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Travels in the New Psychedelic Bazaar (2013) (nymag.com)
37 points by gwern on Nov 2, 2014 | hide | past | favorite | 5 comments



China's revenge for the opium wars...

I probably count as a pioneer in this sort of thing; I remember an outfit on usenet who was an early research chemical and plant salesman, and thought it was incredibly cool to be able to do this. While nothing bad happened, I regret those youthful indiscretions, and feel sad for the kids messing with far more potentially dangerous things these days. I remember a big population of junkies ended up with parkinsons because someone cut corners on a fentanyl synthesis and made an isomer which is now widely used in Parkinson's research. It's only a matter of time before something like this happens again. Perhaps it already has.


You're thinking of MPTP[1]. It shows up in fiction a decent amount. Not many have been harmed by it; maybe seven cases total.

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPTP#Discovery_in_users_of_illi...


What year was that?

Reminds me of this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Web_Tryp


I'm absolutely for the legalization of all drugs, but haven't figured out how that marketplace should look like -- I don't think they should be "pushed" at all.


"When one takes a new and unstudied drug, one makes oneself a human guinea pig."




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