Breakthrough AI

Artificial Intelligence is poised to take the psychedelic and mental health treatment world by storm. Recent developments in computer learning have opened the door to drug development like never before. Thousands of new and novel compounds are now being discovered using AI technologies that previously might have taken human researchers years, if not decades, to create.

AI drug development opens the door to personalized therapies, unique to an individual’s genetics and physiological variances, with less toxicity, better tolerance, and more efficacy than the previous generations of pharmaceuticals. Not only could AI insights help us navigate the complexity of emerging consciousness research, but also help address the dearth of psychedelic research. Until recently, legal barriers and social stigma have prevented most pharmaceutical companies from pursuing these remarkable compounds. These programs could leapfrog the research decades, potentially up to an even footing with modern pharmaceuticals.

Alexander Shulgin, author of the magnum opus tomes PIHKAL and TIHKAL, (Phenethylamines I Have Known and Loved, & Tryptamines I Have Known and Loved, respectively) conducted some of the most complete and thorough psychedelic research to date, earning Shulgin the moniker “godfather of psychedelics”. He spent decades in drug development, synthesis, self testing, and recording on hundreds of compounds he created, methodically researching and cataloging the subjective effects of these compounds with his wife Ann shulgin. So the AIs were put to the “Shulgin” test, and like Deep Blue with chess, and Watson with Jeopardy, these programs outpaced human efforts by orders of magnitude. They were able to “rediscover” many of Shulgin’s compounds, recreating his work not in decades, but in mere weeks.

Currently, psychedelic research straddles a delicate balance between therapeutic endpoints and subjective experience. Pharmaceutical companies are focusing on molecular therapies, which show tremendous potential treating depression, addiction, and cognitive behavioral issues like PTSD, eating disorders, and end of life anxiety. Molecular actions are easier to test and explain, and in this context, hallucinations are often viewed as an unnecessary hurdle; a bug and not a feature. Pharma companies are now looking to remove the “trip”, by engineering the subjective experience out, for more manageable and consistent therapies, with no peculiar mystical encounters to explain away.

We believe that there is a different approach to consider. We think the Marsh Chapel Experiment, single dose cures for a variety of disorders, and semi permanent personality changes, all hint that the molecular effects might only be the tip of the iceberg. These compounds appear to catalyze a subjective experience that, when adequately achieved, allow profound psychological changes. To disregard these experiences would be to overlook their potential for transformative change.

We are endeavoring to partner AI companies to create a “Breakthrough List” of new technologies that are known to consistently induce the transformative “breakthrough” experience. By developing this list, we hope to provide researchers with a new way to explore this vast and uncharted frontier, much like how NASA seeks out new worlds to discover and understand.