1 00:00:05,800 --> 00:00:07,800 Speaker 1: Hey, Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name 2 00:00:07,840 --> 00:00:10,840 Speaker 1: is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. In It's Saturday. 3 00:00:11,000 --> 00:00:13,520 Speaker 1: Time to go into the vault. Now this time we're 4 00:00:13,560 --> 00:00:17,159 Speaker 1: going to be listening to part two of the the 5 00:00:17,200 --> 00:00:22,400 Speaker 1: episode from last Saturday, the episode originally from September that 6 00:00:22,440 --> 00:00:25,560 Speaker 1: you and Christian did about Timothy Leary. Yeah, we figured 7 00:00:25,640 --> 00:00:28,160 Speaker 1: since we have the big psychedelic series that we've been 8 00:00:28,360 --> 00:00:30,360 Speaker 1: putting out, you know, the new episodes of Stuff to 9 00:00:30,360 --> 00:00:33,200 Speaker 1: Blow Your Mind, it made sense to revisit these older 10 00:00:33,240 --> 00:00:37,280 Speaker 1: episodes that that explored some of the similar territory, you know, 11 00:00:37,360 --> 00:00:40,440 Speaker 1: some similar history by focusing in on the life and 12 00:00:40,560 --> 00:00:46,559 Speaker 1: death of Timothy Leary. All right, so we hope you enjoy. 13 00:00:47,240 --> 00:00:50,080 Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 14 00:00:50,080 --> 00:00:58,720 Speaker 1: Works dot Com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 15 00:00:58,800 --> 00:01:01,320 Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Christian Segar, and 16 00:01:01,360 --> 00:01:05,039 Speaker 1: this is part two of our Timothy Leary l s 17 00:01:05,160 --> 00:01:08,839 Speaker 1: D series of episodes. We've already done part one where 18 00:01:08,840 --> 00:01:11,560 Speaker 1: we talk about the basic science behind l s D 19 00:01:12,040 --> 00:01:15,080 Speaker 1: and psilocybin and the research that's been done using these 20 00:01:15,080 --> 00:01:18,160 Speaker 1: psychedelic substances. And we talked about the first part of 21 00:01:18,200 --> 00:01:22,559 Speaker 1: Timothy Leary's life leading up to his research on this. Yes, 22 00:01:22,600 --> 00:01:25,160 Speaker 1: that's right. So if you if you missed part one, 23 00:01:25,440 --> 00:01:27,160 Speaker 1: go back and listen to it, because that's the one 24 00:01:27,200 --> 00:01:29,520 Speaker 1: that's going to be front loaded with all that LSD 25 00:01:29,600 --> 00:01:33,600 Speaker 1: science and just the initial period of Leary's life which 26 00:01:34,160 --> 00:01:38,000 Speaker 1: which ultimately kind of sets the sets the pace for 27 00:01:38,080 --> 00:01:41,480 Speaker 1: the rest of his life, like the destruct self destructive behaviors, 28 00:01:41,520 --> 00:01:46,119 Speaker 1: the patterns, they're all pretty much present before he even 29 00:01:46,360 --> 00:01:49,440 Speaker 1: you know, gets that finishes his education. So I've been 30 00:01:49,480 --> 00:01:51,960 Speaker 1: sitting around the house reading about Timothy Leary for the 31 00:01:52,000 --> 00:01:54,880 Speaker 1: last couple of days and my wife says, out of nowhere, 32 00:01:55,160 --> 00:01:59,080 Speaker 1: you know, I met him, right, And I was like, no, really, 33 00:01:59,160 --> 00:02:02,080 Speaker 1: And we both went to college at the University of 34 00:02:02,080 --> 00:02:05,440 Speaker 1: New Hampshire for undergraduate and before I got there, but 35 00:02:05,480 --> 00:02:08,760 Speaker 1: while she was there, either as a freshman or sophomore. Uh, 36 00:02:08,760 --> 00:02:12,440 Speaker 1: Timothy Learry came on one of his infamous campus speaking tours, 37 00:02:12,840 --> 00:02:15,600 Speaker 1: gave one of his you know, enlightenment talks, and then 38 00:02:15,680 --> 00:02:19,040 Speaker 1: afterwards my wife was outside the venue just like smoking 39 00:02:19,040 --> 00:02:22,040 Speaker 1: a cigarette, and Timothy Leary came out and sat down 40 00:02:22,040 --> 00:02:23,880 Speaker 1: next to her and just smoked a cigarette with her, 41 00:02:23,919 --> 00:02:26,280 Speaker 1: and they chatted for like five or ten minutes, and 42 00:02:26,280 --> 00:02:28,000 Speaker 1: then he got up and went on his way. What 43 00:02:28,080 --> 00:02:30,200 Speaker 1: they talked about, she didn't really say. She just said 44 00:02:30,200 --> 00:02:33,920 Speaker 1: that like he was this kind of kind cool older guy. 45 00:02:34,320 --> 00:02:38,560 Speaker 1: But when I read about his life and all of 46 00:02:38,600 --> 00:02:42,840 Speaker 1: the uh sort of women he went through, I can't 47 00:02:42,840 --> 00:02:45,240 Speaker 1: help but imagine that he's the kind of like old 48 00:02:45,320 --> 00:02:48,280 Speaker 1: He was the kind of older man who leeringly went 49 00:02:48,360 --> 00:02:51,600 Speaker 1: up to eighteen year old girls after talks and was like, 50 00:02:51,680 --> 00:02:54,720 Speaker 1: let's talk about LSD. You know. Yeah. One of the 51 00:02:54,760 --> 00:02:57,520 Speaker 1: interesting things that Robert Greenfield points out in his biography, though, 52 00:02:57,560 --> 00:03:02,080 Speaker 1: is that apparently, like there's the Leary that we all imagine, 53 00:03:02,120 --> 00:03:05,680 Speaker 1: which is often that that cool older guy, you know, 54 00:03:05,840 --> 00:03:08,600 Speaker 1: with all this charisma and certainly seems to have had 55 00:03:08,600 --> 00:03:11,799 Speaker 1: a certain amount of Christmas entire life. But there's there 56 00:03:11,919 --> 00:03:15,200 Speaker 1: was this period where he was kind of like a um, 57 00:03:16,560 --> 00:03:18,919 Speaker 1: kind of just like a greasy guy with a mustache 58 00:03:19,200 --> 00:03:21,720 Speaker 1: in ill fitting clothing. Like that was the version of 59 00:03:21,800 --> 00:03:26,120 Speaker 1: him before his first wife died. Uh. And it's it 60 00:03:26,240 --> 00:03:28,880 Speaker 1: was after that that things begin to change and he 61 00:03:28,960 --> 00:03:32,360 Speaker 1: kind of morphed into this uh this more you know, 62 00:03:32,720 --> 00:03:36,240 Speaker 1: the older hip cool Leary that we instantly imagine. And 63 00:03:36,280 --> 00:03:39,840 Speaker 1: this really all began at Harvard University, the place you 64 00:03:39,840 --> 00:03:43,680 Speaker 1: would least expect it. So Leary joined Harvard University in 65 00:03:43,800 --> 00:03:46,720 Speaker 1: nineteen fifty nine. But contrary to myth, I want to 66 00:03:46,800 --> 00:03:50,240 Speaker 1: establish this because so many of the research got pieces 67 00:03:50,280 --> 00:03:53,360 Speaker 1: of research got this wrong. He taught there, but he 68 00:03:53,440 --> 00:03:56,360 Speaker 1: was not a professor there. He was not like a 69 00:03:56,960 --> 00:04:01,160 Speaker 1: tenured faculty. Okay, he was teaching there for sure, and 70 00:04:01,200 --> 00:04:03,880 Speaker 1: he was part of the psychology department. Now originally his 71 00:04:04,000 --> 00:04:07,680 Speaker 1: research they're focused on the interaction of dimensions of personality 72 00:04:07,720 --> 00:04:11,400 Speaker 1: and social relationships. He also did some work there as 73 00:04:11,400 --> 00:04:17,280 Speaker 1: a psychotherapist. Leary was really anti behaviorism, and he disagreed 74 00:04:17,360 --> 00:04:22,760 Speaker 1: that psychologists should only concern themselves with observable behavior. This 75 00:04:22,839 --> 00:04:25,560 Speaker 1: was the exact opposite of what was in trend at 76 00:04:25,560 --> 00:04:29,320 Speaker 1: the time. He more wanted to explore thoughts and beliefs 77 00:04:29,360 --> 00:04:33,640 Speaker 1: and other internal mental states. He actually later on would 78 00:04:33,680 --> 00:04:37,719 Speaker 1: compare himself in this role to William James, who is 79 00:04:37,920 --> 00:04:41,599 Speaker 1: understood as the father of American psychology, uh and who 80 00:04:41,680 --> 00:04:46,159 Speaker 1: was also known to use nitrous oxide to stimulate mystical consciousness. Well, 81 00:04:46,400 --> 00:04:49,839 Speaker 1: so would Lear. Yeah. Later on, uh so at Harvard 82 00:04:49,920 --> 00:04:52,520 Speaker 1: along with a guy named Richard Alpert who would later 83 00:04:52,560 --> 00:04:56,279 Speaker 1: go on to become Rom Doss. Uh This you might 84 00:04:56,320 --> 00:05:00,000 Speaker 1: know Ram Doss from the sort of infamous meditation book 85 00:05:00,040 --> 00:05:03,200 Speaker 1: I guess called be Here Now. Uh So he they 86 00:05:03,320 --> 00:05:07,640 Speaker 1: worked together there in the psychology department. Leary introduced others 87 00:05:07,680 --> 00:05:11,400 Speaker 1: on the Harvard faculty to psilocybin. And this, as we 88 00:05:11,400 --> 00:05:14,320 Speaker 1: talked about last episode, is the active ingredient in certain 89 00:05:14,360 --> 00:05:18,320 Speaker 1: species of mushrooms. And at the time it was legally 90 00:05:18,360 --> 00:05:21,800 Speaker 1: available for research. But what about his first experience with 91 00:05:21,839 --> 00:05:25,479 Speaker 1: this stuff? Well, he takes psilocybin while he's on vacation 92 00:05:25,640 --> 00:05:28,880 Speaker 1: in Quernavaca, Mexico. This is he and some friends were 93 00:05:28,880 --> 00:05:33,479 Speaker 1: on vacation in between semesters. They took some samples of mushrooms. Uh. 94 00:05:33,480 --> 00:05:36,279 Speaker 1: And their argument for the research that they were doing. 95 00:05:36,320 --> 00:05:39,880 Speaker 1: This is back at Harvard was that if psychology is 96 00:05:39,920 --> 00:05:42,039 Speaker 1: the study of the mind, then it should have a 97 00:05:42,120 --> 00:05:46,760 Speaker 1: legitimate interest in how cognition, perception, and emotion are affected 98 00:05:46,760 --> 00:05:50,520 Speaker 1: by mind altering substances. So some argued at the time 99 00:05:50,600 --> 00:05:53,680 Speaker 1: that they were also unaware of the potential dangers of 100 00:05:53,680 --> 00:05:57,880 Speaker 1: such research. Right, So, because psilocybin and LSD were so 101 00:05:58,040 --> 00:06:01,360 Speaker 1: new on the scene, especially in America, uh that this 102 00:06:01,400 --> 00:06:04,640 Speaker 1: team of psychologists, no matter how good intention they were, 103 00:06:04,720 --> 00:06:08,880 Speaker 1: they weren't aware of what the drawbacks could be, and 104 00:06:09,000 --> 00:06:12,960 Speaker 1: Larry and Albert agreed to policies to protect their subjects. 105 00:06:12,960 --> 00:06:17,520 Speaker 1: So this included no participation from undergraduate students. They were 106 00:06:17,560 --> 00:06:20,800 Speaker 1: not supposed to be giving any kind of psychedelics to 107 00:06:20,800 --> 00:06:24,880 Speaker 1: the undergraduate students at Harvard, but in nineteen sixty three, 108 00:06:25,000 --> 00:06:29,560 Speaker 1: Albert was dismissed after he administered psilocybin to an undergraduate 109 00:06:29,640 --> 00:06:33,160 Speaker 1: off campus, reportedly for sexual favors, although that is it's 110 00:06:33,240 --> 00:06:38,240 Speaker 1: unclear whether or not that's true. So Leary begins administering 111 00:06:38,400 --> 00:06:41,640 Speaker 1: these drugs to other researchers. He also administers it to 112 00:06:41,720 --> 00:06:44,560 Speaker 1: a group of prison inmates and a group of Divinity 113 00:06:44,680 --> 00:06:50,080 Speaker 1: students for his research. This was called the Harvard Psilocybin Project, 114 00:06:50,520 --> 00:06:53,279 Speaker 1: and the goal basically of this project was to document 115 00:06:53,360 --> 00:06:58,080 Speaker 1: the effects of psychedelics on human consciousness. The notes from 116 00:06:58,120 --> 00:07:01,000 Speaker 1: these studies were very carefully doc commented in scripted, and 117 00:07:01,000 --> 00:07:04,320 Speaker 1: we know this because Timothy Leary's archives are pretty well 118 00:07:04,360 --> 00:07:06,760 Speaker 1: maintained in there at the new York Public Library. Yeah, 119 00:07:07,080 --> 00:07:09,320 Speaker 1: in the various product he was involved, and he was 120 00:07:09,520 --> 00:07:12,360 Speaker 1: he was apparently very big on everyone providing him with 121 00:07:12,480 --> 00:07:15,520 Speaker 1: lots of data, and it was kind of a meticulous 122 00:07:15,560 --> 00:07:18,560 Speaker 1: record keeper in that regard. So let's take a little 123 00:07:18,600 --> 00:07:21,559 Speaker 1: bit closer look at these these studies that he did. Okay, 124 00:07:21,640 --> 00:07:23,280 Speaker 1: let's look first at the one that he did with 125 00:07:23,320 --> 00:07:26,120 Speaker 1: a group of Divinity students. So this was called the 126 00:07:26,160 --> 00:07:29,600 Speaker 1: Good Friday Experiment, and it went like this. They gave 127 00:07:29,640 --> 00:07:34,160 Speaker 1: psilocybin to ten students and ten to a placebo group. 128 00:07:34,720 --> 00:07:37,520 Speaker 1: All of them then went to a Good Friday service. 129 00:07:38,240 --> 00:07:40,760 Speaker 1: They wanted to see if this would facilitate any kind 130 00:07:40,760 --> 00:07:44,000 Speaker 1: of mystical or spiritual experience, and in fact, eight of 131 00:07:44,040 --> 00:07:48,240 Speaker 1: the ten reported a mystical experience. One reported a feeling 132 00:07:48,240 --> 00:07:52,480 Speaker 1: of sacredness in a sense of peace. The placebo group, however, 133 00:07:52,640 --> 00:07:56,680 Speaker 1: sat quietly through the service. The others would quote laid 134 00:07:56,720 --> 00:08:00,240 Speaker 1: down or wander around the chapel muttering things like odd 135 00:08:00,280 --> 00:08:04,880 Speaker 1: is everywhere or oh the glory. What Leary failed to 136 00:08:04,920 --> 00:08:07,800 Speaker 1: report in the study was that one of the subjects 137 00:08:07,840 --> 00:08:10,680 Speaker 1: actually had a disturbing reaction and had to be given 138 00:08:10,720 --> 00:08:14,200 Speaker 1: a dose of thorazine to calm down. Now you look 139 00:08:14,240 --> 00:08:18,320 Speaker 1: back on this, that's a huge lapse of research ethics. 140 00:08:18,360 --> 00:08:23,600 Speaker 1: That's that's not good. So so that's unfortunate. Now, Rick Doblin, 141 00:08:23,760 --> 00:08:28,280 Speaker 1: who is the founder of MAPS, the Multidisciplinary Association for 142 00:08:28,320 --> 00:08:30,520 Speaker 1: Psychedelic Studies, he's come up on the show before. We 143 00:08:30,600 --> 00:08:32,800 Speaker 1: talked especially about MAPS during our M d M A 144 00:08:32,840 --> 00:08:36,000 Speaker 1: two parter. He went back and he replicated this study, 145 00:08:36,400 --> 00:08:39,680 Speaker 1: and he interviewed seven of the ten students involved, and 146 00:08:39,720 --> 00:08:43,120 Speaker 1: they all said the experience reshaped their lives in profound ways. 147 00:08:43,520 --> 00:08:46,840 Speaker 1: The student who reacted poorly actually said that he became 148 00:08:46,920 --> 00:08:50,400 Speaker 1: convinced that he had been chosen to announce the arrival 149 00:08:50,480 --> 00:08:54,360 Speaker 1: of the Messiah and ran from the chapel. So this 150 00:08:54,440 --> 00:08:57,360 Speaker 1: is apparently what actually happened. He freaked out, he started 151 00:08:57,400 --> 00:09:00,520 Speaker 1: running away from the chapel. Responsibility like you need that 152 00:09:00,600 --> 00:09:03,480 Speaker 1: now if he's gonna announced the Messiah on Good Friday, Yeah, 153 00:09:03,520 --> 00:09:08,280 Speaker 1: of course, yeah, give me some advanced prep on some 154 00:09:08,280 --> 00:09:10,680 Speaker 1: more prep time. All right, let's talk about the Conquered 155 00:09:10,679 --> 00:09:14,120 Speaker 1: Prison experiment next. Okay, this is even wilder. So the 156 00:09:14,240 --> 00:09:18,480 Speaker 1: aim here was to use psychedelics to reduce the recidivism 157 00:09:18,640 --> 00:09:21,840 Speaker 1: rate and inmates. Now, Leary was was not interested in 158 00:09:21,880 --> 00:09:24,960 Speaker 1: working with prisoners for a few different reasons, but he 159 00:09:25,000 --> 00:09:28,160 Speaker 1: realized that he needed a way to measure that the 160 00:09:28,200 --> 00:09:31,079 Speaker 1: transformative nature of the drugs that he so believed in, 161 00:09:31,320 --> 00:09:34,240 Speaker 1: and this offered the chance. So it seems like a 162 00:09:34,240 --> 00:09:38,840 Speaker 1: decent argument, right. Could these substances open inmates up in 163 00:09:38,880 --> 00:09:42,280 Speaker 1: a way that allowed them to discuss their conditions and 164 00:09:42,280 --> 00:09:45,040 Speaker 1: their feelings, you know, someone who's just been hardened and 165 00:09:45,120 --> 00:09:50,080 Speaker 1: calloused by you know, by crime, by life, and by incarceration. 166 00:09:50,440 --> 00:09:52,840 Speaker 1: Could this be the substance to just loosen them up 167 00:09:52,960 --> 00:09:55,600 Speaker 1: enough to actually get some some work done with them. 168 00:09:55,800 --> 00:09:59,120 Speaker 1: So over the course of nine months, they used over 169 00:09:59,160 --> 00:10:03,680 Speaker 1: a dozen convicts there as test subjects with psychedelics. Again, 170 00:10:04,000 --> 00:10:10,160 Speaker 1: Rick Doblin replicated this study and re analyzed it in UH. 171 00:10:10,200 --> 00:10:15,120 Speaker 1: He found that Learry's conclusion wasn't warranted. Larry's conclusion was 172 00:10:15,480 --> 00:10:20,120 Speaker 1: the recidivism rate has been significantly reduced, but Rick actually 173 00:10:20,120 --> 00:10:23,920 Speaker 1: found maybe not so much. Timothy Learry, Uh, the flaw 174 00:10:24,120 --> 00:10:27,040 Speaker 1: was in the reporting results. He looked at recidivism rates 175 00:10:27,200 --> 00:10:31,320 Speaker 1: ten months after release for the psilocybin takers, but he 176 00:10:31,320 --> 00:10:33,720 Speaker 1: didn't look at the same amount of time. For the 177 00:10:33,720 --> 00:10:36,520 Speaker 1: control group, he only looked at them thirty months later. 178 00:10:36,760 --> 00:10:39,960 Speaker 1: And this is important because recidivism depends a lot on time, 179 00:10:40,240 --> 00:10:43,760 Speaker 1: with rates rising the more time one is out because 180 00:10:43,800 --> 00:10:46,960 Speaker 1: of the increased opportunities. You know, when are you gonna 181 00:10:47,360 --> 00:10:49,240 Speaker 1: end up getting busted and end up going to back 182 00:10:49,280 --> 00:10:51,079 Speaker 1: to jail? Is going to be the first day year out? Now, 183 00:10:51,120 --> 00:10:53,240 Speaker 1: it's going to be in the weeks that follow as 184 00:10:53,280 --> 00:10:55,880 Speaker 1: more and more temptations come. Yeah, We've talked about this 185 00:10:55,920 --> 00:10:59,040 Speaker 1: on the show Gee's many many times, but this goes 186 00:11:00,080 --> 00:11:02,480 Speaker 1: It speaks to something called the halo effect, right, where 187 00:11:02,559 --> 00:11:06,120 Speaker 1: researchers start seeing their data in a positive light as 188 00:11:06,200 --> 00:11:09,679 Speaker 1: much as possible. This becomes misleading. This actually seems to 189 00:11:09,720 --> 00:11:12,079 Speaker 1: go beyond the halo effect. Right, He's not just seeing 190 00:11:12,120 --> 00:11:15,040 Speaker 1: his data in a positive light. He's manipulating the data 191 00:11:15,440 --> 00:11:19,240 Speaker 1: so that it looks better than actually is. So already 192 00:11:19,280 --> 00:11:23,040 Speaker 1: here you see, like these are basically his two big 193 00:11:23,120 --> 00:11:28,800 Speaker 1: studies on using psychedelics medically in any kind of way, 194 00:11:28,840 --> 00:11:33,160 Speaker 1: and he's uh either falsified as research or or made 195 00:11:33,240 --> 00:11:37,280 Speaker 1: huge gaps in in ethical claims. Now. Albert would later 196 00:11:37,760 --> 00:11:40,320 Speaker 1: explain that the aim of the project he thought was 197 00:11:40,320 --> 00:11:44,040 Speaker 1: was pretty solid and with a very reasonable therapeutic model. 198 00:11:44,640 --> 00:11:48,280 Speaker 1: But he says it would have required long term application 199 00:11:48,360 --> 00:11:52,040 Speaker 1: and study, and Leary simply didn't have the patients for 200 00:11:52,160 --> 00:11:56,920 Speaker 1: long term studies. Um, which it's you can be to 201 00:11:56,960 --> 00:11:58,640 Speaker 1: make the argument, Well, then you're kind of in the 202 00:11:59,360 --> 00:12:01,640 Speaker 1: wrong line of business here, right. I mean, if you 203 00:12:02,000 --> 00:12:04,160 Speaker 1: if you want to conduct a scientific study, if you 204 00:12:04,200 --> 00:12:07,679 Speaker 1: want to really um do the work, then you need 205 00:12:07,720 --> 00:12:10,480 Speaker 1: to have the patients to see it through. And if 206 00:12:10,520 --> 00:12:12,120 Speaker 1: you if you don't have the patients, you're gonna end 207 00:12:12,240 --> 00:12:15,480 Speaker 1: up with what we have here, a a flawed study 208 00:12:15,760 --> 00:12:19,400 Speaker 1: that ends up having to be thrown out later on. Now, 209 00:12:19,440 --> 00:12:22,600 Speaker 1: remember how I was saying that the the notes that 210 00:12:22,679 --> 00:12:26,199 Speaker 1: he took during this time were meticulous. Wired magazine did 211 00:12:26,200 --> 00:12:28,520 Speaker 1: a great article and Timothy Leary and I pulled a 212 00:12:28,600 --> 00:12:31,960 Speaker 1: quote directly from it. They said later reports adhere less 213 00:12:32,040 --> 00:12:35,840 Speaker 1: strictly to reality, meaning his reports in one filled out 214 00:12:35,880 --> 00:12:38,719 Speaker 1: in March of nineteen sixty three, just weeks before he 215 00:12:38,760 --> 00:12:42,160 Speaker 1: got kicked out of Harvard Leary Prince in big block letters, 216 00:12:42,400 --> 00:12:45,040 Speaker 1: he puts down a question mark for his age, enlists 217 00:12:45,080 --> 00:12:50,920 Speaker 1: his occupation as angel. Okay, yeah, so you can start 218 00:12:50,920 --> 00:12:54,280 Speaker 1: to see that he's already unraveling here, right. So Larry 219 00:12:54,320 --> 00:12:57,760 Speaker 1: eventually moves on from psilocybin and he tries LSD in 220 00:12:57,840 --> 00:13:01,120 Speaker 1: nineteen sixty two and then was dismissed from Harvard in 221 00:13:01,200 --> 00:13:04,839 Speaker 1: nineteen sixty three. Various faculty and administrators were essentially worried 222 00:13:04,880 --> 00:13:08,080 Speaker 1: about the safety of their subjects, especially because Larry and 223 00:13:08,080 --> 00:13:11,280 Speaker 1: Albert were conducting their research while they themselves were under 224 00:13:11,320 --> 00:13:17,199 Speaker 1: the influence of psilocybin. Psychologist Professor Herbert C. Kellman circulated 225 00:13:17,240 --> 00:13:19,560 Speaker 1: a letter around the faculty and called for a meeting 226 00:13:19,880 --> 00:13:23,200 Speaker 1: calling for the trials to be voluntary. One of Larry's 227 00:13:23,240 --> 00:13:25,679 Speaker 1: former students remembers that they had a choice at the 228 00:13:25,760 --> 00:13:28,000 Speaker 1: end of the semester. They could either take their final 229 00:13:28,360 --> 00:13:33,120 Speaker 1: or they could participate in psilocybin trials. So it's interesting. 230 00:13:33,559 --> 00:13:36,240 Speaker 1: That's an interesting choice to make. Yeah, yeah, it is 231 00:13:36,320 --> 00:13:39,440 Speaker 1: an odd choice to give a college student. So okay, 232 00:13:39,520 --> 00:13:42,000 Speaker 1: after all this stuff of the faculty, Larry was officially 233 00:13:42,040 --> 00:13:46,600 Speaker 1: fired for failing to fulfill his teaching obligations because he 234 00:13:46,640 --> 00:13:49,559 Speaker 1: went traveling instead. This is actually what they nailed him 235 00:13:49,559 --> 00:13:52,160 Speaker 1: for was that he wasn't teaching his classes. It wasn't 236 00:13:52,480 --> 00:13:54,439 Speaker 1: the actual research that he was doing. He was just 237 00:13:54,520 --> 00:13:56,520 Speaker 1: kind of like, I'm just going to travel instead of 238 00:13:56,520 --> 00:13:59,160 Speaker 1: teaching my classes. And they were like, look, the job, 239 00:13:59,480 --> 00:14:02,520 Speaker 1: says teach the classes. You're not really doing the job. Sorry, 240 00:14:02,520 --> 00:14:05,880 Speaker 1: you're done. Now. This is the moment where Leary and Alpert, though, 241 00:14:05,920 --> 00:14:08,880 Speaker 1: are propelled into stardom because they get kicked out of 242 00:14:08,920 --> 00:14:11,040 Speaker 1: Harvard and that's a big deal, right, and they become 243 00:14:11,160 --> 00:14:15,360 Speaker 1: proponents for psychedelics. Peter Connors writes this book called The 244 00:14:15,360 --> 00:14:18,920 Speaker 1: White Hand Society about Leary and his relationship with Alan Ginsburg. 245 00:14:19,360 --> 00:14:21,600 Speaker 1: He says, this is really there's a certain point, and 246 00:14:21,640 --> 00:14:24,560 Speaker 1: this is it where Larry gives up on science. Instead 247 00:14:24,560 --> 00:14:28,320 Speaker 1: of looking for data to legitimize his psychedelic research, he 248 00:14:28,360 --> 00:14:33,120 Speaker 1: started talking about spiritual enlightenment instead. This wasn't entirely his fault, 249 00:14:33,160 --> 00:14:36,320 Speaker 1: because let's think about it, he had no adequate scientific 250 00:14:36,440 --> 00:14:39,960 Speaker 1: language in place to do so. Uh. Instead he fell 251 00:14:40,040 --> 00:14:42,720 Speaker 1: back on hip poetic language that he picked up from 252 00:14:42,720 --> 00:14:45,880 Speaker 1: hanging out with people like Alan Ginsberg and Charles Olsen, 253 00:14:46,360 --> 00:14:49,720 Speaker 1: and that really ended the field of psychology taking him 254 00:14:49,720 --> 00:14:52,640 Speaker 1: seriously and anyway. But it also makes me think like 255 00:14:52,720 --> 00:14:56,080 Speaker 1: ultimately Leary, like this is a guy who was better 256 00:14:56,120 --> 00:14:57,880 Speaker 1: suited to be a shaman than a scientist. This is 257 00:14:57,880 --> 00:15:01,760 Speaker 1: a guy who's beterfitted to be this this celebrity figure 258 00:15:01,880 --> 00:15:05,080 Speaker 1: than than than an actual researcher. Yeah, and now I 259 00:15:05,120 --> 00:15:08,560 Speaker 1: have a lovely story before we end the Harvard stuff 260 00:15:08,560 --> 00:15:11,760 Speaker 1: and jump into his time with the Millbrook group. So 261 00:15:12,040 --> 00:15:15,520 Speaker 1: William S. Burrows is one of the people who actually 262 00:15:15,640 --> 00:15:20,479 Speaker 1: denounced Timothy Leary for the same thing. WILLIAMS Burrows obviously 263 00:15:20,640 --> 00:15:23,960 Speaker 1: interested in psychedelics, author of Naked Lunch. Yeah, he goes 264 00:15:24,040 --> 00:15:27,120 Speaker 1: to visit Timothy Leary while he's at Harvard. And Burrows 265 00:15:27,600 --> 00:15:30,680 Speaker 1: gets there and he's like, where are the scientific studies? 266 00:15:30,720 --> 00:15:33,440 Speaker 1: Like I expected there to be mazes with rats running 267 00:15:33,440 --> 00:15:36,560 Speaker 1: through them and electrodes and stuff. What you aren't proving anything. 268 00:15:36,920 --> 00:15:38,920 Speaker 1: All you're doing is just sitting around and getting high 269 00:15:38,960 --> 00:15:43,720 Speaker 1: and enjoying yourself. So even william S Burrows was like, no, sorry, 270 00:15:43,840 --> 00:15:46,640 Speaker 1: Like I'm not buying this. So it makes you sympathize 271 00:15:46,680 --> 00:15:49,160 Speaker 1: with this Harvard faculty crew who are like kind of 272 00:15:49,160 --> 00:15:51,680 Speaker 1: painted throughout the history of psychedelics as just being these 273 00:15:51,720 --> 00:15:54,640 Speaker 1: like stodgy old men, right, But like even william S 274 00:15:54,640 --> 00:15:58,000 Speaker 1: Burrows was like, you're not really doing anything here. Yea. 275 00:15:58,200 --> 00:16:00,600 Speaker 1: Burrows is basically saying, I thought you or one of them, 276 00:16:00,600 --> 00:16:04,320 Speaker 1: but you're just one of us, you know, yeah, yeah, exactly. 277 00:16:04,560 --> 00:16:06,160 Speaker 1: All Right, we're gonna take a quick break and when 278 00:16:06,200 --> 00:16:08,160 Speaker 1: we come back, we're gonna move on to the next 279 00:16:08,240 --> 00:16:12,880 Speaker 1: chapter in the life of Timothy Leary. Alright, we're back. 280 00:16:13,320 --> 00:16:15,760 Speaker 1: So this is a great quote that comes from Louis 281 00:16:15,840 --> 00:16:19,360 Speaker 1: Mannan's New Yorker article on Timothy Leary, and I think 282 00:16:19,360 --> 00:16:21,880 Speaker 1: it's a good segue into his time with the Millbrook Group. 283 00:16:21,880 --> 00:16:25,440 Speaker 1: He says the only things Leary was serious about were 284 00:16:25,480 --> 00:16:30,200 Speaker 1: pleasure and renown. He underwent no fundamental transformation when he 285 00:16:30,280 --> 00:16:33,520 Speaker 1: left the academic world for the counterculture. He liked women, 286 00:16:33,720 --> 00:16:35,960 Speaker 1: he liked being the center of attention, and he liked 287 00:16:36,000 --> 00:16:38,640 Speaker 1: to get high. And then there's this is another quote 288 00:16:38,640 --> 00:16:41,720 Speaker 1: from it. He was a counter culture salesman, and he 289 00:16:41,720 --> 00:16:45,760 Speaker 1: wore on every occasion the same blissed out smile, a 290 00:16:45,880 --> 00:16:49,400 Speaker 1: rictus somewhere between a beat a fick, what me worry 291 00:16:49,440 --> 00:16:53,320 Speaker 1: grin and a movie stars frozen stare into the flash bulbs. 292 00:16:53,480 --> 00:16:57,280 Speaker 1: One of his ex wives described it as the smile 293 00:16:57,480 --> 00:17:02,440 Speaker 1: of the ego actually eating the per sonality that I 294 00:17:02,800 --> 00:17:09,720 Speaker 1: can't think of a harsher condemnation. That's brutal. Alright, So 295 00:17:10,280 --> 00:17:12,159 Speaker 1: these guys get kicked out of Harvard. That's where we 296 00:17:12,240 --> 00:17:16,399 Speaker 1: left off, basically, right, Albert and Leary they go and 297 00:17:16,440 --> 00:17:19,399 Speaker 1: they say, well, let's just establish our own privately funded 298 00:17:19,440 --> 00:17:21,600 Speaker 1: research group, and we're going to call it the International 299 00:17:21,600 --> 00:17:25,920 Speaker 1: Foundation for Internal Freedom, and it's going to be in Mexico. Basically, 300 00:17:26,119 --> 00:17:28,080 Speaker 1: we'll get a bunch of people around the world to 301 00:17:28,160 --> 00:17:31,520 Speaker 1: form groups. They'll take LSD and they'll report their results 302 00:17:31,520 --> 00:17:36,720 Speaker 1: to us. Will be kind of like citizen science, very scientific. Unfortunately, 303 00:17:36,800 --> 00:17:39,360 Speaker 1: the Mexican government wasn't having it, so they stepped in 304 00:17:39,440 --> 00:17:43,160 Speaker 1: and they demanded that Albert and uh Leary leave. So 305 00:17:43,400 --> 00:17:45,959 Speaker 1: they leave. They've got no place left to go. Cambridge 306 00:17:46,000 --> 00:17:48,680 Speaker 1: doesn't want them, Mexico doesn't want them. Well, where do 307 00:17:48,720 --> 00:17:51,359 Speaker 1: they go? They go to this country estate in Millbrook, 308 00:17:51,440 --> 00:17:54,640 Speaker 1: New York that was provided to them by a millionaire 309 00:17:54,680 --> 00:17:57,560 Speaker 1: who sympathized with their research in LSD. This is what 310 00:17:57,600 --> 00:18:00,520 Speaker 1: we all need, man, We just need a sympathetic millionaire. 311 00:18:01,359 --> 00:18:06,240 Speaker 1: This millionaire was William Melon Hitchcock, also known as Mr Billy. 312 00:18:06,960 --> 00:18:10,240 Speaker 1: Huh yeah, Mr Billy was the grandson of the founder 313 00:18:10,359 --> 00:18:13,120 Speaker 1: of Gulf Oil. This is where all his money came from. 314 00:18:13,160 --> 00:18:17,439 Speaker 1: And at Millbrook, Leary established what he called the Castallia Foundation, 315 00:18:17,520 --> 00:18:20,840 Speaker 1: which he said was dedicated to the scholarly study of 316 00:18:21,080 --> 00:18:25,199 Speaker 1: LSD and its spiritual applications. So what's one of the 317 00:18:25,200 --> 00:18:28,359 Speaker 1: things he does while he's there that's anywhere close to academic. 318 00:18:28,760 --> 00:18:33,320 Speaker 1: He helps develop a device that's called the experiential typewriter. Uh, 319 00:18:33,400 --> 00:18:37,800 Speaker 1: and this allows psychedelic subjects to record what they're experiencing 320 00:18:37,840 --> 00:18:40,800 Speaker 1: as it's happening. Otherwise they can't tell you. This is 321 00:18:40,920 --> 00:18:45,600 Speaker 1: essentially him saying I can't not be high while I'm 322 00:18:45,640 --> 00:18:48,600 Speaker 1: doing these studies on people, So we need something that 323 00:18:48,640 --> 00:18:52,320 Speaker 1: we can just hit buttons of to get across what's happening, 324 00:18:52,400 --> 00:18:54,479 Speaker 1: rather than have somebody who's in the room who can 325 00:18:54,520 --> 00:18:57,320 Speaker 1: sort of translate it. Right, It's easier to have a 326 00:18:57,480 --> 00:19:00,760 Speaker 1: special typewriter for people that that are high then to 327 00:19:00,840 --> 00:19:04,359 Speaker 1: have a single person that is not high. And seems 328 00:19:04,400 --> 00:19:06,840 Speaker 1: to be the case. Yeah, yeah. So this thing looked 329 00:19:06,840 --> 00:19:09,840 Speaker 1: like an old adding machine, had large buttons on it 330 00:19:09,880 --> 00:19:12,679 Speaker 1: that had labels to indicate what kind of bodily sensations 331 00:19:12,760 --> 00:19:15,840 Speaker 1: you're experiencing or if you were having hallucinations or you 332 00:19:15,880 --> 00:19:18,199 Speaker 1: had a sense of entering the void. I'd love to 333 00:19:18,240 --> 00:19:21,000 Speaker 1: see what the graphics. I think it would be an emoji. Right, 334 00:19:21,000 --> 00:19:24,919 Speaker 1: he's describing he was inventing an emoji's only type. Right. 335 00:19:25,000 --> 00:19:27,400 Speaker 1: You know what, Yeah, we're not giving him enough credit. Yeah, 336 00:19:27,520 --> 00:19:30,440 Speaker 1: Tnethy Leary invented emojis. We wouldn't have the Emoji movie 337 00:19:30,480 --> 00:19:33,960 Speaker 1: if we're not to Timothy Leary. Uh, you know, to 338 00:19:33,960 --> 00:19:37,160 Speaker 1: to blame him for something else. Okay, So then this 339 00:19:37,200 --> 00:19:40,119 Speaker 1: thing basically, after you know you're high, you pound on 340 00:19:40,119 --> 00:19:42,320 Speaker 1: all these buttons, it prints out a little paper script 341 00:19:42,359 --> 00:19:45,600 Speaker 1: that records what your trip was like. Uh. Some articles 342 00:19:45,680 --> 00:19:50,320 Speaker 1: characterized the Millbrook Group and Leary as actually not being 343 00:19:50,400 --> 00:19:52,960 Speaker 1: as a kind of like psychedelically crazy as you might 344 00:19:53,040 --> 00:19:56,720 Speaker 1: think they were. Uh. They were sometimes depicted as being 345 00:19:56,840 --> 00:20:01,480 Speaker 1: East Coast upper class elitists and very exclusive. Now Ken 346 00:20:01,600 --> 00:20:06,080 Speaker 1: Kisi and his Mary Pranksters came out there at one point, uh, 347 00:20:06,080 --> 00:20:07,840 Speaker 1: and they were like, oh this is great, let's go 348 00:20:07,920 --> 00:20:10,640 Speaker 1: meet these psychedelic pioneers. And they're like, oh man, these 349 00:20:10,680 --> 00:20:14,080 Speaker 1: guys are just total stiffs. They're boring. Um, So it 350 00:20:14,720 --> 00:20:18,399 Speaker 1: is interesting interaction between these two worlds. Yeah, like because 351 00:20:18,400 --> 00:20:20,199 Speaker 1: you tend to think, well, Leary would have just been 352 00:20:20,240 --> 00:20:23,119 Speaker 1: able to move throughout the counterculture and he would do 353 00:20:23,119 --> 00:20:27,440 Speaker 1: to be embraced everywhere. But but not so so. During 354 00:20:27,480 --> 00:20:30,600 Speaker 1: this time with Millbrook, Leary was convicted on several charges. 355 00:20:30,640 --> 00:20:32,520 Speaker 1: This is when a lot of the prison stuff happens. 356 00:20:33,000 --> 00:20:35,840 Speaker 1: It's all related to drug use in possession. The Millbrook 357 00:20:35,880 --> 00:20:40,240 Speaker 1: house itself was raided and Leary was arrested by who 358 00:20:40,640 --> 00:20:44,639 Speaker 1: G Gordon Liddy. And at the time G. Gordon Liddy 359 00:20:44,880 --> 00:20:48,200 Speaker 1: was he was part of the County Sheriff's department there 360 00:20:48,200 --> 00:20:50,560 Speaker 1: in New York. Now, later on he went to be 361 00:20:50,600 --> 00:20:54,280 Speaker 1: part of the Watergate Burglary. Uh, and he ends up 362 00:20:54,359 --> 00:20:57,720 Speaker 1: kind of teaming up with Timothy Leary down the way. Yeah, 363 00:20:57,760 --> 00:21:00,439 Speaker 1: we'll get into that in a bit. So yeah, so 364 00:21:00,560 --> 00:21:03,520 Speaker 1: this is, man, this is where things just really started 365 00:21:03,520 --> 00:21:08,600 Speaker 1: getting bonkers, right Mill Millbrook and afterwards are just where 366 00:21:08,640 --> 00:21:11,920 Speaker 1: things really let loose with Leary. Yeah. Now, this is 367 00:21:11,960 --> 00:21:16,000 Speaker 1: definitely a period where on one level, uh, Leary and 368 00:21:16,119 --> 00:21:19,399 Speaker 1: his bunch they are being targeted, Yeah, totally. On the 369 00:21:19,400 --> 00:21:21,159 Speaker 1: other hand, you could also say, well, they're kind of 370 00:21:21,160 --> 00:21:25,040 Speaker 1: they're making themselves easy targets. But you know, you eventually 371 00:21:25,119 --> 00:21:27,600 Speaker 1: end up in kind of gray area there when when 372 00:21:27,640 --> 00:21:30,240 Speaker 1: you're saying, well, you know, did he have it coming 373 00:21:30,359 --> 00:21:33,080 Speaker 1: or not. But now, this is certainly a period of 374 00:21:33,080 --> 00:21:35,720 Speaker 1: time though, where you can say that that Leary and 375 00:21:35,840 --> 00:21:38,600 Speaker 1: people in his circle were being targeted by the authorities. 376 00:21:39,240 --> 00:21:41,120 Speaker 1: On the other hand, you might charge while they were, 377 00:21:41,160 --> 00:21:44,359 Speaker 1: they were kind of making themselves ideal targets for these uh, 378 00:21:44,520 --> 00:21:47,680 Speaker 1: for these forces as well. Yeah, yeah, I mean, well, 379 00:21:47,800 --> 00:21:51,040 Speaker 1: let's take this as an example. Okay, so right after 380 00:21:51,119 --> 00:21:54,159 Speaker 1: this raid happened, Leary goes down to New York and 381 00:21:54,320 --> 00:21:57,679 Speaker 1: at the Manhattan Town Hall. There he gives a talk, 382 00:21:57,840 --> 00:22:02,040 Speaker 1: and there he says ls it might actually be a problem, 383 00:22:02,080 --> 00:22:05,120 Speaker 1: And he says, quote l s D maybe creating a 384 00:22:05,160 --> 00:22:09,119 Speaker 1: new race of mutants. This is like the kind of 385 00:22:09,200 --> 00:22:12,919 Speaker 1: hyperbole that he's starting to use in his rhetoric. He 386 00:22:13,000 --> 00:22:15,359 Speaker 1: said he was going to stop using LSD and he 387 00:22:15,480 --> 00:22:18,159 Speaker 1: urged others to do so, but he also advocated that 388 00:22:18,320 --> 00:22:22,480 Speaker 1: LSD would cure alcoholism, accelerate learning, and maybe helpful and 389 00:22:22,520 --> 00:22:24,720 Speaker 1: treating all forms of mental illness. Well, as we know 390 00:22:24,800 --> 00:22:27,040 Speaker 1: from the last episode, some of these things seem to 391 00:22:27,040 --> 00:22:29,480 Speaker 1: be true, we just need to do more research on them. 392 00:22:29,520 --> 00:22:33,080 Speaker 1: But because of its harmful side effects, Leary advised using 393 00:22:33,200 --> 00:22:37,520 Speaker 1: other methods to produce psychedelic effects. So he says, you 394 00:22:37,560 --> 00:22:40,760 Speaker 1: can just simply do this with the right lights, sounds, 395 00:22:40,920 --> 00:22:43,440 Speaker 1: and a stroboscope. So he's basically like, yeah, I just 396 00:22:43,480 --> 00:22:45,960 Speaker 1: don't bother with the LSD anymore, just like get in 397 00:22:46,000 --> 00:22:49,119 Speaker 1: the right mood, man, and we'll like put the right 398 00:22:49,160 --> 00:22:51,800 Speaker 1: kind of colorful lights in the room and things like that, 399 00:22:51,840 --> 00:22:54,000 Speaker 1: and it's the same experience. Well, this is this is 400 00:22:54,000 --> 00:22:55,560 Speaker 1: a really you know, I found this to be a 401 00:22:55,600 --> 00:22:58,680 Speaker 1: really interesting chapter in his life based on Greenfields telling 402 00:22:58,680 --> 00:23:01,440 Speaker 1: in the biography, and I want to just drive home, 403 00:23:01,520 --> 00:23:05,639 Speaker 1: like Greenfield is not a Leary apologist, if anything, Like 404 00:23:05,760 --> 00:23:10,760 Speaker 1: his book could have been titled Timothy Leary colon a mess, right, Yeah, 405 00:23:11,160 --> 00:23:13,840 Speaker 1: but but he gives an interesting account of this. So 406 00:23:15,520 --> 00:23:20,560 Speaker 1: in this talk, Leary prophesieses an evolution in human consciousness 407 00:23:20,680 --> 00:23:24,240 Speaker 1: that will allow humans to consult their own heightened cellular 408 00:23:24,280 --> 00:23:27,600 Speaker 1: consciousness and live in harmony with nature. So basically like 409 00:23:27,680 --> 00:23:31,040 Speaker 1: the abandonment of cities and and everything you know is 410 00:23:31,080 --> 00:23:33,840 Speaker 1: growing green again and where lives like a new Eden. 411 00:23:33,880 --> 00:23:37,439 Speaker 1: On Earth, you know all, you know, sort of you know, 412 00:23:37,560 --> 00:23:42,280 Speaker 1: highly optimistic, sort of hippie dippy kind of ideas, which 413 00:23:42,440 --> 00:23:44,400 Speaker 1: one might expect. But then he calls for a one 414 00:23:44,480 --> 00:23:48,320 Speaker 1: year moratorium analysis D usage. And this is because of 415 00:23:48,560 --> 00:23:51,960 Speaker 1: the changing legal status of of of l s D 416 00:23:52,560 --> 00:23:56,120 Speaker 1: and on the heels of all these various legal problems 417 00:23:56,119 --> 00:24:00,240 Speaker 1: that he's encountering. And uh In Greenfield points out that 418 00:24:00,320 --> 00:24:03,879 Speaker 1: this was quote a calculated strategy to curry favor with 419 00:24:03,920 --> 00:24:07,320 Speaker 1: the establishment. With the current level of LSD use in 420 00:24:07,359 --> 00:24:11,320 Speaker 1: America having reached epidemic proportions, Tim wanted to restore his 421 00:24:11,359 --> 00:24:14,560 Speaker 1: own credibility by becoming the man with a solution to 422 00:24:14,640 --> 00:24:18,040 Speaker 1: the problem. Yeah. I mean, I think this is really 423 00:24:18,080 --> 00:24:23,560 Speaker 1: where we start seeing that he unfortunately made decisions for 424 00:24:23,640 --> 00:24:27,680 Speaker 1: his own well being over the decisions that may have 425 00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:31,719 Speaker 1: you know, helped highlight what these psychedelics were capable of 426 00:24:32,160 --> 00:24:36,160 Speaker 1: any kind of medical or mental health prospect right, Uh, 427 00:24:36,200 --> 00:24:40,879 Speaker 1: and any really was self serving. Yeah. Now you mentioned 428 00:24:40,880 --> 00:24:43,880 Speaker 1: how he said, well you can use all alternate methods. Well, 429 00:24:43,920 --> 00:24:45,920 Speaker 1: he had told he told everyone, well, if you've used 430 00:24:46,000 --> 00:24:48,520 Speaker 1: l s D, then you maybe don't need it anymore. 431 00:24:48,520 --> 00:24:50,000 Speaker 1: You can use alternate methods, and if you don't know 432 00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:52,480 Speaker 1: alternative methods, I'll teach you. You know, this is a 433 00:24:52,520 --> 00:24:55,840 Speaker 1: subch price, I bet, but this is an area where 434 00:24:55,960 --> 00:25:00,159 Speaker 1: I feel like, um, like Leary is correct. You we 435 00:25:00,240 --> 00:25:04,320 Speaker 1: know that there are other ways to to have hallucinatory experiences, 436 00:25:05,200 --> 00:25:10,120 Speaker 1: including meditation, including things like yoga. So he's actually correct here. 437 00:25:10,240 --> 00:25:16,280 Speaker 1: You know, his whatever, his his exact motivations aside. You know, 438 00:25:16,359 --> 00:25:18,320 Speaker 1: he's saying, yeah, you can, you can have some sort 439 00:25:18,320 --> 00:25:21,600 Speaker 1: of heightened sense of of being. You can you can 440 00:25:21,640 --> 00:25:26,320 Speaker 1: have this alternate experience without the use of this substance 441 00:25:26,359 --> 00:25:29,800 Speaker 1: that's becoming problematic now. He even goes on to testify 442 00:25:30,040 --> 00:25:33,080 Speaker 1: before the Senate in nineteen sixty six on the nature 443 00:25:33,080 --> 00:25:35,600 Speaker 1: of l s D. But this turns out to be 444 00:25:35,600 --> 00:25:39,080 Speaker 1: a rather lackluster performance. So he wasn't very assertive. And 445 00:25:39,119 --> 00:25:43,080 Speaker 1: there's it's I was reading the the back and forth 446 00:25:43,119 --> 00:25:45,560 Speaker 1: here and there's just like a lot of stuff where 447 00:25:45,560 --> 00:25:48,639 Speaker 1: he makes a statement and then they're asking him if 448 00:25:48,760 --> 00:25:51,040 Speaker 1: is that is are you being metaphorical or is that 449 00:25:51,080 --> 00:25:54,000 Speaker 1: a literal statement? And they spend time discussing that. They 450 00:25:54,040 --> 00:25:56,920 Speaker 1: talk about how l s D might theoretically be controlled 451 00:25:56,960 --> 00:26:00,760 Speaker 1: in some fashion, but everyone was pretty much disappointed with 452 00:26:00,800 --> 00:26:02,960 Speaker 1: how it came out, Like he basically, this was a 453 00:26:03,040 --> 00:26:06,159 Speaker 1: point where Leary could really stand up and be the like, 454 00:26:06,200 --> 00:26:10,000 Speaker 1: the positive, optimistic voice of the of the counterculture and 455 00:26:10,440 --> 00:26:14,560 Speaker 1: speak for for this substance and speak for its research potential, 456 00:26:14,680 --> 00:26:17,879 Speaker 1: and he wasn't able to come through. I just imagined 457 00:26:17,920 --> 00:26:20,800 Speaker 1: like people like John C. Lily or Sasha Shogun were 458 00:26:20,840 --> 00:26:24,880 Speaker 1: like just sitting at home, like face to palm, just like, oh, 459 00:26:25,200 --> 00:26:27,400 Speaker 1: like man, like you were supposed to be the one 460 00:26:27,480 --> 00:26:30,760 Speaker 1: that made this accessible for the rest of us, and 461 00:26:30,800 --> 00:26:35,120 Speaker 1: now we're all screwed. Also, I'm really glad Twitter wasn't 462 00:26:35,119 --> 00:26:37,399 Speaker 1: around when Timothy Learry was alive. Can you imagine he 463 00:26:37,400 --> 00:26:42,679 Speaker 1: would have been insufferable on Twitter? Probably? All right? This 464 00:26:42,840 --> 00:26:46,080 Speaker 1: is also around the time where he gives his infamous 465 00:26:46,240 --> 00:26:50,400 Speaker 1: nineteen sixties six Playboy interview. This came up in every 466 00:26:50,520 --> 00:26:53,320 Speaker 1: single article I read about him, So I went and 467 00:26:53,320 --> 00:26:56,200 Speaker 1: I pulled the actual text and read the interview. This 468 00:26:56,320 --> 00:26:59,000 Speaker 1: was man. Playboy must have spent a lot of money 469 00:26:59,080 --> 00:27:00,800 Speaker 1: on the sheets of pay bro that they printed this 470 00:27:00,840 --> 00:27:03,920 Speaker 1: interview on because it was like a novel. Uh. He 471 00:27:04,040 --> 00:27:08,920 Speaker 1: makes some really outrageous claims here, including that women commonly 472 00:27:09,080 --> 00:27:12,760 Speaker 1: can have several hundred orgasms during sex on l s D, 473 00:27:13,359 --> 00:27:18,160 Speaker 1: So that doesn't seem to be true. Again, fair enough, 474 00:27:18,200 --> 00:27:20,160 Speaker 1: we haven't done that much research on it, but I'm 475 00:27:20,160 --> 00:27:23,560 Speaker 1: pretty sure that's not true. Uh. Some other stuff he said. 476 00:27:23,600 --> 00:27:26,600 Speaker 1: He talks more about the LSD cease fire, basically saying 477 00:27:26,960 --> 00:27:29,480 Speaker 1: that he thinks that the two generations that are you know, 478 00:27:29,560 --> 00:27:32,720 Speaker 1: battling over LSD right now need to just like cool 479 00:27:32,760 --> 00:27:35,040 Speaker 1: off for a little while so they can get to 480 00:27:35,040 --> 00:27:37,359 Speaker 1: the point where they can start looking at it analytically. 481 00:27:38,000 --> 00:27:41,920 Speaker 1: He also says like some frankly really misogynistic stuff here, 482 00:27:41,960 --> 00:27:44,000 Speaker 1: not just about you know, women and sex, but he 483 00:27:44,000 --> 00:27:47,200 Speaker 1: says every woman has built into her cells and tissues 484 00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:50,680 Speaker 1: the longing for a hero sage mythic male to open 485 00:27:50,800 --> 00:27:55,080 Speaker 1: up and share her own divinity. But casual sexual encounters 486 00:27:55,119 --> 00:27:58,679 Speaker 1: do not satisfy this deep longing. Uh. So he's just 487 00:27:58,760 --> 00:28:03,040 Speaker 1: he's really making these like huge mythic pronouncements. Uh. And 488 00:28:03,040 --> 00:28:07,120 Speaker 1: it's just I think in poor taste. Maybe in sixties 489 00:28:07,160 --> 00:28:08,840 Speaker 1: six it was taken as being sort of a little 490 00:28:08,840 --> 00:28:11,119 Speaker 1: bit more eccentric and interesting. Yeah, this is certainly to 491 00:28:11,240 --> 00:28:15,600 Speaker 1: modern readers, this does sound like the ego consuming the personality. Now, 492 00:28:15,640 --> 00:28:18,320 Speaker 1: this is this next quote is really one of the 493 00:28:18,359 --> 00:28:22,040 Speaker 1: worst ones he's asked about homosexuality, and he says, the 494 00:28:22,119 --> 00:28:25,320 Speaker 1: fact is that l s D is a specific cure 495 00:28:25,600 --> 00:28:29,959 Speaker 1: for homosexuality. It's well known that most sexual perversions are 496 00:28:30,000 --> 00:28:33,840 Speaker 1: the result not of biological binds, but of freaky, dislocating 497 00:28:33,960 --> 00:28:38,920 Speaker 1: childhood experiences of one kind or another. Consequently, it's not 498 00:28:39,040 --> 00:28:41,920 Speaker 1: surprising that we've had many cases of long term home 499 00:28:42,040 --> 00:28:45,160 Speaker 1: sexuals who under l s D discover that they are 500 00:28:45,200 --> 00:28:49,080 Speaker 1: not only genitally but genetically male. I don't even know 501 00:28:49,120 --> 00:28:52,360 Speaker 1: what he's saying there, uh that they are basically attracted 502 00:28:52,400 --> 00:28:55,200 Speaker 1: to females. The most famous in public of such cases 503 00:28:55,360 --> 00:28:59,120 Speaker 1: is that of Alan Ginsburg, who has openly stated that 504 00:28:59,200 --> 00:29:02,360 Speaker 1: he the first time that he turned onto women was 505 00:29:02,480 --> 00:29:05,920 Speaker 1: during an LSD session several years ago. This is only 506 00:29:05,960 --> 00:29:10,040 Speaker 1: one of many such cases. Okay, so I have a 507 00:29:10,080 --> 00:29:12,520 Speaker 1: lot of a lot of problems with with all this stuff. Yeah, 508 00:29:12,960 --> 00:29:15,000 Speaker 1: but I mean one of them is that it's not 509 00:29:15,040 --> 00:29:19,960 Speaker 1: like Leary didn't, did not and had not had numerous 510 00:29:20,240 --> 00:29:26,880 Speaker 1: friendships and professional relationships with with with homosexual people, including 511 00:29:26,920 --> 00:29:29,880 Speaker 1: Alan Ginsberg. Yeah, and uh dr D was another one 512 00:29:30,160 --> 00:29:32,320 Speaker 1: I mentioned, Uh, you know, Tuscalaloose has been kind of 513 00:29:32,360 --> 00:29:36,120 Speaker 1: this uh uh, the university there being this this sort 514 00:29:36,160 --> 00:29:40,000 Speaker 1: of you know, fortress of of of liberal minds at 515 00:29:40,000 --> 00:29:43,840 Speaker 1: the time, and a number of different homosexual professors, many 516 00:29:43,880 --> 00:29:46,240 Speaker 1: of which had you know, had gone to bat for 517 00:29:46,240 --> 00:29:49,040 Speaker 1: for Leary and helped him with the connections he needed 518 00:29:49,040 --> 00:29:52,280 Speaker 1: to navigate that portion of his life. So it just 519 00:29:52,320 --> 00:29:57,440 Speaker 1: seems just completely ridiculous and u uh and disappointing to 520 00:29:57,640 --> 00:29:59,680 Speaker 1: to hear him talk about Yeah, I mean, he's saying 521 00:29:59,720 --> 00:30:02,840 Speaker 1: stuff that's like patently untrue. He has no evidence for that, 522 00:30:02,920 --> 00:30:04,880 Speaker 1: but that on top of all of it, he's throwing 523 00:30:04,880 --> 00:30:08,880 Speaker 1: his friends under the bus. You know. It's just it's strange. Uh. 524 00:30:09,040 --> 00:30:11,680 Speaker 1: And So really this is the point where a lot 525 00:30:11,680 --> 00:30:15,080 Speaker 1: of people feel like he helped hasten the blackout on 526 00:30:15,120 --> 00:30:18,200 Speaker 1: psychedelic research, because every time he had a stunt like 527 00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:20,240 Speaker 1: this or the one where he gave that talk in 528 00:30:20,240 --> 00:30:25,440 Speaker 1: the Manhattan town Hall, it would just accelerate the establishments 529 00:30:25,600 --> 00:30:27,760 Speaker 1: thoughts that, oh my god, we absolutely have to shut 530 00:30:27,800 --> 00:30:32,120 Speaker 1: this down, right. So the Millbrook Group goes on to 531 00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:37,960 Speaker 1: disband and Leary becomes a psychedelic speaker coach, and this 532 00:30:38,080 --> 00:30:40,480 Speaker 1: is really the latter part of his life what most 533 00:30:40,520 --> 00:30:43,160 Speaker 1: people know him for. Uh. He's a public figure. He's 534 00:30:43,160 --> 00:30:46,400 Speaker 1: associated with psychedelics and spiritual discovery. He even starts his 535 00:30:46,400 --> 00:30:49,520 Speaker 1: own church called the League for Spiritual Discovery. He writes 536 00:30:49,520 --> 00:30:52,680 Speaker 1: a bunch of books. In a one segment that I 537 00:30:52,760 --> 00:30:56,040 Speaker 1: read about this, a guy named Steve Silverman described Leary 538 00:30:56,080 --> 00:30:59,120 Speaker 1: as a genius marketer during this time. He says he 539 00:30:59,160 --> 00:31:02,240 Speaker 1: could have had a brilliant career hyping up luxury cars, 540 00:31:02,280 --> 00:31:06,360 Speaker 1: iPads are social media startups. Instead he was hawking LSD 541 00:31:06,560 --> 00:31:11,400 Speaker 1: and psychedelic nosis. Uh. And then in that same conversation, Connors, 542 00:31:11,440 --> 00:31:14,800 Speaker 1: who wrote that White Hand Society book that I mentioned earlier, 543 00:31:15,000 --> 00:31:17,840 Speaker 1: he responds and he says Leary got caught in a 544 00:31:17,920 --> 00:31:22,080 Speaker 1: circular trap of marketing himself so he could get money 545 00:31:22,120 --> 00:31:26,960 Speaker 1: to then afford to defend himself from his prosecutors. Uh. 546 00:31:27,280 --> 00:31:29,520 Speaker 1: It's just all kinds of crazy stuff are going on. 547 00:31:29,600 --> 00:31:32,880 Speaker 1: He gets pulled over in nineteen sixty eight. Uh, he's 548 00:31:32,960 --> 00:31:36,360 Speaker 1: he's driving down Laguna Beach and he's arrested for drugs. 549 00:31:36,400 --> 00:31:38,680 Speaker 1: His son was so stoned in the back seat that 550 00:31:39,000 --> 00:31:41,800 Speaker 1: when they pulled him into the jail, he took off 551 00:31:41,800 --> 00:31:44,880 Speaker 1: all of his clothes and started masturbating. When he was 552 00:31:44,880 --> 00:31:48,880 Speaker 1: shown what his son was doing, Leary laughed. His daughter 553 00:31:49,080 --> 00:31:51,880 Speaker 1: was sentenced to six months in prison. Jack was ordered 554 00:31:51,880 --> 00:31:55,800 Speaker 1: to undergo psychiatric observation. Leary got one to ten for 555 00:31:55,840 --> 00:31:59,400 Speaker 1: possession of marijuana. So this is one of many cases 556 00:31:59,400 --> 00:32:01,240 Speaker 1: where he goes to jail and he gets out right. 557 00:32:01,960 --> 00:32:04,960 Speaker 1: He's described in the New York Times obituary when he died. 558 00:32:05,040 --> 00:32:07,400 Speaker 1: This is how the New York Times described him as 559 00:32:07,480 --> 00:32:11,240 Speaker 1: having an elegant, happy contempt for authority. And this is 560 00:32:11,280 --> 00:32:15,160 Speaker 1: around the time where Richard Nixon infamously refers to him 561 00:32:15,200 --> 00:32:19,640 Speaker 1: as the most dangerous man in America. Again, hyperbole everybody 562 00:32:19,680 --> 00:32:21,720 Speaker 1: all over the place sounds a lot like right now 563 00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:24,480 Speaker 1: people are just throwing out like this stuff that is 564 00:32:24,520 --> 00:32:28,840 Speaker 1: just like super extreme. Uh. He talks to Marshall McCluin 565 00:32:28,920 --> 00:32:32,120 Speaker 1: during this period of time. This is when McCluin advises him, 566 00:32:32,560 --> 00:32:33,959 Speaker 1: you know what you should do. You need to come 567 00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:37,280 Speaker 1: up with a catchy slogan to advertise the wonders of LSD. 568 00:32:37,840 --> 00:32:40,720 Speaker 1: This is where we get turn on, tune in, drop 569 00:32:40,720 --> 00:32:44,000 Speaker 1: out from basically McLuhan saying like you need to get 570 00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:47,160 Speaker 1: better at brand marketing. Dude. I I never thought that 571 00:32:47,160 --> 00:32:49,880 Speaker 1: that was a really great slogan for anything. I mean 572 00:32:50,040 --> 00:32:53,800 Speaker 1: the dropout part especially. It's just like, I don't want 573 00:32:53,960 --> 00:32:59,040 Speaker 1: to try something that's gonna make me drop out of something, right, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um. 574 00:32:59,200 --> 00:33:01,360 Speaker 1: He basically be comes a celebrity during this time. I 575 00:33:01,360 --> 00:33:02,920 Speaker 1: said this at the top of the first episode. This 576 00:33:02,960 --> 00:33:05,560 Speaker 1: is where he becomes famous for being famous. Right. He 577 00:33:05,720 --> 00:33:08,800 Speaker 1: ends up associating and taking trips with and I mean 578 00:33:08,880 --> 00:33:13,520 Speaker 1: psilocybin trips with authors, musicians, criminals, and movie stars. Right. 579 00:33:13,600 --> 00:33:15,520 Speaker 1: He just gets famous for hanging out with these people. 580 00:33:16,080 --> 00:33:20,320 Speaker 1: In nineteen seventy, he declares his candidacy for governor of California. 581 00:33:20,560 --> 00:33:26,280 Speaker 1: Who's he running against? Ronald Reagan? Now this was interrupted 582 00:33:26,400 --> 00:33:30,760 Speaker 1: when he was convicted on marijuana charges again. Uh, and 583 00:33:30,840 --> 00:33:33,680 Speaker 1: he escaped. This is this is the craziest part of 584 00:33:33,680 --> 00:33:36,800 Speaker 1: the whole story. He escapes prison. This is at San 585 00:33:37,240 --> 00:33:41,640 Speaker 1: Luis Oba Sipo. I guess that's a prison in California, 586 00:33:41,680 --> 00:33:45,720 Speaker 1: and his followers help him get to Algeria. He essentially 587 00:33:45,760 --> 00:33:49,360 Speaker 1: goes from Algeria to Switzerland and then to Afghanistan before 588 00:33:49,400 --> 00:33:52,560 Speaker 1: returning to the United States in nineteen seventy three, eventually 589 00:33:52,560 --> 00:33:54,680 Speaker 1: serves three more years in prison. But hold on, I 590 00:33:54,760 --> 00:33:58,400 Speaker 1: just jumped over like four years of crazy behavior. Let's 591 00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:01,800 Speaker 1: zoom in on this a little bit. Supposedly, his escape 592 00:34:01,840 --> 00:34:05,720 Speaker 1: from prison was assisted by the weather underground and in 593 00:34:05,800 --> 00:34:09,640 Speaker 1: Algeria he was the house guest of Eldridge Cleaver, who 594 00:34:09,640 --> 00:34:12,760 Speaker 1: was part of the Black Panthers. That they didn't get along, 595 00:34:12,880 --> 00:34:14,880 Speaker 1: So he goes on to Switzerland. You know who he 596 00:34:14,920 --> 00:34:19,320 Speaker 1: meets in Switzerland, Albert Hoffman, the guy who invents LSD. 597 00:34:19,520 --> 00:34:23,200 Speaker 1: They sit down and have a conversation. But uh, I 598 00:34:23,239 --> 00:34:25,479 Speaker 1: also want to mention Greenfield, who we've been talking about 599 00:34:25,480 --> 00:34:28,360 Speaker 1: this whole time. It's in Algiers with the two of 600 00:34:28,400 --> 00:34:31,480 Speaker 1: them first meet up. So this is Greenfield's first experience 601 00:34:31,520 --> 00:34:34,160 Speaker 1: with with Timothy Leary is while he's on the run 602 00:34:34,560 --> 00:34:39,200 Speaker 1: from escaping prison. When he returned to the US, here's 603 00:34:39,200 --> 00:34:41,560 Speaker 1: the thing, he was facing way more jail time than 604 00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:44,680 Speaker 1: three years, and he informed on all of his previous 605 00:34:44,719 --> 00:34:49,680 Speaker 1: associates to the authorities. That includes his third wife, Rosemary, 606 00:34:49,760 --> 00:34:52,560 Speaker 1: so he informed on her as well. She had left him. 607 00:34:52,640 --> 00:34:55,160 Speaker 1: During the middle of all of this, he ends up 608 00:34:55,400 --> 00:35:00,839 Speaker 1: writing articles for the conservative magazine National Review. And in 609 00:35:00,880 --> 00:35:04,520 Speaker 1: these articles he starts attacking John Lennon and Bob Dylan. 610 00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:07,239 Speaker 1: And the reason why was he wanted to demonstrate that 611 00:35:07,280 --> 00:35:10,200 Speaker 1: he had rehabilitated so they wouldn't put him back in prison. 612 00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:13,240 Speaker 1: Oh and this this again sounds like the classic pattern 613 00:35:13,320 --> 00:35:16,160 Speaker 1: with Leary that the Greenfield points out that he'll he'll 614 00:35:16,200 --> 00:35:18,840 Speaker 1: get on a kick where he's following a rigid system 615 00:35:18,920 --> 00:35:21,880 Speaker 1: and adhering to some sort of you know, expectation of 616 00:35:21,880 --> 00:35:24,400 Speaker 1: what he should be, but it's only gonna last for 617 00:35:24,400 --> 00:35:26,040 Speaker 1: so Yeah, he turns around and bites the hand that 618 00:35:26,080 --> 00:35:30,440 Speaker 1: feeds him. Yeah. Yeah, so okay. After this, he mainly 619 00:35:30,480 --> 00:35:34,400 Speaker 1: spends time on the campus lecture circuit. This includes public 620 00:35:34,440 --> 00:35:37,120 Speaker 1: debates with G. Gordon Liddy. This is like one of 621 00:35:37,160 --> 00:35:39,920 Speaker 1: the most fascinating parts that we found in this entire 622 00:35:39,960 --> 00:35:44,480 Speaker 1: affair here. Yeah, the Liddy thing is interesting because both 623 00:35:44,560 --> 00:35:49,279 Speaker 1: Leary and Liddy had become caricatures of themselves at this point. Um, 624 00:35:49,719 --> 00:35:54,680 Speaker 1: you know, inflated cartoon characters of liberal goofiness and conservative 625 00:35:55,360 --> 00:36:00,440 Speaker 1: uh uh curmudgeonary. Uh. They even made a movie, uh 626 00:36:00,600 --> 00:36:04,080 Speaker 1: to capitalize on on their fame or or I guess 627 00:36:04,120 --> 00:36:06,799 Speaker 1: to squeeze the last bits of juice out of it 628 00:36:07,120 --> 00:36:10,160 Speaker 1: um And there's a New York Times review of the 629 00:36:10,200 --> 00:36:14,120 Speaker 1: film by Vincent can Be, and he shares the following 630 00:36:14,160 --> 00:36:16,959 Speaker 1: I thought, I thought this was particularly telling. The two 631 00:36:16,960 --> 00:36:20,520 Speaker 1: men are not exactly freaks, but one has the suspicion 632 00:36:20,640 --> 00:36:23,200 Speaker 1: that they wouldn't be showing off in this way if 633 00:36:23,200 --> 00:36:26,280 Speaker 1: they could possibly make a living in some other fashion. 634 00:36:26,960 --> 00:36:30,280 Speaker 1: Whether accurately or not. The movie suggests that the world 635 00:36:30,280 --> 00:36:33,360 Speaker 1: has passed them by and that this personal appearance tour 636 00:36:33,560 --> 00:36:36,160 Speaker 1: is one of the last ways in which each can 637 00:36:36,200 --> 00:36:40,279 Speaker 1: turn his individual notoriety to profit now. The reviewer also 638 00:36:40,320 --> 00:36:43,799 Speaker 1: goes on to say that despite their their personas, there 639 00:36:43,880 --> 00:36:46,200 Speaker 1: is a scene in the film where where each man 640 00:36:46,520 --> 00:36:49,640 Speaker 1: um in their current lives sit down and have breakfast 641 00:36:49,680 --> 00:36:53,320 Speaker 1: together and they're having just this a very normal conversation 642 00:36:53,560 --> 00:36:57,120 Speaker 1: about you know, just just everyday stuff, like not a nothing, 643 00:36:57,120 --> 00:37:00,400 Speaker 1: nothing about law or politics or drugs or counterculture. Like 644 00:37:00,480 --> 00:37:02,680 Speaker 1: there is this moment where you see this idea that 645 00:37:02,760 --> 00:37:06,560 Speaker 1: there perhaps just yet two people who are just trying 646 00:37:06,600 --> 00:37:09,480 Speaker 1: to make a living for the time being, and this 647 00:37:09,560 --> 00:37:12,440 Speaker 1: is what they have. This would have been like, uh, 648 00:37:12,480 --> 00:37:16,440 Speaker 1: if Steve Bannon and Lindsay Lohan went on tour together, 649 00:37:16,680 --> 00:37:19,400 Speaker 1: had like a reality TV show together where they just 650 00:37:19,440 --> 00:37:23,359 Speaker 1: constantly argued, Yeah, and and if you've neither had you know, 651 00:37:23,760 --> 00:37:27,200 Speaker 1: a significant enterprise to to back them up with that, Right, Yeah, 652 00:37:27,239 --> 00:37:29,279 Speaker 1: it's kind of I get the impression. That's kind of 653 00:37:29,320 --> 00:37:32,960 Speaker 1: like it's kind of like celebrity TV. If if if 654 00:37:33,000 --> 00:37:34,840 Speaker 1: this had happened today, it would have been a Leary 655 00:37:34,880 --> 00:37:38,840 Speaker 1: and Liddy television show on some reality network, right, them 656 00:37:38,840 --> 00:37:41,360 Speaker 1: trying to learn how to dance better than one another? Exactly? 657 00:37:42,680 --> 00:37:44,600 Speaker 1: All right, why don't we take one more break, and 658 00:37:44,640 --> 00:37:46,279 Speaker 1: then when we get back, we're gonna talk about the 659 00:37:46,360 --> 00:37:49,160 Speaker 1: end of Leary's life and his focus on of all 660 00:37:49,239 --> 00:37:55,359 Speaker 1: things cybernetics than all right, we're back. So we've talked 661 00:37:55,360 --> 00:37:59,200 Speaker 1: a lot on our show before about cyborgs and cybernetics 662 00:37:59,200 --> 00:38:01,120 Speaker 1: and trans human as him and what that has to 663 00:38:01,200 --> 00:38:05,239 Speaker 1: do with space travel. It turns out Timothy Leary in 664 00:38:05,280 --> 00:38:10,719 Speaker 1: his seventies became fascinated by all this stuff, specifically electronic communication, 665 00:38:10,800 --> 00:38:14,759 Speaker 1: and he would tell his audiences that electronic communication was 666 00:38:14,800 --> 00:38:17,800 Speaker 1: going to be what would free their brains and souls 667 00:38:18,160 --> 00:38:23,680 Speaker 1: from oppressive orthodoxies like education, religion, and politics. In particular, 668 00:38:23,800 --> 00:38:27,800 Speaker 1: he was fascinated by things like virtual reality computer games. 669 00:38:28,160 --> 00:38:30,080 Speaker 1: He even went so far as to start his own 670 00:38:30,160 --> 00:38:34,000 Speaker 1: software company before he died. He also predicted that implanted 671 00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:38,480 Speaker 1: acceptal electrodes would one day be used recreationally. Uh, and 672 00:38:38,560 --> 00:38:40,680 Speaker 1: we're not quite there yet, But it just goes to 673 00:38:40,680 --> 00:38:43,759 Speaker 1: show how how interested he became in the role technology 674 00:38:43,800 --> 00:38:47,759 Speaker 1: could play in alternate states of of awareness. Yeah, I 675 00:38:48,320 --> 00:38:50,920 Speaker 1: don't know, I'm I'm I don't know if I'm quite 676 00:38:50,960 --> 00:38:54,600 Speaker 1: there with Timothy Leary on this one, because we are 677 00:38:54,640 --> 00:38:57,560 Speaker 1: now in an age where electronic communication is so vast. 678 00:38:57,680 --> 00:39:00,280 Speaker 1: Like I said earlier, he would have been insufferable on Twitter. 679 00:39:00,320 --> 00:39:03,239 Speaker 1: I imagine I can't imagine what this would be like. 680 00:39:03,280 --> 00:39:08,200 Speaker 1: And I don't know necessarily that these technologies have enabled 681 00:39:08,280 --> 00:39:12,280 Speaker 1: us to break free of oppressive orthodoxy like education, religion, 682 00:39:12,280 --> 00:39:16,160 Speaker 1: in politics. But hey, there's still time, right, I mean, 683 00:39:16,200 --> 00:39:18,879 Speaker 1: it's only been like twenty years since he passed away. 684 00:39:19,040 --> 00:39:23,200 Speaker 1: Speaking of which, So, he died in nine at his 685 00:39:23,239 --> 00:39:26,480 Speaker 1: home in Beverly Hills, California. He was seventy five years old. 686 00:39:27,040 --> 00:39:30,360 Speaker 1: Interesting thing about this is, outside of his fascination with 687 00:39:30,440 --> 00:39:35,239 Speaker 1: psychedelics and electronics, his other fascination was with death and 688 00:39:35,400 --> 00:39:39,320 Speaker 1: out of body experiences near death. So this was something 689 00:39:39,360 --> 00:39:41,920 Speaker 1: that he turned into a public performance as well. He 690 00:39:42,000 --> 00:39:45,560 Speaker 1: made it an event. He had video cameras record his death. 691 00:39:45,560 --> 00:39:47,880 Speaker 1: He built the whole thing up from a year before 692 00:39:47,920 --> 00:39:49,719 Speaker 1: when he was first told that he was diagnosed with 693 00:39:49,760 --> 00:39:53,719 Speaker 1: prostate cancer, and his friends collected his writings and his 694 00:39:53,800 --> 00:39:57,920 Speaker 1: papers all on a leery themed website and they posted 695 00:39:58,000 --> 00:40:01,720 Speaker 1: films of him there. He even corded his daily drug 696 00:40:01,800 --> 00:40:04,120 Speaker 1: intake on this website. It was basically a blog before 697 00:40:04,120 --> 00:40:07,719 Speaker 1: there were blogs. Uh, now I want to recap here. 698 00:40:07,920 --> 00:40:11,319 Speaker 1: Let's return just We've been hitting on this over and 699 00:40:11,360 --> 00:40:13,680 Speaker 1: over and over again throughout the episode, how self destructive 700 00:40:13,719 --> 00:40:16,879 Speaker 1: he was. He went through two divorces. He went through 701 00:40:16,920 --> 00:40:21,320 Speaker 1: one separation, his first wife committed suicide. His second wife, 702 00:40:21,880 --> 00:40:25,920 Speaker 1: who was the mistress that he he left his first 703 00:40:25,960 --> 00:40:28,920 Speaker 1: wife over and who she committed suicide over. That woman 704 00:40:29,040 --> 00:40:32,520 Speaker 1: left him after he struck her and their landlady called 705 00:40:32,560 --> 00:40:35,880 Speaker 1: the police on them. And then his daughter also committed 706 00:40:35,920 --> 00:40:39,400 Speaker 1: suicide in nineteen nine. So he left this wake of 707 00:40:39,480 --> 00:40:43,000 Speaker 1: broken people behind him. It just doesn't leave a good 708 00:40:43,000 --> 00:40:46,319 Speaker 1: taste in my mouth. Yeah, that was That was my 709 00:40:46,360 --> 00:40:48,960 Speaker 1: experience with the research as well. I didn't go into 710 00:40:48,960 --> 00:40:52,879 Speaker 1: this idolizing Leery, but but I went and went into 711 00:40:52,920 --> 00:40:56,800 Speaker 1: it like appreciating some of the things he'd said before 712 00:40:56,960 --> 00:41:00,480 Speaker 1: and the use of his persona in various to fiction 713 00:41:00,520 --> 00:41:04,880 Speaker 1: and music. And it was it was disappointing to to really, uh, 714 00:41:05,160 --> 00:41:07,240 Speaker 1: not only to see this pattern, but then to spend 715 00:41:07,239 --> 00:41:09,600 Speaker 1: a lot of time reading about it. Yeah. I think 716 00:41:09,640 --> 00:41:12,759 Speaker 1: like after he had been like, you know, he's been 717 00:41:12,840 --> 00:41:17,759 Speaker 1: mythologized over the years, especially for our generation, I expected more. 718 00:41:18,360 --> 00:41:20,080 Speaker 1: You know, well, a lot of you know, I noticed 719 00:41:20,120 --> 00:41:23,360 Speaker 1: that a lot of people were kind of critical on Amazon, 720 00:41:23,560 --> 00:41:27,799 Speaker 1: for instance, of the green Field biography because they thought, 721 00:41:27,800 --> 00:41:29,120 Speaker 1: you know, it's like, oh, he's just kind of a 722 00:41:29,280 --> 00:41:33,240 Speaker 1: it's kind of a hatchet job or whatever. But uh, 723 00:41:33,280 --> 00:41:37,240 Speaker 1: I think the thing is that the biography reveals more 724 00:41:37,280 --> 00:41:40,200 Speaker 1: about the real Timothy Leary than a lot of people, 725 00:41:40,480 --> 00:41:46,480 Speaker 1: you know, we're comfortable confronting. Yeah, now he's dying, as 726 00:41:46,520 --> 00:41:49,400 Speaker 1: he said, and uh, and he's keeping a track of 727 00:41:49,440 --> 00:41:53,400 Speaker 1: the various substance he's he's taking. So Leary actually considered 728 00:41:53,440 --> 00:41:55,880 Speaker 1: taking LSD on his deathbed, and this would have and 729 00:41:56,200 --> 00:41:58,040 Speaker 1: in doing this, he would have been following the lead 730 00:41:58,080 --> 00:42:01,360 Speaker 1: of Altre Huxley, who took an injection of a hundred 731 00:42:01,400 --> 00:42:05,600 Speaker 1: micrograms on his deathbed. Um. Now, in the time leading 732 00:42:05,640 --> 00:42:09,120 Speaker 1: up to his death, Leary did use ketamine and enhanced 733 00:42:09,120 --> 00:42:11,560 Speaker 1: it with nitrous hawks side he drank Towards the end 734 00:42:11,560 --> 00:42:16,279 Speaker 1: there was a lot of smoking, especially Carol Rosen, a 735 00:42:16,320 --> 00:42:19,839 Speaker 1: friend who was at at his bedside, said that his 736 00:42:20,080 --> 00:42:23,880 Speaker 1: penultimate words were why not, why not? Why not, repeating 737 00:42:23,920 --> 00:42:27,680 Speaker 1: the final question fifty times fifty times in different voices, 738 00:42:28,360 --> 00:42:32,839 Speaker 1: and then, according to his son, he said beautiful and died. Okay, 739 00:42:33,200 --> 00:42:36,320 Speaker 1: part of me is very cynical and has to wonder 740 00:42:37,040 --> 00:42:39,840 Speaker 1: how much of that was performed. Yeah, given that he 741 00:42:39,920 --> 00:42:42,319 Speaker 1: knew that the cameras were on and everything, that's yeah, 742 00:42:42,400 --> 00:42:45,880 Speaker 1: that's that's true. Now, he had pursued chronic suspension at 743 00:42:45,920 --> 00:42:48,560 Speaker 1: one point, but his final wishes were that his cremated 744 00:42:48,600 --> 00:42:52,000 Speaker 1: remains be distributed among his friends, as well as shot 745 00:42:52,040 --> 00:42:55,440 Speaker 1: into space. So indeed, a year later, seven grams of 746 00:42:55,480 --> 00:42:57,600 Speaker 1: his ashes and a vial went into a space into 747 00:42:57,640 --> 00:43:00,000 Speaker 1: space on a Pegasus rocket. And this, by the way, 748 00:43:00,040 --> 00:43:02,239 Speaker 1: it was the rocket that also contains seven grams of 749 00:43:02,280 --> 00:43:07,440 Speaker 1: ashes from a few other notable individuals, including Gene Roddenberry. Now, 750 00:43:07,520 --> 00:43:09,319 Speaker 1: so how do you get Do you buy into that 751 00:43:09,480 --> 00:43:13,120 Speaker 1: ahead of time or does somebody sponsor you? How's that work? Um? 752 00:43:13,160 --> 00:43:17,000 Speaker 1: I think in Leary's case it was a sponsorship situation. Now, 753 00:43:17,400 --> 00:43:21,600 Speaker 1: Greenfield in his biography has some everything up that I 754 00:43:21,600 --> 00:43:23,960 Speaker 1: think rather succinctly. At the end, he says, a self 755 00:43:24,000 --> 00:43:27,040 Speaker 1: proclaimed at cheer leader for change who himself had never 756 00:43:27,080 --> 00:43:30,360 Speaker 1: been able to change, Timothy Leary had finally achieved his 757 00:43:30,400 --> 00:43:33,840 Speaker 1: heart's desire in death as he could never be in life. 758 00:43:34,000 --> 00:43:36,320 Speaker 1: He was not only free, but soaring through the heavens 759 00:43:36,560 --> 00:43:39,600 Speaker 1: at which he had gazed so often in wondering during 760 00:43:39,680 --> 00:43:43,279 Speaker 1: his most improbable life. That's a that's a very nice eulogy, 761 00:43:43,360 --> 00:43:45,920 Speaker 1: I think, Yeah, I mean, but I mean it also 762 00:43:46,000 --> 00:43:48,080 Speaker 1: just sums up that, you know, a lot of the 763 00:43:48,120 --> 00:43:50,920 Speaker 1: disorder that was there as well. Yeah. Absolutely, But it 764 00:43:50,960 --> 00:43:53,560 Speaker 1: paints him in a nicer picture than I think. Honestly, 765 00:43:53,600 --> 00:43:56,480 Speaker 1: maybe we have in the last two episodes of the show, 766 00:43:56,719 --> 00:43:58,880 Speaker 1: we've been trying. I really wanted to give him the 767 00:43:58,880 --> 00:44:02,160 Speaker 1: benefit of the doubt, you know. Yeah, it's the same here. Yeah. So, 768 00:44:02,239 --> 00:44:05,320 Speaker 1: actually I mentioned this earlier, but Leary's archives are today's 769 00:44:05,360 --> 00:44:09,160 Speaker 1: stored at the New York Public Library. Reportedly, the library 770 00:44:09,160 --> 00:44:12,480 Speaker 1: paid nine hundred thousand dollars for them, uh and a 771 00:44:12,680 --> 00:44:15,440 Speaker 1: portion of that, just to be clear, went back toward 772 00:44:15,560 --> 00:44:20,359 Speaker 1: processing the collection. These archives had an interesting life before 773 00:44:20,400 --> 00:44:22,399 Speaker 1: they showed up the library because they were moved from 774 00:44:22,400 --> 00:44:27,480 Speaker 1: place to place so that they could avoid the FBI season. Uh. 775 00:44:27,520 --> 00:44:30,920 Speaker 1: And they they actually did end up getting seized by 776 00:44:30,920 --> 00:44:34,160 Speaker 1: the FBI regardless, and then they were returned. They ended 777 00:44:34,200 --> 00:44:38,480 Speaker 1: up in a storage facility in California until now the 778 00:44:38,560 --> 00:44:43,799 Speaker 1: library houses his documents alongside George Washington, Herman Melville, and 779 00:44:43,880 --> 00:44:50,000 Speaker 1: Truman Capote. So in closing, um, yeah, there was there 780 00:44:50,040 --> 00:44:53,200 Speaker 1: was definitely a lot more chaos and disorder in Leary's 781 00:44:53,280 --> 00:44:56,640 Speaker 1: life than than than I anticipated going in, again, not 782 00:44:56,640 --> 00:44:59,319 Speaker 1: not being very familiar with the details of his life, 783 00:44:59,320 --> 00:45:02,279 Speaker 1: just sort of having a pop culture awareness of him 784 00:45:02,320 --> 00:45:05,680 Speaker 1: and a media filtered awareness of him. Um. Yeah, it 785 00:45:05,800 --> 00:45:10,680 Speaker 1: ended up being, uh at times a depressing journey to 786 00:45:10,680 --> 00:45:13,399 Speaker 1: to uh to read more in detail about his life 787 00:45:13,440 --> 00:45:17,400 Speaker 1: and his work. Yeah. I agree. The New Yorker review 788 00:45:17,600 --> 00:45:20,000 Speaker 1: of the Greenfield biography that we use for a lot 789 00:45:20,040 --> 00:45:23,280 Speaker 1: of this compares him to Wilhelm Reich, who we also 790 00:45:23,520 --> 00:45:27,239 Speaker 1: have an episode on uh, and they basically say, look, 791 00:45:27,239 --> 00:45:31,440 Speaker 1: they were both renegade psychologists who became brand fads among 792 00:45:31,640 --> 00:45:35,960 Speaker 1: quote unquote enlightened people. Uh. To me, Larry seems to 793 00:45:36,000 --> 00:45:38,799 Speaker 1: be more like a sly huckster than any kind of 794 00:45:38,840 --> 00:45:42,680 Speaker 1: contributor to philosophy or psychology. Like I said, that's unfortunate. 795 00:45:42,800 --> 00:45:45,760 Speaker 1: I guess I just expected more. Uh. The Don Latin 796 00:45:45,840 --> 00:45:48,680 Speaker 1: book The Harvard Psychedelic Club, which I also read through, 797 00:45:49,080 --> 00:45:51,840 Speaker 1: refers to him as the trickster throughout the book, like 798 00:45:51,880 --> 00:45:56,480 Speaker 1: they give a sort of like mythal mythical status to 799 00:45:56,560 --> 00:45:59,520 Speaker 1: each of the characters from the Harvard Psychedelic Club. Richard 800 00:45:59,520 --> 00:46:03,320 Speaker 1: Alpert or rumdsk gets the term the seeker, but Leary 801 00:46:03,400 --> 00:46:05,600 Speaker 1: is the trickster, so he'd be kind of like the 802 00:46:05,640 --> 00:46:10,240 Speaker 1: low key of this Avengers. Yeah, it seems like. Yeah, 803 00:46:10,280 --> 00:46:12,439 Speaker 1: I had a hard time reading all this research and 804 00:46:12,480 --> 00:46:16,960 Speaker 1: not seeing a selfish, kind of egomaniacal guy who seemed 805 00:46:17,000 --> 00:46:19,680 Speaker 1: to sacrifice all of his family and friends along the 806 00:46:19,680 --> 00:46:23,319 Speaker 1: way just so he could extend his five minutes of 807 00:46:23,400 --> 00:46:26,640 Speaker 1: either fun or fame or both. I don't know. So, yeah, 808 00:46:26,680 --> 00:46:31,600 Speaker 1: it was really disappointing unfortunately. UM yeah, I'm curious. I'm 809 00:46:31,600 --> 00:46:33,400 Speaker 1: sure that there are plenty of people who are listening 810 00:46:33,400 --> 00:46:37,719 Speaker 1: to this episode who are real, uh, devout you know, 811 00:46:38,160 --> 00:46:41,640 Speaker 1: fans of Leary and his wisdom, and maybe there's something 812 00:46:41,680 --> 00:46:43,600 Speaker 1: that Robert and I are missing out on here. I 813 00:46:43,640 --> 00:46:47,239 Speaker 1: don't know. Well, I will say this and to sort of, 814 00:46:47,280 --> 00:46:50,120 Speaker 1: you know, ended on a positive note. Leary's words have 815 00:46:50,200 --> 00:46:52,719 Speaker 1: definitely inspired me in the past, and I think I'll 816 00:46:52,800 --> 00:46:56,000 Speaker 1: continue to find inspiration in some of his words. One 817 00:46:56,040 --> 00:46:58,960 Speaker 1: of the weird things that happens with icon celebrities and 818 00:46:59,200 --> 00:47:02,560 Speaker 1: and even profit is that there emerges this disconnect between 819 00:47:02,560 --> 00:47:06,680 Speaker 1: self and perception, between actuality and the ideal. So, you know, 820 00:47:06,760 --> 00:47:09,480 Speaker 1: the pop culture Leary here is I think, something of 821 00:47:09,480 --> 00:47:13,759 Speaker 1: a fiction, but it can serve as a as a 822 00:47:13,800 --> 00:47:17,319 Speaker 1: beneficial fiction, I think at times. So I'd like to 823 00:47:17,320 --> 00:47:19,480 Speaker 1: to close out here with a quote that I've always valued, 824 00:47:19,640 --> 00:47:21,160 Speaker 1: uh and and one that I tend to sort of 825 00:47:21,200 --> 00:47:23,439 Speaker 1: employ as a guiding principle for for stuff to blow 826 00:47:23,480 --> 00:47:26,560 Speaker 1: your mind. So I will read it once again in 827 00:47:26,840 --> 00:47:31,480 Speaker 1: UH in my impersonation of Timothy Leary. Throughout human history, 828 00:47:31,600 --> 00:47:35,080 Speaker 1: as our species is faced the frightening terrorizing fact that 829 00:47:35,200 --> 00:47:38,080 Speaker 1: we do not know who we are or where we 830 00:47:38,120 --> 00:47:40,640 Speaker 1: are going. In this ocean of chaos. It has been 831 00:47:40,680 --> 00:47:45,480 Speaker 1: the authorities, the political, the religious, the educational authorities who 832 00:47:45,480 --> 00:47:51,120 Speaker 1: attempted to comfort us by giving us order, rules, regulations, informing, 833 00:47:51,560 --> 00:47:55,399 Speaker 1: forming in our minds their view of reality. To think 834 00:47:55,440 --> 00:47:58,320 Speaker 1: for yourself, you must question authority and learn how to 835 00:47:58,360 --> 00:48:02,000 Speaker 1: put yourself in a state of vulnerable, open mindedness, chaotic, 836 00:48:02,160 --> 00:48:08,239 Speaker 1: confused vulnerability to inform yourself. Now that I can agree with, Yeah, 837 00:48:08,520 --> 00:48:11,680 Speaker 1: that I think that lines up with with how we 838 00:48:11,719 --> 00:48:14,480 Speaker 1: tend to approach topics here. How I think we should 839 00:48:15,040 --> 00:48:17,879 Speaker 1: always approach any kind of you know, authority figure, even 840 00:48:17,920 --> 00:48:21,440 Speaker 1: when that authority figure is Timothy Learry. So hope you 841 00:48:21,560 --> 00:48:25,160 Speaker 1: enjoyed this marathon of Timothy Leary and l s D 842 00:48:25,400 --> 00:48:28,719 Speaker 1: information that we gave you this week. We are probably 843 00:48:28,760 --> 00:48:32,320 Speaker 1: going to be doing a Facebook Live trailer talk event 844 00:48:32,719 --> 00:48:36,400 Speaker 1: the day after this episode releases, So if you're listening 845 00:48:36,600 --> 00:48:40,880 Speaker 1: the day of go to our Facebook page. That Friday 846 00:48:41,000 --> 00:48:45,120 Speaker 1: morning will probably be on Facebook Live talking about movies 847 00:48:45,160 --> 00:48:50,040 Speaker 1: that are related to Timothy Leary and or LSD and psilocybin. Yeah, 848 00:48:50,120 --> 00:48:53,320 Speaker 1: some sort of psychedelic cinema celebration. We haven't figured it 849 00:48:53,360 --> 00:48:56,640 Speaker 1: out yet, but it'll probably probably be more fun than 850 00:48:56,680 --> 00:49:00,759 Speaker 1: the details of Larry's life. Yeah, maybe so so right. 851 00:49:01,120 --> 00:49:03,160 Speaker 1: If you want to contact us or follow us on 852 00:49:03,200 --> 00:49:05,560 Speaker 1: that or find out when that's happening, we're all over 853 00:49:05,640 --> 00:49:08,040 Speaker 1: social media. We'll try to post an advance let you 854 00:49:08,080 --> 00:49:10,360 Speaker 1: know what the timing is on that. We're on Facebook, 855 00:49:10,360 --> 00:49:12,919 Speaker 1: we're on Twitter, we're on Tumblr, and we're on Instagram. 856 00:49:13,000 --> 00:49:14,360 Speaker 1: And if you want to get in touch with us 857 00:49:14,360 --> 00:49:16,320 Speaker 1: the old fashioned way, just shoot us an email and 858 00:49:16,480 --> 00:49:28,920 Speaker 1: blow the mind at how stuff works dot com for 859 00:49:29,080 --> 00:49:31,360 Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics. Does it 860 00:49:31,440 --> 00:49:38,680 Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com b