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January 28 - January 28, 2018
it’s no wonder most money gets funneled into fixing illness as opposed to helping mostly upper-middle-class entrepreneurs and professionals get a 5% to 10% boost in cognitive enhancement.
A similar ethos has pervaded many of the more courageous minds within the cognitive enhancement and nootropics space.
Empowered Responsibility
In 2007, Wired magazine ran a story dubbing the term “Quantified Self.” In the article, technologists Kevin Kelly and Gary Wolf outline why individuals were interested in “self-knowledge through self-tracking.”
In a procedure that only costs a couple hundred dollars, Dr. Hill was able to provide “...empirical evidence that phenylpiracetam increases focus, concentration, and quick-thinking…”
powerful tool. Radical
Neurochemical Change: Psychedelics
Native tribes in South America used ayahuasca; tribes in North America used mescaline, and even the ancient Greeks consumed kykeon, a dark black liquid many researchers
In 2006, Johns Hopkins researcher, Dr. Roland Griffiths began to study psilocybin mushrooms and “mystical experiences” of his participants.
Administering a dose of mescaline, Dr. Fadiman discovered that 44.4% of his sample population (twelve out of twenty-seven people) had breakthrough solutions that became patents or other tangible assets.
Dr. Carhart-Harris at Imperial College London has published findings using fMRI brain scans of patients while using psychedelic substances.
it’s important to create sustainable cognitive enhancement as opposed to quick bursts and crashes.
The downsides and risks of these amphetamine-based drugs are the perfect examples of the “what goes up must come down” concept. Amphetamine-based drugs (like Adderall) create sleep disturbances even when one has stopped taking the substance.111
For piperine to increase the absorption of curcumin, it must reduce detoxifying enzymes. In the case of curcumin absorption, that’s what we want. When it comes to other toxins and chemicals, it is not.
Jesse Lawler, the host of popular podcast Smart Drug Smarts, once shared a quote with me, which is compatible with my point: “Homeostatic equilibrium will not be denied.”
Take days off Cycle nootropics Vary mechanisms
During my off days, I still may take deficiency-based supplements, such as fish oil or coenzyme q10 (CoQ10), but no stimulants or focus enhancers.
When it comes to stimulation, caffeine blocks adenosine receptors and influences dopamine and adrenaline activity.
Phenylpiracetam (a member of the racetam family with a phenyl group), on the other hand, seems to increase focus and attention through the cholinergic system.
wasn’t long after that he purchased a smart drug from a shady vendor. Its use resulted in seizures and a near-death visit to the emergency room. It was the first of many hospital visits.
A few months after that, Charles was dead. Whether the emergency visits and seizures were directly to blame for his death is unknown, but he was in his mid-thirties. The story always sits as a reminder of how dangerous nootropics and supplementation can be.
The attorney general of New York State accused Walgreens, Walmart, Target, and GNC of “selling fraudulent and potentially dangerous herbal supplements.”116 Reports found four out of five products did not contain any of the herbs listed on the bottles.
Seek third party testing Research community data Use the “Shulgin method”
The nootropics community is a great resource for collecting safety data on vendors. Reddit has around a hundred thousand members; Longecity has tens of thousands more. The experiences of others can inform purchase decisions.
American biochemist Alexander Shulgin. During his long career, he invented nearly two hundred and thirty psychedelic compounds. He is considered one of the most important figures in chemistry and psychopharmacology of the past few hundred years.
A microdose is the first step, which may yield no noticeable results, but can provide valuable allergy information.
After passing the microdose allergy test, you can then move up to a half-dose of the new substance to rule out a reaction to more of the substance. Finally, take a single dose of the recommended range.
Children under twenty-five years old Taking more than one new nootropic Experimental drugs No matter your age, there
developing. A 2014 study in Frontiers in Neuroscience (a very reputable publication) concluded that many stimulants cause damage to brain development in early years.118
Another risk, no matter the age, is taking too many new nootropics at once. When we use the “Shulgin method” explained in the previous section, we can avoid dangerous situations, but only if we take a single nootropic compound.
More importantly, we want to make sure we are taking conscious and well-informed risks if that is the route we decide to go.
Out of fifteen hundred corporate leaders in sixty countries, over 60% said creativity was the most important leadership quality.119 This came ahead of integrity, global thinking, or even dedication.
The crew found that creativity is essential for solving complex problems, such as poverty, energy shortages, and war. With so much hope placed on creativity, it’s no wonder many nootropics enthusiasts are trying to enhance this skill. Creativity is challenging to define, but working memory is an essential component.
Increasing our working memory enables us to hold many ideas in our head at one time and combine them to form creative solutions.
One reason modafinil has grown in popularity is that it’s a potent stimulant with benefits in both focus and creativity (by inducing adrenaline activity in the prefrontal cortex).122
A day filled with specific tasks (focus and concentration) may require a cup of coffee (caffeine) with some L-theanine.
Aniracetam may be better for a separate day requiring creativity.
The only time he feels comfortable using modafinil is to create an outline for the story (requiring both creativity and concentration).
This increases adrenaline and dopamine activity for focus and concentration, a twenty-minute walk can produce endorphins, and a joint (marijuana) can support lateral thinking through a chemical called anandamide.123
Adderall (and Vyvanse, Ritalin, and numerous generic names) is an amphetamine-based drug.
There is another important concept involved with using stimulants called the Yerkes-Dodson Law. The relationship between being alert or highly focused and performance suggests there is a bell-curve response with stimulation. Too much stimulation (from either caffeine, Adderall or others) can cause poor performance due to high anxiety.
Unfortunately, nearly 11% of American children aged four to seventeen are prescribed some type of amphetamine-based drug and even more are using them off-label to keep up.126
Neuroprotection and preventing the symptoms of aging are ideal pursuits as human lifespan grows. This field is where much of the nootropic world started. Piracetam, a synthetic derivative of GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid), was created in the 1960s and used successfully to improve aspects of cognition and memory in elderly people.128
