#16 - Prof David Nutt: The Neuroscience Of Psychedelics, Addiction, And How Drugs Help Us Understand The Brain

Prof David Nutt is Neuropsychopharmacologist specialising in the research of drugs that affect the brain and conditions such as addiction, anxiety, and sleep. He is the chairman of Drug Science, a non-profit which he founded in 2010 to provide independent, evidence-based information on drugs.
Prof David Nutt is Neuropsychopharmacologist specialising in the research of drugs that affect the brain and conditions such as addiction, anxiety, and sleep. He is the chairman of Drug Science, a non-profit which he founded in 2010 to provide independent, evidence-based information on drugs. Nutt is the deputy head of the Centre for Psychedelic Research at Imperial College London. He and his team have published research into psilocybin for TRD, as well as neuroimaging studies investigating psilocybin, MDMA, LSD, and DMT.

In this episode we discuss:

  • How drugs help our understanding of the brain
  • Impact of prohibition on investigation and research
  • Key terms - decriminalisation, depenalisation, legalisation
  • Drug harm profiles - alcohol, lsd, mdma, psilocybin
  • Physiology and psychology of addiction
  • Brain-mind interplay
  • The psychedelic experience and its phenomena 
  • The default mode network
  • Functional connectivity
  • Neuroplasticity
  • Why profound alterations in consciousness permit long-term changes
  • Serotonin's role in depression
  • Psilocybin vs SSRIs and the 5HT2a receptor
  • Psychedelics vs Psychedelic-assisted psychotherapies 
Tommy Moore