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Researchers found that between 2018 and 2021, U.S. adults aged 19 to 30 increased their use of mescaline, peyote, psilocybin ("magic mushrooms") and PCP, though not LSD. Photo by Hans/Pixabay Young American adults have doubled their use of non-LSD hallucinogens in just a few years, a new report warns. Researchers found that between 2018 and 2021, U.S. adults aged 19 to 30 increased their use of mescaline, peyote, psilocybin ("magic mushrooms") and PCP, though not LSD. The prevalence of young adults' past-year use of these drugs was 3.4% in 2018, but it hit 6.6% in 2021. "However, the prevalence of...

BOGOTA, Colombia - Mexico has passed a sweeping bill legalizing the possession of small quantities of almost all illegal drugs, including heroin and cocaine. The regime, likely to be one of the most liberal in the world, is designed to avoid clogging prisons with drug addicts, allowing police to go after big-time dealers. Under the bill, it would be legal to possess 25 milligrams of heroin, five grams of marijuana, half a gram of cocaine, as well as small amounts of LSD, hallucinogenic mushrooms, amphetamines, and a hallucinogenic cactus, peyote. All that remains is for President Fox to sign the...

The human brain is a remarkable thing; our most complex machines are not even close to competing with our powers of higher consciousness and ingenuity. And yet, those 80 billion or so neurons are also incredibly fragile. If the tiniest thing goes wrong with a particular connection - maybe something misfires, or a certain neural pathway is blocked - things can fall apart very quickly. And, oddly enough, even without any injuries or structural malfunctions, the human brain can get weird all by itself - turns out, it's surprisingly easy to trick it into seeing and hearing things that aren't...

The Great Peacemaker, whose name means "Two River Currents Flowing Together" and is sometimes referred to as Deganawida, was an Iroquois Prophet who convinced five warring Indian tribes to join in peace. He prophesied that a "white serpent" would come to his people's lands and make friends with them, only to deceive them later. A "red serpent" would later make war against the "white serpent." After a season, a "black serpent" would come and defeat both the "white" and "red serpents". According to the prophecy, when the people gathered under the elm tree become humble, all three "serpents" would be...

Drugs made from magic mushrooms could help treat people with severe depression, a new study suggests. Scientists believe that the chemical psilocybin, the psychedelic ingredient in magic mushrooms, can turn down parts of the brain that are overactive in severely depressive patients, the Guardian reported. The drug appears to stop patients dwelling on themselves and their own perceived inadequacies. However, a bid by British scientists to carry out trials of psilocybin on patients in order to assess its full medical potential has been blocked by red tape relating to Britain’s strict drugs laws. Professor David Nutt, professor of neuropsychopharmacology at...

April 24, 2012. Des Moines. Two networks yesterday, CNBC and MSNBC, broadcast a little known fact – Ron Paul appears to be winning the Republican nomination for President. When the popular Texas Congressman repeatedly assured supporters that the race was about delegates, not beauty contests, he apparently knew what he was talking about. Now, after three more states locked in delegates to the GOP nominating convention – CO, MN and IA – indicators point to a brokered convention with a possible, even probable, Ron Paul victory.

INDIANAPOLIS – A large, long-term study confirms that medications with anticholinergic activity, which include many drugs frequently taken by older adults, cause cognitive impairment. The research is also the first to identify a possible link between these drugs – which include over-the-counter and prescription sleep aids and incontinence treatments – and risk of death. The two-year study of the impact of these medications on 13,000 men and women aged 65 and older is part of the Medical Research Council (UK) Cognitive Function and Ageing Studies (CFAS), a large UK-based longitudinal multi-center study initiative looking at health and cognitive function in...

A sign in front of Mauro Morales' Rio Grande City home announces his business for everyone to see. "Peyote Dealer," it proclaims in large block letters. Each day, drivers passing by slow down for double takes and some even pull over, get out and snap photos. Who can blame them?, Morales asks with a mischievous grin. He is, after all, part of a dwindling fraternity. The slight, 65-year-old Rio Grande City man is one of only three people in the United States - all in Starr and Webb counties -authorized to harvest and sell the psychedelic cactus. But as overharvesting...

(3) And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold, a great red dragon, having seven heads, and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads. (3a) "And there appeared another wonder in heaven: and behold, a great red dragon,..." Red is the ancient color of evil. Red and black in combination symbolizes far greater evil. The red dragon is both Satan/The Serpent, and the body politic spiritual construct of the known world in the fifteenth century. It is both theological and secular, but primarily it is a cabal bent on world domination. Again, we are dealing with non-linear time....

American adherents of a Brazilian religious sect have won their battle to use hallucinogenic tea in their worship services. In a unanimous ruling with major implications for minority religious groups in America, the US Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the right of religious organizations to claim exemption from certain laws that undercut their ability to practice their faith. At issue was a clash between US drug laws - which ban the hallucinogenic substance in the sect's sacred tea - and a 1993 religious freedom law that requires the government to grant religious exemptions when possible. Although the central issue in...

BOSTON – A study of the effects of peyote on American Indians found no evidence that the hallucinogenic cactus caused brain damage or psychological problems among people who used it frequently in religious ceremonies. In fact, researchers from Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital found that members of the Native American Church performed better on some psychological tests than other Navajos who did not regularly use peyote. A 1994 federal law allows roughly 300,000 members of the Native American Church to use peyote as a religious sacrament. The five-year study set out to find scientific proof for the Navajos’ belief that the substance,...

Justices lean toward ceremonial use of hallucinogen Wednesday, November 02, 2005 By Michael McGough, Post-Gazette National Bureau WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Supreme Court yesterday reacted with surprising sympathy to the claim by a small religious movement with roots in Brazil that it should be allowed to import a tea containing an illegal hallucinogenic drug for use in its rituals. Noting that federal law permits 250,000 members of the Native American Church to use the hallucinogen peyote as part of its worship, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg asked a lawyer for the Bush administration why it wants to prevent 130 U.S. adherents...

SALT LAKE CITY - The leader of an American Indian church is suing county officials who unsuccessfully prosecuted him for using peyote during religious ceremonies. James "Flaming Eagle" Mooney, in a federal lawsuit filed Wednesday, accuses officials in Utah County of civil rights violations, including unlawfully searching his property in October 2000 and confiscating thousands of peyote buttons. Mooney, who is part American Indian, also claims the county officials have refused to return the items even though he was vindicated by a state Supreme Court ruling last June that found that non-American Indian members of the Native American Church can...

DENVER - Hunter S. Thompson, the "gonzo journalist" with a penchant for drugs, guns and flamethrower prose, might have one more salvo in store for everyone: Friends and relatives want to blast his ashes out of a cannon, just as he wished. "If that's what he wanted, we'll see if we can pull it off," said historian Douglas Brinkley, a friend of Thompson's and now the family's spokesman. Thompson, who shot himself to death at his Aspen-area home Sunday at 67, said several times he wanted an artillery send-off for his remains. "There's no question, I'm sure that's what he...

AP News Alert ASPEN, Colo. (AP) -- The son of Hunter S. Thompson says the author shot himself to death at his Aspen-area home.

Masked demonstrators hurl objects during clashes with Italian Police at Circo Massimo grounds at a protest against the visit by President Bush in Rome, Friday June 4, 2004. Bush, who met Pope John Paul II at the Vatican Friday, is in Italy to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Rome's liberation and will proceed to France Saturday.(AP Photo/Pier Paolo Cito) A U.S. flag with a swastika is seen during a protest against a visit by President Bush (news - web sites) in Rome, Friday June 4, 2004. Bush, who met Pope John Paul II at the Vatican Friday, is in...