I have a theory about mental disorders caused by drugs. It is due to what Jung described as an inability to adapt. Our energies are ideally focused on improving our ability to deal with reality, i.e., adapt. When the mind finds itself in a situation to which it can't adapt, it turns its energies inward to create internal adaptations. These are the skills via which we mature such as confidence, acceptance, or patience. Mental neuroses, in Jung's opinion, were symptoms of this internal focus of the psychic energies.

Drugs like LSD can change our mind's perceptions far quicker than we are evolved to handle. If a person's mental skills are not up to par, it leads to a regression of some magnitude which can lead to disturbing side effects ranging from minor neuroses to schizophrenia. Look at those that have mental disturbances lasting only a few weeks or months before they are resolved. This could be explained by the resolution of internal issues and focus being returned to the external world.

This is probably a bunch of hogwash, but I've never heard a more satisfactory explanation so I stick with it.

A good friend had some traumatic experiences due to hallucinogen-induced psychosis. Experiences from LSD, mescaline, and the like prior to the episode were embraced with open arms and handled well. There seemed to be some switch that flipped, not due to any sort of internal fortitude but instead some purely biochemical reaction. He's been on antipsychotics since.

That said, he holds the substances in high regard for their ability to open the mind. Users should simply be aware that predisposition to psychosis can't be identified before the episode, something like 4 in 1000 will have such a reaction (http://www.maps.org/research/abrahart.html - see Cohen and Malleson research discussion)

LSD trips are usually intensely emotional experiences. Any intensely emotional experience can trigger psychotic symptoms in people predisposed to them.

If you advise people predisposed to psychosis to stay away from LSD, you should also advise them to stay away from sex and any and all other intensely emotional experiences.

That said, there's always a risk to doing anything. People choose to engage in risky behaviors every day. You take a risk by moving your butt out of your chair. You certainly take a pretty big risk to your mental and physical well-being by riding in or driving a car (it risks your mental well-being due to the possibility of brain injury in an accident). Yet people do it all the time. Often without giving it a second thought -- and if you point out the risk they're taking, they'll usually shrug it off.

Some people like to risk their lives by smoking tobacco, others by drinking alcohol, yet others by stuffing their face with junk food. For some the fun is in risking their lives skydiving, or scubadiving, or hang-gliding, or paragliding, or surfing, or spelunking, or swimming.

But you don't have to go to extremes to risk your life. Just hanging out at the local pub is risky (you could get injured or killed in a brawl). Climbing a ladder is risky. Crossing a street is risky.

But once the subject turns to drugs people start freaking out about the fact that you're taking a risk by doing them, as if taking risks was something only crazy homeless people and stunt-car drivers did, and not something they themselves did every day of their lives.

The intensity of an LSD experience is in a completely different category than almost any other conventional experience. I was as dismissive of the risks as you were until I saw two good friends develop permanent mental illness as a result of psychedelic experiences.

Perhaps. I have two good friends that developed permanent mental illness catalyzed by drug use. One is in an institution and the other takes a fistful of anti-psychotics everyday to get by. I do think that some people benefit from psychedelics but the dangers are very real for others.

Oh definitely, I don't deny the dangers. I was merely mentioning one possible explanation for those dangers.

To quote the article: "To complicate matters further, LSD also acts at other receptors."

So LSD appears to interact with more than "one of the signaling systems in your brain."

There is something curious about LSD.

A "more than recreative" dose of 200 micrograms is still a very small dose compared with most drugs. And it will blow your head up.

According to various sources (e.g. erowid) LSD is eliminated by the liver very quickly.

So how come that the trips lasts 5-12 hs, with negligible blood concentrations?

I may very well behave as Tim Leary said a "chemical key" for certain brain circuits.

Ah, a fellow fan of the 8 Circuit Model. Mind emailing me? :)

> So how come that the trips lasts 5-12 hs, with negligible blood concentrations?

Some drugs are very tightly bound to the receptors they target. (A few are even permanent, so the target protein has to be recycled to turn off the drug.) The blood-brain barrier serves as a one way gate that retains some drugs despite falling blood levels.