
Tim Ferriss Major Depression Research - gwintrob
https://www.crowdrise.com/timferriss
======
CitizenKane
I'm very happy to see this. I've seen people with serious depression issues be
completely turned around by a single dose of psilocybin. I'm not sure I would
have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, but I'm hoping that
these studies will become more common and hopefully the efficacy of these
treatments will prove out.

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voynich61
lmao @ ppl taking this guy seriously

Highlights from his wikipedia page
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Ferriss](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Ferriss)):

> In 2001, Ferriss founded BrainQUICKEN, an online nutritional supplements
> company which made a product that was marketed as both BodyQuick and Brain
> Quicken.[22] It was claimed that this product would dramatically increase
> short term memory and reaction speed, taking effect within 60 minutes, but
> these claims made about this combination of ingredients have never been
> scientifically validated

> Notable works: The 4-Hour Workweek, The 4-Hour Body, The 4-Hour Chef

> his campaigns, such as dedicating his birthday to raising funds and heading
> LitLiberation to increase literacy worldwide

> The New Yorker Magazine described Ferriss as "this generation's self help
> guru"

EDIT: all these downvotes! How doesn't he remind you of this guy?:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xg29TuWo0Yo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xg29TuWo0Yo)

~~~
bobbygoodlatte
I take him seriously. The slow carb diet from 4 Hour Body has had a huge
impact on how I eat. It works and has helped 1000's of people improve their
lives.

~~~
makeset
It makes me sad to see this comment here. This is precisely how pseudoscience
sells and proliferates: subjective attribution of all success to the hyped
bunk.

Quirk diets work because adherents accidentally get the calorie balance in the
right direction by limiting/changing dietary habits. It's not the quirk, which
might maybe contribute a tiny effect if it's not entirely bogus in principle.
Yet people hail, "The diet works! The guru was right! All hail the Guru!"

Ask and you'll hear the exact same refrain for homeopathy, acupuncture, rhino
horn powder, shark fin soup, albino body parts, ...

~~~
voynich61
Yes, and well put too. Evidence seems to suggest that the placebo effect can
occur even for those who know they're getting a placebo
([http://www.theguardian.com/science/2010/dec/22/placebo-
effec...](http://www.theguardian.com/science/2010/dec/22/placebo-effect-
patients-sham-drug\)--) methinks some 'conscious placebo' product could really
help people without deluding them...

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rajacombinator
This is cool but I would have liked to see something in the description about
why crowdfunding is needed when the fundraising target is pocket change for 1)
any of the listed "public supporters", 2) Johns Hopkins. Surely the incentive
is there for any of these parties to want to attach their name to such ground
breaking research.

If part of the purpose is "show the public that they can contribute to science
through crowdfunding", then that is legit and they should make it clear. Or
maybe it's too controversial for JHU or NIH to fund, etc.

edit: additionally, a better explanation of what the funds will be used for
would set a good precedent.

------
Estragon

      This pilot study will enroll up to 6 individuals with
      treatment-resistant depression (at least 2 failed
      attempts at an anti-depressant treatment) who are judged
      by a physician to be appropriate for the study and who
      remain under outpatient supervision for the duration of
      the study.
    

This requires $80K???

~~~
wayofthesamurai
Read The Spirit Molecule about the studies done on DMT in New Mexico during
the 90s.

It was a nightmare for the lead researcher to get everything done.

80K actually seems like too little to me.

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lutusp
If only programs like this could be conducted by dispassionate scientists, out
of the spotlight, and without the financial angle and the incentive to produce
results that investors expect.

When I see a project being promoted by a list of famous, influential
investors, instead of the refereed results of extensive and carefully
controlled clinical trials, I'm reminded how often this sort of project
conceals more than it reveals:

[http://www.nature.com/news/over-half-of-psychology-
studies-f...](http://www.nature.com/news/over-half-of-psychology-studies-fail-
reproducibility-test-1.18248)

Let's all remember that, in science, evidence trumps eminence -- or it should.

~~~
hosh
Unfortunately, there are certain area of science where there are unexamined
biases. Stray too close to there, and they are automatically dismissed as
crackpot.

In science, evidence trumps eminence, unless it is something like cold fusion.

If we can measure this "crackpot bias", I am not sure psychedelic research
would have as high of a bias as cold fusion, but it might have been closer
say, ten or twenty years ago. No one wanted to touch that stuff or could get
grants to do such research.

~~~
lutusp
> If we can measure this "crackpot bias", I am not sure psychedelic research
> would have as high of a bias as cold fusion ...

Yep. For things like cold fusion, wishful thinking reigns, but for anything
health-related, desperation reigns. Neither produces any kind of desirable
science, the kind that's curious without being passionate for a particular
outcome.

~~~
hosh
I brought up cold fusion as a great example. There are some very interesting
research out there that are fighting against this very bias you are
demonstrating right now. Is there wishful thinking? Sure, but perhaps not
among some of the serious efforts going on.

"for anything health-related, desperation reigns" <\-- That sounds like a
clever, truthful statement, but it's nothing more than a blanket statement
that also demonstrates this bias I spoke of. Are there desperate people? Yes,
quite a number of them. Is what Tim Ferris doing a result from desperation? I
doubt it. Are there people who will unthinkingly fund this because of Tim
Ferris's fame? Sure. Are there people who are open-minded though skeptical and
curious about what Tim Ferris is doing? Sure. So what's the problem here?

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jph
Also see today's discovery a new kind of anti-depressant.

[http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/new_type_...](http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/new_type_of_antidepressant_found_to_act_quickly_in_mice)

"The compound CGP3466B, already proven nontoxic for people, may effectively
and rapidly treat depression, according to results of a study in mice.... it
may work in patients who are unresponsive to other types of drugs and it lays
the foundation for the development of a new class of fast-acting
antidepressants that target the same network."

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mathgenius
"Here take this, it may be a placebo, so you may or may not get extremely
high"... I can't imagine what that would be like..

~~~
tim333
Probably disappointing if you get the placebo. On a more serious point if they
use a sugar pill as a placebo it's going to make it pretty obvious to the
subjects who got the real stuff and who didn't thus rendering the results
iffy. Maybe they should use something like Citalopram as the placebo.

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tryitnow
I don't think using a placebo is sufficient in a study like this.

I'd like to see another psychedelic used as a control, not just a placebo.
Subjects are going to "know" when they've received psilocybin and then they're
going to be likely to "perform" better when evaluated for depression.

At least that would be my hypothesis.

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ommunist
You can grow that funny helping fungi yourself. And in Sweden for example they
just grow in the forest, although tropical varieties are much more potent.

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djloche
I wonder why they chose 'people with depression AND cancer' demographic.

~~~
timClicks
It'll be due to the social stigma will experimenting with psychedelics. It's
more permissible to try 'last chance' therapies with people who are dying from
cancer.

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pasbesoin
Through observation and personal experience, I've come to the conclusion that
the majority of depression has its basis in physical conditions -- the state
of (the rest of) one's body, and/or of one's environment. And really,
environmental causes become intractable when they produce corresponding
physical changes in the subject. (Including, but not only, the brain.)

So, until physical health and environment become center stage, "the problem"
of depression will continue, with at best various palliative treatments -- too
often touted as "the cure" \-- slapped on to ameliorate, or bury, some measure
of the symptoms including "depression".

I'm not saying this is 100% the case. But I've seen too much of the extreme
opposite end, where diagnosis and treatment are rather divorced from the
physical circumstances.

Even these days, the "industry" seems to be heavily populated with... [oh,
redacted, I guess].

P.S. Regarding psilocybin, which the OP endeavor is apparently focusing on,
perhaps again my experience is an anomaly, but many of my drug-taking friends
from my younger years seem to have ended up happier and more "successful", in
a personal sense, in life.

Having been more than sufficiently scared/indoctrinated in my early years, I
avoided drugs. Looking around me, I now more than occasionally regret that.
Maybe a little self-medication and experimentation would have led to some
different choices at critical junctures that I now see, in retrospect.

Granted, drugs do destroy some people. And, given current circumstances,
societies. I don't mean to make light of that.

But the often hypocritical, "just say no" fear-based inter-generational
culture that has predominated in my part of the world, with respect to this
topic? Not productive.

Hell, aside from the personal side, we've lost -- delayed for decades --
research into psilocybin and marijuana, that earlier showed signs of promise
and now are proving to be quick fruitful areas of pharmacological development.

P.P.S. Maybe this is the wrong message to share. And even with my current
wondering, I have -- retrospectively, I guess -- no desire to become, or have
become, a habitual user.

My primary point, I guess, must return to the personal and the anecdotal. I've
had my ups and downs, but I always used to bounce back -- until some physical
injuries led to chronic discomfort and limitations on my activities. That
marked the start of extended dark times, and a gradual but relentless downward
spiral including further, reinforcing physical health developments.

Guard your health! Your first and best line of defense -- or offense, to put
it perhaps in a less fearful term.

That includes guarding it by using it for positive experiences. They tend to
be self-reinforcing -- just as the negative are, in the opposite direction.

