Joe Rogan Experience #1136 - Hamilton Morris

1. 0:01 – 1:57

   Back on the mic—why long-form conversation works (and why they’re sober now)

   1. JRJoe Rogan0:01

      (sighs) I try so hard. (laughs)

   2. HMHamilton Morris0:03

      (laughs) Boom, and we're live, Hamilton Morris, (fingers snap) sober as fuck. How about you? Absolutely sober.

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:12

      Yes, this time. So we did a podcast seven years ago and most people apparently didn't know how fucked up we were. But, uh, I figured, "Damn, we're here with Hamilton Morris, we should go deep." And we just kept hitting that joint till I lost most of my grasp on reality while we were talking. (laughs)

   4. HMHamilton Morris0:31

      (laughs)

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:32

      It was just a very slippery conversation. I was just too high to form coherent thoughts. It was just... Whatever I pieced together was just, uh, it was... You know, it was al- almost like miming a conversation.

   6. HMHamilton Morris0:44

      (laughs) But now it's seven years later and you have a new place.

   7. JRJoe Rogan0:48

      Yeah.

   8. HMHamilton Morris0:48

      It's beautiful.

   9. JRJoe Rogan0:49

      Yeah. Well, you were... At the early days, we did it at my house.

   10. HMHamilton Morris0:52

       Yeah.

   11. JRJoe Rogan0:52

       That was way, way, way back in the day.

   12. HMHamilton Morris0:54

       I had no idea, really. I knew who you were, of course, but I didn't know about your podcast entirely. I'd seen clips of you on YouTube and it wasn't until I was driving home from that recording and my phone just filled with hundreds of emails that I realized, "Oh, wow, this is a, a serious phenomenon that I was not aware of."

   13. JRJoe Rogan1:12

       (laughs)

   14. HMHamilton Morris1:13

       And now I see it's just become huge.

   15. JRJoe Rogan1:16

       It's a weird thing, dude. It, it's, uh, it's got the wheel. I just sort of have to show up. It's a very stran- uh, an- and it sounds like, um, false modesty or something like that, but I'm just being totally honest. Like, this thing does itself.

   16. HMHamilton Morris1:31

       I think a lot of it might have to do with the long form.

   17. JRJoe Rogan1:34

       Yeah.

   18. HMHamilton Morris1:34

       Because people are so used to seeing people's opinions condensed and filtered into these soundbites and snippets, and to hear an extended conversation with someone where they can actually tell stories and articulate their opinions in a nuanced, careful way is so rare.

   19. JRJoe Rogan1:50

       I agree. Um, uh, it's one of the reasons why I don't do those shows anymore, like panel shows and things like that.

   20. HMHamilton Morris1:56

       Yeah.

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:56

       It's just so frustrating.

2. 1:57 – 3:00

   TV talk-show chaos: Dr. Oz, applause signs, and fake ‘debate’ formats

   1. HMHamilton Morris1:57

      Oh, it's insane. I have very little experience with that sort of thing, but I did Dr. Oz, um-

   2. JRJoe Rogan2:02

      (laughs)

   3. HMHamilton Morris2:02

      (laughs) ... last year.

   4. JRJoe Rogan2:03

      One of the worst ones.

   5. HMHamilton Morris2:04

      Yes. And I don't know how any normal person could function in that sort of environment. I mean, I have a, a TV show, so arguably, I'm well-trained for that sort of thing. But unless you're an actor who's prepared a line to say as soon as they point at you, there's no way that you could function because it's not a genuine conversation. It's just an opportunity to launch one-sentence soundbites and then audience applause.

   6. JRJoe Rogan2:28

      Yeah. And also, the audience is such a strange element to add to a conversation. I mean, if you and I were having this conversation exactly in this r- this room, but to the left of us is an enormous group of people, we would feel weird. We would have to address them, we'd have to turn to them. It, it would be odd.

   7. HMHamilton Morris2:46

      Following illuminated applause-

   8. JRJoe Rogan2:48

      Yeah.

   9. HMHamilton Morris2:48

      ... and laughter signs.

   10. JRJoe Rogan2:49

       Oh, God, those are the weirdest. When the... There's always the warmup guy who's like-

   11. HMHamilton Morris2:53

       (claps hands)

   12. JRJoe Rogan2:53

       ... "Okay, everybody, we're coming back from break. We're coming back from break." And they hold up the sign, "Applause. Applause. Applause." And everybody goes crazy.

3. 3:00 – 6:22

   Kratom deep dive: dosing, risks, and why people use it to quit opioids

   1. HMHamilton Morris3:00

      And they create the worst environment. I was on this, uh, discussion about kratom. Are you familiar with this? This-

   2. JRJoe Rogan3:05

      Shh. I'm on it right now.

   3. HMHamilton Morris3:06

      Oh, wow.

   4. JRJoe Rogan3:07

      Yeah.

   5. HMHamilton Morris3:07

      I-

   6. JRJoe Rogan3:07

      I just took some. I, I fucked my knee up the other day. I did something and, uh, it's been stiff and painful, so I iced it before I came here, and then I just took, uh, took six of them, see what happens.

   7. HMHamilton Morris3:19

      Wow. Uh-

   8. JRJoe Rogan3:19

      Took 10 once. Oof.

   9. HMHamilton Morris3:21

      10 one-

   10. JRJoe Rogan3:22

       10 pills.

   11. HMHamilton Morris3:23

       ... gram capsules?

   12. JRJoe Rogan3:23

       Yeah.

   13. HMHamilton Morris3:24

       Or... I don't know how much you take.

   14. JRJoe Rogan3:24

       I don't know. T- can you grab that bag? There's a bag that's sitting right o- on the sink. I'll tell you w- exactly what's in it. But, uh, now I get why people might think it's a drug. Because-

   15. HMHamilton Morris3:35

       Well, it is a drug.

   16. JRJoe Rogan3:36

       Yeah, for sure. But when I took four, I was like... Well, I took two for... The first time I took it, I took two, and then a couple times I took two, I'm like, "This is, like, a mild stimulant." But then when you get into the range of eight to 10 pills, it's like, "Oh, this w- this'll fuck you up." This stuff. The stuff I take is Urban Ice Organics and, um... See, it says, it says take two. It definitely-

   17. HMHamilton Morris4:03

       It doesn't say the amount of material in the capsule?

   18. JRJoe Rogan4:07

       What does it say there?

   19. HMHamilton Morris4:08

       750 milligrams. Okay.

   20. JRJoe Rogan4:11

       So not quite a gram.

   21. HMHamilton Morris4:12

       Not quite a gram. All right. That seems like a, a reasonable amount. But they always construct these things in these ridiculous dramatic oppositions, like it was me versus a woman whose son had died of some kratom-associated overdose. And, you know, it, it turns into a thing, like, "Well, what do you have to say to this woman whose son died?" It's like, "I don't know. You know, there are people that die from caffeine overdoses as well. It's tragic that this happens."

   22. JRJoe Rogan4:38

       Have people died from this?

   23. HMHamilton Morris4:40

       Yes. They have-

   24. JRJoe Rogan4:41

       How much do you have to take?

   25. HMHamilton Morris4:42

       An enormous amount. I mean, I think a lot of people set up these unrealistic expectations with these drugs where they, if they like a drug, they want to say, "It's impossible-"

   26. JRJoe Rogan4:49

       Right.

   27. HMHamilton Morris4:49

       "... for it to kill anyone."

   28. JRJoe Rogan4:50

       Right.

   29. HMHamilton Morris4:50

       "It's impossible. There's no possible way."

   30. JRJoe Rogan4:52

       Right.
4. 6:22 – 7:21

   Freedom vs ‘safety’: the case for cognitive liberty and honest education

   1. HMHamilton Morris6:22

      Right, right. Exactly. And it's just... I think it's also just a sort of a bad road to go down. People always wanna emphasize the safety of things.

   2. JRJoe Rogan6:29

      Right.

   3. HMHamilton Morris6:29

      But in my opinion, safety isn't the point. It doesn't ultimately matter to me whether or not something is safe. I think we should have the freedom to do dangerous things if we choose. We're allowed to ride motorcycles, we're allowed to shoot guns, you're allowed to go skydiving and bungee jumping. All those things carry risks, but it's assumed that any adult that does them is aware of those risks.

   4. JRJoe Rogan6:49

      Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I mean, it's, it's also w- who is... If the w- the society that we live in was just you and I, as the... We were the only two people alive, who are you to tell me what I can do or me to tell you what you can do? It's ridiculous. And so when you have grown adults, telling a grown adult who's informed what they can and can't do, then it becomes a p- a question of children. Well, then it becomes a p- an, an education issue and it becomes a parental issue. I mean, it's just y- you can't lie to your children about the effects of certain drugs because then they're not gonna believe you about the really actual... The actual dangerous ones.

5. 7:21 – 12:46

   The opioid epidemic narrative: pharma scapegoating, addiction realities, and off-ramps

   1. HMHamilton Morris7:21

      Right. And this is, of course, reflected in the so-called opioid epidemic-

   2. JRJoe Rogan7:26

      Yes.

   3. HMHamilton Morris7:26

      ... right now.

   4. JRJoe Rogan7:27

      Yes.

   5. HMHamilton Morris7:27

      There's endless finger-pointing. Everyone wants to find a culprit that's behind all of it and the easiest person to blame, of course, are pharmaceutical companies because everybody hates pharmaceutical companies, so why not blame them?

   6. JRJoe Rogan7:39

      Right.

   7. HMHamilton Morris7:39

      But, you know... And I'm not pro-pharmaceutical by any stretch of the imagination but I'm also not anti-pharmaceutical either. And when you look at the way, for example, The New York Times is covering the opioid epidemic, it's always in this tone of, like, "Documents were uncovered that show that executives at Purdue Pharma were aware that morphine was addictive as early as 1999." It's like, well, of course. Of course, they were aware. People have known that morphine is addictive for hundreds of years. This is old news. And this whole idea that doctors were convinced by some letter in The New England Journal of Medicine that said that OxyContin isn't addictive is absurd. These are all morphine derivatives. Any adult, especially a medically trained adult, should know that no matter what little variation you make on that molecule if it's structurally and pharmacologically and qualitatively similar to morphine, of course, it's going to be addictive. And that, in and of itself, isn't even a bad thing. It should be okay to give people addictive drugs as well as long as everyone's aware of the risks.

   8. JRJoe Rogan8:40

      As long as they understand the protocol to get off of it. The... You, you know... There's so many people that get on these things and then wind up taking them far longer than they're supposed to because it's easy to, to get hooked. I mean, we need to at, at least have some sort of responsible direction that these people need to go to to get off of them once they're on them. Because people that get, uh, back operations, any- anything where they prescribe you, uh, high doses of, uh, opiates, it's a huge problem. I know many, many people that have gotten hooked because of it. And in fact, I should tell you that my good friend, Justin Wren, his wife found out about kratom because of you.

   9. HMHamilton Morris9:18

      Oh.

   10. JRJoe Rogan9:18

       Because of your show, he, um, had a problem with his shoulder, got shoulder, shoulder surgery. They put him on OxyContins. He was fucked up on them and he was having a really hard time getting off it, having the shakes really bad, and kratom is the only thing that got him off of it.

   11. HMHamilton Morris9:34

       Right. And that's not surprising. I mean, this has been known for a very long time in Thailand and that was actually the reason that it was originally prohibited. I don't know if you're aware of that but because the government taxed opium, um, and people started using kratom, then they made kratom illegal-

   12. JRJoe Rogan9:50

       Is that the right way to say it? Because people say kratom.

   13. HMHamilton Morris9:52

       Yeah.

   14. JRJoe Rogan9:52

       Um, you're the only one I've heard say kratom.

   15. HMHamilton Morris9:54

       People in... It's a Thai word. People in Thailand call it kratom.

   16. JRJoe Rogan9:57

       Oh, okay. Okay.

   17. HMHamilton Morris9:57

       So people in the US call it kratom. It's... I... It's also they have... You know, it's... Maybe it's like kratom so they're like-

   18. JRJoe Rogan10:04

       Right.

   19. HMHamilton Morris10:04

       ... "I'm not gonna go that far."

   20. JRJoe Rogan10:05

       Right, right, right.

   21. HMHamilton Morris10:05

       But kratom is closer.

   22. JRJoe Rogan10:06

       If you did, it would be weird. (laughs)

   23. HMHamilton Morris10:07

       (laughs) Yeah, yeah. No. But I feel... As, you know... Yeah.

   24. JRJoe Rogan10:11

       Like American people that say Ecuador.

   25. HMHamilton Morris10:13

       (laughs)

   26. JRJoe Rogan10:14

       Argentina.

   27. HMHamilton Morris10:15

       But it is kratom.

   28. JRJoe Rogan10:17

       Yeah. Kratom. Okay. So we'll try to call it kratom.

   29. HMHamilton Morris10:19

       Or something close to that.

   30. JRJoe Rogan10:20

       Yeah.
6. 12:46 – 16:32

   Pharmacological determinism is a myth: culture, context, and drug stereotypes (PCP, heroin, etc.)

   1. JRJoe Rogan12:46

      I always felt like people that did heroin or opiates or something like that were on a very short road to death. That, that was my perception when I was a kid. And then I had a friend who was a longshoreman. They, uh, worked on the docks bringing ... They would bring fish in (clears throat) and, uh, filet the fish for the market. And, um, he worked with a guy that every day at lunch, the guy would go cop, he would get his heroin, he would shoot it up in his car, and then he'd go back to work. And I was like, "You'd go back to work?" And they're like, "Yep, he worked every day." Like, every day he shot up and every day he worked. Like, yeah. He was never late. Nope. Just did his work.

   2. HMHamilton Morris13:24

      Right.

   3. JRJoe Rogan13:24

      I'm like, "Wow. Well, I didn't think you could do that. I thought if you did heroin, the next thing you know, you'd just be on the floor in f- in a fetal position in your own urine, and you just would fall apart and die."

   4. HMHamilton Morris13:34

      Right. Yeah, there's this idea that people sometimes refer to as pharmacological determinism, that a certain drug has to do a certain thing. So alcohol has to sedate and disinhibit you. Heroin has to addict you and make you a slave to it and kill you. Cocaine has to be a euphoric thing that's done at parties. It's also very addictive. PCP has to make you strip nude and run around, um-

   5. JRJoe Rogan13:59

      Fighting cops.

   6. HMHamilton Morris14:00

      ... Compton, fighting cops, and punching-

   7. JRJoe Rogan14:02

      Yeah.

   8. HMHamilton Morris14:02

      ... holes in wooden fences.

   9. JRJoe Rogan14:04

      (laughs)

   10. HMHamilton Morris14:05

       Um, (can pops open) but when you look at this, you know, anthropologists have looked at certain drugs that are used cross-culturally, like alcohol, and what you find is this whole idea of pharmacological determinism is fundamentally flawed. Drugs behave differently in different cultures depending on the set and setting of the user. And so, you find all sorts of instances that are major exceptions to these rules that we've set up for these various drugs. For example, PCP, which is arguably one of the most ubiquitously maligned drugs in the world. I mean, no one can imagine that PCP is medicinal. But even to this day, PCP is in Schedule II, not Schedule I like cannabis and LSD. Schedule II, it can still be prescribed actually, and that's because it had a history of medicinal use. There was even PCP psychotherapy in the UK in the, in the '50s. So this is, uh, something that most people wouldn't believe, but to those patients that were taking it then, there was none of this cultural association with PCP being a drug that causes psychosis or makes you strip nude. It was simply another tool for a psychiatrist to use and help people release repressed memories or traumas that they were afraid to talk about when sober.

   11. JRJoe Rogan15:21

       Hmm. Well, we're seeing that now with MDMA, right? I mean, and also ketamine. Ketamine used ... being used as an, an actual tool for psychotherapy, particularly for people with depression. It's having really good results. My, uh, my friend (clears throat) excuse me, Neal Brennan, uh, who's a hilarious comedian, he's had struggles with depression, he, uh, he got great relief from, uh, from taking ketamine.

   12. HMHamilton Morris15:46

       Right. And what I think is really interesting is, you know, this is often packaged as a sort of psychedelic renaissance, but I think in a larger context, it's a drug-facilitated psychotherapy renaissance, because this was not just limited to psychedelics. People did something called narcoanalysis, where they would give people, um, sedatives like propofol, the drug that killed Michael Jackson, or, um, u- various barbiturates or various other drugs, and the relaxing effect would allow people to talk more openly to a therapist, and it was considered very effective. Now, this idea of a, a psychiatrist injecting you with a drug in order to help you talk about your problems is ... it's unheard of. I don't think anyone does it anymore, but it used to be very common, and I think a return to that is going to be really beneficial.

7. 16:32 – 26:14

   Schedules, prohibition, and capitalism: how drugs become legal (and who profits)

   1. JRJoe Rogan16:32

      Yeah. I, I agree with you. I think the right drugs with the right cases and the right people, and I think we've got to get past these schedules, that when you have things like marijuana and psilocybin and, and especially DMT, which your own body produces, is a Schedule I drug in the famous Terence McKenna line, "We're all holding," you know, with ... when it comes to DMT. It's just stupid. It's just, it's stupid that these things are Schedule I when you're saying there's no medical benefit whatsoever or medical application for cannabis. It's fucking crazy. When some- uh, there, I mean, you wanna have something that really a- actively promotes a distrust in law enforcement, the scheduling of drugs is one of the best ones, because when you look at something like marijuana and you see that that's a Schedule I drug, that, that, that's infuriating to people that gain huge benefits from cannabis. I mean, people that have ... going through chemotherapy, people that have, you know, uh, s- interocular pressure from glaucoma. I mean, you can go down the list over and over and over again. P- kids that have epilepsy. There's so many people that have, uh, had great benefit, for- particularly from edible cannabis, people that have seizures. I mean, you could keep going on and on and on. It's just, it's an amazing plant. And to have that demonized because of some ridiculous propaganda from the 1930s that's still somehow or another clung on in 2018. When you think about all the information we have now...... with the internet and the fact that cannabis is still Schedule 1, you have assholes like Jeff Sessions still saying things like, "Good people don't smoke marijuana." Like, this is crazy talk.

   2. HMHamilton Morris18:13

      It's crazy but keep in mind, it was just about a, a hundred years ago that alcohol was prohibited in the United States and it took 13 years to reverse that. And that was alcohol.

   3. JRJoe Rogan18:22

      (laughs)

   4. HMHamilton Morris18:22

      There's no drug more integrated into our culture than alcohol and that took 13 years to reverse.

   5. JRJoe Rogan18:29

      Uh, what was that like back then? That must have been madness when alcohol was illegal and the cops would come in and jackbooted thugs would knock over gin mills and bust open kegs of whiskey and spill it all out. Like, what the fuck was that like?

   6. HMHamilton Morris18:43

      It was, it was disastrous, but I think what's interesting about that is it was a worthwhile experiment. To give them the benefit of the doubt, it was worthwhile to see because on some sense, you could say that prohibition has a certain logic to it. You could say drugs cause problems, so if we just make all the drugs illegal, then maybe those problems will disappear.

   7. JRJoe Rogan19:04

      Hmm.

   8. HMHamilton Morris19:04

      But it didn't work. The experiment failed. And there's nothing wrong with a failed experiment, but it's a problem if you keep repeating it over and over and over again for a hundred years looking for a different result.

   9. JRJoe Rogan19:15

      Right. And then go to other drugs and go, "Well, this one. Let's try this one. Let's make this one illegal."

   10. HMHamilton Morris19:21

       And it's a terrible PR situation for the police as well. If I were a police officer, I'd be the biggest opponent of the war on drugs and, of anyone in the government, because when you think about why does the average person in New York City love a firefighter? They love firefighters, but they hate cops. Why is that? It's because of the drug war because a firefighter isn't going to hurt you for something that wasn't really a crime to begin with, for some kind of victimless crime. A firefighter is just there to help you, to save you if you're in trouble. And the same would be true of police officers if it weren't for the drug war, ideally. There's a little more complexity to it than that.

   11. JRJoe Rogan19:57

       Sure. There's certain, certainly more complexity when it comes to (clears throat) shootings and-

   12. HMHamilton Morris20:02

       Yes, exactly.

   13. JRJoe Rogan20:02

       ... things along those lines. But, I mean, uh, the stop and frisks. I read something about stop and frisk in New York when they had, when they had that instituted that most of it was drugs. Most of it was, like, catching people with marijuana.

   14. HMHamilton Morris20:14

       Yeah.

   15. JRJoe Rogan20:15

       Which is just fucking insane. You just stop, "Hey, you look like you might be streetwise. Get over here."

   16. HMHamilton Morris20:21

       And that's the way these laws have functioned from the very beginning. I mean, if you look at drug law in the UK, it tends to be very black and white. Something is legal or illegal. If it's legal, it can be sold in stores because it's legal. If it's illegal, it can't be sold anywhere. In the US, they've instead created this nebulous, far-reaching gray area where there's all sorts of things that are maybe illegal, kind of legal, do it but don't get caught. And, uh, and it's created an ability for the government to selectively prosecute people whenever they want, if they want.

   17. JRJoe Rogan20:55

       Mm, yeah. Well, that seems to be lessening. I mean, when you have someone like Jeff Sessions in office, it's very disturbing. But then Trump says things like he's very strong on states' rights to, you know, pass marijuana laws and things along those lines. Y- you look, you're very incredulous. (laughs)

   18. HMHamilton Morris21:16

       (laughs) I don't know. I mean, I, I suppose I am a bit incredulous when it comes to Trump doing anything good. But, uh, i-

   19. JRJoe Rogan21:24

       I think if you told him that people love him more if he did things good, he would do things good.

   20. HMHamilton Morris21:29

       That's probably true.

   21. JRJoe Rogan21:30

       I think that's-

   22. HMHamilton Morris21:30

       If someone that he trusted said it, yeah.

   23. JRJoe Rogan21:32

       I think that's as m- I think we gotta get somebody in deep. We gotta get a mole in there. Gotta get somebody who's good at back rubs.

   24. HMHamilton Morris21:38

       Get-

   25. JRJoe Rogan21:38

       Gets behind them.

   26. HMHamilton Morris21:39

       ... Ivanka on the podcast.

   27. JRJoe Rogan21:41

       (laughs)

   28. HMHamilton Morris21:41

       And get her on here.

   29. JRJoe Rogan21:41

       I don't think that'll help.

   30. HMHamilton Morris21:43

       (laughs)
8. 26:14 – 34:31

   Cannabis psychology: shame, paranoia memes, and reframing ‘bad trips’

   1. HMHamilton Morris26:14

      And what I think is really interesting is that, in and of itself, changes the nature of the cannabis experience. So I think if somebody uses cannabis in a culture that supports it, that approves of it, their experience will be better by virtue of that fact.

   2. JRJoe Rogan26:29

      Right.

   3. HMHamilton Morris26:29

      So, there's a certain shame that a lot of people feel when using any drug. I, for whatever crazy reason, feel it a little bit with cannabis. It's, you know, a little, just a hair of, "I should be, you know, I should be studying, I should be reading."

   4. JRJoe Rogan26:41

      (laughs)

   5. HMHamilton Morris26:41

      "I should be, you know, more focused. This is a little hedonistic. It's a little comfort-oriented."

   6. JRJoe Rogan26:47

      Yeah.

   7. HMHamilton Morris26:47

      "I should be working harder." But, um, that's, I think, just the vestiges of this propaganda that I've been fed, or something like that. Or maybe it's true. But I understand from one perspective why the cannabis culture drums the benefits of cannabis so hard, you know, that it cures all disease, that it's good for you, that it cures cancer, all this stuff. Because if you have that in your mind, um, at the very least, it's going to reduce that sort of internal shame that you might feel, and makes the entire experience healthier and more beneficial. Because we do construct these limitations. We construct these experiences to some extent. So if you decide that cannabis is a dissociative drug that's hedonistic and comfort-oriented and will take you away from your responsibilities, then that's what it will become. But if you decide, like Terence McKenna did, that it's an intellectual catalyst, that it will facilitate your ability to read and learn and think and write, then it will become that as well.

   8. JRJoe Rogan27:41

      Yeah. It's, it's a weird one, right? 'Cause people that are ... People that take it that are prone to paranoia, or that are dealing with, like, some difficult issues in their life right now that they're perhaps trying to avoid, it becomes an uncomfortable experience. Whereas people that are happy and having a good time and in a good place, the marijuana s- will sort of enhance that. It'll give you this loving, warm feeling of, of comfort and of, like, sort of acceptance of your existence. And it's gonna be okay.

   9. HMHamilton Morris28:14

      Right. But I think even the paranoia is like a, sort of, a sort of, um, meme, you could say, a sort of vestige of this propaganda that makes people afraid in the same ide- uh, vein as the bad trip.

   10. JRJoe Rogan28:28

       Mm-hmm.

   11. HMHamilton Morris28:28

       I think the concept of a bad trip is a very damaging concept because ... And I know from personal experience, I never really used psychedelics in high school, with the exception of salvia, um, because I was terrified of a bad trip. I'd talk to friends who'd describe bad trips and they'd say, "Oh, it's a, it's a bad, it's a bad trip. It's really bad. It's scary." And I would think, "Oh, that's terrible. I could, I would never want a bad trip. I'm never gonna touch these things because a bad trip would be too much for me to tolerate." And then I started using psychedelics, and I realized there's no such thing as a bad trip any more than there's a bad meal or a bad relationship or a bad day. I mean, having an occasional bad thing in life doesn't stop you from doing things like eating or having relationships or living, typically. So, wha-

   12. JRJoe Rogan29:13

       What do you mean by there's ... Are you saying there's no such thing as a bad trip?

   13. HMHamilton Morris29:17

       Yes.

   14. JRJoe Rogan29:17

       Are you saying there's no such thing as a bad meal?

   15. HMHamilton Morris29:19

       I'm saying that there is such thing as a bad meal, but-

   16. JRJoe Rogan29:23

       Okay.

   17. HMHamilton Morris29:23

       ... but it wouldn't prevent you from tripping. And I think that even the bad ... Or wouldn't prevent you from eating, rather.

   18. JRJoe Rogan29:28

       Eating, right.

   19. HMHamilton Morris29:28

       Sorry about that. But, uh, but I think even these bad trips, although they can be difficult, are beneficial in our learning experience, in the same way that a bad meal could be. You'd learn not to go to that restaurant.

   20. JRJoe Rogan29:37

       Right.

   21. HMHamilton Morris29:37

       Or maybe you'd learn something about what makes you sick or what to be careful of in the future. You know, if you are approaching life from a non-fearful perspective, where your intention is to learn, then you can extract benefit from almost any experience. And these difficult psychedelic experiences, I genuinely believe, and this is what is maybe the hardest thing to communicate about psychedelics, is that it's the difficult ones that are often the best. Those are the ones that really teach you something. And when you're trying to talk about psychedelics with people who've never used them, it's not a great selling point to say, "Oh, you know, the best thing that can happen is you're gonna think you're gonna die."

   22. JRJoe Rogan30:12

       (laughs)

   23. HMHamilton Morris30:14

       But that is ...... arguably the best thing that can happen-

   24. JRJoe Rogan30:17

       Yeah.

   25. HMHamilton Morris30:17

       ... is to think that you're going to die, because that's a confrontation with the overarching fear, the fear that generates all other fears. And if you conquer that fear, then your life will almost certainly improve.

   26. JRJoe Rogan30:29

       Well, what is one thing that's, uh, sort of genuine- genuinely universally accepted as a beneficial experience is a near-death experience. Sort of universally accepted as a transformative moment in people's lives. Like, I had this near-death experience and I realized, "Wow, I gotta get my shit together." After that heart attack, I realized that life is a gift and I changed the way I think about things, and I started calling people that I loved and telling them that I loved them. This is the same, you can get a near-death experience from cannabis, you just don't ever die (laughs) .

   27. HMHamilton Morris31:00

       (laughs)

   28. JRJoe Rogan31:00

       But you really do. I mean, it's the death of so many perceptions and so many things about your life, especially from edible cannabis, which I think is probably one of the least understood and most potent things that people are consuming on a daily basis. I- I can't tell you how many times I've given someone edible marijuana and they're fucking convinced that it's been laced with something awful and that they're going to die. But then afterwards, they come out of it and they're like, "Oh, I guess, uh, I got some work to do." (laughs)

   29. HMHamilton Morris31:30

       (laughs)

   30. JRJoe Rogan31:31

       The only way I would disagree with you is people that are prone to psychotic breaks.
9. 34:31 – 38:17

   Research needs vs political science: predicting risk, genetics, and mechanism-level understanding

   1. JRJoe Rogan34:31

      Yeah, it's impossible to say. I think it's very important to talk about that though. And with further research, perhaps we could isolate genes, you know, like they have for CTE now, they have, um... They can do an analysis of your genes and then determine whether or not something like football would be a dangerous path for you because you have a- a higher probability of developing CTE. It would be wonderful if they figured out a way to do that with psilocybin or with cannabis or with anything else and be able to recognize the potential links to psychotic breaks and to, you know, a host of different mental disorders that could possibly be triggered by high doses.

   2. HMHamilton Morris35:13

      Yes. I mean, this is one of so many things that needs to be done. And that's, you know, everyone's very excited about all this clinical research that's happening right now. I'm excited about it as well, but on one level, it is very politically oriented research. You know, the- the things that they're looking at have actually typically been done before, not all of it, but the aim is to firmly establish these things that have been known for a long time. Psilocybin, occasions, mystical type experience, or MDMA is useful for treating PTSD or psilocybin has an anti-addictive effect. These are things that people have known for a little while, but now it's about proving it. But I'm really looking forward to getting deeper into these serious questions about, you know, exactly how these drugs interact with various subtypes of serotonin receptors because I think that they're going to be very important tools for understanding consciousness as a whole.

   3. JRJoe Rogan36:11

      Yeah, it would also be interesting knowing how they react to different diets, you know, when people are, uh-... you know, when you're eating certain types of foods that are n- bad for your body. I would really be curious to see what kind of effect that has. I mean, when, when you have real large-scale research that goes over really imp- important variables in terms of, like, human health, and then you add in these different substances, whether it's psilocybin or cannabis or w- whatever it is, it's, it's gonna be interesting to see how the body reacts to these various perturbances, these various changes of your state.

   4. HMHamilton Morris36:52

      Yeah. And that's a... You know, traditionally, in a lot of these indigenous groups, the diet plays a big role in the way that the drug is administered, and I think we're slowly rediscovering a lot of things that have been known for tens, maybe hundreds, maybe thousands of years in some of these indigenous groups. Have you had a chance to see any of m- any of my new show, by any chance?

   5. JRJoe Rogan37:14

      No. No, I haven't.

   6. HMHamilton Morris37:15

      Oh, y- I think you'd like it.

   7. JRJoe Rogan37:16

      I'm sure I'd like it.

   8. HMHamilton Morris37:17

      Yeah.

   9. JRJoe Rogan37:17

      I like your old show. (laughs)

   10. HMHamilton Morris37:18

       Yeah. This is... I think it's a lot better than the old show.

   11. JRJoe Rogan37:20

       Yeah?

   12. HMHamilton Morris37:21

       Yeah.

   13. JRJoe Rogan37:21

       Awesome.

   14. HMHamilton Morris37:22

       Yeah. But I, you know, I had the opportunity to look at the way salvia is used in the mountains of Oaxaca and, you know, Native American peyote use and all these different things. And yeah, there, there's so much to be learned from all of these traditions that are not reflected in the current clinical climate, because they can't be. But I think that that's gonna be a part of it, is slowly integrating these other alkaloids that are present in the plants to see what role they play, in the same way that, you know, uh, the initial medicalization of cannabis was Marinol, which is just THC and sesame oil. But now, there's increased understanding of the way these accessory cannabinoids modulate the THC experience, or whether THC is even the primary therapeutic agent for certain disorders. And I imagine the same thing will be true for peyote and for the iboga alkaloids, and probably even for some of the chemicals found in mushrooms.

10. 38:17 – 1:06:39

    Media incentives and drug panic: sensationalism, synthetic cannabinoids, and the cost of headlines

    1. JRJoe Rogan38:17

       So when you're doing this show, have you had any problems? Have you had any, uh, p- pushback against what you're doing, or any, any issues with it being on VICE?

    2. HMHamilton Morris38:32

       I've had a- an enormous amount of freedom. You know, ultimately, I have very, very little to complain about when it comes to censorship. There was, um... Uh, uh, the way the show got started, the actual TV show, is sort of an interesting story, where they were starting up Viceland and, uh, a producer who's now gone, uh, gave me this deck of drug stories they were gonna do, and they were all kind of terrible scare stories, like, "The new drug, Bromo Dragon Fly, it's killing teens." "A new drug-"

    3. JRJoe Rogan38:59

       Bromo Dragon Fly?

    4. HMHamilton Morris39:00

       Yeah, Bromo-

    5. JRJoe Rogan39:00

       Is that real?

    6. HMHamilton Morris39:00

       Yeah, yeah.

    7. JRJoe Rogan39:01

       What is that?

    8. HMHamilton Morris39:02

       It's a really fascinating compound developed by this chemist, David E. Nichols, who, um, found that it, that these conformationally constrained benzofuran, uh, amphetamine derivatives are, like, very high potency DOB derivatives. Anyway, it's just a, it's a super potent psychedelic amphetamine that has a cool tricyclic structure.

    9. JRJoe Rogan39:22

       Huh.

    10. HMHamilton Morris39:22

        And it looks like a dragonfly.

    11. JRJoe Rogan39:24

        Oh.

    12. HMHamilton Morris39:24

        The molecule looks like a dragonfly, kind of.

    13. JRJoe Rogan39:27

        And it's got a very high, or-

    14. HMHamilton Morris39:29

        Yes. It, it's super, super potent and very, very long-lasting.

    15. JRJoe Rogan39:33

        Oof.

    16. HMHamilton Morris39:33

        So it, it, it lent itself to scare stories. Um, you know, people... It's a potent vasoconstrictor, so people would take very high doses of it and occasionally they would have to amputate a-

    17. JRJoe Rogan39:44

        Oh, geez.

    18. HMHamilton Morris39:44

        ... a finger or something like that. But again, you know, this isn't because the drug is bad. It's because people used it irresponsibly, and this is something that people have so much difficulty understanding. We're so eager to blame drugs for all of our problems. Drugs have never hurt anyone. They're just inanimate constellations of carbon and hydrogen and nitrogen and oxygen. They don't jump out of their bags and vials and attack your serotoninreceptors or dopamine transport or anything like that. So, this is just a, a weird pattern that we've done repeatedly over time. And I, I don't know if you read the new Michael Pollan book. I know he was on the podcast.

    19. JRJoe Rogan40:21

        Yes. I'm in it right now.

    20. HMHamilton Morris40:22

        Yeah. It's great. Um-

    21. JRJoe Rogan40:23

        Yeah. It is great.

    22. HMHamilton Morris40:25

        But, um, one thing that I thought was interesting about it, um, is that he put a lot of the emphasis on the prohibition of psychedelics on Leary. And Leary almost certainly played a role, but I think it's slightly ironic that he's a journalist and didn't really go that deep into the role that journalists played in all of this, which was humongous. You know, journalists are sculptors of public opinion, and it became the standard way of reporting on any of these things th- to say that they're bad, to sensationalize it, and to not have any consideration for what that would do. Because anytime a journalist writes some scare story, they can really mess with drug policy in a serious way. It might seem like nothing, like, "Oh, there's a bunch of people in Brooklyn and they overdosed on some obscure synthetic cannabinoid, AMB-Fubinica. Who cares about AMB-Fubinica? No big deal. Say that it turns people into zombies, and if it gets thrown into Schedule I, who cares? Not a big deal." Well, that's a very short-sighted way of thinking about all of this, because that's exactly what happened with psychedelics. And then, we're not learning from the mistakes of the past, that just because something gets fun to sensationalize and talk about how dangerous it is at this moment, doesn't mean that 10 years from now we're gonna recognize that it has serious therapeutic potential and we made a big mistake outlawing it. And I think a lot of that also comes from this sort of us-versus-them mentality that people have, where it's, "Cannabis is good. Synthetic cannabinoids are bad." Well, synthetic cannabinoids don't have to be bad for cannabis to be good. Cannabis can be good without something else being bad to counterbalance it. You don't need to hate something to justify your love of cannabis. And this whole hatred of synthetic cannabinoids, I think, is totally misdirected, because these are products of prohibition that most people wouldn't even want to use in the first place. And when they do use them, they don't know what they're taking, they don't know what dose they're consuming, and so of course they're having bad experiences. That would happen with almost any drug, caffeine included, if people just consumed enormous, unmeasured doses without having any idea what they were getting into. And so they're thrown into Schedule I. Well, what happens if-... 30 years from now once the therapeutic potential of cannabinoids is being really seriously explored, we find out that that AMB-TFUBENICA that everyone was saying turned homeless people into zombies in Brooklyn in 2017 turns out to activate a certain subtype of the CB1 receptor that's especially useful for Parkinson's Disease or something like that-

    23. JRJoe Rogan42:51

        Hmm.

    24. HMHamilton Morris42:52

        ... then we're gonna regret having done that. So I think people have to be very careful. Anytime you say anything negative about a drug, you have to be very, very careful because the implications can be enormous. I think that the best stance in all of this is to not speak ill of drugs-

    25. JRJoe Rogan43:08

        (laughs)

    26. HMHamilton Morris43:08

        ... of any drug. Give the drugs a break.

    27. JRJoe Rogan43:11

        Spoken like a true drug enthusiast.

    28. HMHamilton Morris43:12

        (laughs)

    29. JRJoe Rogan43:12

        But isn't that a problem also with just what journalism is? It's like asking a comedian to talk about something but not make fun of it. It's... But their job, in, in a certain sense, is to get people excited about things. And I don't know whether you'd say the lazy way out or the, the common approach is to say something that scares people. I mean, that's, that's what clickbait is mostly about, either outrage or fear.

    30. HMHamilton Morris43:35

        That's true, but there's a lot of richness in truth, I will say.
11. 1:06:39 – 1:28:00

    Stimulants and moral narratives: Adderall, meth, and the urge to blame drugs for people

    1. JRJoe Rogan1:06:39

       Yeah, I mean, th- uh, you would get pretty productive for a short period of time doing speed, but I think the downside of that... There's so many people that are on Adderall today, right?

    2. HMHamilton Morris1:06:50

       Oh, yeah.

    3. JRJoe Rogan1:06:50

       What, what are, what are your feelings on that?

    4. HMHamilton Morris1:06:52

       I think that it's a very interesting issue, because, uh, it's amazing when you look at the history of all these things, how these issues repeat themselves-

    5. JRJoe Rogan1:07:01

       Right.

    6. HMHamilton Morris1:07:01

       ... over and over and over again, so it was a problem in the '50s, and it's a problem in the '60s, and it's a problem in the '70s. Now, it's a problem now. It's always a problem that we're treating as if it were a new thing, but people have been using amphetamine-type stimulants for the better part of 100 years, and, um...People will now... Th- the kind of popular thing to say is, you know, "Didn't you know Adderall is one carbon atom away from meth?" But here's the flip side: meth is one carbon away from Adderall. So this whole idea that meth, again, back to pharmacological determinism, that meth is a drug that turns you into a toothless, insane, white trash, uh, guy who's stabbing the walls with a cleaver looking for people that are hiding and whispering secret messages or something like that. Like, this is just a stereotype that we have created. Of course there are people like that, but the reality is that these stimulants have an ambiguous potential for all sorts of things. Some people use low doses of methamphetamine. In fact, methamphetamine is Schedule II because to this day it can be and is prescribed as a treatment for ADHD, in addition to amphetamine, which is Adderall.

    7. JRJoe Rogan1:08:09

       What do they call it when they prescribe it?

    8. HMHamilton Morris1:08:10

       Desoxyn is the brand name for methamphetamine.

    9. JRJoe Rogan1:08:14

       (laughs)

    10. HMHamilton Morris1:08:15

        And, uh, Adderall is the brand name for amphetamine. And they're ve-

    11. JRJoe Rogan1:08:19

        Wow.

    12. HMHamilton Morris1:08:19

        And I've tried both drugs, both amphetamine and methamphetamine, and they're very, very similar drugs. And that's not to say that either are good or bad. It's just a, a factual statement that if in a double-blind, placebo-controlled... Or not even placebo-controlled, just a double-blind trial, I don't think that I could-

    13. JRJoe Rogan1:08:35

        It could treat ADHD.

    14. HMHamilton Morris1:08:36

        ... differentiate them.

    15. JRJoe Rogan1:08:36

        It could also help obese patients lose weight.

    16. HMHamilton Morris1:08:39

        Yeah.

    17. JRJoe Rogan1:08:39

        Did you know that, um, there's a lot of people who think Trump is on diet pills?

    18. HMHamilton Morris1:08:43

        Oh, yeah, yeah. On, uh, diethylpropion.

    19. JRJoe Rogan1:08:45

        Yeah.

    20. HMHamilton Morris1:08:45

        Right?

    21. JRJoe Rogan1:08:46

        Yeah. And that he used to be on one of the, one of the elements of phen- Phenphen? Fenphen? Fenphen.

    22. HMHamilton Morris1:08:52

        Fenfluramine maybe?

    23. JRJoe Rogan1:08:53

        Yeah. Yeah.

    24. HMHamilton Morris1:08:54

        Phentermine?

    25. JRJoe Rogan1:08:55

        Well, there was a- some journalist that even talked about that Dwayne... We saved this. We have it on a folder now. What'd you say, Jamie?

    26. HMHamilton Morris1:09:02

        Uh, I've been g- hit up messages about that journalist, that he might be compromised-

    27. JRJoe Rogan1:09:05

        Sketchy?

    28. HMHamilton Morris1:09:06

        ... or sketchy or something like that too.

    29. JRJoe Rogan1:09:07

        Yeah.

    30. HMHamilton Morris1:09:07

        So I don't know. But, but even if he were on diethylpropion or phenfluramine or phentermine or phenmetrazine or any of these substances-

Episode duration: 2:53:37