Matthew Johnson: Psychedelics | Lex Fridman Podcast #145

1. 0:00 – 2:02

   Introduction

   1. LFLex Fridman0:00

      The following is a conversation with Matthew Johnson, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral science at Johns Hopkins and is one of the top scientists in the world conducting seminal research on psychedelics. This was one of the most eye-opening and fascinating conversations I've ever had on this podcast. I'm sure I'll talk with Matt many more times. A quick mention of the sponsor, followed by some thoughts related to the episode. Thank you to a new sponsor, Brave, a fast browser that feels like Chrome but has more privacy-preserving features. Neuro, the maker of functional sugar-free gum and mints that I use to give my brain a quick caffeine boost. Four Sigmatic, the maker of delicious mushroom coffee. I'm just now realizing how (laughs) ironic this set of sponsors are. And Cash App, the app I use to send money to friends. Please check out these sponsors in the description to get a discount and to support this podcast. As a side note, let me say that psychedelics is an area of study that is fascinating to me in that it gives hints that much of the magic of our experience arises from just a few chemical interactions in the brain and that the nature of that experience can be expanded through the tools of biology, chemistry, physics, neuroscience, and artificial intelligence. The fact that a world-class scientist and researcher like Matt can apply rigor to our study of this mysterious and fascinating topic is exciting to me beyond words, as is the case with any of my colleagues who dare to venture out into the darkness of all that is unknown about the human mind with both an openness of first-principle thinking and the rigor of the scientific method. If you enjoy these things, subscribe on YouTube, review it with five stars on Apple Podcasts, follow on Spotify, support on Patreon, or connect with me on Twitter @lexfridman. And now here's my conversation with Matthew Johnson.

2. 2:02 – 18:04

   Introduction to psychedelics

   1. LFLex Fridman2:03

      Can you give an introduction to psychedelics, like a whirlwind overview? Maybe what are psychedelics and, uh, what are the kinds of psychedelics out there? And in whatever way you find meaningful to categorize.

   2. MJMatthew W. Johnson2:17

      Yeah. You can categorize them by their chemical structure, so phenethylamines, tryptamines, ergolines. Um, that is, is less of a meaningful way to classify them. I, I think that their pharmacological activity, their receptor activity is the best way. Let me, let me start even broader than that because there I'm talking about the classic psychedelics. So broadly speaking, when we say psychedelic, that refers to, for most people, a broad number of compounds that work in different pharmacological ways. So it includes the so-called classic psychedelics. That includes psilocybin and psilocin, which are in mushrooms, LSD, dimethyltryptamine or DMT, it's in ayahuasca, people can smoke it too, mescaline, which is in peyote and San Pedro cactus. Um, and those all work by hitting a certain, uh, subtype of serotonin receptor, the serotonin 2A receptor. It's, they act as agonists at that receptor. Other compounds like PCP, ketamine, MDMA, ibogaine, they all are, more broadly speaking, called psychedelics, but they work by, uh, very different ways pharmacologically and they have some different effects, including sub- subjective effects, even though there's enough of an overlap in the subjective effects that, you know, people informally refer to them as psychedelic. And I think what that overlap is, you know, compared to, say, you know, caffeine and cocaine and, you know, Ambien, et cetera, um, other psychoactive drugs, is that they have strong effects in altering one's sense of reality and including the sense of self. And I should throw in there that, that cannabis, more historically, like in the '70s, has been called a minor psychedelic. And I think with that latter definition, it, it, it does fit that definition, particularly if one doesn't have a, a tolerance.

   3. LFLex Fridman4:30

      So you mentioned serotonin. So most of the effect comes from something around, like the, the chemistry around neurotransmitters and so on? So it's, uh, chemical interactions in, in the brain or is there other kinds of interactions that have this kind of perception and self-awareness-altering effects?

   4. MJMatthew W. Johnson4:51

      Well, as far as we know, all of the, the psychedelics of all the different classes, um, we've, we've, we've talked about, it, their major activity is caused by receptor level events. So either acting at the post-receptor side of the synapse, so in other words, neurotransmission operates by, you know, one neuron releasing neurotransmitter into a synapse, a gap between the two neurons, and then the other neuron, um, receives. They have, it has receptors that receives, and then there can be an ac- activation, um, you know, caused by that. So it's like a pitcher and a catcher.

   5. LFLex Fridman5:30

      Yep.

   6. MJMatthew W. Johnson5:30

      So all of the major psychedelics work by either acting as a pitch- mimicking a, a, a, a, a, a, a pitcher or a catcher. So for example, the classic psychedelics, they fit into the same catcher's mitt on the post-receptor, uh, post-synaptic receptor side as serotonin itself, but they do a slightly different thing to the, to the cell, to the neuron than serotonin does. Um, there's a different signaling pathway after that initial activation. Something like MDMA...... works at the presynaptic side, the pitcher side, and basically it floods the synapse or the gap between the cells with a bunch of serotonin, the natural, um, neurotransmitter. So it's like the, the pitcher in a baseball game all of a sudden just starts throwing balls, like, every, every second (laughs) .

   7. LFLex Fridman6:20

      Everything we're talking about, is it, uh, often more natural, meaning found in the natural world? You mentioned cacti, cactus. Or is it, uh, chemically manufactured like, uh, artificially in a lab?

   8. MJMatthew W. Johnson6:35

      So the classic psychedelics, there's, um-

   9. LFLex Fridman6:38

      What are the classics? So-

   10. MJMatthew W. Johnson6:40

       Yeah.

   11. LFLex Fridman6:40

       ... using terminology that's not chemical terminology, not like the terminology you see in titles of papers, academic papers, but more sort of common parlance.

   12. MJMatthew W. Johnson6:50

       Right. It would be good to kind of define their, you know, their effects, like, how they're different. And so it includes LSD; psilocybin, which is in mushrooms; mescaline; DMT.

   13. LFLex Fridman7:00

       Which one is mescaline, sorry?

   14. MJMatthew W. Johnson7:01

       Mescaline is in the different cacti. So the one most people will know is, is peyote, but it also shows up in San Pedro or Peruvian torch. And all of these classic psychedelics, they have, at the right dose, you know, and, and typically, they have ex- very strong effects on one's sense of reality and one's sense of self. What- some of the things that makes them different than other, more broadly speaking psychedelics like MDMA and, and, and others, is that they're, um... At least the, the major examples, there are some exotic ones that differ, but th- the ones I've talked about are extremely safe at the physiological level. Like, there's, like, LSD and psilocybin, there's no known lethal overdose, unless you have, like, really severe, you know, um, heart disease. You know, 'cause it modestly raises your blood pressure, so-

   15. LFLex Fridman7:52

       Right.

   16. MJMatthew W. Johnson7:52

       ... same person might be hurt shoveling snow or going up the stairs, you know, that could, you know, have a ca- they could have, have a, have a cardiac event because they've taken a, um, a, one of these drugs. But for most people, you know, someone could take 1,000 times what the effective dose is and it's not gonna cause any organ damage, affect the brain stem, make them stop breathing. So in that sense, you know, it's, they're, they're freakishly safe at the physiolo-

   17. LFLex Fridman8:16

       Mm-hmm.

   18. MJMatthew W. Johnson8:16

       I would never call any compound safe, 'cause there's always a risk. They're freakishly safe at the physiological level. I mean, you can hardly find anything over the counter like that. I mean, aspirin's not like that, caffeine-

   19. LFLex Fridman8:27

       Yeah.

   20. MJMatthew W. Johnson8:27

       ... is not like that. Most drugs you take five, 10, 20, maybe it takes 100, but you get to some, eh, times the effective dose and it's gonna kill you-

   21. LFLex Fridman8:37

       Yeah.

   22. MJMatthew W. Johnson8:37

       ... or cause some serious damage. And so that's, that's something that's remark about, about these, most of these classic psychedelics.

   23. LFLex Fridman8:43

       That's incredible, by the way, that you can go on a hell of a journey in the mind, like, probably transformative, potentially in a, like, deeply transformative way, and yet there's no dose that in most people would have a lethal effect. That's kind of fascinating.

   24. MJMatthew W. Johnson9:03

       Yes.

   25. LFLex Fridman9:03

       There's this, this duality between the mind and the body. It's like a, it's the... (laughs) Okay, sorry if I bring him up way too much, but David Goggins is like a... You know, the kind of things you go on a, on the long run, like the hell you might go through in your mind. Your mind can take a lot and you can go through a lot with the mind, and the body will just be its own thing. You can go through hell, but, uh, after a good night's sleep, be back to normal-

   26. MJMatthew W. Johnson9:30

       Right.

   27. LFLex Fridman9:30

       ... and the body is always there. So-

   28. MJMatthew W. Johnson9:31

       So bringing it back to Goggins, it's like, you can do that without even destroying your knee or whatever-

   29. LFLex Fridman9:35

       Right. Oh, yes.

   30. MJMatthew W. Johnson9:35

       ... or having, or coming close and riding that line.
3. 18:04 – 21:16

   Psychedelics expand the mind

   1. MJMatthew W. Johnson18:04

      with MDMA.

   2. LFLex Fridman18:05

      Is there something general to say about what the psychedelics do to the human mind?So you mentioned a, kind of, an ego loss experience. In the space of Venn diagrams, if we were to, like, draw a big circle, what can we say about that big circle?

   3. MJMatthew W. Johnson18:23

      In terms of people's report of subjective experience, probably one of the most general things we can say is that it, it expands that range. So, many people come out of these sessions saying that they didn't know it was possible to have an experience like that.

   4. LFLex Fridman18:44

      So there's an emphasis on the subjective experience that, um... Is, is there words that people put at, put to it that capture that experience? Or, uh, is it something that just has to be experienced?

   5. MJMatthew W. Johnson19:00

      Yeah. People like-

   6. LFLex Fridman19:02

      As a researcher, that's an interesting question because you have to kinda measure, uh, the, um, the effects of this and, uh, how do you convert that into numbers?

   7. MJMatthew W. Johnson19:13

      Right.

   8. LFLex Fridman19:13

      That, that's a ƒ the ultimate challenge. So how is, is that even, is that possible to one, convert it into words and second, convert the words into numbers somehow? (laughs)

   9. MJMatthew W. Johnson19:22

      So we do a lot of that with questionnaires, you know, some of which are very psychometrically validated, so they've... Lots of numbers have been crunched on them. And there's always a limitation with, with questionnaires. I mean, subjective effects are subjective effects. Ultimately, it's what the person is reporting and, and that doesn't necessarily point towards a ground truth. Um-

   10. LFLex Fridman19:43

       Right.

   11. MJMatthew W. Johnson19:44

       What, what they're... So for example, if someone says that it, they felt like they touched another dimension or they felt like they, they sensed the reality of God-

   12. LFLex Fridman19:52

       Mm-hmm.

   13. MJMatthew W. Johnson19:52

       ... or if they, um, you know, um... I mean, just you name it. People's ontological views can sometimes shift. I think that's more about where they're coming from and I don't think it's the, the quintessential way in which they work. There's plenty of people that hold onto a completely naturalistic viewpoint and come, and, and have profound and, and, and, and helpful experiences w- with these compounds. But the subjective effects can be so broad that for some people, it shifts their, their, their philosophical viewpoint-

   14. LFLex Fridman20:25

       Mm-hmm.

   15. MJMatthew W. Johnson20:25

       ... uh, uh, more towards idealism, more towards, you know, thinking of what, that, the nature of reality might be more about consciousness than about material. That's a domain I'm very interested in. Right now, we have essentially zero to say about that in terms of validating those types of claims. But it's even interesting just to see what people say along those lines.

   16. LFLex Fridman20:49

       So y- you're interested in saying, like, can we more rigorously study this process of expansion? Like, what do we mean by this expansion of your s- sense of what is possible in the experiences in this world? What-

   17. MJMatthew W. Johnson21:03

       Right. As much as what we can say about that through naturalistic psychology.

   18. LFLex Fridman21:07

       Right.

   19. MJMatthew W. Johnson21:07

       Especially as much as we can root it to, um, solid psychological constructs and solid neuroscientific constructs.

4. 21:16 – 25:11

   The priors we bring to the psychedelic experience

   1. MJMatthew W. Johnson21:16

   2. LFLex Fridman21:16

      And I wonder what the impact is of the language that you bring to the table. So you mentioned about God or, um, speaking of God, a lot of people are really into sort of theoretical physics these days (laughs) at a very surface level. And you can bring the language of physics, right? You can talk about quantum mechanics, you can talk about general, general relativity and, uh, curvature of space-time, and using just that language without a deep technical understanding of it, to somehow start thinking, like, sort of visualizing atoms in your head. And somehow through that process, because you have the language, using that language to kinda dissolve the ego, like, realize, like, that we're just all little bits of physical objects that behave in mysterious ways. And so that, that has to do with the language. Like, if you read a Sean Carroll book or something recently, it seems like that's a huge influence on the way you, uh, might experience, might perceive the world and might experience the alteration that psychedelics brings to the, um, to the, your perception system. So I wonder, like, the language you bring to the table, how that affects the journey you go on with the psychedelics.

   3. MJMatthew W. Johnson22:30

      I think very much so. And, and I think there's... I'm a little concerned some of the science is going a little too far in the direction of, of... Around the edges, you know, speaking about it changing beliefs in this sense or that sense about particular, in particular domains. And I think what really what a lot of what's going on is what you just discussed. It's, it's the priors coming into, into it. So if you've been reading a lot of, you know, um, physics, then you might, you know, um, bring up, you know, like, you know, space-time and interpret the experience in, in that sense. I mean, it's not uncommon for people to come out talking about visions of the, uh... It's not the most typical thing, but it's come up in sessions I've, I've guided. Um, the Big Bang, um, and the, you know, this sort of nature of reality. I, I-

   4. LFLex Fridman23:21

      Mm-hmm.

   5. MJMatthew W. Johnson23:21

      I think probably the, the best way to think about these experiences is that... And, and the best evidence even though we're in our infancy in understanding it, they, they really tap into more general psychological mechanisms. I think one of the best arguments is they, they, they, they reduce the influence of the, of our priors-

   6. LFLex Fridman23:41

      Mm-hmm.

   7. MJMatthew W. Johnson23:41

      ... of what we bring into the, all of the assumptions that we all, that, you know, we're... Essentially, especially as adults, we're riding on top of heuristic after heuristic to get through life. And, and you need to do that and that's a good thing and that's extremely efficient and evolution has shaped that, but that comes at an expense. And I... It seems that these experiences will, will allow someone greater mental flexibility and openness. And so one can be both less influenced by their, their prior assumptions, but still nonetheless-... the nature of the experience can be influenced by the, what they've been-

   8. LFLex Fridman24:24

      Yeah.

   9. MJMatthew W. Johnson24:24

      ... exposed to in the world. And sometimes they can get it at a deep, in a deeper way. Like, maybe they've read... I mean, I had a philosophy professor one time-

   10. LFLex Fridman24:31

       (laughs)

   11. MJMatthew W. Johnson24:31

       ... as a, as a participant-

   12. LFLex Fridman24:33

       Yeah.

   13. MJMatthew W. Johnson24:33

       ... in a high-dose psilocybin study and he's like... I remember him saying, "My God, it's like Hegel's opposites defining each other."

   14. LFLex Fridman24:40

       (laughs)

   15. MJMatthew W. Johnson24:40

       Like, "I get it."

   16. LFLex Fridman24:41

       Yeah.

   17. MJMatthew W. Johnson24:41

       "I taught this thing for, you know, years and years and years. Like, I get it now." And so, like, that, you know? And, and even at the psychological, emotional level, like, the cancer patients, um, we worked with, you know, they told themselves a million times, or these people trying to quit smoking, it's, "I need to quit smoking. Oh, I'm, I'm ruining my life with this cancer. I'm still healthy, I should be getting out. I'm letting this thing defeat me." It's like, yeah, you told yourself that in your head, but sometimes they have these experiences and they kind of feel it in their heart. Like, they really get

5. 25:11 – 35:41

   Elon Musk and first principles thinking

   1. MJMatthew W. Johnson25:11

      it.

   2. LFLex Fridman25:12

      So in some sense that, uh, you bring some prize to the table, but psychedelics allow you to acknowledge them and then throw them away. So, like, one popular terminology around this in the engineering space is first principles thinking that, uh, Elon Musk, for example, espouses a lot. Let me ask a fun question before we, uh, return to our more serious discussion. With Elon Musk as an example, but it could be just engineers in general, do you think there's a use for psychedelics to, uh, take a, a journey of rigorous first principles thinking? So, like, throwing away... We're not talking about throwing away assumptions about the nature of reality in terms of, like, our philosophy of the way we live day-to-day life, but we're talking about, like, h- how, how to build a better rocket-

   3. MJMatthew W. Johnson26:08

      Mm-hmm.

   4. LFLex Fridman26:08

      ... or how to build a better car, or how to build a better, uh, social network, or all those kinds of things. Engineering questions.

   5. MJMatthew W. Johnson26:15

      I absolutely think there's huge potential there. And it's... Uh, there was some research in the, um, late '60s, early '70s that were... It was, you know, very early and not very rigorous in terms of, um, methodology, but, um, it was consistent with the... I mean, there's just countless anecdotes of folks. I mean, people have argued that just, you know, Silicon Valley was, was largely influenced-

   6. LFLex Fridman26:39

      (laughs)

   7. MJMatthew W. Johnson26:39

      ... by psychedelic experience. I-

   8. LFLex Fridman26:41

      Mm-hmm.

   9. MJMatthew W. Johnson26:41

      ... I remember the, I think the, the person that came up with the, the concept of freeware or shareware.

   10. LFLex Fridman26:46

       Mm-hmm.

   11. MJMatthew W. Johnson26:46

       It's like, it kind of was generated, you know, o- out of, uh, or influenced by psychedelic experience, you know? So to this... I, I think there's incredible potential there and we know really next... There's no rigorous research o- on that, but-

   12. LFLex Fridman27:03

       Is there anecdotal stuff, like with Steve Jobs? I think there's stories, right? I- in your exploration of the... Is there something a little bit more than just stories? Is there, like, a little bit more of a solid data points, even if they're just experiential, like, anecdotes? Is there something that you draw inspiration from, like, in your intuition? 'Cause we'll talk about you're trying to construct studies that are more rigorous around these questions, but is there something you draw inspiration from, from the past, from the '80s and the '90s in Silicon Valley, that kind of space? Uh, or is it just, like, you have a sense based on everything you've learned and these kind of loose stories that there's something worth digging at?

   13. MJMatthew W. Johnson27:47

       I am influenced by the, gosh, the, the, the inc- just incredible number of, of anecdotes surrounding-

   14. LFLex Fridman27:55

       Right.

   15. MJMatthew W. Johnson27:55

       ... these. Uh, I mean, um, uh, Kary Mullis, he, he invented PCR. I mean, absolutely revolutionized biological sciences. He says he wouldn't have, you know... Won the Nobel Prize from it, said he wouldn't have come up with that had he not had psychedelic experiences. Um, you know, now he's an interesting character. People should read his autobiography 'cause you could point to other things he was into. But, but I think that speaks to the, the casting your nets wide and this mental flexi-

   16. LFLex Fridman28:23

       Yeah.

   17. MJMatthew W. Johnson28:23

       ... more of these general, these, these general mechanisms where sometimes if you cast your nets really wide, and it's gonna depend on the person and their influences, but sometimes you come up with false positives, y- you know. Um, you know, you connect the dots where-

   18. LFLex Fridman28:39

       Right.

   19. MJMatthew W. Johnson28:39

       ... maybe you shouldn't have connected those dots. But it, it... I, I think that can be constrained and, and so much of our, not only our personal psychological suffering, but our, our limitations, um, academically and in terms of technology are because of the self-imposed limitations and, and heuristics, th- these entrenched ways of thinking. You know, like, those examples throughout the history of science where someone has come up with a, a, a rat- the paradigm, Kuhn's paradigm shifts. It's like, here's something completely different.

   20. LFLex Fridman29:14

       Yeah.

   21. MJMatthew W. Johnson29:14

       You know, this doesn't make sense by any of the previous models. And, like, we need more of those. We, I mean, you know, and then you need the right balance between that because so many of the, you know, novel, crazy ideas are just bunk. And y- y- you nee- that's what science is about, separating them from, from the valid paradigm-shifting ideas. But we need more paradigm-shifting ideas, like, in a big way. And I think we could... I think you could argue that we've, because of the structure of academia and science in modern times, it heavily biases against those.

   22. LFLex Fridman29:49

       Right. Uh, there's all kinds of mechanisms in our human nature that resist paradigm shift quite, sort of obviously. Uh, so... And, uh, psychedelics, there could be a, a lot other tools, but it seems like psychedelics could be one set of tools that encourage paradigm-shifting thinking. So, like, the first principles kind of thinking.

   23. MJMatthew W. Johnson30:11

       Right.

   24. LFLex Fridman30:11

       So it's a kind of, um... You're at the forefront of research here. There's just kind of anecdotal stories. There's, uh, early studies. There's a sense that we don't understand very much, but there's a lot of depth here. How do we get from there to where Elon and I can regularly... Like, I wake up every morning and have deep work sessions where...... it's well-understood, uh, like what dose to take. Like, if I want to explore something where it's all legal, where it's all understood and safe, all that kinda stuff, how do we get from, uh, where we are today to there? Not speaking in terms of legality in the sense, like, policy-making, all that, like, laws and stuff. Meaning, like, how do we scientifically understand this stuff well enough to get to a place where I can just s- take it safely in order to expand my, uh, thinking, like this kind of first principles thinking? Which I'm, in my personal life, currently doing, like, how do I revolutionize, uh, particular several things? Like, uh, it seems like the only tools I have right now is just... (laughs) Just. But my mind going, doing the first principles, like, "Wait, wait, wait. Okay. Why has this been done this way? Can we do it completely differently?" It seems like I'm still tethered to the priors that I bring to the table, and I keep trying to untether myself. Maybe there's tools that can systematically help me untether.

   25. MJMatthew W. Johnson31:44

       Yeah. Well, we need experiments, you know? And that's- that's tied to kind of the policy level stuff. Um, and I should be clear, I would, I'd never encourage anyone to do anything, um, illicitly. But yeah, uh, you know, uh, in the future, we could see these- these, you know, compounds used for the- for- for technical and- and scientific innovation. What we need are studies that are digging into that. Right now, most of what the- the funding, which is largely fund- from philanthropy, um, not from the government, um, largely what it's for is- is treatment of- of mental disorders like addiction and- and depression, et cetera. Um, but we need studies, you know? One of the early initial stabs, um, on this question decades ago was they took some architects and engineers and said, "What- what problems have you been working on? Where have you been stuck for months, like, working on this damn thing and you're not getting anywhere, like, your head's butting up against the wall?" It's like, "Come in here, take..." and I think it was 100 micrograms of LSD, so not a big session. And a little bit different model where they were actually working. It was a moderate enough dose where they could work on the problem during the session.

   26. LFLex Fridman33:00

       Mm-hmm-

   27. MJMatthew W. Johnson33:00

       I- I think probably... I'm an empiricist, so I'd- I'd like to see all the studies done, but-

   28. LFLex Fridman33:06

       Right.

   29. MJMatthew W. Johnson33:06

       ... the first thing I would do is, like, a really high dose session where you're-

   30. LFLex Fridman33:09

       Yeah.
6. 35:41 – 47:03

   DMT

   1. MJMatthew W. Johnson35:41

      In terms of just, like, what's the most fascinating (laughs) ... You know, understanding the nature of these experiences, if you really wanna, like, wrap your head around what's going on when someone has an- a- a completely altered sense of reality and sense of self, there I think you're- you're talking about the- i- the- the high dose, either smoked, vaporized, or intravenous injection, which all kind of, um... They're very similar pharmacologically o- of DMT and 5-methoxy-DMT. This is like when people... This is what... I don't know if you're familiar with Terence McKenna. He would-

   2. LFLex Fridman36:16

      Mm-hmm-

   3. MJMatthew W. Johnson36:16

      ... talk a lot about smoking DMT. Joe Rogan has- has talked a lot about that. People will say that... And there's a close relative called 5-methoxy-DMT. Most people who know the terrain will say that's- that's an order of magnitude or orders of magnitude beyond, I mean, anything one could get from even a high dose of psilocybin or LSD. Um, I think it's a question about whether, you know, how therapeutic. I- I think there is a therapeutic potential there, but it's...... probably not as sure of a bet because one goes so far out it's almost like they- they're not contemplating their relationship and their-

   4. LFLex Fridman36:51

      (laughs)

   5. MJMatthew W. Johnson36:51

      ... direction in life. They are like, reality is ripping apart at the seams.

   6. LFLex Fridman36:55

      (laughs) Yeah.

   7. MJMatthew W. Johnson36:55

      And- and the very nature of the- o- of the self and of the sense of reality. A- and the amazing thing about these compounds, a- and same to a lesser degree with the, you know, with oral psilocybin and LSD is that unlike some- some other drugs that- that really throw you far out there, um, you know, anesthetics, and- and even, uh, even alcohol, like, it- as realities start to become different at higher and higher doses, there's- there's this numbing. There's this sort of, um... There's this ability for the sense of being the center, having a conscious experience that's memorable, that is maintained throughout these classic psychedelic experiences. Like, one can go as far, so far out while still being aware of the experience-

   8. LFLex Fridman37:50

      So-

   9. MJMatthew W. Johnson37:50

      ... and remembering the experience.

   10. LFLex Fridman37:52

       Interesting. So being able to carry something back.

   11. MJMatthew W. Johnson37:55

       Right.

   12. LFLex Fridman37:56

       Can you, uh, dig in a little deeper, like, what is, uh, DMT? How long is the trip usually? Like, how much do we understand about it? Is there s- something interesting to say, uh, about just the- the nature of the experience and what we understand about it?

   13. MJMatthew W. Johnson38:15

       One of the common methods for people to use it is to- is to smoke it or vaporize it, and it usually takes... And this is a pretty good kind of description of what it might feel like on the ground. Um, the caveat is it's- it's- it's- it's a completely insufficient description and someone's gonna be listening (laughs) -

   14. LFLex Fridman38:33

       (laughs)

   15. MJMatthew W. Johnson38:33

       ... to us doing this. It's like nothing you could say is gonna come close.

   16. LFLex Fridman38:35

       Yeah.

   17. MJMatthew W. Johnson38:36

       But it'll take about three big hits, inhalations, in order to have what people call a breakthrough dose. Um, and there's no great definition of that, but basically meaning moving away from, you know, not just having the typical psilocybin or LSD experience where, like, things are radically different but you're still basically a person in this reality, to going somewhere else.

   18. LFLex Fridman39:04

       Hmm.

   19. MJMatthew W. Johnson39:04

       And so that'll typically take, like, three hits. And this stuff comes on like a freight train.

   20. LFLex Fridman39:10

       (laughs)

   21. MJMatthew W. Johnson39:10

       So one takes a hit, and around the time of the first exhalation, so we're talking about a few seconds in, or maybe just, you know, sometime between the first and the second hit, like, it'll start to come on. And they're already up to s- say, um, you know, what they might get from a 30 milligram or- or 300 microgram LSD trip, a big trip. They're already there when, at- at the second hit. But it's, they're going, their consciousness is gear... This is like acceleration, not speed-

   22. LFLex Fridman39:43

       (laughs)

   23. MJMatthew W. Johnson39:43

       ... to speak of physics, okay?

   24. LFLex Fridman39:44

       Yes.

   25. MJMatthew W. Johnson39:44

       It's like you just, those receptors are getting filled like that and they're going from zero to 60 in like, you know, Tesla time.

   26. LFLex Fridman39:51

       Yeah.

   27. MJMatthew W. Johnson39:51

       And at the second hit, again, they're at this, maybe the strongest psychedelic experience they've ever had. And then if they can take that third hit (laughs) -

   28. LFLex Fridman40:01

       (laughs)

   29. MJMatthew W. Johnson40:01

       ... and some people can't, they're, I mean, they're, they're propelled into this other reality. And the nature of that other reality, it will- will- will differ depending on who you ask, but, you know, folks will talk, often talk about it, and- and we've done some survey research on this, entities of different types, elves tend to pop up.

   30. LFLex Fridman40:26

       (laughs)
7. 47:03 – 53:11

   Joe Rogan and DMT

   1. LFLex Fridman47:03

      I don't know how much you're familiar with Joe Rogan, but he- he does bring up DMT qui- quite a bit. (laughs) It's almost a meme. Uh, it is a meme.

   2. MJMatthew W. Johnson47:10

      Right.

   3. LFLex Fridman47:11

      Have you ever, uh... what is it? Have you ever tried DMT? (laughs) Uh, I mean, he... I think he talks about this experience of, um, having met other entities, um, and, uh, they were mocking him, I think, if I remember the experience correctly, like laughing at him and saying, "F you, F you," or something like that.

   4. MJMatthew W. Johnson47:32

      Mm-hmm.

   5. LFLex Fridman47:32

      I may be mis- misremembering this, but- but there was a general mockery and, uh, the- the... what he learned from that experience is that he shouldn't take himself too seriously, so it's the- the dissolution of the ego and so on. Like, what do you think about, uh, that experience? And maybe if you have more general things about, uh, Joe's infatuation with DMT and if DMT has that important role to play in, um, popular culture in general?

   6. MJMatthew W. Johnson48:02

      I'm definitely familiar with it. I remember telling you offline that when I first... the first time I- I learned who Joe Rogan was was probably 15 years ago. And I came ac- upon a clip and I realized there's another person in the world who's into both DMT and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and I think both those worlds have grown-

   7. LFLex Fridman48:21

      Yeah.

   8. MJMatthew W. Johnson48:21

      ... dramatically since, and it's probably not such a special club these days.

   9. LFLex Fridman48:24

      Mm-hmm.

   10. MJMatthew W. Johnson48:24

       So he definitely, uh, you know, got onto my radar screen quickly.

   11. LFLex Fridman48:29

       You- you were into both before it was cool. (laughs)

   12. MJMatthew W. Johnson48:32

       Right. I mean, you know, it- this is all relative 'cause there's people that were, you know, before the late '90s-

   13. LFLex Fridman48:36

       Yes.

   14. MJMatthew W. Johnson48:36

       ... and early 2000s that were into it that say, you know, "You're a Johnny-come-lately." But- but yeah.

   15. LFLex Fridman48:40

       Yeah.

   16. MJMatthew W. Johnson48:41

       Compared to where we're at now... But yet, one of the things I always found fascinating by...... by Joe's i- i- you know, um, telling of his experience, experiences, I think, is that they resemble very much Terence McKenna's experiences with DMT. And, and Joe has talked very much about Terence McKenna and his experiences. If I had to guess, I would guess that probably just having heard Terence McKenna talk about his experiences, that Joe's, that that influenced the coloring-

   17. LFLex Fridman49:14

       Yeah, it gives you the language to-

   18. MJMatthew W. Johnson49:14

       ... of Joe's experience.

   19. LFLex Fridman49:15

       It's funny. It's funny how that works because, I mean, that's why McKenna hasn't... I mean, poets and, uh, great orders give us the words to then, like, start to describe our experiences because our words are limited, our language is limited, and it's always nice to get some kind of nice poetry into the mix to allow us to put words to it.

   20. MJMatthew W. Johnson49:36

       Right. And he-

   21. LFLex Fridman49:37

       Yeah.

   22. MJMatthew W. Johnson49:37

       But I also see some elements that, that, that seem to relate to Joe's psychology, aga- just from what I've seen of him-

   23. LFLex Fridman49:44

       (laughs) Yeah, yes.

   24. MJMatthew W. Johnson49:45

       ... you know, from hours of, of watching him on his podcast is that, you know, he's a self-critical guy.

   25. LFLex Fridman49:51

       Yes.

   26. MJMatthew W. Johnson49:52

       And I think with always this positive bent, I'm always struck being a, a behavioral pharmacologist that, and he, no one else really says it about cannabis, and I'll get back to the DMT thing about he likes the, kind of the paranoid side of things.

   27. LFLex Fridman50:03

       Yeah.

   28. MJMatthew W. Johnson50:03

       He's like, "That's you radically examining yourself."

   29. LFLex Fridman50:05

       Yeah.

   30. MJMatthew W. Johnson50:05

       It's like, that's not just a bad thing. That's, you need to, like, look hard at yourself.
8. 53:11 – 1:07:00

   The nature of drug addiction

   1. MJMatthew W. Johnson53:12

   2. LFLex Fridman53:12

      You've mentioned addiction. Maybe we could take a little bit detour i- into a darker aspect of things. Or not even darker, it's just an important aspect of things. What's the nature of addiction? You've mentioned some things within the big umbrella of psychedelics, maybe m- usually not addictive, but maybe MDMA, I think you said, might have some addictive properties. But the, the point is stuff outside of the psychedelics umbrella can often be highly addictive. So you've studied addiction from several angles, one of which is behavioral economics. What have you understood about addiction? What is addiction from the biological, physiological level to the psychological, to whatever is an interesting way to talk about addiction?

   3. MJMatthew W. Johnson54:02

      Right. Yeah, and I, uh, the lenses that I view addiction through very much are behavioral economic. But I also think they converge on, I think it's beautiful, at the other end of the spectrum, sort of just a completely, um, humanistic psychology perspective. Um, you know, and I, it, it converges on what people come out of, you know, 12-step meetings talking about ... noneconomic behavior. So, basically, at one point, you know, like, psychologists figured out that there's this whole other discipline that's been studying behavior, just happened to be all focused on monetary behaviors, spending and saving money, et cetera. But it comes with all of these, like, principles that can be wildly and, and, and fruitfully applied to understanding behavior. So, so for example, I've studied things like, um, demand curve analysis of drug consumption. So, I look at, um, for example, the, the tobacco, cigarettes, and nicotine products through the lens of, of, of, of demand curves. And y- y- in other words at different prices if y- if there's different work requirements-

   4. LFLex Fridman55:40

      Mm.

   5. MJMatthew W. Johnson55:40

      ... for, um, being able to smoke cigarettes, sort of, modeling price.

   6. LFLex Fridman55:46

      Within that price data, there is some indication of addiction, how much you, the habits that you form around these particular, uh, drugs.

   7. MJMatthew W. Johnson55:53

      Yeah, it's, it's one, one important dimension. So, I think a particularly important one there is elasticity or inelasticity, you know, um, two ends of the spectrum. So, that's the, the price sensitivity. So, so f- for example, you could have something that's pretty price, um, uh, inelastic like, like gasoline. So, the price of gas at times can keep going up and Americans are just gonna p- p- pretty much, you know, buy the same amount of gas. Or maybe, you know, the, the price of, of gas doubles, but their consumption only decreases by 10%.

   8. LFLex Fridman56:26

      Mm-hmm.

   9. MJMatthew W. Johnson56:26

      So, it's a, a sub-proportional reduction. So, that's in- inelastic. And, and, and that changes. Like, you push the price up high enough, I mean, if it was $100 a gallon, it would eventually turn, the curve would turn, um, a- and, and go downward more, more drastically and it would be elastic. But you can apply that to someone, you know, someone who, a regular cigarette smoker who, um, who, who is working for cigarette puffs, who has, who's gone six hours without smoking. And you're asking questions like, you know, how many times are they willing to pull this knob in the lab during this three-hour session, I do a lot of work like this, in order to earn a cigarette pu- How does the, how does the content of nicotine in that affect it? How does the availability of, of nicotine replacement products, like nicotine gum or e-cigarettes a- affect those, those decisions? So, you can... It's a certain lens of it's sort of a way to take the, kind of, the classic behavioral psychology definition of reinforcement-

   10. LFLex Fridman57:21

       Mm-hmm.

   11. MJMatthew W. Johnson57:21

       ... and which is just basically reward, you know, how much is this a good thing? And it kind of breaks that apart into a multi-dimensional, um, space. So, it's not just the ideas reward i- or reinforcement, it's not unidimensional. So, for example, well, you can unpack that with demand curves. At a cheap price, you might prefer one good to another, you know. So, the classic example is luxury versus necessity, so diamonds versus toilet paper.

   12. LFLex Fridman57:49

       Mm-hmm.

   13. MJMatthew W. Johnson57:49

       So, at, at those cheap prices you can look at something called intensity of demand. You know, if it was basically as cheap as possible, or essentially zero, how much would you buy of this good? But then you keep jacking up the price and you'll see... So, you know, diamonds will look like the better reward at that, at that low price sort of intensity of demand side of things, but as you keep jacking up the price, you gotta have some toilet paper.

   14. LFLex Fridman58:12

       Yes.

   15. MJMatthew W. Johnson58:13

       And again, we can get into the whole, like, bidet thing, but forget that-

   16. LFLex Fridman58:16

       (laughs)

   17. MJMatthew W. Johnson58:16

       ... you know, like, uh-

   18. LFLex Fridman58:17

       Yeah.

   19. MJMatthew W. Johnson58:18

       ... I know Joe's been pushing that too.

   20. LFLex Fridman58:20

       (laughs)

   21. MJMatthew W. Johnson58:20

       (laughs) But, but, you know, you're gonna, you're gonna hang on and keep buying the toilet paper to a greater degree than you will the diamonds.

   22. LFLex Fridman58:26

       Yes.

   23. MJMatthew W. Johnson58:26

       So, you'll see a crossing of demand curves. So, what's the better reinforcer? What's the better reward? Depends on your price, you know.

   24. LFLex Fridman58:33

       Yes.

   25. MJMatthew W. Johnson58:33

       And so that's one, that's an example of one way to, in that, o- o- of look at addiction, so specifically drug consumption which is, isn't all of addiction. But it's like, in order for something to be addictive, it has to be a, a reward and it has to compete with other rewards in, in your life. And, and one of the two main aspects of addiction in my, in my view, and this doesn't map onto how the, you know, the DSM, the psych- psychiatry bible defines addiction which I think is largely bunk, you know, but there's some value to have some common description. But it's, you know, how rewarding is it from this multi-dimensional lens? And h- specifically how does it, how does that rewarding value compete with other rewards, other consequences in your life?

   26. LFLex Fridman59:24

       Mm-hmm.

   27. MJMatthew W. Johnson59:25

       So, uh, it's, it's not a problem if, if the use of that substance is rewarding, you know. Okay, yeah, you like to have a couple of beers every once in a while and it's, like, not a problem. I mean, um, but then you have the alcoholic who is drinking so much that they, their, their, it tanks their career, it, it ruins their marriage. It's in competition with these prosocial aspects to their life.

   28. LFLex Fridman59:52

       It's all about comparing to the other choices you're making, the other activities in your life. And if it, uh, you value it as a much higher reward, uh, than anything else, that becomes an addiction.

   29. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:00:05

       Right, right. And so it's not just the rewarding value but it's the relative rewarding value. And, and the other major as- again, from ec- behavioral economics that, th- that, the thing that makes addiction is something called delayed discounting. Um, so in, in economics sometimes it's called time preference. It's, this is the, it's what compound interest rates are based upon. It's the idea that delaying a, a good, access to a good or a reward, um, comes with a certain decrement to its value. So, we'd all rather have things now than later. Um, and we can study this at the individual level of, you know, would you rather have, you know, $9 today or, or, or $10 tomorrow? Um, and you get, when you do that, you get huge differences between addicted populations and non-addicted. Not just heroin and cocaine, but, like, just cigarette smokers, like, normal, everyday cigarette smokers. And even when you look at something like, you know, monetary rewards. And, and so you can go into the rabbit hole with, with this delayed discounting model. So, it's not only those huge differences that, that seem to have a face valid-... aspect to it. Like, the cigarette smoker is choosing this thing that's rewarding today, but I know it comes with increased risk of having these horrible consequences down the line. So it's this competition between what's good for me now and what's good for me later.

   30. LFLex Fridman1:01:28

       Mm-hmm.
9. 1:07:00 – 1:13:15

   The economics of drug pricing

   1. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:07:00

   2. LFLex Fridman1:07:01

      So then to s- take a step back just something wha- you brought up earlier, the inelasticity of pricing. Uh, is it, uh, from a perspective of the dealers, whether we're talking about cigarettes or maybe-... venturing slightly into the illegal realm, you know, of people who sell drugs illegally. They also have an economics to them, that they set prices and all those kinds of things. Does addiction allow you to mess with the nature of pricing? Like, so I, I, I kind of assume that you meant that there is a correlation between things you're addicted to and the inelasticity of the price. So, you can jack up the price. Is, is there something-

   3. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:07:47

      Right.

   4. LFLex Fridman1:07:47

      ... interesting to be said both for legal drugs and illegal drugs about the kind of price games you can play, um, because the consumers of the product are addicted?

   5. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:08:04

      Right. I mean, I, I think you just described it. Yeah, you can jack up the price and, you know, some people are gonna drop off, but the people, you know... And it's not dichotomous 'cause you could just consume less. But some people are gonna con- consume less, and the people that are most addicted are gonna keep, you know, um... I mean, you see this, they're gonna keep, you know, purchasing. So, you see this with cigarettes. And so it, it's interesting when you interface this with policy, like, in one respect, heavily taxing cigarettes is a good thing. We know it keeps, you know, um... Adolescents are particularly price sensitive, so y- you definitely-

   6. LFLex Fridman1:08:37

      Oh, interesting.

   7. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:08:37

      People smoke less and especially kids smoke less when you keep cigarette prices high and you tax the hell out of them. Um, but one of the downsides, you've got to balance and, and keep in mind, is that you disproportionately have working class, um, poor people.

   8. LFLex Fridman1:08:52

      (laughs)

   9. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:08:52

      And then you get into a point where someone's spending, you know-

   10. LFLex Fridman1:08:55

       Yeah.

   11. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:08:55

       ... a quarter of their paycheck on cigarettes if they're happy.

   12. LFLex Fridman1:08:56

       So, they're gonna smoke no matter what. And, uh, basically because they're addicted, they're gonna smoke no matter what, and you're just... Yeah, you're, you're taxing their existence. (laughs)

   13. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:09:06

       Right, so you're making it worse for the... If, if they don't, if they are completely inelastic, you're actually making that person's life worse.

   14. LFLex Fridman1:09:12

       Yeah.

   15. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:09:12

       Because we know that, that by, by interfering with the, the amount of money they have, you're interfering with the other, um, pro-social, the potential competitors to smoking, you know? Um, and we know that when someone's in more impoverished environments and they have less sort of non-drug alternatives, you know, the, the more likely they're gonna stay addicted. So, you know...

   16. LFLex Fridman1:09:35

       Is there a data, this is interesting, uh, from a scientific perspective of those same kind of games in illegal drugs? Sort of, um... Because that's where most drug... I, I was, I mean, I don't know, maybe you can correct me, but it seems like most drugs are, are currently illegal. And so they're, but there's still an economics to them, obviously.

   17. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:10:00

       Right.

   18. LFLex Fridman1:10:00

       Hence the drug war and so on. Is there data on the setting of prices or, like, how good are the business people running the selling of drugs, uh, that are illegal? Are they all the same kind of rules apply from a behavioral economics perspective?

   19. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:10:15

       I think so. I mean, they're b- basically that whe- whether they're crunching the numbers or not, they're basically sensitive to that demand curve, and they're doing the, the, the same thing that businesses do in, in a legal market. And, you know, you wanna sell as much of a, of a product to get as much money. Um, you're looking more at the total income, so if you jack the price a little bit, you're gonna get some reduction in consumption, but it may be that the total amount of money that you rake in is gonna be more than, than... You know, it's gonna overcompensate for that. So, you're willing to take, "Okay, I'm gonna lose 10% of my customers, but I'm getting more per- you know, more than, uh, enough to compensate from that, from the extra money from the people who still are buying." So, I think there are more... You know, and especially when we get to the lower... I wouldn't be surprised if people are crunching those numbers and looking at demand curves maybe at the, you know, at the really high levels of the, you know, up the chain-

   20. LFLex Fridman1:11:06

       Right.

   21. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:11:06

       ... with the cartels and whatnot. I don't know. I, that wouldn't surprise me at all. But I think it's probably, you know, more implicit at the, at the lower levels where-

   22. LFLex Fridman1:11:13

       Right.

   23. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:11:14

       ... um, something that you brought up, drug policy, I will say that, uh, for, for years now it's been this kind of, um, unquestioned goal, um, by, for example, the, the, the Drug Czar's office, um, a- a- in the US to, to make the price of illegal drugs as high as possible without this kind of nuanced approach that, um, yeah, if you make... You know, for some people, if y- y- you know, if you make the price so high, you're actually making things worse.

   24. LFLex Fridman1:11:43

       Mm-hmm.

   25. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:11:43

       I mean, I'm all about reducing the problems associated with drugs and-

   26. LFLex Fridman1:11:48

       Right.

   27. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:11:48

       ... drug addictions, and part of that is the, our more direct consequences of those drugs themselves. And, but a whole lot is what you get from indirectly and, and, you know, sort of the in- in, both for the individual and for soc- society. So, like, making a poor person who doesn't have enough money for their kids, making them even poorer. So, now you've made their, their chil- children's future worse because they're-

   28. LFLex Fridman1:12:11

       Yeah.

   29. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:12:11

       ... growing up in deeper poverty because you've essentially levied a tax onto this person who's heavily, uh, addicted. Um, but then the s- at the societal level, you know, so everything we know about the drug war in terms of the, the heavy criminalization and filling up of prisons and, and reducing employment and educational opportunities, whi- which in the big picture we know are the things that, in a free market, compete against some of the worst problems o- of addiction is actually having educational and employment opportunities. But when you get, give someone a felony, for example-

   30. LFLex Fridman1:12:44

       Mm-hmm.
10. 1:13:15 – 1:25:18

    Should we legalize all drugs?

    1. LFLex Fridman1:13:15

       you know, there's some libertarian, um-... candidates for president and just libertarian thinkers that had a nice thought experiment of possibly legalizing or has spoken about possibly legalizing basically all drugs. In your intuition, do you think a world where all drugs are legal is a safer world or a less safe world for the users of those drugs?

    2. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:13:45

       It really depends on what we mean by legalization. So, this is one of my beefs with this, you know, how these things are talked about. I mean, we have very few completely laissez-faire, you know, legal drugs. So, even caffeine is one of the few examples. So, for example, caffeine and tea and coffee is in that realm. Like, there's no limits, no one's testing, there's no laws, regulation at any level of how much-

    3. LFLex Fridman1:14:09

       Mm-hmm.

    4. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:14:10

       ... caffeine you're allowed to buy or how much in the pro- But even, like, with this, um, Starbucks, like, nitro, there are rules with soda and with canned products, you can only put so much-

    5. LFLex Fridman1:14:19

       In there, yeah.

    6. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:14:20

       Yeah. So there's a, there's, this is FDA regulated.

    7. LFLex Fridman1:14:22

       Mm-hmm.

    8. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:14:22

       And it's kind of weird because there's a limit to sodas that's not there for energy drinks and other things. So... But, you know, so even caffeine, it depends on what product we're talking about. Y- like, if you're s- like, NoDoz and other caffeine products over the counter, like, you can't just put 800 milligrams in there. The pills are like 1 or 200 milligrams. And so it's FDA regulated as an over-the-counter drug. Some of the most dangerous drugs in society, I would say arguably one of the most dangerous class of drugs are the volatile anesthetics, huffing, people huffing gasoline and, you know, airplane glue, toluene, whatnot, um, severely damaging to the nervous system. Pretty much legal, but there's some regulation in the sense that there's a warning label, like it's illegal to do it for e- not that it nece- people, they're busting people for this.

    9. LFLex Fridman1:15:07

       Mm-hmm.

    10. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:15:07

        But, you know, it's against federal law to use this in a way other than intended type of thing. Basically saying like, yeah, don't huff this, you know?

    11. LFLex Fridman1:15:16

        Yeah.

    12. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:15:16

        Um, your paint thinner or whatnot, at least keeps people from selling it for that. Like, no-

    13. LFLex Fridman1:15:22

        Ah, yeah.

    14. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:15:22

        ... 'cause they're gonna, they're gonna go after that person. They're not-

    15. LFLex Fridman1:15:24

        Yes.

    16. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:15:24

        ... gonna be able to find the 12-year-old who's huffing.

    17. LFLex Fridman1:15:27

        Yeah.

    18. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:15:27

        So anyway, just as some extreme ex- examples at, at the end, and then, you know, even the, the so-called illegal, like Schedule I drugs, psilocybin, we do plenty on, and, um, in terms of Schedule II, which is ironically less restrictive than psilocybin, but methamphetamine and cocaine, I've done human research with. My research has been legal. So they're scheduled compounds, but they're not completely illegal. Like, you can do research with them with the appropriate licenses and, um, uh, yeah, approval. So, there really is no such thing a- a- and, like alcohol, well, it's illegal if you're tw- 12 years old or 18 years old or 20 years old. And for anyone, it's illegal to, to be drinking it while you're driving. So, there's always a nuance to this.

    19. LFLex Fridman1:16:09

        There's rules, right?

    20. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:16:09

        It's not dichotomy.

    21. LFLex Fridman1:16:11

        And I actually should admit, it's been on my to-do list for a while to buy, in Massachusetts, some, like, edibles, buy weed legally. I, um, yeah, haven't done that in Massachusetts, let's put it this way.

    22. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:16:24

        (laughs)

    23. LFLex Fridman1:16:25

        (laughs) Uh, it, and I, I, I wonder what that experience is like, 'cause I get, I think it's fully legal in Massachusetts. And, and so I wonder what legal drugs look like. To, to me, you know, I grew up with m- even weed being, like, you know, not, it's like this forbidden thing, you know? Not, not forbidden, but it's illegal, you know? Most people, of course, I never partook, but, uh, most people I knew would, uh, attain it illegally. And so that big switch that's been happening across the country, there, there's, like, federal s- stuff going on to make, uh, marijuana legal federally? I, I'm, I'm half paying attention.

    24. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:17:01

        There's some movement there.

    25. LFLex Fridman1:17:02

        Yeah.

    26. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:17:02

        I mean, the House passed a bill that's not gonna be passed by the, by the Senate, but yeah, it's, it's progress, it's, yeah.

    27. LFLex Fridman1:17:08

        But change, there's, there's clearly a change in-

    28. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:17:10

        Right, it's moving in a trend, yeah.

    29. LFLex Fridman1:17:11

        So that's an example of a drug that, uh, used to be illegal and is now becoming more and more and more legal. Um, so, like, I wonder what, like, uh, cocaine being legal looks like.

    30. MJMatthew W. Johnson1:17:22

        Right.

Episode duration: 3:34:57