If anyone has yet to see it, there's a current show called "Common Side Effects" that has a similar vein of thought to this study (a mycologist discovers a mushroom capable of healing illnesses, wounds, and even restoring life to dead creatures, humans included). Highly recommend if you can get past it being animated.
Fantastic show. The co-creator, Joseph Bennett, also co-created Scavengers Reign, which is a masterpiece. While more obviously science fiction, it shares some thematic and aesthetic similarities with Common Side Effects.
Yea, that's how I found out about the show Scavengers Reign is one of the best shows I've ever seen. While I really like Common Side Effects, the way Scavengers Reign was done is really hard to beat.
I don’t think you multiplied quite right. An 80-kg person would need 400mg, which would take 40g of shrooms if potency is 10mg per dried gram.
That would still be 10 times larger than a regular dose. I think that would make most people seriously ill, not to mention the mental effects. One must assume that mice respond differently than humans.
It's 5 mg/kg (or 15 mg/kg due to faster metabolism) for rats, and 25 mg (not per kg!) for humans. To be clear, 25 mg is a completely normal dosage that has been used in previous human studies.
"First, we sought to model high-dose used in a clinical study for chronic pain, where patients were administered a psychedelic dose (25 mg) of psilocybin. Using the standard allometric scaling method, a human dose of 25 mg of psilocybin translates to a mouse dose of approximately 5.14 mg/kg."
First, please correct me if I'm wrong, but is it possible that the article made a mistake either in the dosages or the substance that was administered? It calls 5mg/kg of psilocybin a low dose. To me, this is an insanely high amount if we're really talking pure psilocybin (not psilocybin mushrooms). Johns Hopkins reported treating people with (high) therapeutic doses of psilocybin (not mushrooms) of between 20mg and 30mg per 70kg. In strictly mushroom weight, that's anything between 3g and 5g of dried cubensis. If the article is correct, what they administer those mice is the equivalent of giving a 70kg human 350mg of psilocybin (as a low dose lol), or about 50g-60g of dried mushrooms to munch on? I hope the article made a mistake, rather than someone from the research team misread the recommended dosage.
EDIT: According to my limited search, a 12-weeks old lab rat could weight anything between 0.25-0.5kg. At 5mg-15mg/kg, that's approximately 1.25-2.50mg for low doses of psilocybin and 3.75-7.5mg for high doses. I don't find this as outrageous as originally. It could work if we take into consideration that brain size is probably a more significant factor than body mass.
Second.
> this study suggests that psilocybin impacts multiple hallmarks of aging by reducing oxidative stress, improving DNA repair responses, and preserving telomere length. Telomeres are the structured ends of a chromosome, protecting it from damage that could lead to the formation of age-related diseases, such as cancer, neurodegeneration or cardiovascular disease. These foundational processes influence human aging and the onset of these chronic diseases.
Unless I misunderstand what I'm reading, I wouldn't say that it's really psilocybin (the chemical) that's responsible. It's the taking then subsequent tripping. It's now known that without the trip, no benefit. If my intuition is correct, it could be that LSD along with a few other psychedelics (and associated practices) might affect you in a similar way over the long run.
Dosing seems correct, they established that psilocin (the metabolite of psilocybin ) increases lifespan. The on hand mouse expert likely understood roughly how much psilocybin could be metabolised safely by the mouse.
The mice also had some head jerk indicating that they were under influence and they also established that the mice didn't lose more weight compared to the control group.
Some comparisons between animals and humans just aren't compatible with understanding dose and volume. Some smaller animals eat their weight in food, I just wouldn't recommend basing your own dietary fiber intake on that.
Take a look at allometric scaling.
"The rationale for dosing regimen utilized was based on a number of factors. First, we sought to model high-dose used in a clinical study for chronic pain, where patients were administered a psychedelic dose (25mg) of psilocybin. Using the standard allometric scaling method, a human dose of 25 mg of psilocybin translates to a mouse dose of 5.14 mg/kg; "
I likely misunderstood the article or inferred the wrong thing. The study is indeed very focused on the effects of psilocin/psilocybin. The monthly spacing of doses threw me in a different trajectory.
Cool study. I really want to believe the results, but the effect on life extension is so large (see figure 2B) that I find it hard to. Maybe there was some uncontrolled confounding factor? It is noted in the 'Methods' section that 'Researchers were not blinded to group allocation [...]', which is unfortunate.
I’ve heard this a lot, but I think a good part of the nausea is caused by the same compounds as the psychedelia. LSD seems to cause just as much nausea, and it’s a tiny droplet of liquid absorbed through the mucous membranes.
Look at this optical illusion and then look at a wall. That's pretty much what it looks like when people say walls are breathing. Add in tracers and closed eye visuals and it can get to be too much.
I am surprised no one ever mentions psilacetin. You should get it. It is essentially a pill form of psilocybin. It is psilocybin without the shroom matter.
In my case the problem is not really the taste, but shroom matter is difficult to digest, and it is the cause of the nausea, and nausea completely kills the trip for me. I have not tried ginger + honey with ground shroom though.
I am not sure where to get psilacetin from, not anymore at least. It was readily available 2 years ago (was cheap as hell, too), but I don't know about today.
There's no way for the average person to know it only contains 4-aco-dmt though.
I did 4-aco-dmt multiple times in high school.
Luckily, I just tripped and was grateful to be alive on the other side.
At least half, if not 15 out of 20 of my friends went completely into psychosis and a good majority of those people had persistent negative symptoms for weeks after.
Agreed. I have bought it legally from a reputable vendor in a country where it was legal at the time (and possibly still is), so I wasn't worried, but ideally some independent authority would do the testing on each batch and post it for everyone to check.
Can someone comment on why SSRIs wouldnt have a similar effect? The hypothesis seems to be seratonin affects aging. Does it matter where it comes from?
How does that work? I would have understood this if it said people shoot themselves in the head or - if you insist - people physically/actually/sometimes/even shoot themselves in the head, it would be people taking up ballistic weapons which they point at their heads and fire away. Literal shooting on the other hand sounds like something Chekov would write about, something about the rifle above the fireplace in chapter 1 which needs to have been used by the next chapter [1].
Maybe I'm taking all the superfluous use of the word literally too literal?
"People do this, people do that ..." Unless you're speaking from personal experience or have some hard data, you're spewing utter BS, you're doing this now. Teach yourself!
Meh let them do it. They’re annoying to deal with but it’ll make success easier for the rest of us. (And we totally know they’re high despite what they think)
that is how I feel about exercise... spending 10 hours per week in my youth at a gym for 40 years to buy me an extra 10-20 years at the end of my life.
This is misguided. A healthy lifestyle doesn't simply mean extra decades at the end of your life and everything else remains the same. It means many health issues also start later and you have more healthy years available to in your younger years as well. Many turn 30 and already find some things ache or don't work quite the right way. Take care of your body and those risks drastically go down, it doesn't take ten hours a week.
> Many turn 30 and already find some things ache or don't work quite the right way
it also goes the other direction: Men in their 20s and 30s get hurt doing the same risky activities they did in high school (rock climbing, basketball, soccer, etc) resulting in lower back pain, damaged hands, etc.
I've wanted to get into swimming, but swimming requires a lot more planning (prepping a towel, getting changed, drying off, managing wet objects after).
Whereas non-wet activities have similar requirements to my regular laundry management
Exercise starts paying off in midlife by fixing your back pain, letting you go trampolining, steadying your balance, not getting winded or having to breathe through your mouth on stairs, and just generally making your body spend its repair cycles on things that make you feel healthy instead of inflamed. I develop so many aches and pains that exercise helps fix. Without the exercise you might not even want the extra 10-20 years.
It’s not about buying extra years but making your life a hole lotta better as well.
Am not kidding. I hated exercise, I still hate it, but it objectively makes everything else so much better I keep at it.
There are simple and effective protocols. You don’t need to be ”in to it”. You don’t need to buy extra equipment (necessarily) nor do you need purchase anything from anyone (unless you want to).
Running, pushups and kettle bell swings are enough (with a good strategy). Having a daily stretching/mobility routine is advisable the older you get.
Just do it! If you think it will totally suck, it probably will! If the question ”what are you training for” irritates you it sure as hell will keep irritating. There are _zero_ lifestyle things you need to buy into. But it’s medicine. Pure medicine.
Not really an expert here but happy to share my path. My current goal is to maintain minimum flexibility, do some resistance training and keep some aerobic fitness.
If you have very little exercise from recent years, I really recommend finding a local personal trainer, explain you want a bare minimum personal program and start from there.
Once you know what your body can do under supervision you can think about how to develop routines that last your life.
Personally I bought some courses from GMB fitness for mobility and for some kettlebell stuff read the book ”Simple&Sinister” whose basic program I did for a year, and then started doing ”The quick and the dead” program from the same author. Now - the books are a bit weird and the motivational narration may be offputting but the exercises seem legit and effective.
I don’t know if any of the above is usefull at all for anyone else. But the basic science sort of goes you need some basic aerobic exercise and some resistance training. Free weights like kettlebell seem to offer best bang for buck since the basic exercises actually train a lot of the muscles at the same time.
The ”lets isolate the muscle groups and pinpoint these exercises” regimen might have it’s use but’s imho it’s sort overcomplicating the basic equation if you really are not training for anything particular and have no handicaps from injuries.
I understand the deadlift is a super effective and simple technique but I hate going to gym and don’t have space for anyhting else except kettlebell.
Like Scott Hanselman tipped - plan a routine that gives you least amount of opportunities for excuses.
It's not just about the extra life span, it's the quality of life until then.
I wish the same focus was given to weight loss, smoking, etc. No one really cares about living an extra 10 years from 70 to 80 if it means giving up 40+ yesrs of enjoying bad habits.
Exercise is especially neat because there are enjoyable ways to do it
> I wish the same focus was given to weight loss, smoking, etc. No one really cares about living an extra 10 years from 70 to 80 if it means giving up 40+ yesrs of enjoying bad habits.
It’s the same thing, right?
That is, exercise may not necessarily make your life longer, but has a good chance of making your life higher quality.
Similarly, bad habits can shorten your life, and even if it doesn’t, will most definitely make your life lower quality (eventually).
I mean most of the anti-smoking, weight-loss, campaigns are focused on trying to convince people thats its bad for you because it increases the chance of lung cancer, or heart morbidity. Ergo, you shouldn't do them because you won't live as long.
Instead, I think we need to focus on "you'll feel better, like right now".
Exercising makes you feel better. It’s a necessary component of living a good life. Extending your life is irrelevant. However, strength training is necessary to ensure the later parts of your life are worth living
Who says you have to spend that much time in the gym? Unless you're really going for pro, nutrition and maintaining healthy blood pressure will get you most if not all the way to a longer lifespan while saving you countless hours. Even just an hour of high intensity exercise a week can maintain muscle and provide cardiovascular benefits.
30 min a day or 3hrs a week in a gym is all you need. I’ve been working out for 10 years, and if I can pull 3 hours in 1 week, it’s a great week! And it’ll keep me real strong. Plus, makes you sleep better, which means you probably need to sleep less. Working out is almost always a “you get more than what you gave” kinda deal.
Vegetarians live 10 years longer than meat-eaters.
Some studies indicate that vegetarians may live an average of 6 to 10 years longer than meat-eaters, with some studies showing even larger differences for those who switch to a plant-based diet early in life.
People following any kind of intentional diet live longer than average. Because they are people that care any their health, not because of whichever diet they choose.
It sounds familiar, but it's one of those things that's secretly checking something else.
Vegetarians are generally more conscious of their health than omnivores. Because you have to realize that omnivores includes the vast majority of people.
