Ben Sessa - Shaping the renaissance of psychedelic research

MDMA Molecule (ecstasy)

This commentary by Ben Sessa was published in The Lancet, one of the most widely read medical journals in the world. It's a hopeful message for those of us who believe in the medical and psychotherapeutic benefits of psychedelics and entheogens.

This link was published in the MAPS Newsletter.

Shaping the renaissance of psychedelic research 

Psychedelic drugs have a rich and vibrant history as clinical aids for psychiatry. For two decades after the discovery of lysergide (LSD) in the 1940s, psychedelics were extensively studied and clinical progress was good.(1) But research collapsed rapidly in 1966 when LSD was made illegal, and there was a subsequent hiatus of psychedelic research. After 40 years, this pause is now coming to an end, with many new studies and a refreshing approach to the research of psychedelic drugs.(2)

Since the late 1980s, several new organisations have emerged: the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), the Heffter Research Institute, and the Beckley Foundation are all revisiting psychedelic research, undertaking preclinical studies with LSD, psilocybin, ayahuasca, ibogaine, and methylenedioxymetamfetamine (MDMA). Several phase 2 clinical studies have been published and more are underway, with an emphasis on anxiety disorders and addictions. By undertaking methodologically sound studies, contemporary researchers are describing how psychedelics—when carefully managed in a super vised clinical environment—can safely harness the transformative power of the peak experience to improve the engagement and depth of psychotherapy. With information from functional neuroimaging and reassessment of the harm and safety profiles of psychedelic drugs,(3) there is a strong commitment to get research into psychedelics right this time around, by undertaking meticulously planned randomised, controlled, double-blind studies, in contrast to the anecdotal studies of the 1960s. A noticeable shift in attitudes from the mainstream medical community has seen increasing publications in high impact journals in recent years and a major UK conference in 2011, Breaking Convention.

The active component in so-called magic mushrooms, psilocybin, has been investigated for the treatment of the anxiety, pain, and existential crises associated with end-stage cancer(4) and also as a potential new treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder.(5) Ketamine has been studied as a treatment for alcohol and opiate addictions(6) and for management of depression.(7) Psychedelic research can also teach us about the nature of consciousness. In a study at Johns Hopkins University (Baltimore, MD, USA), psilocybin was used to explore how an induced peak experience can improve negative personality traits,(8) and at Imperial College London (London, UK), functional MRI was used to show how psilocybin can improve psychotherapy by allowing for an increased recall of repressed emotional memories.(9)

Further work investigating psilocybin as a potential new treatment for nicotine addiction and depression is underway, and the psychedelic drug ibogaine is increasingly being applied in the treatment of opiate, alcohol, and methamphetamine addictions. Additionally, LSD and psilocybin are being explored as treatments for unremitting cluster headaches(10) and for anxiety (Gasser P, Private Practice, Solothurn, Switzerland, personal communication).

However, perhaps the area where psychedelics show the greatest promise is in enhancement of trauma-focused psychotherapy; in particular MDMA, which can reduce the overwhelming fear response to memories of trauma and improves engagement with therapy.(11) In 2010 came the first published randomised controlled trial of MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for treatment-resistant post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD),(12) which has now been replicated. Given the growing clinical burden of post-combat PTSD, a viable and innovative approach is sought. Together with Jon Bisson (Cardiff University, Cardiff , UK) and David Nutt (Imperial College London, UK), I am currently seeking funding for a controlled study to investigate MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for treatment-resistant PTSD, for which we will then seek ethical approval. We propose a design with 20 randomised patients who will receive a standard 16-week course of cognitive-behavioural therapy versus 20 patients who will receive a 16-week course of therapy in which three sessions are MDMA assisted, with the other nondrug sessions used to integrate their drug experiences. Patients will be monitored by functional MRI scans before and after treatment to assess neurophysiological changes associated with MDMA therapy. Our study puts an emphasis on delivering this treatment at a standard National Health Service (NHS) clinic so that the immediate clinical relevance can be realised.

Doctors in the specialty of psychiatry recognise that research with psychedelic compounds is controversial. These drugs are powerful substances and have a negative image in society. Certain patient groups are appropriately contraindicated from using them clinically, such as people with a personal or family history of psychosis. These drugs do have capacity to cause harm, and many such examples of misuse have occurred when they are used recreationally.(13) However, if careful attention is paid to the mindset of the users and the clinical setting in which psychedelics are prescribed, such harms can be minimised to adequately satisfy a risk:benefit analysis.

We must learn from both the successes and mistakes of the 1960s. We have gained some useful information from those early studies, and disregarding entirely the unique transpersonal approach of psychedelic therapy is not the answer. But new treatments must be framed in a modern context, be relevant to today’s therapeutic culture, and must avoid the pitfalls of the past by separating the therapeutic uses of these drugs from their historical recreational misuse. We need focused, practical, and deliverable clinical advances. If we can achieve this, we may find these fascinating substances have a fresh role in modern psychiatry.

Ben Sessa
CAMHS Team, Foundation House, Wellsprings Road,
Taunton TA2 7PQ, UK
bensessa@gmail.com

I declare that I have no conflicts of interest.

1 Malleson N. Acute adverse reactions to LSD in clinical and experimental use in the United Kingdom. Br J Psychiatry 1971; 118: 229–30.
2 Sessa B. Can psychedelics have a role in psychiatry again? Br J Psychiatry 2005; 186: 457–58. 

3 Nutt DJ, King LA, Saulsbury W, Blakemore C. Development of a rational scale to assess the harm of drugs of potential misuse. Lancet 2007; 369: 1047–53.
4 Grob CS, Danforth AL, Chopra GS, et al. Pilot study of psilocybin treatment for anxiety in patients with advanced-stage cancer. Arch Gen Psychiatry 2011; 68: 71–78.
5 Moreno FA, Wiegand CB, Taitano EK, Delgado PL. Safety, tolerability, and efficacy of psilocybin in 9 patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder. J Clin Psychiatry 2006; 67: 1735–40.
6 Krupitsky EM, Burakov AM, Dunaevsky IV, Romanova TN, Slavina TY, Grinenko AY. Single versus repeated sessions of ketamine-assisted psychotherapy for people with heroin dependence. J Psychoactive Drugs 2007; 39: 13–19.
7 Zarate CA, Singh JB, Carlson PJ, et al. A randomized trial of an N-methyl-D-aspartate antagonist in treatment-resistant major depression. Arch Gen Psychiatry 2006; 63: 856–64.
8 Griffi ths RR, Richards WA, McCann U, Jesse R. Psilocybin can occasion mystical experiences having substantial and sustained personal meaning and spiritual significance. Psychopharmacology (Berl) 2006; 187: 268–83.
9 Carhart-Harris R, Leech R, Williams TM, et al. Implications for psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy: functional magnetic resonance imaging study with psilocybin. Br J Psychiatry 2012; 200: 238–44.
10 Sewell RA, Halpern JH, Pope HG Jr. Response of cluster headache to psilocybin and LSD. Neurology 2006; 66: 1920–22.
11 Sessa B. Could MDMA be useful in the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder? Prog Neurol Psychiatry 2011; 6: 4–7.
12 Mithoefer MC, Wagner MT, Mithoefer AT, Jerome L, Doblin R. The safety and efficacy of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine-assisted psychotherapy in subjects with chronic, treatment-resistant posttraumatic stress disorder: the first randomized controlled pilot study. J Psychopharmacol 2010; 25: 439–52.
13 Wade D, Harrigan S, Edwards J, Burgess PM, Whelan G, McGorry PD. Substance misuse in first-episode psychosis: 15-month prospective follow-up study. Br J Psychiatry 2006; 189: 229–34.

Additional Information:

• For Breaking Convention see http://breakingconvention.co.uk
  
• For the MAPS see http://www.maps.org
  
• For the Heffter Research Institute see http://www.heffter.org
  
• For the Beckley Foundation see http://www.beckleyfoundation.org

Arthur Dobrin - 13 Ways of Looking at Compassion

From his Psychology Today blog, Am I Right? How to live ethically, Arthur Dobrin riffs on some ways we can look at compassion, coming up with 13 (my favorite number).

13 Ways of Looking at Compassion

Humanity is realized in compassion and justice.

Published on August 13, 2012 by Arthur Dobrin, D.S.W. in Am I Right?

1. You are part of society.
Therefore, happiness is created through compassionate living.

2. Compassion is part of human nature.
Cultivate the compassionate part of yourself and connect to others.

3. Reason is part of human nature.
Cultivate the reasonable part of yourself so you make sound decisions.

4. Compassion is part of human nature. Reason is part of human nature.
Therefore, make no separation between heart and mind. Emotion and reason, feeling and thought — all that is human.

5. Compassion and thoughtfulness lead to good deeds.

6. You realize your humanity in compassion and justice.

7. A corrupt heart rattles with greed.

8. You may reside in another's heart even at a distance.
The greater reward is hearts in close contact.

9. If your heart is acquisitive, you will lead a life of disappointment.
If your heart is generous, your life will be satisfied.

10. Listen with an open mind. 
Listen with an open heart. Let the other in. This is the way of respect.

11. A closed fist can't offer a helping hand. 
A closed heart can't find fellow-feeling.

12. You cannot know peace if your heart if full of bitterness.

13. A fearful heart cannot feel compassion.

From Mean Land, an excellent article on the scam that is academic publishing. Where else can you make people (or institutions) pay to get their articles published and then make those same institutions pay incredible sums to have that journal in their library, and then make individuals like me pay between $10 and $50 dollars for access to the article (which is generally time limited, so I am not buying it so much as renting it)?

Open access fixes the problem, although now journals offer an open access option that costs the authors even more money then to get their article published - something needs to change. 

Academics are Revolting: The open access frontier

Posted at Friday 08 Jun
by Catherine Moffat.

Here’s the deal. You work hard to produce something, then sell it for a pittance. Perhaps you even give it away. The buyer ‘adds value’ and sells it back to you at an enormous profit. It’s standard sweatshop practice.

It can also be, in some cases, standard publishing practice. Authors and creators, keen to add the ‘value’ and prestige of a publisher to their work, or just excited that someone – anyone, is interested in publishing them, often give their work away with little thought of remuneration or what’s happening to their copyright.

Of course, publishers rightly argue they have the costs of editing, producing, advertising and distribution, not to mention the financial risks. It’s about adding value.

The rush to publish in ‘quality’ journals at any cost is particularly true of academic publishing. Academics are driven by a ‘publish or perish’ mandate where promotion and tenure is largely reliant on publishing and citation counts in accredited peer reviewed publications. Check out what’s happening at Sydney University (and coming soon to a university near you) where a retrospective performance marker of four research publications in the last three years is being used as one criteria to cull the ‘non performing’.

Of course, academics, unlike your average author, generally have the benefit of an income that is independent of their publications. As Louise Adler pointed out in The Australian last year, authors and creators not publishing in academia are probably in more actual danger of perishing, given, ‘the average annual income of Australian writers has declined in the past decade from $23,000 to a character-building $11,000.’
But while non-academic authors might be teetering on the breadline, operating outside of academic publishing models does provide the opportunity (and probably a more immediate incentive) to experiment with new modes of production.

In a recent appearance at the Sydney Writer’s Festival on a panel discussing the implications of the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), Jeff Jarvis stressed the need for authors to develop new business models. While this may be good advice, many authors, and academic authors in particular, risk becoming trapped in their existing arrangements, relying on proving their publication record in traditional formats.

But as the cost of academic journals rise, many are asking who benefits most from the current model? Philip Soos in a piece on the Conversation, ‘The Great Publishing Swindle’, argues that what was intended as a public good has become a publishing monopoly.

Danny Kingsley, also writing on The Conversation about the US Research Works Act – A Small Bill in the US, a Giant Impact for Research Worldwide breaks it down like this:

‘Publicly funded research being undertaken by researchers who are often themselves (in Australia almost exclusively) also publicly funded, is written up and submitted to a publisher. The publisher sends it back out to the academic community to peer review the work, for no charge. Many of the editors of journals are also academics who again are doing the work gratis. The publisher then adds the journal design to the article and publishes it, charging disproportionally large subscription fees for access to the work. These fees are paid by university libraries, again, with public funding.’

And they are big fees. Each year university libraries pay millions of dollar to give scholars the right to access material that in the main has been provided by the same scholars, free of charge. Prices continue to increase while University budgets diminish and as Adam Habib outlines, developing countries are priced out of the market.

While authors are using the internet to experiment with new ways to reach their audience, many academics are also revolting and choosing open access publishing models that offer the same peer reviewed guarantee while allowing anyone who wants, access to their work.

Take a look at this open-access.net clip for a really simple overview:


Most users of the web, including authors and creators, aren’t interested in all this closed/open access and copyright stuff. Authors put their work on the internet and users take it for free if they can. Many people don’t realise that the internet is governed by the same copyright laws that exist in physical space. Others don’t care. But if you’ve been yawning behind your hand, consider this: One of the really interesting things about all the new google/facebook and other whizz gadgetry that allows your every move to be traced, is the potential to make it really easy to track the use of copyright material.

Unless you’re Kim.Dotcom making an estimated $175 million from alleged illegal filesharing, it’s unlikely you’ll find the FBI on your doorstep any time soon. I can’t help thinking, however, that we’ve been living in the digital equivalent of a frontier town, and sooner or later, for good or ill, the lawmen ride in and the frontier gets tamed.

Big Copyright has been slow to mobilize and grasp the monetary potential of the web, but it’s starting to lumber to its feet, and when it gets there you can be sure the 99% are going to be left hanging. PIPA and SOPA, the Research Works Act, extensions to copyright embedded in free trade agreements and similar actions are indications that the giant is awake now.

Copyright is like superannuation and interest rates – something no one pays attention to until they have to. But it’s important for authors and creators to think about how they want others to access their work. If you want others to access your work freely, make it clear. If you want them to pay, make it easy for them to do so. Read the contracts you sign. Because the reality is, if you don’t think about what’s happening to your copyright, someone else will.

K.C. Cole - Ancient Brains, Modern Dilemmas

This is an op-ed column from K.C. Cole in the L.A. Times. Cole is riffing a bit here on Daniel Kahneman's fast brain/slow brain distinction (Thinking, Fast and Slow), wherein the fast brain is mostly unconscious to us and acts (sometimes) before we are even aware of it.

Her view is pretty bleak, but she is not without hope. We can learn to override the fast brain, but it requires a lot more mindfulness than most of us are willing to invest.

Ancient brains, modern dilemmas

The human species is uniquely equipped to shoot itself in the foot.

"Most of what we do (or think) is based on 'thinking' that takes no time (or thought) at all," writes K.C. Cole. (Daniel Zender / For The Times / August 10, 2012)

By K.C. Cole

August 12, 2012

August is a great month for celebrating human stupidity.

On Aug. 6, 1945, we all but disappeared Hiroshima with a single atomic bomb, and then did it again, three days later, at Nagasaki. And now we barely seem to care.

The sad truth is, we are incapable of understanding exactly what these seemingly ancient events mean — right now, for all of us, today. The August anniversaries are a stark reminder that the brains we inherited from our ancestors simply may not be up to dealing with much of the modern world we've (they've) created — especially the most dangerous parts.

Few people today know firsthand what an atomic bomb can do to human beings. One American airman riding in the plane that dropped the Hiroshima bomb described what he saw as "a pot of boiling black oil." In an instant, people were reduced to charred cinders; survivors hobbled around with their skin hanging from their bodies like rags.

The carnage created widespread hope that such terrible weapons might mean no more war. We know how well that worked.

Today, the world has thousands of nuclear bomb-bearing missiles on "hair-trigger alert." They are thousands of times more destructive than the 1945 models, which were a thousand times more destructive than conventional weapons.

So why have humans done so little to neutralize the threat? To even recognize that these are tools of our own destruction?

For one thing, our brains don't really "grok" factors of a thousand. Imagine throwing a dinner party for four, and suddenly 4,000 show up; or your salary of $100,000 getting reduced to $100. The difference between a million, a billion and a trillion are also factors of a thousand, which is why we don't do so well comparing domestic budgets, say, with military ones, or the wealth of the truly wealthy with the poverty of the extremely poor.

A little number sense, and also stories that convey the information in ways our brains can perceive it, could go a long way toward helping us be less stupid. But that's merely a start.

The brain has other problems with the modern world. Take speed. Research pioneered at the lab of USC neuroscientist Antonio Damasio revealed that it can take up to six seconds for the brain to process complex emotions such as empathy or admiration. That can be a long time in today's multitasking multiverse. What do we miss?

In fact, most of what we do (or think) is based on "thinking" that takes no time (or thought) at all.

In effect, we have at least two brains working together, more or less. The ancient "reptilian" brain is fast, bossy, sure of itself and never shuts up. The modern brain, primarily the cortex, is reflective, slow, conflicted and often defers to its elder. In the time it takes the reflective brain to give you a long-winded lecture on the perils of sweet greasy food, the reptile has you on your second jelly doughnut.

The ancient brain is what gets us through life on a daily basis. It can act in a flash to scoot you out of harm's way, tell friend from foe, get food, find a mate, win a fight. But it was a lot better suited to a time when humans had to wolf down every scrap of sugar and fat they could find to survive — and fought each other with sticks and stones.

These interacting brains have created some curious strategies for getting along. Consider "confirmation bias," now known to be behind some of the dumbest human decisions ever.

A simple example: Your reptilian brain gets you to flirt with that sexy lout, even though the rational brain knows better; rather than admit your mistake, you cherry-pick reasons to justify your acts and ignore all contradictory evidence. He did take you to that nice restaurant — even though he was two hours late, and "forgot" his wallet.

If we believe something is true (or simply trust the person who's saying it), we believe any argument that "supports" it, even when that argument is obviously false.

Don't get me wrong: Our brains are multilayered marvels. They landed an SUV-sized spacecraft on Mars with the grace of a ballerina; they gave us quantum mechanics (and with it, all of our electronic gadgets), relativity (thank it for your GPS); they gave us birth control, democracy, "The Daily Show," Bach, agriculture, baseball, banks.

The problem is that we let the brain get ahead of itself. We build weapons we can't or won't control, for example, and trade stocks faster than our neurons can fire. We generally allow the lizard brain too much say over complex issues only the cortex can really handle: the death penalty, intolerance, war, climate change

In short, the human species is uniquely equipped to shoot itself in the foot (and much worse). I mean, even dogs don't poop in their beds, and yet we foul the air we breathe and fiddle while the Corn Belt burns. We drive and chatter on the phone, even though we know it's more dangerous than drinking and driving. Our gluttony makes too many of us too fat to serve in the military. And how smart is it to stop vaccinating children or fluoridating water, proven lifesavers?

Is there hope? You bet. Our modern brains can teach the older brain new tricks. We've learned to wash hands before surgery, click seat belts, even stop smoking. None came naturally.

But before we can figure out how to change (a slow brain function), we have to stop letting the fast brain do dumb things. Now.

The best way to put on the brakes may well be to enlist the old brain's prime assets: emotion and speed. Luckily, the modern brain has given us some tools: Twitter. Instagram. YouTube. All work fast, and with feeling.

Of course, these tools are also (perhaps primarily) known for spreading hostility, lies and, well, stupidity. But they can also turn a train station of strangers into performance art, touching the common humanity in everyone. Some would say they brought down Arab dictators.

For real, long-term solutions, we could learn from the Mars rover Curiosity. All the momentum that was put into the spacecraft at launch had to be dissipated in a complex choreography of steps before it could safely touch down. That's also true of unraveling the idiocy in the elaborate and too often dangerous military, corporate, civic and personal structures we've erected. That will take time, and thought.

But August would certainly be a great time to start trying to tweet ourselves back to sanity.

K.C. Cole's biography of Frank Oppenheimer, who founded the Exploratorium in San Francisco to promote human awareness, is now available in paperback and ebook. She is a professor of journalism at USC.

This is interesting in a sad kind of way - this "church" embodies the shadow side of religion in a more obvious form than any we have seen in our lifetimes. It seems that these people are damaged in some fundamental way that is beyond my comprehension.

Brainwashed by the Westboro Baptist Church

VICE followed the story of the Westboro Baptist Church as families split and children were brainwashed into picketing funerals and bashing homosexuals.

During that time, VICE interviewed more than a dozen members of the reviled group, including some of the only members not related by blood, the Drains.

They welcomed the filmmakers into their homes and gave them access to 17 years of home video footage. In return, they produced an unbiased look into the lives of one of America’s most despised organizations.

ALSO SEE: The Most Hated Family in America and America’s Most Hated Family In Crisis.

Watch the full documentary now (playlist – 40 minutes)

Interesting interview from NPR's The Diane Rehm Show - Diane visits with Dan Ariely about his new book, The (Honest) Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie To Everyone - Especially Ourselves.

Dan Ariely: "The (Honest) Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie To Everyone - Especially Ourselves"

• Listen
• Transcript
• Order a CD

Monday, August 13, 2012 

Bernard L. Madoff, the accused mastermind of a $50 billion Ponzi scheme, leaves Federal Court in New York, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2009.

Dan Ariely: The (Honest) Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie To Everyone - Especially Ourselves

A best-selling author and expert on irrationality investigates why we cheat and lie, and identifies what keeps us honest.

Most of us think of ourselves as honest, but psychology professor Dan Ariely says in fact, we all lie and cheat. In a new book, he challenges preconceptions about dishonesty, from seemingly small white lies to avoid hurting someone’s feelings to massive financial fraud like Bernie Madoff’s ponzi scheme. He explores how unethical behavior in the personal, professional and political worlds affects all of us. He joins Diane to explain how dishonesty can be a slippery slope, what keeps us honest and how to achieve higher ethics in our everyday lives.

Guests 

Dan Ariely

professor of psychology and behavioral economics at Duke University, founder and director of the Center for Advanced Hindsight and author of "Predictably Irrational" and "The Upside of Irrationality."

Related Links

Dan Ariely Website

Excerpt: "The Honest Truth About Dishonesty: How We Lie to Everyone---Especially Ourselves"

Authors@Google - Jonathan Haidt: The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion

The more I read of Haidt's work (and not listen to him talk about his work, wherein he sounds more open-minded and less partisan), the less I think he has anything of any value to offer. Whatever he professes, he is a conservative with a definite bias.

Haidt proposes,  in The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion, that there are just six “moral foundations” - care, fairness, liberty, loyalty, authority, and sanctity, and their multivariate manifestations generate the spectrum of moral behaviors in which humans seem to engage. According to Haidt, liberals are good at care and fairness, but conservatives are good at liberty, loyalty, authority, and sanctity, and they aren't to bad at care at fairness either.

He marshals the evidence to support his claims, but it feels like cherry-picking only the data that support his bias. There are equally strong data arguing opposite perspectives. In essence, I don't trust him.

That's my bias.


Authors@Google - Jonathan Haidt

In his new book, "The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion", Jonathan Haidt explores the origins of morality and its basis in politics and religion. In this talk, given during his visit to the Google headquarters in Mountain View, CA, Jonathan provides an introduction to the core themes of the book, particularly as they apply to the "hive-like" mode of operation of Google, Zappos, and many other successful organizations. He investigates the question of why some successful organizations operate like wolf packs, others like beehives. And he links several theories from the natural sciences, religion, and philosophy to try to explain how and why humans can be far more "groupish" than "selfish".

Jonathan Haidt is a professor of psychology at the University of Virginia and a visiting professor of business ethics at New York University's Stern School of Business. He is the author of "The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom.

Bookforum Omnivore: Psychology and Its Discontents

From August 9th, this collection of articles was featured in Bookforum's Omnivore blog. There are some good pieces, especially the Allen Frances article on the pathologizing of human emotions.

Psychology and its discontents

Aug 9 2012
11:00AM

• A new issue of The New School Psychology Bulletin is out.
• The paradox of popular psychology: Samuel McNerney on the irrationality of irrationality. 
• From Arena, John Cash on obedience to authority and its discontents. 
• Psychology and its discontents: We see an area in the brain “light up” when we think about a topic, and assume we know something about thought — but what, exactly? 
• Decisions, decisions: Why humans can’t seem to make the “right” choices. 
• Are people probabilistically challenged? Alex Stein reviews Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow. 
• Are we systematically biases against changing the status quo? Nick Bostrom discusses this tendency and its implications when it comes to making decisions about cognitive enhancement. 
• Is crazy the new normal? We are at risk of turning everyday struggles into illnesses, according to prominent U.S. psychiatrist, Allen Frances. 
• George Miller, who wrote the almost-magical essay “The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two”, dies.

Chris D. Frith - Consciousness Is for Sharing: A Commentary on Graziano and Kastner - Human consciousness and its relationship to social neuroscience: A novel hypothesis

Michael S. A. Graziano and Sabine Kastner, both of Princeton University, published an interesting paper last year, Human consciousness and its relationship to social neuroscience: A novel hypothesis. They propose an understanding of consciousness as a construct of social perception processes. Their model suggests that the specialized neuronal circuits (they use the term "machinery" a lot) that allow human beings to be socially intelligent are also responsible for constructing models of other people’s minds (theory of mind), which allows us to predict the behavior of others. 

Here is the part that really interests me:

In the present hypothesis, awareness is a perceptual reconstruction of attentional state; and the machinery that computes information about other people’s awareness is the same machinery that computes information about our own awareness.

I'm not sure I agree with this last sentence, but the idea of awareness being constructed from attention is essential to where my own thinking is headed.

Here is the full abstract:

A common modern view of consciousness is that it is an emergent property of the brain, perhaps caused by neuronal complexity, and perhaps with no adaptive value. Exactly what emerges, how it emerges, and from what specific neuronal process, are in debate. One possible explanation of consciousness, proposed here, is that it is a construct of the social perceptual machinery. Humans have specialized neuronal machinery that allows them to be socially intelligent. The primary role of this machinery is to construct models of other people’s minds thereby gaining some ability to predict the behavior of other individuals. In the present hypothesis, awareness is a perceptual reconstruction of attentional state; and the machinery that computes information about other people’s awareness is the same machinery that computes information about our own awareness. The present paper brings together a variety of lines of evidence, including experiments on the neural basis of social perception, on hemispatial neglect, on the out-of-body experience, on mirror neurons, and on the mechanisms of decision-making, to explore the possibility that awareness is a construct of the social machinery in the brain.

The PDF linked to above contains the full paper and a series of commentaries, followed at the end by a response from the paper's authors to the commentaries. One of the commentaries that I quite liked came from Chris Frith, which is included below. Other commentaries include Christof Koch, Marco Iacoboni, Peter Carruthers and Vincent Picciuto, and David A. Leopold.

Full Citation:

Graziano, M.S.A., and Kastner, S. (2011). Human consciousness and its relationship to social
neuroscience: A novel hypothesis. Cognitive Neuroscience, 2 (2), 98–133 (Includes Discussion Paper, Commentaries, and Reply). DOI: 10.1080/17588928.2011.585230

Commentary Citation:

Frith, C.D. (2011): Consciousness is for sharing. Cognitive Neuroscience, 2:2, 117-118. DOI: 10.1080/17588928.2011.585230

Consciousness is for sharing

Chris D. Frith: Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging at University College London, UK, & Center of Functionally Integrative Neuroscience at Aarhus, University, Denmark
E-mail: c.frith@ucl.ac.uk

Abstract: I welcome the idea that consciousness, rather than being private, has a crucial role in understanding other minds. However, I believe that the critical mechanism underlying consciousness is metacognition; the ability to reflect upon and report mental states, whether our own or those of others. This allows us to share experiences and create a more accurate picture of the world.

Graziano & Kastner put forward an ingenious proposal about the origin of consciousness. This will be counter-intuitive for some, since, rather than being a private place for the self, consciousness emerges from the neural mechanism that permits tracking the attentional focus of others. The same mechanism is also used to represent our own attention. G & K suggest that consciousness emerges from this ability to represent our own attention. In this scheme consciousness is the meta-cognitive representation of our own awareness.
 

I must immediately declare a strong bias in favor of these ideas. Like G & K I believe that, if we want to understand consciousness we need to ask what it is for and, like them, my answer is that its fundamental function is social (Frith, 2008). I also like very much their novel and innovative idea that the machinery for representing of the focus of attention is applied to others as well as to ourselves. A major clue to where others are focussing their attention comes from eye gaze direction and humans are very accurate at judging where people are looking. The human iris, uniquely among primates (Kobayashi& Kohshima, 1997), is surrounded by white sclera making it easier to discern eye gaze direction. Thus, the evolution of this aspect of the human eye was not directly for the benefit of the individual, but for the benefit of others. This is confirmatory evidence for G & K’s suggestions about the social function of representations of the focus of attention.

However, I am unconvinced about the link with consciousness. People compute the direction of attention of others, where they are looking and what they see, automatically (Bayliss & Tipper, 2006; Qureshi, Apperly, & Samson, 2010). I conclude that we can take account of the attention of others without awareness. Also I don’t see why G & K’s account necessitates a subjective component. What does the feeling of being aware add to our ability to compute what people are attending to? The problem is to explain the function of this subjective component.

I believe we have all been misled by the longstanding idea that consciousness is private. On the contrary, conscious experience is the one outcome of our brain’s information processing that can be shared with others. It is this sharing that provides the value of consciousness. By sharing their experiences, two people can gain a more accurate perception than the best person working on her own (Bahrami et al., 2010). 

On this account the key component of consciousness is meta-cognition. I agree with G & K that a representation of our awareness, creating a feeling of being aware, is fundamentally important. But this meta-cognitive process can be applied to many things in addition to attention, including, for example, the feeling of agency. What we need to uncover is the neural mechanisms underlying meta-cognition. There is currently increasing interest in meta-cognition with developments in its empirical study (Lau, 2008) and quantification (Galvin, Podd, Drga, & Whitmore, 2003). Although, as yet, we know little of relevant neural mechanisms, the prefrontal cortex is strongly implicated (Del Cul, Dehaene, Reyes, Bravo, & Slachevsky, 2009; Fleming, Weil, Nagy, Dolan, & Rees, 2010).

But this critique of G &K concerns just minor details. I am very pleased to join them in promoting the idea that consciousness is not a private place. It has a major role in enabling the richness of human of social interactions.

Dylan Evans - Risk Intelligence: How to live with uncertainty

Dylan Evens is an expert in "risk intelligence," a kind of intelligence that is not correlated with IQ and is often difficult to identify because those who possess it are working in fields as diverse as weather-forecasting, professional poker players, and hedge-fund managers. According to Evans, "Many people in positions which require high risk intelligence - doctors, financial regulators and bankers - seem unable to navigate doubt and uncertainty."

Evans (along with Benjamin Jakobus) is the founder of Projection Point, a team of consultants based in the US, Europe, and Australia "who help a wide variety of organizations to manage and sustain risk intelligence." He is the author of Risk Intelligence: How to Live with Uncertainty.

Risk Intelligence: How to live with uncertainty

5th Jul 2012

Listen to the audio

(full recording including audience Q&A) - Please right-click link and choose "Save Link As..." to download audio file onto your computer.

Watch the video (edited highlights)

RSA Thursday

In an age of global uncertainty it has become increasingly difficult to work out what exactly should be done next.

There is a special kind of intelligence for dealing with risk and uncertainty. It doesn't correlate with IQ and most psychologists fail to spot it because it is found in such a disparate, rag-tag group of people such as weather-forecasters, professional gamblers and hedge-fund managers. Many people in positions which require high risk intelligence - doctors, financial regulators and bankers - seem unable to navigate doubt and uncertainty.

Risk intelligence expert Dylan Evans visits the RSA to provide a traveller's guide to the twilight zone of probabilities and speculation, arguing that we can all learn a lot from expert gamblers, not just about money,  but in areas as diverse as dealing with climate change to combating terrorism.

Speaker: Dylan Evans, founder, Projection Point, a global leader in risk intelligence solutions.

Chair: Julian Thompson, director of enterprise, RSA.

See what people said on Twitter: #RSArisk

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Joseph LeDoux -The Perplexing Relationship Between Emotions and Consciousness

This is Joseph LeDoux's talk at the Evolution and Function of Consciousness Conference ("Turing Consciousness 2012") held at the University of Montreal as part of Alan Turing Year. LeDoux is author of The Emotional Brain: The Mysterious Underpinnings of Emotional Life (1998) and Synaptic Self: How Our Brains Become Who We Are (2001).

Joseph Ledoux - The Perplexing Relationship Between Emotions and Consciousness

Abstract: I propose a re-conceptualization of key phenomena important in the study of emotions - those phenomena that reflect functions and circuits related to survival, and that are shared by humans and other animals. The approach shifts the focus from questions about whether emotions that humans consciously feel are also present in other animals, and toward questions about the extent to which circuits and corresponding functions that are present in other animals (survival circuits and functions) are also present in humans. Survival circuit functions are not causally related to emotional feelings but obviously contribute to these, at least indirectly. The survival circuit concept integrates ideas about emotion, motivation, reinforcement, and arousal in the effort to understand how organisms survive and thrive by detecting and responding to challenges and opportunities in daily life.

LeDoux J. (2012). Rethinking the emotional brain. Neuron; 73(4): 653-76. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22365542 (PDF is here)

One of the experiential aspects of post-traumatic stress for those who have Complex PTSD (often associated with repeated childhood or adult sexual trauma) is the experience of depersonalization (feeling that one’s body is unfamiliar or strange) and/or derealization (feeling that one’s surroundings are unreal or unfamiliar), both of which are types of dissociation.

A third experience, known as structural dissociation, is the experience of different "selves" taking over the personality. This can range from the experience of one's wounded "inner child" acting out all the way to distinct personalities with names and characterological differences (dissociative identity disorder). Often the experience is somewhere in the middle - the primary self experiences lost time, "absent mindedness," and may told s/he acts like different people sometimes. This is usually the experience of different "stuck" parts of the self taking over, but it can also be specific subpersonalities or parts [mangers] whose job it is to manage stress and anxiety.

This recent study form the Archives of General Psychiatry identified a subgroup of highly dissociative survivors (about 12% of individuals with a current diagnosis of PTSD), as well as a low-severity group and high-severity group. 

The [dissociative] group was characterized by severe PTSD symptoms combined with marked elevations on items assessing flashbacks, derealization, and depersonalization. Individuals in this subgroup also endorsed greater exposure to childhood and adult sexual trauma compared with the other 2 groups, suggesting a possible etiologic link with the experience of repeated sexual trauma.

The researchers suggest that this finding may be sufficient for a dissociative PTSD subtype in the DSM-5, but that is hardly what is needed, in my opinion.

Rather, in my opinion we need:

(1) A developmental trauma criteria, since the experience of trauma during development creates whole different kind of wounding than later trauma [which may also be seen in those who develop structural dissociation];

(2) A Complex PTSD criteria for those who experience repeated and/or on-going trauma, which, again, creates a different collection of symptoms when the wounding manifests in the personality; and

(3) A single-episode PTSD criteria for those who experience a unique traumatic event (natural disaster, terrorist attack, etc.) and experience some of the various symptoms of PTSD, such as hyper-vigilance, hyperarousal, acute anxiety, depression, and nightmares/flashbacks. This final category is unlikely to experience the dissociation with which survivors in the first two categories generally have to deal.

In fact, in my opinion, nearly all "mental illness" is the result of physical, emotional, and/or psychological trauma - i.e., it's all relational (aside from the very few organic issues). This should be the basis for our "diagnostic manual."

But for now, at least psychiatrists believe dissociation is real (for a while, the majority opinion was that patients were only seeking secondary gain).

New ‘Unreal’ Subtype of PTSD Proposed

By Rick Nauert PhD Senior News Editor
Reviewed by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on July 4, 2012 

 

A provocative new study suggests that dissociation is associated with one form of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Dissociation typically reflects problems in consciousness and awareness. Understanding that the course of PTSD may take alternative paths is an important discovery for treatment of the disorder.

Researchers discovered dissociation is often associated with unique PTSD symptoms of derealization, the feeling that one’s surroundings are unreal or unfamiliar, and depersonalization, or the feeling that one’s body is unfamiliar or strange.

Researchers studied PTSD and dissociative symptoms in 492 veterans and their intimate partners, all of whom had histories of trauma.

Participants reported exposure to a variety of traumatic events including combat, childhood physical and sexual abuse, partner abuse, motor vehicle accidents and natural disasters with most participants reporting exposure to multiple types of traumatic events.

Clinicians interviewed participants with the Clinician Administered PTSD Scale (CAPS), a diagnostic instrument that measures the frequency and severity of PTSD and dissociation symptoms.

Analysis revealed a small but distinct subset of participants characterized by high symptoms of dissociation and PTSD along with high rates of sexual assault history.

Researchers believe the findings contribute to a growing body of research, which could provide a basis for adding the new dissociative subtype distinction to the PTSD diagnosis in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5).

The study was led by Erika J. Wolf, Ph.D., and Mark W. Miller, Ph.D., both from the National Center for PTSD at the VA Boston Healthcare System and Department of Psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine.

“This study helps to identify a small group of individuals who show a unique pattern of post-traumatic symptoms marked by derealization, or feeling that one’s surroundings are unreal or unfamiliar, and depersonalization, or feeling that one’s body is unfamiliar or strange,” said Wolf.

“The results clarify that these symptoms are not a core part of PTSD for most people with the disorder. However, identification of this group of individuals is important for maximizing PTSD treatment effectiveness.”

The study findings are published in the journal Archives of General Psychiatry.

Source: Boston University Medical Center

Full Citation:
Wolf EJ, Miller MW, Reardon AF, Ryabchenko KA, Castillo D, Freund R. (2012, Jul). A Latent Class Analysis of Dissociation and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Evidence for a Dissociative Subtype. Arch Gen Psychiatry; 69(7):698-705. doi:10.1001/archgenpsychiatry.2011.1574.

Here is the abstract for the study:

ABSTRACT

Context  The nature of the relationship of dissociation to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is controversial and of considerable clinical and nosologic importance.

 

Objectives  To examine evidence for a dissociative subtype of PTSD and to examine its association with different types of trauma.

Design  A latent profile analysis of cross-sectional data from structured clinical interviews indexing DSM-IV symptoms of current PTSD and dissociation.

Settings  The VA Boston Healthcare System and the New Mexico VA Health Care System.

Participants  A total of 492 veterans and their intimate partners, all of whom had a history of trauma. Participants reported exposure to a variety of traumatic events, including combat, childhood physical and sexual abuse, partner abuse, motor vehicle accidents, and natural disasters, with most participants reporting exposure to multiple types of traumatic events. Forty-two percent of the sample met the criteria for a current diagnosis of PTSD.

Main Outcome Measures  Item-level scores on the Clinician-Administered PTSD Scale.

Results  A latent profile analysis suggested a 3-class solution: a low PTSD severity subgroup, a high PTSD severity subgroup characterized by elevations across the 17 core symptoms of the disorder, and a small but distinctly dissociative subgroup that composed 12% of individuals with a current diagnosis of PTSD. The latter group was characterized by severe PTSD symptoms combined with marked elevations on items assessing flashbacks, derealization, and depersonalization. Individuals in this subgroup also endorsed greater exposure to childhood and adult sexual trauma compared with the other 2 groups, suggesting a possible etiologic link with the experience of repeated sexual trauma.

Conclusions  These results support the subtype hypothesis of the association between PTSD and dissociation and suggest that dissociation is a highly salient facet of posttraumatic psychopathology in a subset of individuals with the disorder.

Ellis Sandoz - What is a Mystic Philosopher and Why does it Matter? Preliminary Reflections

This paper was delivered by Ellis Sandoz at the Eric Voegelin Society, 27th Annual International Meeting in Seattle, Washington (September 2, 2011). Sandoz is the Hermann Moyse Jr. Distinguished Professor of Political Science and is Director of the Eric Voegelin Institute for American Renaissance Studies at Louisiana State University.

Sandoz offers this definition of the mystic philosopher of his title:

A mystic philosopher is one who takes the tension toward the transcendent divine ground of being as the cardinal attribute of human reality per se and explores the whole hierarchy of being from this decisive perspective. 

Here is a little about Eric Voegelin, since his theory and philosophy play a central role in this paper (from Wikipedia):

Voegelin worked throughout his life to account for the endemic political violence of the twentieth century in an effort variously referred to as a philosophy of politics, history, or consciousness.

Voegelin published scores of books, essays, and reviews in his lifetime. An early work was Die politischen Religionen (1938), (The Political Religions), on totalitarian ideologies and their structural similarities to religion. His magnum opus is the multi-volume (English-language) Order and History, which began publication in 1956 and remained incomplete at the time of his death 29 years later. His 1951 Charles Walgreen lectures, published as The New Science of Politics, is generally seen as a prolegomenon to this, and remains his best known work. He left many manuscripts unpublished, including a history of political ideas that has since been published in eight volumes.

Order and History was originally conceived as a six-volume examination of the history of order occasioned by Voegelin's personal experience of the disorder of his time. The first three volumes, Israel and Revelation, The World of the Polis, and Plato and Aristotle, appeared in rapid succession in 1956 and 1957 and focused on the evocations of order in the ancient Near East and Greece.

Voegelin then encountered difficulties that slowed the publication down. This, combined with his university administrative duties and work related to the new institute, meant that seventeen years separated the fourth from the third volume. His new concerns were indicated in the 1966 German collection Anamnesis: Zur Theorie der Geschichte und Politik, and the fourth volume, The Ecumenic Age, appeared in 1974. It broke with the chronological pattern of the previous volumes by investigating symbolizations of order ranging in time from the Sumerian King List to Hegel. Continuing work on the final volume, In Search of Order, occupied Voegelin's final days and it was published posthumously in 1987.

One of Voegelin's main points in his later work is that a sense of order is conveyed by the experience of transcendence. This transcendence can never be fully defined nor described, though it may be conveyed in symbols. A particular sense of transcendent order serves as a basis for a particular political order. It is in this way that a philosophy of politics becomes a philosophy of consciousness. Insights may become fossilised as dogma. The main aim of the political philosopher is to remain open to the truth of order, and convey this to others.

Voegelin is more interested in the ontological issues that arise from these experiences than the epistemological questions of how we know that a vision of order is true or not. For Voegelin, the essence of truth is trust. All philosophy begins with experience of the divine. Since God is experienced as good, one can be confident that reality is knowable. As Descartes would say, God is not a deceiver.

Voegelin's work does not fit in any standard classifications, although some of his readers have found similarities in it to contemporaneous works by, for example, Ernst Cassirer, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Martin Heidegger, and Hans-Georg Gadamer. He has a sometimes unapproachable style and a heavy reliance upon extensive background knowledge. Voegelin often invents terms or uses old ones in new ways. However, there are patterns in his work with which the reader can quickly become familiar.

Among indications of growing engagement with Voegelin's work are the 305 page international bibliography published in 2000 by Munich's Wilhelm Fink Verlag; the presence of dedicated research centers at universities in the United States, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom; the appearance of recent translations in languages ranging from Portuguese to Japanese; and the publishing of the nearly complete 34 volume collection of his primary works by the University of Missouri Press and various primary and secondary works offered by the Eric-Voegelin-Archiv of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität.

Having read a couple of Voegelin's books (Order and History, Vol. 3: Plato and Aristotle and From Enlightenment to Revolution), I would suggest that he is one of the under-appreciated (if at all even acknowledged) philosophers in the canon of integral theory.

This is an interesting paper by the man who has edited the Collected Works of Voegelin.

Full Citation:

Sandoz, E. (2011). What is a Mystic Philosopher and Why does it Matter? Preliminary Reflections. APSA 2011 Annual Meeting Paper. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1903028

What is a Mystic Philosopher and Why does it Matter? Preliminary Reflections

Ellis Sandoz - Louisiana State University

2011
APSA 2011 Annual Meeting Paper

Abstract:
The question posed by my title (What is a Mystic Philosopher and Why Does it Matter?) can be answered briefly: A mystic philosopher is one who takes the tension toward the transcendent divine ground of being as the cardinal attribute of human reality per se and explores the whole hierarchy of being from this decisive perspective.

Introduction
The question posed by my title (What is a Mystic Philosopher and Why Does it Matter?) can be answered briefly: A mystic philosopher is one who takes the tension toward the transcendent divine ground of being as the cardinal attribute of human reality per se and explores the whole hierarchy of being from this decisive perspective. Thus, all philosophy worthy of the name is mystic philosophy. It has been so from the pre-Socratics to Plato to Voegelin himself, by his account, as the sine qua non of philosophizing, past, present, and future. It matters because more than a mere definition is at take. It matters because the experiential core of noetic and pneumatic reality insofar as glimpsed in consciousness and regarded as basic to human existence is available only through individual persons‟ divine-human mystical encounters– which happen as events in a variety of modalities evidenced from prehistory to the contemporary.

If it be suspected that this implies that the history of philosophy may be in largest part the history of its derailment the point is conceded, as Voegelin himself tells us (1). To inventory and critique the assorted ways in which the philosophic impulse has been diverted or has otherwise gone astray is a task for another day–a task, however, already substantially addressed in Voegelin's own life-long quest for truth in resistance to untruth under such familiar rubrics as sophistry, gnosticism, scholasticism, Enlightenment, phenomenalism, ideology, and positivism among myriad other deformations. Enough here if I can bring a bit more clearly to light the meaning and implications of mystic philosophy and its importance for a non-reductionist exploration of metaxic reality, one grounded in common sense and participatory (or apperceptive) empiricism– i.e., one which invokes in principle the Socratic “Look and see if this is not the case.”

This then gets us to more familiar ground: Mystic philosophy is what Plato‟s Socrates was about, as the messenger of the God. Sundry Spinozaists and latter day Averroists among us will be unpersuaded, since for them and their epigones theology (a neologism and term of art in Plato, Republic 379a) and philosophy are taken to be radically different enterprises. Dogmatic delusion everywhere dies a hard death, and you can‟t win them all. However, to argue that the history of philosophy is largely the history of its derailment admittedly puts Voegelin somewhat in the company of Johannes Brahms when he departed a social gathering, insouciantly turning at the door to say: “If there‟s anyone here I haven't offended I apologize.”

What is at stake here, however, is more than social amenities. When Voegelin told an old friend from Vienna days not to be too surprised to learn that he was a mystic as well as a philosopher (2), he did so after a high stakes battle to recover something of the truth of reality–one he had pursued for decades so as to find his way out of the lethal quandaries of radical modernity and convincingly critique National Socialism. The effort produced three books while he was a professor in Vienna, cost him his job, and very nearly his life. Still, as the battle in various less grim forums continued thereafter, humor intruded from time to time. So with a genial intramural debate while at LSU in the 1940s with the head of the philosophy department (a great admirer of Bertrand Russell) that at one point found Voegelin retorting: Mr. Carmichael you are a philosophy professor. I am a philosopher.

Perhaps the fullest direct clarification of the pertinent issues Voegelin gave in a 1965 talk to the German Political Science Association plenary session, subsequently published as “What is Political Reality?” (3) The drift of that presentation is to explain why political science cannot rightly be assimilated to the natural science model most famously exemplified by Newton's Principia Mathematica but has its own unique paradigm as a philosophical science which Voegelin sketches on the occasion. In effect a minority report to political scholars (rather like our own colleagues here in Seattle still today) eager to be as “scientific” as possible, the tenor is combative as well as diagnostic and therapeutic.

Read the whole article by downloading the PDF.


Notes from the text above:

1 Cf. Eric Voegelin, Order and History, 5 vols. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1956-1987), 3:277.

2 Saint “Thomas [Aquinas] is a mystic, for he knows that behind the God of dogmatic theology there is the tetragrammatic abyss that lies even behind the analogia entis. But in that sense also Plato is mystic, for he knows that behind the gods of the Myth, and even behind the Demiurge of his philosophy, there is the real God about whom one can say nothing. It may horrify you: But when somebody says that I am a mystic, I am afraid I cannot deny it. My enterprise of what you call „de-reification‟ would not be possible, unless I were a mystic.” Letter 422. To Gregor Sebba (Feb. 3, 1973) in The Collected Works of Eric Voegelin, 34 vols. (hereinafter CW), vol. 30, Selected Correspondence 1950-1984, trans. Sandy Adler, Thomas A. Hollweck, & William Petropulos, ed. and intro. Thomas A. Hollweck (2007; Columbia: University of Missouri Press), 751.

3 Eric Voegelin, Anamnesis, trans. and ed. Gerhart Niemeyer (pb. edn, Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1978), 143-214; originally Voegelin, Anamnesis: Zur Theorie der Geschichte und Politik (Munich: R. Piper & Co. Verlag, 1966); also revised and reprinted in Collected Works of Eric Voegelin, vol. 6, trans. M. J. Hanak, ed. with an intro. by David Walsh (2002; 34 vols., University of Missouri Press).