Psychotomimetic experiences

Emotional effects Morphine creates a pleasant, euphoric state, which is an aspect of the behaviorally reinforcing effect. The subjective state produced by opioids is often described as ecstatic and is compared to a sexual experience. These effects are most likely mediated by iJ and possibly 5 receptors, and interactions with the mesolimbic dopamine system (Shippenberg et al. 1993 Di Chiara and North 1992 Wise 1989). In contrast, x opioids have dysphoric and psychotomimetic effects (Kumor et al. 1986). 

Psychotomimetics are able to elicit psychic changes like those manifested in the course of a psychosis, such as illusionary distortion of perception and hallucinations. This experience may be of dreamlike character its emotional or intellectual transposition appears inadequate to the outsider. 

The first phase, typically identified in the literature by the use of the adjective "psychotomimetic," was characterized by dominance of a priori, structured models. Seriously underestimating the effects that such preconceptions might have on the content and aftereffects of the subjective experience, researchers variously reported that psychedelics mimicked mental illness (when given in a setting that provoked it), illuminated Freudian theory (when administered by a com-... 

In addition to their inherent unpredictability and the complexity of the process involved, no universal criteria exist for evaluating the validity or desirability of specific reactions and outcomes. Certainly the nature of a person s experience and his subsequent mode of being-in-the-world are meaningful ways of distinguishing psychotomimetic from psychedelic... 

Customarily, consciousness acts as a reducing valve on the amount of information permitted into awareness, but the drug disturbs this function, and the subject s thought processes are swamped with an "information overload." Ideation becomes so rapid and extended as to be more aptly described as intuition. What would normally be regarded as overinclusiveness of concepts becomes in the psychedelic experience the basis for remarkably speeded, enriched, and extended modes of ideation. In psychotomimetic reactions, however, the overgeneralization disrupts thought processes and produces intense confusion and bewilderment. 

Within a few years after our first patients were treated, we became aware that a large proportion of our alcoholic did not have psychotomimetic reactions. Their experience were exciting and pleasant, and yielded insight into their drinking problems. It became evident that a new phenomenon had been recognized in psychiatry. Osmond created the word psychedelic to define these experiences, and announced... 

A thorough study was made of hundreds of schizophrenic patients, of dozens of autobiographies of schizophrenics, and of many psychotomimetic and psychedelic experiences. From this information, questions were created that would test the experiential world, thought, and mood of subjects. Normal subjects would place most cards in the FALSE box, while schizophrenics would tend to place them in the TRUE box. High scores, therefore, indicate psychopathology.2... 

Historically, paradigm clashes have been characterized by bitter emotional antagonisms and total rejection of the opponent. Currently we see the same sort of process the respectable psychiatrist, who would not take any of those "psychotomimetic" drugs himself or experience that crazy meditation process, carries out research to show that drug-takers and those who practice meditation are escapists. The drug-taker or meditater views the same investigator as narrow-minded, prejudiced, and repressive, and as a result drops out of the university. Communication between the two factions is almost nil. 

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