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Through a philosophical lens, this book explores the powerful educational capabilities of classic psychedelics.In both clinical and informal settings, psychedelics users often report they have undergone something profound and even life-altering. Yet there persists a confounding inability to articulate just what has been imparted. Informed by multidisciplinary emerging research, this book provides an account of the specifically educational aspects of psychedelics and how they can render us ready to learn. Drawing from indigenous peoples worldwide who typically revere these substances as'plant teachers'and from canonical thinkers in the western tradition such as Plato, Spinoza, Kant, and Heidegger, the author proposes an original set of categories through which to understand the educational capabilities of'entheogens'(psychedelics with visionary qualities). It emerges that entheogens'real power lies not in destabilizing and decentering-'turning on and dropping out'-but as powerful aids in restoring and reenchanting our shared worlds.

Handwritten over four years from maximum-security federal prison cells, The Rose of Paracelsus: On Secrets and Sacraments, is a unique work of psychedelic literature that explores the potential of human cognition. This book follows the narrator, a Harvard graduate student and researcher, as he uncovers an intricate, global psychedelic network through encounters with “the Six,” clandestine LSD chemists who synthesize planetary-scale batches of the substance, traversing states of consciousness and advancing human evolution. From Cambridge to Moscow, Oxford to Zürich, Princeton to Mazar-i-Sharif and Bangkok, this book illuminates lifestyles within a rare and elusive organization, one that has evolved special gifts: advanced capacities of thought, memory and perception.The Rose is a psychedelic biography of its author, William Leonard Pickard, a former Harvard chemist who served 20 years in prison for conspiracy to manufacture and distribute LSD. An excerpt from The Rose was published in The Nature of Drugs: History, Pharmacology, and Social Impact (Synergetic Press, 2021).One of the documentarians who made a podcast series dedicated to readings of The Rose said of the book, “Other than LSD, it's quite possibly the most psychedelic thing you'll ever find on paper.”

Neuroenhancement ist eine Entwicklung, die in der heutigen Leistungsgesellschaft auf dem Vormarsch ist. Die Autorin analysiert, ob die Steigerung der geistigen Leistungsfähigkeit durch die Einnahme von verschiedenen Mitteln eine strafrechtliche Bedeutung erlangen kann. Schon bei der Betrachtung des hierfür notwendigen Rechtsguts zieht sie eine Parallele zum Doping im Sport. Auch bei der Analyse der gegenwärtigen strafrechtlichen Regelung und des zukünftigen Regelungsbedarfs vergleicht sie das Neuroenhancement im (hoch)schulischen Bereich mit dem Doping im sportlichen Wettbewerb.

There has been much recent excitement amongst neuroscientists and ethicists about the possibility of using drugs, as well as other technologies, to enhance cognition in healthy individuals. This excitement has arisen from recent advances in neuroscientific technologies such as drugs that increase alertness and wakefulness in healthy individuals or technologies that can stimulate activity in different parts of the brain - either via the scalp or via electrodes - raising the possibility of producing cognitive and affective improvements in otherwise healthy individuals. Despite this growing interest, there are conflicting views on the ethics of cognitive enhancement. Some argue that enhancement is not only an ethical pursuit but one that we have a moral obligation to pursue. Others are more skeptical about the ethical implications and long term effects of cognitive enhancement. Some neuroscientists argue that use of stimulants as putative enhancers will lead to misuse, abuse and addiction in some users, and might have undesirable long-term consequences. This book critically explores and analyses the scientific and ethical debates surrounding cognitive enhancers. Including contributions from neuroscientists, neuropsychopharmacologists, ethicists, philosophers, public health professionals, and policy researchers, the book offers a multidisciplinary, critical consideration of the ethics of the use of cognitive enhancers.