
Nick Sand, Orange Sunshine LSD chemist, has died - Alex3917
https://www.psymposia.com/magazine/nick-sand-orange-sunshine-lsd-chemist-dies-75/
======
themgt
Beautiful quote from him in the article:

 _When I began to navigate psychospace with LSD, I realized that before we
were conscious, seemingly self-propelled human beings, many tapes and
corridors had been created in our minds and reflexes which were not of our own
making. These patterns and tapes laid down in our consciousness are walled off
from each other. I see it as a vast labyrinth with high walls sealing off the
many directives created by our personal history.

Many of these directives are contradictory. The coexistence of these
contradictory programs is what we call inner conflict. This conflict causes us
to constantly check ourselves while we are caught in the opposition of
polarity. Another metaphor would be like a computer with many programs running
simultaneously. The more programs that are running, the slower the computer
functions. This is a problem then. With all the programs running that are
demanded of our consciousness in this modern world, we have problems finding
deep integration.

To complicate matters, the programs are reinforced by fear. Fear separates,
love integrates. We find ourselves drawn to love and unity, but afraid to make
the leap.

What I found to be the genius of LSD is that it really gets you high, higher
than the programs, higher than the walls that mask and blind one to the energy
destroying presence of many contradictory but hidden programs. When LSD is
used intentionally it enables you to see all the tracks laid down, to explore
each one intensely. It also allows you to see the many parallel and redundant
programs as well as the contradictory ones.

It allows you to see the underlying unity of all opposites in the magic play
of existence. This allows you to edit these programs and recreate superior
programs that give you the insight to shake loose the restrictions and
conflicts programmed into each one of us by our parents, our religion, our
early education, and by society as a whole._

\---

Very much in line with what recent neuroscience results are finding:

[https://www.nature.com/articles/srep46421](https://www.nature.com/articles/srep46421)

[http://www.nature.com/news/brain-scans-reveal-how-lsd-
affect...](http://www.nature.com/news/brain-scans-reveal-how-lsd-affects-
consciousness-1.19727)

~~~
soineuh
That's not a beautiful quote, it's incoherent nonsense. You're reading bones,
mystic brute.

~~~
knowaveragejoe
Your responses smack of an angry, small person looking to pick a fight from
what you think is a position of superiority(not engaging in drug use). If you
could actually explain what is wrong with the above quote, that'd be
magnitudes more useful than this and your other screed elsewhere in the
thread.

~~~
mirimir
This is classic troll behavior.

~~~
soineuh
Sure I'm classic, but a troll? Sorry, I don't think so.

~~~
mirimir
Well then, you have a problem, because you're a troll who doesn't know what
they are ;)

~~~
soineuh
Oh my, what's the cure, doctor?

~~~
mirimir
I couldn't care less.

------
ShannonAlther
I'm pretty sure Nick Sand's arrest in 1996 was the cause of the sudden
scarcity of LSD on the market 20 years ago. According to Erowid (
[https://erowid.org/culture/characters/sand_nick/sand_nick_bi...](https://erowid.org/culture/characters/sand_nick/sand_nick_biography1.shtml)
), the RCMP tested samples from his lab and found their purity to be >100%,
suggesting that their reference samples had degraded.

~~~
eip
"According to court testimony, Pickard's lab produced up to a kilogram of LSD
approximately every five weeks for short periods. Despite criticism for their
methodology, the DEA contends that following their arrest there was a 95% drop
in the availability of LSD in the US in the two years following the arrest.[1]
Pickard himself has long denied these claims. In his 2007 paper "International
LSD Prevalence — Factors Affecting Proliferation and Control", Pickard
suggests that since the 1960s LSD production has always been de-centralized.
As to a turn-of-the-century decline in availability due to his own arrest,
Pickard highlights the fact that LSD availability had been on the decline
since 1996, a fact which he correlates in part with the exponential growth of
availability and demand for MDMA and other hallucinogenic drugs.[8] The actual
quantity of LSD seized by the DEA remains unclear, with figures ranging from
198.9 grams to 41.3 kilograms."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Leonard_Pickard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Leonard_Pickard)

------
jongold
Orange Sunshine (the recent documentary) was absolutely excellent. a++
[http://www.orangesunshinemovie.com/](http://www.orangesunshinemovie.com/)

~~~
Alex3917
Glad to know it's actually worth watching. I really wanted a print of their
movie poster, but for whatever reason they only made them in 11 x 17:
[http://belhistory.weebly.com/uploads/1/9/0/7/19079917/158004...](http://belhistory.weebly.com/uploads/1/9/0/7/19079917/1580041.png?446)

------
nnfy
These people arguably changed the world. Early psychonauts and LSD use are
tied to the beginnings of the electronic frontier foundation, and the concept
of an open information space and an alternative reality for all of humanity to
use freely. There is a documentary which shows in interviews that these ideals
were at least partially inspired by LSD use.

I hope someday to conquer my anxiety to a degree sufficient to explore
beneficial LSD use without fear of so called bad trips. Having tried a small
dose, there is without question a power in LSD (and other psychedelics, e.g.
shrooms) as a tool.

~~~
try_it
Bad experiences give light to possibly unrecognized problems. As someone who
likes using psychedelics, nothing has pushed me more into good experiences and
away from bad ones than having a good understanding of the arising and ceasing
of mental phenomena as taught in buddhist teachings of meditation. Whats so
scary about bad thoughts if you have a place where they arent there?

~~~
nnfy
I fear that a particularly difficult experience could leave me with a
permanent worsening of some problems.

I recognize that this is an unlikely case, however during my light trip I
experienced a seemingly inexplicable sudden anxiety attack which was difficult
to control. I feel like LSD is a toss up between potential
euphoria/enlightment and dysphoria/mental illness.

Granted, I did experience a substantial tranquility following the attack and
in the days after the trip, and I believe that cubensis provided me with a
substantial months long relief from existential depression, and helped me
realize the depth of the hole into which I was already aware that I'd fallen.
So I probably just have a few self imposed walls to break down.

~~~
Broken_Hippo
I can understand where you are coming from. I can always feel the anxiety
coming back when I've taken them, and can see how that would make folks
uncomfortable. I've a friend that won't take them because of this, in fact.

For me, having taken more psychedelics than one would like to admit, it just
mellowed out over time. Those walls broke down some and i got more comfortable
with that bit of myself. And oh, the depression lifting has been a real effect
for me as well. Of course, mine didn't reach anxiety attack level either, and
I think that would have scared me off.

------
bdrool
> The mother of his godson Aidan remarked, "Nick didn't care about the stupid
> politics shit, he'd just laugh at it." Jon Hanna said Nick "became a
> criminal as a matter of principle and as an act of civil disobedience."

[https://youtu.be/_Wy0k3j_a7E](https://youtu.be/_Wy0k3j_a7E)

[Note: that's actually him (Nick Sand) in the video clip above.]

~~~
mceoin
_“We got the whole prison stoned, this is what freedom is really about. It’s
not about not being in chains, it’s about not having your mind enslaved,” Nick
declared._

------
boardwaalk
There's a recent documentary about his... entrepreneurship called The Sunshine
Makers. I'd recommend it. It's on US Netflix.

~~~
Alex3917
There's another one called Orange Sunshine also that just came out. I haven't
seen either, but they both get 100% on Rotten Tomatoes.

------
swayvil
Speaking as a meditation enthusiast, he probably did more to expand human
consciousness than a thousand meditation enthusiasts.

~~~
nnfy
I'm curious, have you ever combined meditation with psychoactive substances?

I've found that marijuana and amphetamines both make it substantially easier
for me to meditate and calm my mind. I'm not particularly experienced though-
just a handful of times a month for a few years...

~~~
benevol
I'd recommend combining microdosing (10 micrograms) with meditation. It can
subtly take you to another level. It doesn't however render the "pure"
meditation experience inferior.

~~~
try_it
And I recommend higher doses. But be familiar with both.

~~~
benevol
Oh I didn't intend to exclude those. I absolutely agree - 150 micrograms (and
up, for experienced users) can absolutely have life transforming effects, if
used with the right attitude and careful preparation.

------
seoguru
Great interview of Nick Sand:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxiK827_rX8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxiK827_rX8)

parting words: "If we can keep moving from truth to love to beauty to
preciousness, everything around us becomes sacred"

~~~
soineuh
What was he trying to encourage with those words, exactly? Give up on reality
and at the same time somehow force yourself to care deeply about things?
Didn't humanity throw out this garbage philosophy thousands of years ago? Or
is this instead some strange drug-fueled process I'm not meant to reason about
but only experience?

------
soineuh
Are the rest of you just too polite to knock a soul only looking for a
saviour? Why are these comments exclusively basket-cases fawning over the
'world-changing' meditative power of an objectively useless and destructive
drug?

I'll preempt the obvious response. Yeah, it doesn't kill you, but it
irreparably alters your personality in a completely senseless way, turns you
into Tim Leary, or someotherway spits in the face of the delicate and
exhaustingly intentional intellectual and emotional process that has produced
every genuine, valuable human insight in history. I haven't encountered a
single LSD advocate that wasn't conspicuously unstable and self-hating, and we
don't say a word when they encourage others to risk everything that matters to
a functional person in exchange for fake spiritual nonsense.

Now they'll suggest I take some to free myself from the confines of the
emotional equipment that grounds any reasonable value system. As an exercise,
read the responses carefully. For nothing, they've bargained away their
ability to argue this point with me, and they want me to join the club.

 _edit: As anticipated, this comment is unpopular. However, no one has yet
attempted to articulate a criticism. I welcome any effort, and will try to
respond with care._

~~~
eludwig
>>it irreparably alters your personality in a completely senseless way

There are many things that fit this description: being a parent, puberty, your
first kiss, falling in love, a death in the family. Would you cling to a
definition of yourself that has no room for major, perspective-changing, life-
altering insights? You can try, but life has a way of changing constantly
whether you want it to or not.

Recreational drugs serve no "purpose", as you say (objectively useless). But
what purpose is there in being born, eating, making love, making friends, and
eventually dying? Purpose is what you decide it is. If some people want to
explore their brains using chemicals then what the problem with that? Yes,
everything has risks, but so does getting up in the morning.

Live and let live. You may not like the fact that drugs can change
personalities in a way that makes you uncomfortable, but this is a big world:
I'm sure you will be able to find like minded company. Maybe even here on HN?
Who knows.

~~~
soineuh
I choose to raise children because they are beautiful and I owe the world more
people like me. I was able predict beforehand the ways that it would change
me, and they were all good.

I didn't have a choice to go through puberty. That was programmed through
millions of years of adaptive evolution. It's the last thing from senseless.

I kissed my first woman because millions of years of adaptive evolution have
tempered me to benefit from intimacy, bonding, and community.

If could do anything to help it, my family would never die. This is a terrible
thing I never chose, and wouldn't wish on anybody if it were a choice.

All of these things that change us are nothing like a strange chemical we've
stumbled upon and found to scramble our brains. Next.

