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Every psychological experience has a biological correlate: these are two sides of the same coin.
每一种心理体验都与生物学相关：它们就像看待事情的两种角度。
You see the color green, there's something happening in your brain that's coding that experience of the color green.
看到绿色的时候，你的大脑中会有一些东西把绿色这种经历编译出来。
So, with psychedelics, the biggest divide is whether we're talking about on the psychological side or the biological side.
关于迷幻剂，人们之间最大的分歧是它到底是心理层面的还是生理层面的。
Does it work by hitting these brain receptors and then having other effects?
它起作用的原理是击中大脑中的受体，从而产生其他效果吗？
Or does it work because of the experience?
还是说它是因为人们的经历才起效的？
Clearly, there's this very real biological effect.
很明显，它有非常真实的生理效果。
Something dramatic happens to the brain when you put the psychedelic in the system, but then someone has this experience, and when they change their life because of that, that ends up sounding more like they went through a really good course of psychotherapy.
摄入迷幻剂后，你的大脑会发生剧烈的变化，如果某人有过这样的经历，并因此改变了人生，这最终听起来好像他们经历了一场非常好的心理治疗。
So, psychedelics are really interesting at that bridge between the biological and the psychological.
所以，迷幻剂在连接生理和心理方面所起的作用还挺有意思的。
What 'psychedelic' means from its linguistic roots is "mind manifesting."
从语言的根源来讲，“psychedelic”的意思是“意识展现”。
The idea that these are mind manifesting- that's consistent with this other notion that these are non-specific amplifiers.
关于意识展现的说法--与另一种说法不谋而合，即它们是非特异性的增强剂。
In other words, you could have a euphoric experience.
换言之，你可能会体验到极度兴奋。
You could have a hellish experience.
你也可能会体验到地狱般的痛苦。
Also, terminology is so difficult in this area.
而且，这个领域的术语也很难理解。
Psychedelic can be used to refer to what are called the "classic psychedelic compounds": psilocybin, which is in magic mushrooms, LSD, DMT, which is in ayahuasca, mescaline, which is in peyote.
迷幻剂可以指那些“典型的迷幻化合物”：迷幻蘑菇里的裸盖菇素，LSD，死藤水里的DMT，佩奥特酒里的美斯卡灵。
Those are the classic psychedelics.
这些都是典型的迷幻剂。
They affect a particular type of serotonin receptor and that's their primary mechanism of action.
它们会影响一种特殊的羟色胺受体，这就是它们的主要工作机制。
But then you have other drugs that I think it's appropriate to call them psychedelic; other scientists will disagree.
但还有一些我觉得也可以称为迷幻剂的药品；其他科学家对此并不认同。
So for example, MDMA will work by releasing serotonin.
比如，MDMA通过释放血清素起作用。
So, that's a different mechanism.
这是另一种工作机制。
And you have other drugs such as ketamine and PCP.
还有其他药品，比如氯胺酮和五氯酚。
So, that affects the glutamate system in the brain primarily rather than the serotonin system.
它们主要影响的是大脑中的谷氨酸系统，而不是血清素系统。
So, what does psychedelic mean then if it refers to multiple pharmacological classes of drugs that work in different ways?
那么，如果迷幻剂指的是通过不同方式生效的多种药品药理类别的话，那它到底意味着什么呢？
And the answer for me is that these are all drugs that can have a profound effect on one's sense of reality, including one's sense of self.
我觉得它们都是一些能对人的真实感和自我感产生深刻影响的药品。
The huge question that's always thrown out is: 'How do these psychedelics work?'
经常被问到的一个问题是：“这些迷幻剂的工作原理是什么？”
And you can just come at that from so many different angles.
这个问题可以从很多个角度来解释。
Now to go down that biological path, what's happening?
从生物学的角度来看，发生了什么？
There's a lot going on.
发生了很多事情。
For example, psilocybin, which people may know is the active agent in so-called "magic mushrooms."
比如，裸盖菇素，人们可能知道它是所谓的“神奇蘑菇”中的活性物质。
Once it's circulating through your blood, after you've eaten some of it, it actually converts to a related compound called psilocin, which is the thing that's actually hitting the brain receptors.
一旦你摄入一些裸盖菇素，它开始在你的血液中循环，就会转变成一种叫做二甲-4-羟色胺的相关化合物，它会袭击大脑的受体。
And it activates a subtype of serotonin receptor.
而且它会激活血清素受体的一种亚型。
So, we have lots of different types of serotonin receptors in our brain.
我们的大脑中有很多种不同的血清素受体。
One is called the 'serotonin 2A' receptor, and psilocybin and the other classic psychedelics, can latch onto that the same way that our serotonin latches onto these brain receptors.
其中一种叫做‘血清素2A’受体，裸盖菇素和其他迷幻剂能像我们的血清素一样，跟这种受体结合在一起。
So, psilocybin affects serotonin, but then serotonin affects the glutamate system.
所以，裸盖菇素会影响血清素，而血清素又会影响谷氨酸系统。
And then at another level, you have this massive increase in communication, across these different silos in the brain.
然后在另一个层面，通过大脑中不同的筒仓，你的交流会大幅增加。
That is probably an important level of analysis that is underlying at the psychological level: patients who have claims of insight viewing themselves from a radically different perspective, from a different lens, and based on animal research, there also seems like there may be increased 'neuroplasticity' in the system so that in the days following the psychedelic experience, people are more primed to learn new things.
这可能是位于心理层面之下的重要分析：声称有洞察力的患者从完全不同的角度，从不同的方面观察自己，而且根据对动物的研究，身体系统似乎也增加了“神经可塑性”，因此在体验过迷幻剂后的几天里，人们更愿意学习新鲜事物。
There's a greater ability to establish a new and more optimal normal state.
人们更能够建立起一种新的最佳状态。
So, there's seemed to really be something important about 'the nature of the experience' that people have during these sessions.
所以，人们在这些过程中所拥有的“体验本质”似乎真的很重要。
It's not just about hitting a certain type of serotonin receptor in the brain.
它不仅仅是袭击大脑中的某种血清素受体。
There's something about the psychology of the experience that unfolds during that session that tends to be important- which is in some sense what makes the psilocybin treatments, a bit more like psychotherapy than traditional psychiatric medications where you just take the pill and you forget it.
在这个过程中，有些心理上的体验是很重要的，这在某种意义上让裸盖菇素的治疗更像心理治疗，而不像传统的精神药物那样，你只要吃了药就能忘记。
There's some interacting reasons why the psychedelic renaissance is happening now.
迷幻剂之所以能在现在卷土重来，是有一些相互作用的原因。
Our society has been in a mental health crisis, and it's been stagnating.
我们的社会上存在精神健康危机，而且它停滞不前。
Pharmaceutical companies don't make the investments in new mental healthcare treatments, like they did decades ago.
制药公司也不像几十年前那样去投资新的精神健康治疗措施。
I mean, the best medical treatments that we have for many addictions, are substitution treatments, also known as 'agonist treatments.'
针对许多药物上瘾，最佳治疗方法是替代治疗，也叫作‘受体激动剂治疗’。
And I think these are good, but when you don't see success, I would say it's probably 'cause they fail to get to the roots of these mental disorders, including addiction.
这些方法很好，但如果没有疗效，我觉得可能是因为它没能解决这些精神疾病的根源，包括上瘾。
That's why I think psychedelics have been so successful.
我觉得那就是迷幻剂能取得成功的原因。
Nothing is gonna be a miracle cure for everyone- nonetheless, they have so much promise, and we have to have that balance.
任何东西都无法治愈所有人，但它们前途光明，而我们必须要把握好其中的平衡。
I think that's more possible today.
如今，我们更有可能做到这一点。
