As early as the 1790s, doctors, scientists and other specialists sought to plumb the expanses of their minds through psychoactive drug use in pursuit of better knowledge of their chosen substances’ effects. On these quests, self-experimentation was long regarded as indispensable and, before the late 19th century, had public and professional support. As the century progressed, the mood changed due to growing concerns regarding the risk of addiction, a preference for ‘objective’ forms of research that overlooked a drug’s benefits, and – consequently – support for outlawing their use. The last 30 years have seen resumed support for self-experimentation in ascertaining the usefulness of psychedelic drugs. Taking the long view, Mike Jay helps us understand the historical complexities behind modern-day drug policy.

Jay’s title comes from the German author Ernst Jünger. In his 1949 novel Heliopolis Jünger coined the term psychonauts to refer to people who used drugs to explore their minds. Collectively, Jay’s subjects experimented with laughing gas, ether, chloroform, hashish, morphine, cocaine, mescaline and LSD. Some of his psychonauts will be familiar: Sigmund Freud, for example, who used cocaine and studied its potential therapeutic value, or Timothy Leary, who experimented with LSD. Jay also includes many less famous but equally influential self-experimenters, sharing their insights, their impacts and the reasons why their approaches fell from favour.

Advocates of self-experimentation insisted that, without trying it themselves, they could not understand a drug’s effects, given how inscrutable second-hand accounts could be. In the 1790s, one such psychonaut wrote of laughing gas that, under its influence, ‘I feel like the sound of a harp’. Many researchers hoped to experience the visions and feelings that the substances inspired, and thereby to determine the drugs’ value in treating ailments. Others saw substances as providing a portal to insights and truths otherwise unattainable or hidden. When the French psychiatrist Jacques-Joseph Moreau tried hashish, for example, he concluded that ‘the inner world of dreams and the waking state of reason’ could ‘coexist and observe one another’. In 1902, the American philosopher William James claimed that our ‘waking consciousness’ was not our only consciousness.

Read the rest of the review at HistoryToday.com.

Elizabeth K. Gray is the author of Habit Forming: Drug Addiction in America, 1776-1914 (Oxford University Press, 2022).

Psychonauts: Drugs and the Making of the Modern Mind by Mike Jay is a wonderful history of drugs in, primarily, western culture and how they played a role in how all of us experience the world.

Like the title makes clear, this is about the "making of the modern mind," so there really shouldn't be a problem about not going deep into the science. That is kinda like criticizing a book about heavy metal for not going deep enough into James Taylor. If you want the science, there are plenty of options available, have a ball. This is not that book, never claimed to be and, frankly, serves a much bigger purpose by not being that book. How we got here is about how people use what science gives us, not the science itself. Both are essential, but unapplied science doesn't cause societal impact.

In light of the reassessment of psychoactive drugs for medical use, the focus here is largely on that area. It is, after all, the substances that caused or assisted with both scientific and artistic advances that became among the most misunderstood and the most criminalized. And no, those writers did not all see God (and a lot of their writing was very successful, but probably over the idiot's head), that is an ignorant comment from someone who prefers to capitalize on the criminalization of drugs rather than any benefits humans can gain. Pity the fool.

Jay certainly highlights both the positives and negatives of early experimentation and use, but also shows how so many of those people did exhibit caution, based on the science available to them then. For every historical figure one can point to who overdid it, there are a handful who, like Freud, exhibited moderation and caution. And, even for those who have no experience with nor desire to try these drugs, their discoveries have played a role in how we view the world.

I would recommend this to readers who would like a history to accompany the current events that will no doubt be reported with bias and sensationalism on both sides. This is not just for those into the "drug culture," but those into contemporary culture as a whole. Take off the blinders!

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley. ( )