Hey fellow nexians

I am planning on attending a conference this year, where Rick Doblin will be headlining. I know a bunch of really well educated or experienced people in world psychedelics that are also attending.
Traditionally at this conference about 400 people shows up and it goes for about 4 days, some of those days are full lecture days and others are full party days, and some are a mix.
Anyway, I figure this puts me in quite a good position to ask Rick a few questions. I would love to speak with him in person though if possible.
:arrow:
Anyway, I really wanted to ask him how he thinks one should break into the field of psychedelic research, what stage of their career its wise to do so, and which areas in medicine psychedelics could be most useful.

Are there some more specific questions that we could possibly raise?
Perhaps have a read under "Resources" on MAPs Official Website and see what projects they are currently involved in.

Would really appreciate the nexus input! Cheers

DJ

well personally I would ask him (off the record) how much molly that guy eats because he looks messed up

I imagine quite a bit, but he doesn't look messed up to me. When you watch recent interviews with him he looks quite presentable.
Think about how you would look wade if you had an entire psychedelic research facility behind you and unlimited access to any psychedelic you can imagine...yeah...I suspect most of us would look a lot worse

Weird assumptions there. First of all, the assumption that he has a 'psychedelic research facility' at his disposal, as if he can just open any cabinet and get the drugs in huge amounts and party (the scheduled substances need to be catalogued and there is control over the amounts). Second assumption is that, even IF one would have free access to it, that Rick Doblin (and us) would take very high amounts of it all. Third assumption is that taking a large amount of psychedelics will make you look bad (and then again mdma is not exactly a psychedelic).

Wade, I know this was a joke but sounds a bit childish, no offense intended...

Sorry to the OP but I dont have any idea on what to ask Rick Doblin. I find MAPS great but I dont share their enthusiasm for MDMA, I would rather there were more researches on the 'real' psychedelics, but I understand that MDMA might be a softer doorway to cross and start getting these substances in the legitimate use realm.

This echoes my sentiments perfectly. The funny thing is that, from talking to several professionals at various universities, one of the main issues that doctors had, or at least the ones I encountered who were familiar with Doblin's work, was that the research has shown that mdma isn't as harmful as the government painted it and it is somewhat effective in certain therapies, but they don't see those two factors as compelling enough to endorse mdma-assisted therapy. Given the fact that many cited neurotoxicity issues, I found myself wondering if they wouldn't be more receptive to something along the lines of psilocybin. Either way, as Doblin's/MAPS main work champions mdma studies, I don't really have any questions because ultimately, i'm not interested. MDMA is the most boring and ineffective weak "psychedelic" I've ever encountered. I'd really love to see them further the Griffiths protocol or maybe do some sort of complimentary study.

Indeed snozzle! Psilocybin would be a good candidate for more studies, and Griffith's research was great! Or starting more ayahuasca studies too, that would be interesting and it seems there is a certain receptivity nowadays to it that is not tainted with the prejudices people have against LSD for example.

Very true, I will definitely not limit myself to questions about MDMA, I'm sure Rick has a lot of knowledge regarding current research on LSD, Mescaline, Psilcybin and (Hopefully) DMT or Ayahuasca - even if it isn't directly through MAPS. If I do get some face time in with him, I'll definitely find out what i can about contributing to DMT research.

sorry it wasnt a joke. last time i sat and watched this man speak i just couldnt get over how wild and high this man looked i thought it was a little unprofessional but maybe he just had a crazy night prior?
dont get me wrong I love what maps is doing. still, I would love to ask him just how often he doses just out of curiosity.

yeah there is that strange glow in his eyes...

Is Rick Doblin really that hard to get to?
I think that if you send him or you ask someone at maps to send him an email
you can probably ask him lots of questions.
Personaly I dont know, I haven't sent him a question yet so I guess nothing for the moment.

i'd ask him if i could be a volunteer for any lsd peyote shroom or pedro studies

Have a look at the new book called 'Blows To The Back Of The Head I Have Known And Loved'

How do i help/get involved/what can i do?

Mr Doblin is a nice guy SWIM met him before. He's not a hard scientist though hes more of an advocate and organizer which is needed for this kind of research.

One question I want to ask is how does he plan on funding phase III clinical trials with MDMA. It seems like phase II is going to go through very well. But phase III is another level of costs management and personal. Without backing from pharmaceutical industry or major funding its going to be very very hard to do.

good idea burnt! and Xtechre!

Why didn't he join forces with Dr. Strassman and really blow this thing wide open? Why did he have to allow his ego to get involved?

But...I think he's doing good work so it's hard to not like him.

Strassman and Doblin are working on two different things. MAPS is mostly focused on MDMA (although they are helping other research too) and Strassman was strictly focused on DMT. MAPS goal is to get these drugs to be FDA approved Strassman wasn't studying therapeutic use in his grant for DMT research.

It has nothing to do with ego. More to do with research priorities.

I've met Rick too. Nice guy. I say good luck and godspeed to MAPS and their work. I think both questions mentioned would be good ones to ask.

I'm not so sure about that....well ok at this point in time you are mostly right. But early on there was a little frustration from Dr. Strassman about no one joining forces...it was him after all the jumped through all the hopes first and paved the way for Dublin. Maps is now at the forefront of helping research groups get through the red tape.

I've spoken to Dr. Strassman about his new non-profit he's working on "cotton wood". Strassman isn't focused on DMT per-say...he just started there. His big interest now lies in endogenous trypatmine assay's. He's working pretty close with researchers at LSU to get a trace endogenous tryptamine assay up and running...and working on a book...and working on a move... He's a pretty busy guy.

Anyway I think the work they are both doing is necessary and good. Hopefully Strassman get's his non profit off the ground and then there is more than one group making a big push.

^^ I see what you mean. Those kind of issues with collaboration often get tough with research groups. I think in such a small field more is always better.