prof albert hoffman, creator of LSD |
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After their discovery in 1955, magic mushrooms remained
the domain of middle-class botanists and adventurers who hightailed it to Mexico
to follow R Gordon Wasson's trail
Meanwhile, Swiss biochemist Albert Hoffman,
the creator of LSD, was studying the mushrooms in his lab and was soon to isolate
the stable active ingredient, psilocybin.
By 1958 his company Sandoz were sending out little pink pills
of psilocybin to curious psychologists and therapists all over the world.
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Prof Timothy Leary |
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the high priest
One such package arrived on the doorstep of Harvard psychology professor Timothy
Leary.
He soon became convinced that psilocybin (and later, LSD) presented an opportunity
to map the uncharted frontiers of the mind. Over a 15-month period, he conducted
a series of experiments into the psychedelic state.
Some were indulgent, some uneventful, some frankly rubbish. Some
though, like the Good Friday experiment, revealed some interesting insights.
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the good friday experiment
The setting was Boston University's Marsh Chapel. Leary and
co divided 20 theology students into five groups of four. Half were given psilocybin,
and the rest were given a placebo of nicotinic acid, which causes facial flushes,
nothing else. It was a double blind study - neither the students nor the ex-school
teachers who asked the 147-part questionnaire after the experiment knew who had
been given what. Within an hour, though, it was pretty clear:
"While half sat attentively
listening to the Easter service that was being piped in from the main chapel,
the others were all over the place, lying on benches moaning, or wandering around
fixating on the various religious icons. One sat at an organ, playing weird, exciting
chords."
(from Storming Heaven by Jay Stevens)
Of the 10 who downed the nicotinic acid, only one reported
anything close to a religious experience. Of the 10 who took psilocybin, nine
reported having a mystical experience.
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turn on, tune in, drop out
Unfortunately, the "miracle of Marsh Chapel" finally broke
Harvard's patience. Leary was soon sacked and, with his catchy mantra: "Turn on,
tune in, drop out", spearheaded a psychedelic-soaked counter-culture revolution
in 60's America. It would culminate in the Summer Of Love in 1967, and then go
rapidly pear-shaped with media hysteria, Leary's arrest, and the banning of Psilocybin
(along with LSD) in 1968.
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