[dspearson]

True enough, but his health declined in his late 80s. David Nichols is still going strong in his late 70s, Albert Hofmann died at 102, Ram Dass died at 88. I don't see psychedelics, and their use, as being particularly risky to physical health and longevity. Especially since many of us already consume red meat, tobacco, alcohol, etc.

[an-allen]

Isn’t his partner like 92 and still spreading the good word? Folks want to link his chem experimentation to negative health outcomes to justify their own “drugs are bad mkay” beliefs. In the end, he literally cataloged all the chems and lived to 88… if I were going to choose a single case to illustrate this hypothesis-> this psychonaut would not be it. In fact, I probably wouldn’t even want him in my sample if I were going to try and prove the hypothesis.

[ASalazarMX]

> Folks want to link his chem experimentation to negative health outcomes to justify their own “drugs are bad mkay”

Drugs, prescription or not, can be very bad when used in excess or ignorance. These people know what they're putting in their bodies, and have the knowledge and means to test or even make them, but the majority of drug users don't.

[BTCOG]

I'm fairly certain that sitting at a computer working 8-10 hour days of physical inactivity is far worse on the human body than moderate use of psychedelics.

[SpodGaju]

Terrance McKenna died at 53.

Dose is probably important in all this but it’s hard to say with such a small, probably biased, sample size.

[esperent]

He died of glioblastoma and there's absolutely zero evidence that it was related to drug use.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glioblastoma

[patrec]

> I don't see psychedelics, and their use, as being particularly risky to physical health

Maybe if you don't count frying your brain as a risk to your physical health.

[spacemanmatt]

When the DARE officer said stuff like this to us as 7th graders, we laughed.

It's maybe less funny today but ridicule remains the appropriate response.

[grapeskin]

Most 78 year old men who aren't dead don't really have the mental faculties to clearly lecture a university at 78.

A soda a day rots far more brains than an occasional trip.

[antihero]

Is it really fried though? If I didn't want to "fry my brain" I would opt not to participate in this clusterfuck we call modern life.

[netizen-936824]

Can you please explain the neuronal mechanisms involved in this frying? If you have citations I would love to read more.

[dspearson]

Modern society does a pretty good job of that already. How many prescriptions for antidepressants do we issue in the western world? tl;dr, I consider them lower risk than horse riding, or working in a startup.