warrior, a materialist, and/or has a vested interest in the psychiatric pill mill.
When the FDA tells us in effect that MDMA is too dangerous to be used to prevent school shootings and to help bring about world peace, they are making political judgments, not scientific ones.
LA Police Chief Daryl Gates said drug users should be summarily executed. William Bennett said drug dealers should be beheaded. These are the attitudes that the drug war inculcates. This racist and brutal ideology must be wiped out.
At best, antidepressants make depression bearable. We need not settle for such drugs, especially when they are notorious for causing dependence. There are many drugs that elate and inspire. It is both cruel and criminal to outlaw them.
The drug war controls the very way that we are allowed to see the world. The Drug War is thus a meta-injustice, not just a handful of bad legal statutes.
"Chemical means of peering into the contents of the inner mind have been universally prized as divine exordia in man’s quest for the beyond... before the coarseness of utilitarian minds reduced them to the status of 'dope'." -- Eric Hendrickson
How would we even KNOW that outlawed drugs have no positive uses? We first have to incorporate them in a sane, empathic and creative way to find that out, and the drug war makes such a sensible approach absolutely impossible.
Buy the Drug War Comic Book by the Drug War Philosopher Brian Quass, featuring 150 hilarious op-ed pics about America's disgraceful war on Americans
You have been reading an article entitled, William James rolls over in his grave as England bans Laughing Gas: an open letter to Steve Taylor, author of 'The Genius of William James', published on January 27, 2023 on AbolishTheDEA.com. For more information about America's disgraceful drug war, which is anti-patient, anti-minority, anti-scientific, anti-mother nature, imperialistic, the establishment of the Christian Science religion, a violation of the natural law upon which America was founded, and a childish and counterproductive way of looking at the world, one which causes all of the problems that it purports to solve, and then some, visit the drug war philosopher, at abolishTheDEA.com. (philosopher's bio; go to top of this page)
ear Mr. Taylor:
You have been reading an article entitled, William James rolls over in his grave as England bans Laughing Gas: an open letter to Steve Taylor, author of 'The Genius of William James', published on January 27, 2023 on AbolishTheDEA.com. For more information about America's disgraceful drug war, which is anti-patient, anti-minority, anti-scientific, anti-mother nature, imperialistic, the establishment of the Christian Science religion, a violation of the natural law upon which America was founded, and a childish and counterproductive way of looking at the world, one which causes all of the problems that it purports to solve, and then some, visit the drug war philosopher, at abolishTheDEA.com. (philosopher's bio; go to top of this page)