they also must understand that they can positively (for their purposes anyway) use stressful and fear-inducing situations in order to more effectively “teach” and form memories in people. All they have to do is find simple ways to trigger the release of adrenaline in the body associated with key points they wish to have remembered, and voila!

Not a very enlightening comment from me (as usual) but the above comment reminds me of the TV show Arrested Development (funny shit) where they go into segments / flashbacks where the Dad used to teach the kids an important “lesson” by creating a little scenario where his friend in cahoots would somehow (he used it on more than one occasion) lose an arm in front of the kids as a result of their behaviour, shocking the living crap out of them and impressing the lesson.

Sometimes I think these guys get off on creating problems that only further drugging can handle.

I’m 100% with you on that one!

Sometimes I think these guys get off on creating problems that only further drugging can handle. Like prescribing methadone for heroin addiction. Sick, sick, sick, sick, sick.

After what appears to be a 40 year-long ’stay’ in liquid nitrogen, Tichy has to encounter a world profoundly affected by ‘psycho-chemistry’. In all of the worlds - ‘real’ or illusory - that he visits, Tichy walks in the middle of prisoners (in the Platonic sense) rendered defenseless in the bottom of their cavern; the prisoners are not only the unknowing victims of the illusions, but also the vain and mischievous demiurges who perpetrate them. In such worlds, craving for knowledge has been reduced to a mere search for formulas and chemical products whose only role is to provoke the desired reactions and keep all the citizens in a state of sleep. Tichy is alone in perceiving what is positive about getting rid of complete servitude, but the world Lem depicts in the book is so oversaturated with different levels of illusions that such a hope can only lead to failure.
—————-
Written when Poland was under the grip of Communism, “The Futurological Congress” is a powerful parable of a totalitarian state that uses psychotropic drugs not only to subdue its citizens but also to make them believe things are better than they are. The first third of the book reads almost like an adventure story: Ijon Tichy is attending a convention of futurologists in Central America, when he and his colleagues are caught up in a bizarre coup d’etat. When Tichy’s cryogenically frozen corpse is reanimated decades later, the entire overpopulated world is hooked on drugs.

I had not heard that this common medication had any other, (especially mysterious), uses.

Perhaps it is an initiative by the makers of this drug to expand their markets into new areas? Fund some scientists to see what creative uses they can come up with for it, generate a media buzz, and there you go… Simple business.

Unless I am mistaken propanolol is not the drug they are speaking about.

Well, I dont know what to tell you. That’s the drug they are referencing on that page and in the video! Here’s an excerpt from their page:

If there were a pill you could take after experiencing a painful or traumatic event that would permanently weaken your memory of what had just happened, would you take it?

An ongoing study suggests it’s a choice that may not be so far off. The drug is called propranolol and it’s already used to treat high blood pressure. As Lesley Stahl reports, the prospect of using propranolol to modify memory has some trauma victims filled with hope, and some critics alarmed by the potential for misuse.

Unless I am mistaken propanolol is not the drug they are speaking about.

I didnt see the video but I am intimately famliar with propanolol. As some of you might know from my posts ’round here I am an ER nurse (RN) of ten years experience and have given alot of propanolol in my time. It is a heart rythm regulator (a beta blocker) that also lowers blood pressure. It has a mild relaxing effect and is occassionally given to treat anxiety.

I suspect the medication you are speaking of is Diprivan or Propofol by its generic. It sounds alot like propanolol but they are two different beasts. Propofol is given to patients to “knock them out” and keep them out. It is an unusual drug in that it must be emulsified to be injected so as to avoid an allergic reaction and crosses the blood brain barrier in an unusual manner. I have experimented with it myself and can say it is most unusual; it has some endocannaboid effects. But this is strong strong stuff that causes irresistible unconciousness and transient apnea. NOT TO BE TAKEN LIGHTLY AND NOT A PARTY DRUG.

A media-drenched environment such as the one we currently live in, and the recent here’s-shit-in-your-eye the GOP received earlier this month, is going to mean that GIs will be able to share their experiences without worrying about what anyone has to say about it. I can’t imagine too many vets suffering from PTSD are going to have good things to say. I’d imagine that this drug is just as much for the people that won’t need to take it as it is for the people that will.

Or maybe it’s not that angle at all. Maybe it’s going to be the next ephedrine or whatever speedy drug you prefer from the literal horde of speedy drugs that seemed to dominate a few years ago. Maybe it’s going to end up as a commonly abused drug…used by anyone and everyone to “get over” a shitty event, even if that event is some LA socialite’s hissy fit over losing her car keys.

“Maybe that’s not true though, since the “controllers” of humanity seem to have a rich modern history of administering substances both overtly and covertly within society in order to impact societal change. Why is alcohol not only legal but promoted - because it has a tendency to deaden us to the world, if used to excess? In a lot of ways, its not so radically different from a drug like propanolol after all.”

Maybe this is what made me think of vets and the war…and how so many vets after vietnam became alcoholics. “Alcoholism” seems…..not fancy enough?…for our current times. Kinda inadequate, even. It’s almost as if the present state of things demands scientific progression even for inebriation/chemically assisted coping.

regarding the drug. it doesn`t selectively deal with one memory, it effects the archetecture of the brain function that provides access to memory period.

emotional suicide.

robots.

bad thing.