Parapsychological tests meant to prove the existence of ESP, and have been proven to induce vivid, detailed hallucinations. The subject places halved ping pong balls over the eyes which diffuse light, but not block it, and then noise-cancelling headphones playing white noise are placed over their ears. After a few minutes of âactive sensory deprivation,â many report incredibly life-like, often symbolic, meaning-filled visions. Essentially, itâs akin to going on a quick vision quest - like the stereotypical Native Americans do in Hollywood movies. The chief differences here being that you can do it from the comfort of home in the time it takes to not watch Two and a Half men, rather than ten hours inside a sweat lodge, and you donât have to be robbed of your land and have genocide performed on your people. Bonus!
"Psh, what am I supposed to be, impressed? I can do that with a ping-pong ball and an iPod."
Because of shady research practices, skewed results and questionable subjects, the Ganzfeld Experiments did nothing to advance the theory of ESP, but if you really feel like tripping balls, and not so much like eating fungus picked out of cow-shit and then staying up for five hours past the point when it stops being fun, Ganzfeld might do a little something for you.
The Pros
It doesnât alter your blood chemistry, it can be stopped at any point, itâs practically free, and it seems like something out of a Buck Rogers episode.
The Cons
You look like a total and complete tool.
Propanolol is
a form of beta blocker, which have long been used for their calming effects by pretty much anybody with nerves. Musicians, athletes, lawyers and teachers all swear by them for maintaining your cool when a shit ton of people are looking at you for extended periods of time and you think your fly might be down. Itâs most often prescribed for circulatory disorders like hypertension, because it affects blood flow. However, itâs most often abused for itâs suppression of the physical effects of your fight or flight reflex. If, say, a horse-mounted lion leapt out at you, roaring and neighing itâs terrifying battle cry, your body would shoot adrenalin throughout your system, allowing you to react faster and hopefully get away.
This is a handy instinct for actual fight or flight scenarios, but these signals frequently get crossed, and come in quite a bit less handy when youâre trying to tell a girl how beautiful her eyes are and your body is essentially still screaming âHOLY SHIT! LION! RUN!â
"JESUS CHRIST IT'S A WOMAN! GET IN THE CAR!"
In short, itâs artificial confidence in pill form. It does not muddle your thoughts or change your personality in any noticeable way, it just suppresses nerves. Finally allowing you to deliver lines like âdo you have colon cancer? âCause that ass is killer!â without your voice shaking like a pubescent Parkinsonâs patient.
The Pros
Sure, other drugs like alcohol inspire a sort of artificial confidence â but thatâs really more like reduced judgment that comes along with mental impairment. So while liquor may give you the confidence to use your best lines on pretty girls, youâre also more likely to screw them up and end up saying something more along the lines of âdo you have colon cancer? âCause it looks like a tumor. YOUâRE NOT BETTER THAN ME!â Propanolol gives you booze-nerves without the retardation.
The Cons
Among the side-effects are nightmares, confusion, and hallucinations. So to further elaborate on this example, you may well have the mental acuity and confidence to pick up on a pretty girl, but she may only exist slightly between this plane of light and the next and have tits made out of snakes and fire.
There are two ways to progress technologically, you can invent entirely new and innovative products, or you can just improve on existing ones. Theyâre both valid approaches; somebody invents cold fusion reactors, for example, and somebody else puts a clock in them and makes them syncable with your iPod. Acomplia is more along the lines of the latter approach. Initially
used to treat marijuana and heroin addiction (although, come on, marijuana addiction? You ever sucked dick for weed?)
"The answer is yes."
Acomplia was later found to have other effects when the heroin addicts ordered to detox on Acomplia (surprise!) still took a shit-ton of heroin anyway. They found that, when taken with certain other drugs (pot and smack, mostly, but limited effects have also been observed with nicotine, hence its common prescription to quitting smokers,) Acomplia, rather than neutralizing the intoxicant effects of other drugs, instead drastically reduces their side-effects. In other words, instead of preventing heroin addicts from enjoying heroin, it just removed all of the unpleasant consequences. Now, its uses for heroin are clear enough â coming down off the Old Tijuana Waterslide (Editor's note: That's not actually a nickname for heroin) is a hellish experience full of delirium, cold sweats and nausea. But it also reportedly eliminates side-effects for weed as well. Which begs the question: What side effects? Does it rid you of the desperate need for convenience store nachos and the sudden desire to converse in-depth about religion?
The Pros
Acomplia is also prescribed and has been proven rather effective as an anti-obesity drug. So to recap, it reduces the negative side-effects of recreational drugs, helps you quit smoking, and gives you kickinâ abs. Itâs the kickinâ abs that really sends this one over the believability edge, and straight into sci-fi territory. Thatâs just slightly too good to be real. Itâs like an infomercial promising that their device slices, dices, reunites you with your estranged father, makes julienne fries, and brings you to earth-shattering orgasm with every use.
The Cons
It works by messing with the Endocannabiniod system, which is a pretty scary thing to fuck with. It controls pleasure, pain tolerance, and relaxation. So, considering one side effect seen was crippling depression, and another was the resurgence of dominant Multiple Sclerosis in one patient, maybe you should just deal with the beer gut, hangovers, Funyuns cravings and lengthy arguments about whether or not god is really like, this green and pink ball of light that you saw one time in the parking lot of the Circle K.
Read more from Robert at his own site,
I Fight Robots, where you can be assured that there will never, ever be a discussion about spirituality versus religion or the importance of vegan shoes.
Robert Brockway
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