Neuropsychedelia

Anthropological fieldwork is not restricted to isolated indigenous people in remote areas. Anthropologists study scientists in university research labs. Langlitz did a remarkable feat: He immersed himself in the research activities of two laboratories studying psychedelic effects on humans and animals. Through this participation in everyday work, he delineated contextual sociological and psychological factors of what made it possible for researchers to be allowed to give healthy human subjects and patients with psychiatric problems mind-altering drugs in the lab and what motivates researchers to go into these frontier areas of research. LSD, psilocybin, and ayahuasca are studied again scientifically. What… show more.

Langlitz takes readers inside neuroscience laboratories in the United States and Switzerland to show readers how a cultural shift towards brain research has helped to lay the groundwork for a return of psychedelic science. Peaking behind the academic curtain, Langlitz gives readers a rather ‘sobering’ look at the business of neuroscience research and the innovative ways that scientists have invested in psychedelic studies while meeting new demands for ethical protocols and standards for human experimentation that do not allow for the kinds of approaches taken by an earlier generation of psychedelic researchers.