Dr. LSD to Steve Jobs: How was your trip?
Albert Hofmann. Photo: Stefan Pangritz
"Dear Mr. Jobs," begins the 2007 letter from Swiss scientist Albert Hofmann to Apple's (AAPL) CEO. "I understand from media accounts that you feel LSD helped you creatively in your development of Apple computers and your personal spiritual quest. I'm interested in learning more about how LSD was useful to you."
Hofmann, as students of the sixties will recall, was the chemist who first synthesized, ingested and experienced the psychedelic effects of lysergic acid diethylamide.
Steve Jobs, as readers of John Markoff's "What the Dormouse Said: How the Sixties Counterculture Shaped the Personal Computer Industry" may remember, dabbled in psychedelics in the 1970s and has called his LSD experiences "one of the two or three most important things I have done in my life."
"I'm writing now," Hofmann's letter continues, "shortly after my 101st birthday, to request that you support Swiss psychiatrist Dr. Peter Gasser's proposed study of LSD-assisted psychotherapy in subjects with anxiety associated with life-threatening illness."
Hofmann, who died last year at age 102, was writing at the request of his friend Rick Doblin, founder of the nonprofit Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies.
Doblin was hoping for a financial contribution from the billionaire co-founder of Apple. What he got instead, according to Ryan Grim, who posted the previously unpublished letter Tuesday in the Huffington Post, was a half-hour telephone conversation with Jobs. As Grim describes it:
"[Jobs] was still thinking, 'Let's put it in the water supply and turn everybody on,'" recalls a disappointed Doblin, who says he still hasn't given up hope that Jobs will come around and contribute.
Grim got permission to publish Hofmann's letter from the chemist's estate. Grim's Huffington piece is adapted from his book "This Is Your Country on Drugs: The Secret History of Getting High in America."
See also: Top 10 moments in Steve Jobs' career
Albert Hofmann photo courtesy of Stefan Pangritz via Wikipedia Commons.
Below the fold: a snapshot of the letter.
The tragedy about the whole debate over LSD and the use of entheogens is that it is ironically one of the most profound events of the 1940's, along with the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the making of the atomic bomb, and should be beyond petty debate. Should it be used indiscriminately, NO; should it be available like suspected entheogen substances where used at the Eleusian mystery school in Ancient Greece,…YES….Dr Atmo Woob
To Jim in L.A.:
I wish you hadn't written such an insulting comment. 1) Dr. Hofmann's remarks were grammatically correct and pithy. 2) English was his third or fourth language. 3) He was 101 years old at the time he wrote this note to Steve Jobs. Cut him some slack. Believe me, 40 years ago, a far-more-famous "Jim in L.A." (Morrison, of blessed memory) would have appreciated the importance of a handwritten note from Dr. Hofmann. Sincerely, Mac Brachman
My LSD Documentary looks into the effect on POWER and CONTROL and ACID. There are four parts on youtube, features Ram Dass, Krassner, CIA on LSD, Groucho's Trip on Acid, and more
Over the years I've become less and less impressed with Mr. Jobs. One thing I learned about LSD was that it seemed to make crystallize and intensify many aspects of users' personalities, for better or worse. For example, if you were an introspective, humble sort who went about his or her life quietly living, working, etc., you became more into introspection and humility and NOT BLOWING YOUR OWN DAMN HORN every 5 seconds. If on the other hand you tended toward grandiosity and narcissism, you would become the biggest egocentric, God-complexed type of guy the world had ever seen, a real hard-to-take A**HOLE. Mr. Jobs has certainly set new standards in blowing his own horn and in embodying a certain type of cool, though his shtick has long since passed the time when it became annoying. He once challenged Bill Gates, ostensibly the archetype of the socially maladroit nerd, to "rebel," to take acid and have whole new insights into himself and the world. Well, Mr. Gates heads a foundation trying to cure AIDS, stop millions of deaths from infectious diseases in the third world, and contributes millions to a panoply of charities and arts organizations worldwide. What does Mr. Jobs do? When he's not stonewalling the facts about his medical condition in a way that would put the current Iranian regime and its obfuscation about its presidential election results to shame, he's embellishing the Personality Cult of Himself, and refusing to pony up a few bucks to support long-term research into the effects of LSD on users, even after a request to do so from the now-deceased centenarian-plus discoverer of the drug and its effects. The word "psychedelic" has its etymology in the Greek words for "soul-revealing." What I've seen revealed about Mr. Jobs' soul has been quite repellent.
My parents were very into LSD and I was exposed to it at an early age. I think more studies should be done on the long term psychological and sociological effects of the drug.
I believe it can help people to tap into a universal cosmic wisdom that is embedded into our genetic memory. Check out my LSD/Counterculture stories here: http://dryotamrcnhppkd.blogspot.com/2009/01/1963-venice-beach-ca.html
Those who bark at this article can not appreciate true creativity!
LSD paved the way for many of the things you see today.
LSD continues to pave the way for things you will see tomorrow.
Its an amazing substance and should be recognized as such.
I'm sure Mr. Jobs isnt ashamed of his use of it. Clearly he says it was one of the top most important things he has ever done.
And if you have ever experienced it yourself, you will whole heartly agree 100%.
You cant deny what LSD does. You just cant.
It can, will and does unlock doors that you never knew were even there, let alone had enough balls to walk through…
Slander?
That is history and reality, not slander. You cannot deny the effects of the 60's on the personal computer industry. You also cannot deny that you and I are making use of those visions when we use computers and the web.
Never forget history!
It's libel when it's in print, slander is crime of a false statement in the spoken word. However, he can print it if it's true, or thinks it to be true.
How it's relevant to anything, or news is the question. Pretty shaky ground there.
Who pays you to post this slander of Steve Jobs strategically just before Apple earnings? Your dreams will not come true.
Anon: I agree with you, it's too bad that LSD and its use has generated such debate. Unfortunately, the stupidity and greed of human nature helped create the toxic context in which the original promise of LSD was corrupted. No sooner had the U.S. government secured a supply of first rate Sandoz LSD than it began to allow the DIA and the CIA and the Army to run mind-control experiments with it, in hopes of countering the commies and their "brainwashing" techniques. No sooner did a narcissistic sociopath like Tim Leary get hold of it than he set himself up as a latter-day guru, offering instant enlightenment. No sooner did a community based on gentleness, sharing, and love get established in the Haight in SF (1964-1966) than opportunistic, self-centered sociopaths of every ilk descend on the scene like predatory sharks on a pod of baby whales (Charlie Manson, you hit the Haight in '67 after your last parole, I'm talking about you), so that by the end of the so-called "summer of love" in '67, the Haight was strychnine, meth, and heroin laced nightmare, with tombstone-eyed kids wandering the streets in search of a cheap high, or even a peanut butter sandwich, and a thousand mini-Mansons preying on them.
Unfortunately, relatively few humans are as perspicacious, giving, and intellectually honest as the late Dr. Hofmann. If you can find a way to get around these problems, more power to you, Anon.