By Matthew W. Johnson, Ph.D., and Rav Arora

One of the noteworthy achievements of this federal administration is finally breaking the taboo on psychedelics and starting to adjust policy to line up with the scientific evidence. In April, the President signed an Executive Order accelerating research and approval of psychedelic therapies. Since then the FDA, NIH, and VA have taken proactive measures to spotlight, fund, and further investigate psychedelic therapies at the federal level.

Psychedelic medicines are on the verge of FDA approval but another question remains afterwards: how should these compounds be classified under federal drug law? The current policy framework that determines the regulation of psychedelics is the Controlled Substances Act (CSA) passed in 1970 which was enacted to regulate certain drugs with abuse potential, classifying them into five schedules (I through V) based on their accepted medical uses, and potential for abuse.

Currently, psilocybin, MDMA, LSD, and other psychedelics are in Schedule I which is reserved for drugs deemed to have no medical utility and high abuse potential. If the FDA approves Compass Pathways’ COMP360 psilocybin, to take a relevant example, the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) will be forced to reschedule it. From there, two options exist: either DEA reschedules Compass Pathways’ COMP360 psilocybin formulation as a lower Schedule, like III or IV, and keeps any other source of psilocybin in Schedule I (also known as bifurcated scheduling) or the DEA could reschedule the entire molecule, including psilocin, the active compound into which the body converts psilocybin.

In this piece, we summarize our arguments made in our extensive policy document on why we support rescheduling the entire molecule based on science and policy principles.

One of us (Johnson) has spent over two decades investigating psychedelic treatments for addiction, depression, and cancer-related distress, and has conducted extensive research on the harms of drugs including cocaine, methamphetamine, opioids, tobacco, and alcohol, as well as addiction treatment and abuse liability research. The other, Mr. Arora has spent the past seven years journalistically investigating psychedelic medicine, including on this site The Illusion of Consensus, the newsletter and podcast he co-founded with current National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Jay Bhattacharya.

Before the 2024 election, we co-authored a psychedelic policy proposal intended for the incoming administration shared by Joe Rogan on X. Then we wrote an updated version specifically tailored to the Trump administration.

The first principle is simple: drug scheduling should reflect a substance’s medical value and risks, not other political or financial interests. Schedule I is reserved for drugs deemed to have no currently accepted medical use in the United States, high abuse potential, and a lack of accepted safety under medical supervision. If the FDA approves psilocybin as a treatment, that approval would establish an accepted medical use for a medicine whose therapeutic effects come from psilocybin itself. Promising research suggests medical potential for psilocybin in treating depression, cancer-related distress, and various forms of addiction including tobacco, alcohol, and cocaine, although depression is the indication for which psilocybin is likely to receive initial approval.

A second consideration is abuse potential. A 2018 scientific review led by Dr. Johnson examined psilocybin under the Controlled Substances Act’s eight-factor framework. It found limited reinforcing effects, no clear physical dependence or withdrawal syndrome, and comparatively low rates of serious harms and problematic use. The authors concluded that, if approved as a medicine, psilocybin would be appropriately placed no more restrictively than Schedule IV. Moreover, as HHS advisor Calley Means stated in his 2021 piece on psychedelics, “For starters, psychedelic compounds aren’t addictive …. Typical drugs from alcohol to heroin to sugar release a dopamine rush, which can lead to addictive behavior.” Means cites a comprehensive 2010 analysis in the Lancet showing MDMA, LSD, and psilocybin mushrooms have the lowest health and community damage score out of all illegal drugs in the U.K:

This does not mean psilocybin is harmless. It can cause intense distress, impaired judgment, and serious complications for certain vulnerable patients. Safe medical use requires careful screening and supervision. But its risks are not comparable to the addiction and public health risks associated with drugs such as fentanyl, cocaine, and methamphetamine, which sit in Schedule II. If those drugs can be recognized as having legitimate medical uses without being legal for recreational consumption, why should psilocybin be treated differently?

This classification also affects who can investigate the next generation of medicines.

One of us (Johnson) has conducted human research with psilocybin, cocaine, and methamphetamine. Remarkably, psilocybin has routinely been the most difficult to study—not because it is more addictive or dangerous, but because of the added regulatory burdens of Schedule I. Research authorization, security requirements, and obtaining legal supplies have sometimes delayed studies by six months to more than a year.

Leaving the underlying psilocybin molecule in Schedule I could preserve these obstacles even after a branded psilocybin medicine is approved. Scientists hoping to study other doses, applications, or formulations would continue to face special hurdles. Some institutional pharmacies are reluctant to handle Schedule I materials at all. That means fewer researchers, slower discovery, higher costs, and less competition. We support the companies investing in FDA approval. But a policy meant to promote psychedelic innovation should not inadvertently give the first approved product a regulatory head start over future competitors.

The implications extend beyond pharmaceutical companies. Oregon and Colorado have established state-regulated programs involving supervised psychedelic use. Rescheduling psilocybin would not make those programs automatically lawful under federal law. It would, however, acknowledge the substance’s medical utility and remove Schedule I-specific research restrictions, potentially helping policymakers develop a more coherent framework for those programs.

Critically, rescheduling is not legalization. Moving psilocybin to Schedule III or IV would not make mushrooms available for recreational sale, authorize the prescribing of unapproved psilocybin preparations, or eliminate penalties for unauthorized possession and distribution. Cocaine remains tightly controlled in Schedule II. Similarly, unauthorized possession of alprazolam (Xanax), in Schedule IV, is illegal. A substance can have recognized medical value and still be regulated.

Nor are we arguing that every product containing a molecule must always face identical controls. A formulation that demonstrably changes abuse potential or safety might warrant different treatment, athough the DEA’s authority to do this, or impose bifurcated schedules at all, has been questioned in a 2023 essay by Matthew Zorn, now Deputy General Counsel at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)—the DEA offered a formulation-specific rationale in the Marinol case.

On Drugs

Bifurcated (Re)Scheduling

Increasingly, I’ve been getting more questions about something called bifurcated scheduling/rescheduling under the CSA. I’ve discussed the topic elsewhere with a light touch. For example, in the recent GHB essay. Or in this Lucid News piece…

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3 years ago · 9 likes · Matt

But the mere fact that one version is patented or FDA-approved does not, by itself, establish that the identical active substance deserves to remain in Schedule I. And because psilocybin produces essentially all of its psychedelic effects after conversion to psilocin—which also occurs naturally in mushrooms—regulators should evaluate psilocin alongside psilocybin.

Our request is straightforward: if the FDA approves a psychedelic medicine, HHS and the DEA should evaluate whether the underlying active substance also belongs outside Schedule I, applying the same scientific standards used for other drugs. In psilocybin’s case, the evidence makes a strong argument for rescheduling both psilocybin and psilocin, rather than only one company’s formulation.

If a molecule is accepted as medicine, federal drug policy should not pretend that the molecule itself has no medical use.

Read the full policy document here:

Matthew W. Johnson, PhD, conducts psychedelic science at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University. From 2004-2024 he led research at Johns Hopkins on psychedelic treatment for tobacco addiction, cancer, depression & safety. He has been interviewed by Lex Fridman, Dr. Andrew Huberman, Big Think & 60 Minutes.

Rav Arora is an independent journalist known for writing in The New York Post, Globe and Mail, and Foreign Policy Magazine. He has appeared in interviews with Jordan Peterson, Sam Harris, Ben Shapiro, Tim Pool and his work has been praised by Joe Rogan and Megyn Kelly on their podcasts.

The federal government has made significant strides in the advancement of psychedelics. In April, the President signed an Executive Order accelerating research and approval of psychedelic therapies. Since then, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has awarded multiple National Priority Vouchers to psychedelic-related drug programs and held a public hearing on psychedelic therapeutics, while the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) is funding research on ibogaine as a potential treatment for opioid use disorder.

With psychedelic drug products advancing toward potential FDA approval, the United States may soon face a vital policy question about the regulation of drugs that goes well beyond the approval of any single psychedelic medicine.

Take the example of psilocybin. Outside of research, virtually all psilocybin use is in the form of consuming psilocybin-containing mushrooms. These mushrooms also contain psilocin, the active compound into which the body converts psilocybin. If the FDA approves a drug product containing psilocybin like COMP360, Compass Pathways’ investigational psilocybin drug product, the government will have to move that product out of Schedule I before doctors can prescribe it. The typical approach for medically used drugs with liability for abuse has been to place the compound itself (the psilocybin molecule in this case) out for Schedule I. But regulators could choose to reschedule only the FDA-approved product while leaving psilocybin itself in Schedule I. That would create what is sometimes called bifurcated scheduling. For example, in 1986, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) placed the FDA-approved drug product Marinol, containing delta-9-THC (dronabinol) as its active ingredient, in Schedule II (later moved to Schedule III in 1999), but kept delta-9-THC-containing cannabis—and all unapproved formulations of synthetic THC—in Schedule I. In defending its different treatment of Marinol and cannabis, the DEA cited Marinol’s slower onset and the difficulty of extracting THC from its encapsulated sesame oil as reasons for lower abuse and diversion potential. Although the DEA’s legal authority to impose bifurcated scheduling has been questioned—including in a 2023 essay by Matthew Zorn, now Deputy General Counsel at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)—the DEA offered a formulation-specific rationale in the Marinol case.

Under a special law enacted by Congress in 2000, FDA-approved drug products containing GHB were designated for Schedule III, while GHB outside those products was placed in Schedule I. Xyrem—a drug product containing sodium oxybate, the sodium salt of GHB—therefore became subject to Schedule III controls upon its FDA approval in 2002. Unlike the Marinol case, Congress expressly directed this bifurcation rather than leaving the scheduling distinction to the DEA. Although Congress had the authority to create this exception, GHB’s bifurcated scheduling departed from the substance-level approach used for cocaine and many other controlled drugs. This special legislative arrangement reconciled competing policy objectives rather than reflecting a difference in the inherent pharmacology of chemically identical molecules.

We oppose bifurcated scheduling of psychedelics. We take no position here on whether the CSA authorizes the DEA to impose such a distinction; our argument is that scheduling the approved product differently from the underlying substance lacks scientific justification unless meaningful differences in abuse potential or safety are demonstrated. One of us (Johnson) has spent over two decades investigating psychedelic treatments for addiction, depression, and cancer-related distress, and has conducted extensive research on the harms of drugs including cocaine, methamphetamine, opioids, tobacco, and alcohol, as well as addiction treatment and abuse liability research. The other, Mr. Arora, has spent the past five years investigating psychedelic medicine through The Illusion of Consensus, the newsletter and podcast he co-founded with current National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Jay Bhattacharya. After the 2024 election, we co-authored a psychedelic policy proposal intended for the incoming Trump administration.

What the Controlled Substances Act Actually States

The Controlled Substances Act (CSA) does not instruct regulators to retain Schedule I status merely because rescheduling might “send the wrong message.” Under 21 U.S.C. § 811, scheduling decisions involve factors including a substance’s potential for abuse, its pharmacological effects, the state of scientific knowledge about it, patterns and significance of abuse, risks to public health, and its potential to produce physical or psychological dependence.

The criteria for the individual schedules are similarly described.

A Schedule I drug is defined to have a high potential for abuse, no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States, and a lack of accepted safety for use under medical supervision.

Schedule II also includes substances with high abuse potential. Unlike Schedule I, however, it includes only substances that have a currently accepted medical use in treatment in the U.S. or a currently accepted medical use with severe restrictions. Schedules III through V likewise require accepted medical use, with each successive schedule reflecting lower abuse potential than the preceding one.

Measured against those criteria, FDA approval of a psilocybin product would provide a strong basis for moving psilocybin itself out of Schedule I. Although “currently accepted medical use” does not require FDA approval (Grinspoon v. DEA, 1st Cir. 1987), FDA approval is conclusive evidence of “currently accepted medical use.” Promising research suggests medical potential for psilocybin in treating depression, cancer-related distress, and various forms of addiction including tobacco, alcohol, and cocaine. Nonetheless, we base our argument on the contingency that a psilocybin product is granted FDA approval, which appears possible and perhaps likely for treatment-resistant depression within the next year.

A 2018 review co-authored by one of us (Johnson) evaluated psilocybin using the CSA’s eight-factor framework. Although psilocybin has abuse potential as conceptualized by the CSA, this abuse potential is low compared to many scheduled and even unscheduled drugs. Animal and human research show limited reinforcing effects, no clear physical dependence or withdrawal syndrome, relatively low rates of use, treatment-seeking and serious harms among illicit users compared to many abused drugs. The review concluded that, if approved as a medicine, psilocybin’s abuse potential would be consistent with placement no more restrictive than Schedule IV.

Psilocybin is not risk-free. It can produce frightening experiences, impaired judgment, or psychiatric complications in vulnerable individuals. But those risks are quite different from the addiction and large public health burdens associated with drugs in Schedule II like cocaine, methamphetamine, and fentanyl. Likewise, evidence indicates that psilocybin’s abuse potential is lower than that of many substances in Schedule III, which includes ketamine, dronabinol, and the opioid nalorphine.

The relevant point under the CSA is therefore not that psilocybin has zero abuse potential. Its abuse and dependence liability appears substantially lower than that of many drugs placed in less-restrictive schedules—another reason its continued placement in Schedule I becomes difficult to reconcile with the evidence once its medical use is formally recognized by FDA approval.

Scheduling Outside of Schedule I Does Not “Send the Wrong Message”

Placement outside Schedule I is not an endorsement of consumption or legalization for general use. Cocaine, methamphetamine, and fentanyl are Schedule II substances, yet their unauthorized manufacture, distribution, and possession remain illegal. Even Schedule IV drugs such as Xanax (alprazolam) and Ambien (zolpidem) cannot lawfully be possessed for personal use without a valid prescription or other legal authorization. Rohypnol (flunitrazepam, “roofies”), notorious for its use in drug-facilitated sexual assault, is also Schedule IV. Current policy is not permissive of the recreational use of cocaine, Xanax, or Rohypnol. Moving psilocybin to a different schedule would likewise retain controls against diversion and unauthorized use while recognizing its medical utility and calibrating restrictions to its abuse potential. Rescheduling the underlying substance would not itself authorize the marketing or prescribing of unapproved drug products.

Scientific accuracy in scheduling also matters for proportionality in criminal enforcement. Unauthorized possession and distribution would remain illegal after rescheduling. Federal penalties for simple possession generally do not depend on a substance’s schedule, but penalties for certain other offenses, including distribution, do. Where penalties depend on scheduling, they should reflect the substance’s demonstrated risks. Rescheduling could also provide a sounder basis for reconsidering state penalties, including whether a young person’s possession of mushrooms for personal use should carry a felony conviction that restricts future employment and professional opportunities. It would not automatically change state penalties or erase past convictions, but it would remove an unjustified Schedule I classification where the evidence supports a less restrictive schedule.

Schedule I Inhibits the Research Needed to Develop Better Medicines

Keeping the underlying molecule in Schedule I would also preserve substantial barriers to the very research policymakers say they want to encourage. One of us (Johnson) has personally conducted human studies involving psilocybin, cocaine, and methamphetamine. Paradoxically, psilocybin has routinely been the most difficult of the three to study—not because it is more addictive or dangerous, but because it is the only one in Schedule I.

Schedule I status brings additional research authorization requirements, stringent security obligations, and drug-supply difficulties. In some cases, getting all the necessary approvals for a psilocybin study has taken six months to more than a year. By contrast, once the appropriate licenses are in place, obtaining clinical supplies of cocaine or methamphetamine can be considerably more straightforward.

These burdens do more than slow down established psychedelic researchers. They discourage new scientists and companies from entering the field altogether. A sleep researcher, addiction specialist, or neuroscientist who already works with Schedule III or IV medications may be able to begin studying a new question with relatively little additional infrastructure. Requiring that researcher to build a Schedule I compliance regime creates another reason simply not to pursue the question. Some university pharmacies have even declined to hold Schedule I compounds because they do not want to take on the additional DEA requirements.

The result is fewer manufacturers, fewer researchers, higher costs, longer delays, and less competition in developing the next generation of psychedelic medicines. Broad rescheduling would not grant FDA approval to unapproved psilocybin products. But it would remove an unnecessary barrier to studying the molecule, developing new formulations, testing new indications, and determining how these treatments can be made safer and more effective.

Implications for State-level Programs

Broad rescheduling would also matter for the state-regulated psychedelic programs in Oregon and Colorado. Those programs remain in conflict with federal law even where state law permits supervised psilocybin use. Rescheduling psilocybin and psilocin would not itself make those programs federally lawful, but it would remove Schedule I-specific research barriers and establish federal recognition of medical utility and lower abuse liability. That recognition could strengthen the case for future legislation or regulatory changes accommodating the state programs.

What We Are Asking HHS and the DEA To Do

If FDA approves a Schedule I psychedelic, we recommend rescheduling the active agent (e.g., MDMA, psilocybin) outside of Schedule I. For psilocybin, that evaluation should also encompass psilocin.. Evidence indicates that essentially all of psilocybin’s psychoactive effects result from its conversion in the body to psilocin. An approved psilocybin medicine would therefore act through the same compound already present in mushrooms. This shared pharmacology provides a strong scientific basis for scheduling psilocybin and psilocin together.

The rescheduling outside of Schedule I should not be restricted to the FDA-approved drug product. Just as with cocaine or Xanax, the molecule itself and its inherent properties, should determine rescheduling. GHB’s special legislative arrangement should not substitute for a scientific assessment of whether bifurcated scheduling is justified for psychedelics. Cocaine illustrates the substance-level approach we advocate: its accepted medical use is recognized, while unauthorized possession and distribution remain illegal. Likewise, Schedule IV placement of Xanax and Rohypnol does not authorize recreational use. Classifying a substance according to the evidence is compatible with maintaining firm controls against unauthorized use.

FDA approval should trigger an evaluation of the underlying substance, not merely the approved product. Apart from the unresolved question of the DEA’s statutory authority to impose bifurcated scheduling, any proposed distinction between chemically equivalent preparations requires a scientific justification based on meaningful differences in medical utility, safety, or abuse liability.

In this new clip, Keeper founder Jake Kozloski shares how Hinge almost acquired his site but took issue with their pro-marriage stance.

I was astounded by this story — it shows you how far away we have come in society from healthy, monogamous relationships.

Watch the full 7-minute clip here

Full episode here

Jake Kozloski, founder and CEO of Keeper (a new AI marriage site), joins me to explain why he believes modern dating apps are structurally broken—and how AI could radically change the way people find long-term partners. We discuss Hinge’s attempt to acquire Keeper, why the deal fell apart, the incentives keeping users swiping, and what Keeper’s data reveals about attraction, compatibility, sex, and marriage. Jake also breaks down how his AI matchmaking system works, why most dating apps optimize for quantity over quality, and whether technology could eventually become better than humans at finding our ideal partner.

Time-stamps:

0:00 Intro
1:44 Why Modern Dating Apps Are Broken
12:15 Are Dating Apps Incentivized to Keep You Single?
20:15 How Men and Women Experience Attraction Differently
31:24 The Origin Story of Keeper AI
36:05 Why So Many Men Get No Matches
41:07 What Is Keeper AI?
46:51 Inside Keeper’s Matching Algorithm
57:12 How AI Learns Your Physical “Type”
1:02:16 Why Keeper Has No Swiping
1:17:55 Can AI Predict Who You’ll Fall in Love With?
1:31:58 What Jake Learned From 100+ Dates
1:41:54 Does 1 in 10 Keeper First Dates Lead to Marriage?
1:47:29 What Keeper’s Dating Data Reveals
2:05:27 Are People Delusional About Their Attractiveness?
2:18:36 Will AI Become the Best Way to Find Your Soulmate?
2:35:57 What AI Can’t Capture About Attraction
2:38:13 The New Wave of AI Dating Apps
2:46:25 Hinge Tried to Buy Keeper
2:55:36 How Geoffrey Miller Got Involved

If you’re looking…sign up at Keeper here :)

https://app.keeper.ai/login

(1 in 10 dates lead to marriage!)

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In this new clip from my podcast with therapist Ryan Soave, we discuss a fascinating virtual-reality experiment he helped with in Andrew Huberman’s lab.

Participants were placed in simulated fear-inducing scenarios involving heights, spiders, claustrophobia, dogs, and even great white sharks. They consciously knew they were safe — but their bodies still mounted a fear response as though the threat were real.

That raises a much bigger question about fear, trauma, and anxiety: how much does the body distinguish between an actual threat and one that is merely perceived? Ryan explains how our nervous systems can enter fight-or-flight based on the reality our minds construct, and why this may help us understand how chronic fear and unresolved trauma can become embodied.

Watch the full clip here.

Full episode link.

In this new podcast clip, I hypothesize that one practical way to reduce the pull of addiction and unhealthy obsession is to “diversify your dopamine.” The idea is simple: when one activity becomes your only meaningful source of pleasure, validation, or excitement — whether that’s work, partying, social media, sex, or something else — it becomes much easier for that pursuit to take over your life.

I reflect on periods of my own life when my career was almost my sole source of satisfaction, and how building a broader life has made it less likely that any one pursuit becomes all-consuming. Exercise, friendships, time in nature, good books and movies, meaningful work, sports, and spontaneous fun can all become different sources of reward and meaning. Therapist Ryan Soave agrees with the broader principle, while adding that balance also means learning to slow down rather than constantly chasing stimulation.

Watch the short clip below for our full discussion on diversifying your dopamine as a practical antidote to addiction and obsession.

Watch the full episode

What would you like me to ask him?

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Catch my latest episode on treating addiction:

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Here are five quotes from the conversation that stayed with me most - on validation, bad therapy, finding inner peace, and real freedom:

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Chapters:

00:00 Intro
01:49 Florida, alligators & Rav’s reptile phobia
07:49 Fear, phobias & confusing discomfort with threat
10:08 The lemon experiment: how the mind creates physical reactions
12:00 Virtual reality, fear & working with Andrew Huberman’s lab
16:39 Why are mental health problems rising?
20:00 Does modern life make us less resilient?
26:24 Dating apps and the paradox of choice
27:25 Why commitment creates freedom
29:27 Remote work, structure & accountability
32:03 What makes a great therapist?
37:14 Are people actually more mentally ill than in the past?
47:50 Addiction vs. obsession
55:10 Can slowing down make you more successful?
57:18 The thing that makes you successful can ruin the rest of your life
01:00:21 Loneliness, ambition & obsessive work
01:04:34 “Diversify your dopamine”
01:07:49 Stop waiting for success to make you happy
01:10:18 Why Rav became obsessed with career success
01:12:39 External success doesn’t fix internal problems

Check out her recent story in The Free Press here:

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This Week in Canada: Our Economy Looks Better Than Yours

Welcome back to This Week In Canada, where the economy looks pretty spiffy compared to the United States, Alberta’s job-growth engine has a new source of fuel, and our colleges and universities are officially awash in antisemitism. Let’s get to it…

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2 months ago · 56 likes · 137 comments · Rupa Subramanya

Rupa and I are both immigrants and have a unique lens to analyze Canada’s failures in “multiculturalism” as we take hits both from the far Left (who want no borders) and far Right (who want no nonwhite people in this country).

Leave any questions for our conversation in the comments below.

The podcast has been on hiatus for a couple of months as I’ve been trying to find a more financially sustainable model to run the show as it has been hard to keep it running this year, but I’m hoping to be more consistent now.

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Stay tuned for an episode release tomorrow with addiction expert Ryan Soave from the Huberman Lab podcast.

Psychedelics and Big Pharma have historically been at odds with one another due to fundamentally conflicting business models and treatment paradigms. While conventional psychiatric drugs have traditionally emphasized scalable, ongoing pharmacological treatment, psychedelic therapies have centered on infrequent dosing paired with extensive psychological support.

However, those once-separate worlds are now beginning to converge. In a landmark development for the field, Eli Lilly has acquired ATAI, signaling that the world’s largest pharmaceutical company now sees psychedelic medicine not as a disruptive outsider, but as a strategic part of the future of mental health treatment.

This news has struck a nerve and stirred vigorous debate on the timing and long-term success of this acquisition. Some investors in ATAI seemed disappointed by the announced acquisition by Lilly, largely because they’re focusing on the immediate cash payment of “only” $6.75/share and cite ATAI’s leading market position in short-acting psychedelics. However, after speaking with people close to the transaction — particularly with some of the advisors involved — I came away with a very different perspective from that of the more critical voices.

A senior industry insider I spoke to said Eli Lilly “explored Compass Pathways as a potential way to enter psychedelics…but ultimately chose not to pursue a transaction, even though Compass sought an acquisition.” Definium, by contrast, was described to me by an insider as a “poor fit” for Lilly’s strategy, largely because “many see no commercially viable path for treatments that require patients to undergo 8+ hour monitored sessions.” In addition, they said the patent positions at Compass and Definium are relatively “less robust than ATAI’s”, against the backdrop of broader IP challenges around classical psychedelic molecules.

Moreover, those close to the deal I spoke with believe investors in the psychedelic sector are “underestimating the commercial execution risk of psychedelic companies like Definium, Compass and Resilient (formerly Lykos).” Scientific success and commercial success are two very different things. And their roll-out may have the risk of influencing investors’ views for the entire sector.

The biggest obstacle, according to both pharma executives and clinic operators I spoke to is the treatment duration. It’s one of those practical issues that many investors don’t immediately think about. Do clinics need multiple staff shifts to cover a single patient? What happens if an LSD session runs longer than expected? Would clinics ultimately need overnight facilities in this case? There’s also a very mundane but increasingly important issue emerging: the widespread use of GLP-1 medications. Because they can delay gastric emptying, they may delay the onset of orally administered drugs – potentially by more than an hour in some patients – adding yet another layer to an already challenging treatment duration.

ATAI, on the other hand, was viewed very differently. It has the strongest portfolio of short-acting psychedelic therapies (like BPL-003 which resolves in 90 minutes) that are significantly more commercially viable from a real-world healthcare delivery perspective. Equally important, its intellectual property portfolio was consistently described to me as one of its strongest assets.

Insiders told me the challenge for ATAI was the capital required to get this broad portfolio to commercialization. "Remaining independent would likely have required raising well over $1 billion over the coming years to fund late‑stage clinical trials and the build‑out of full commercial infrastructure for ATAI’s whole mental‑health drug portfolio,” one person close to the deal stated. Those financings would have taken place precisely during the period when the commercial launches of Compass, Resilient and Definium face the serious risk of disappointing the market’s expectations, as investors confront the reality of long, staff‑intensive treatment sessions, operational and reimbursement hurdles, and questions about the strength of their intellectual property and durability of clinical benefit.

That would have created substantial financing, dilution, and market risk for existing ATAI shareholders. Additionally, an insider source told me that “there was an existing constant selling pressure due to former Beckley shareholders selling off their unlocked shares month-by-month.” “This held down the share price and prevented a potentially higher headline takeover price from being realistic in negotiations,” they added.

Viewed through that lens, it appears to me that the ATAI board made the decision best for their intended mission to swiftly bring psychedelic therapies to the market. Shareholders receive an attractive premium today and immediate cash value, while still retaining meaningful upside through the contingent value rights without having to fund the remaining development themselves. If the milestones are achieved, the total deal could reach as much as $9.25 per share in total. Perhaps most notably, the people I spoke with expressed a high degree of confidence that those milestone payments are achievable.

Moreover, one insider involved in the deal shared his view that “this would also be in the patient’s best interest because Eli Lilly would broaden the scope of psychedelic treatments and study drugs for several clinical indications, not just one.”

In summary, it appears that this transaction allows shareholders to maximize future success while reducing dilution, financing, execution, and overall market risk. That’s not always the most exciting outcome, but it is often the one that creates the best risk-adjusted return for shareholders.

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Tomorrow I’m interviewing sexologist on the podcast.

I came across Coral’s work on Instagram a couple of months ago and was struck by the depth in which she spoke about human sexuality and dating and what it reveals about the human psyche more broadly. We immediately started exchanging voice notes and bonding over shared interests and curiosities in this decreasingly taboo field of inquiry.

You can find her most viral Substack essay on female arousal here:

And if you’re feeling extra provocative, here’s another one of her essays:

Just like topics like psychedelics & meditation I tackle on the podcast which are now increasingly being discussed by non-suspect, rational people, human eroticism and sexuality also ought to be explored by non-freaky, sensible people.

If anyone has questions they’d like us to discuss, leave it in the comments below!

Remember, paid members get access to such perks and will also be able to watch my podcast with Coral early.

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I was in Las Vegas recently for the first Enhanced Games — a new athletic competition that is considered to be the Olympics for athletes using performance-enhancing substances. The premise is simple: instead of banning enhancement, Enhanced Games allows athletes to use FDA-approved substances under medical supervision, while building a new kind of sports event around human performance, longevity, and physiological optimization.

One of the more revealing parts of my conversation with Enhanced Games co-founder Max Martin was our discussion about how much of the mainstream media covered the event. A lot of the criticism, both from journalists and online commentators, centered on the claim that the Games failed because they did not produce enough world records.

But that framing misses the deeper point. As Max and I discussed, the more important story may not be world records, but personal records: athletes improving beyond their previous limits, often years after their supposed physical prime. World records are exciting spectacle, but personal records are where the broader promise of human performance and physiological optimization becomes much more relevant to ordinary people.

Max also shared a striking anecdote about one journalist who questioned whether Enhanced Games’ clinical data should be taken seriously because some of the research was coming out of Abu Dhabi. His response was basically: if the work is being published transparently and conducted under institutional review board approval, why should its geography automatically discredit it? To him, this reflected a broader problem with parts of the coverage: journalists looking for conflict or narrative rather than seriously engaging with the data and context.

In this clip, we talk about what the media got wrong, why the “not enough world records” criticism is too shallow, and why the real lesson of Enhanced Games may be closer to Jordan Peterson’s rule: compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today.

I recently attended Max Martin & ’s Enhanced Games event in Vegas. One of the most common media criticisms of the event was that it failed to deliver enough world records.

In this new clip from my one-hour podcast with Max, we explored why that framing misses the deeper point. World records are thrilling, of course. They are part of what makes sports dramatic and emotionally powerful. But if the broader question is human performance, health, and self-improvement, then personal records may matter even more.

This is where I invoked one of Jordan Peterson’s most useful rules: “Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today.” Not everyone can become Usain Bolt, Michael Phelps, Erling Haaland, or a seven-foot NBA player. But everyone has a body. Everyone has a baseline. And everyone can ask whether they are becoming stronger, healthier, more resilient, and more capable than they were before.

That, to me, is the more interesting promise of Enhanced Games. It is not merely about producing superhuman spectacle or smashing world records. It is about expanding the conversation around what is possible for the individual: the athlete chasing a personal best, the aging person trying to preserve vitality, and anyone interested in becoming the best version of themselves.

Watch this new clip now

Full episode link here

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In this new episode, I speak with Max Martin, co-founder and CEO of the Enhanced Games, a new athletic competition built around medically supervised performance enhancement. I recently attended the first Enhanced Games event in Las Vegas thanks to hooking it up (who I plan to interview at some point on our shared interests in psychedelics, pharma, and the future of mental health) and came away highly impressed by the event itself and the fascinating, high-quality people it brought together, including friends like Calley Means & Brigham Buhler.

Since launching this podcast and newsletter with Jay Bhattacharya in 2023, I’ve become increasingly interested in health guidelines, protocols, and policy — especially where institutional consensus often lags behind emerging science and human potential. The Enhanced Games provided a masterclass in what innovation can look like at the intersection of athletic competition, human performance, health optimization, and wellness.

My conversation with Max delved into bigger questions about athlete rights, longevity, healthcare, and the future of performance, including the world record broken by swimmer Christian Golomiev, the 21 personal bests achieved by athletes, and why Maximilian believes the real mission is helping people become their personal best — not just chasing world records.

Time-stamps:

00:00 Introduction to Enhanced Games and Human Performance

02:48 Max Martin’s Background and the Birth of Enhanced Games

07:35 The Impact of Performance Enhancements on Athletes

15:21 Challenges in Traditional Athletic Competitions

18:43 Future of Enhanced Games and Upcoming Events

30:14 Memorable Moments from the Enhanced Games

34:16 Awakening to Alternative Health Solutions

36:11 The Role of Enhancements in Athletic Performance

39:55 Personalized Health Protocols for Individuals

42:52 Regulatory Changes and Their Impact on Enhancements

44:46 Accessing Enhancements for Everyday Consumers

47:10 The Future of Enhanced Games and Athlete Longevity

50:12 Media Coverage and Public Perception of Enhancements

Watch Now:

The Future of Human Performance: Enhanced Games Co-Founder Max Martin

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In my new podcast with Dr. Matt Johnson, I ask him about a remarkable new study examining psilocybin therapy for cocaine addiction:

(Study link)

The study, led by Dr. Peter Hendricks & designed by Matt himself, randomized people with cocaine use disorder to either psilocybin or an active placebo, both in the context of psychotherapy. When I asked Matt about the results, he said the effects were “really, really big.”

At six months, the psilocybin group was biologically confirmed to be abstinent from cocaine at extraordinarily high rates — close to 100% in the graph we discussed.

That number is almost hard to believe. It’s a small study, and we need larger replications, but if these findings hold up, this could represent a major breakthrough in addiction treatment.

What makes this study especially fascinating is the population.

This wasn’t a group of upper-middle-class wellness seekers who had read books on shamanism, meditation, or psychedelic spirituality. Matt emphasized that many of the participants were poor, Black, from the Deep South, and making less than $20,000 a year. Many were from the Bible Belt. They were not coming in with the typical positive associations toward psychedelics that you often see in highly educated, white, progressive, psychedelic-curious populations.

And yet, according to Matt, the results were striking.

He also mentioned something that doesn’t show up neatly in the published paper: many participants reportedly had powerful Jesus experiences.

Not New Age “universe” experiences. Not shamanic archetypes.

Jesus.

Matt said Peter Hendricks had described participants having experiences where Jesus “spoke to their heart.” These were often Baptist Christians whose spiritual framework was not psychedelic culture but Christianity. And during these psilocybin sessions, the healing content emerged through that religious language and symbolic world.

That’s one of the most fascinating parts of this whole conversation.

Psychedelics are often framed through a very specific cultural lens: Burning Man, yoga, Eastern spirituality, ayahuasca retreats, shamanism, or secular neuroscience. But this study suggests that the psychedelic experience may express itself through the deepest symbolic and religious architecture of the person undergoing it.

For a secular Westerner, that might be “ego dissolution” or “the interconnected universe.”

For a devout Christian in the Bible Belt, it might be Jesus speaking to the heart.

And clinically, the question is not whether the experience fits neatly into one worldview. The question is whether it helps people change — whether it helps them break destructive patterns, find hope, reconnect with meaning, and stop using a drug that has devastated their lives.

Matt’s broader point is that psilocybin does not seem to work by targeting one specific drug receptor system involved in one specific addiction. It’s not “anti-cocaine medication” in the narrow sense. Instead, the working hypothesis is that psilocybin may work on the psychology of addiction itself.

The compulsive loop. The emotional pain. The loss of agency. The identity of being trapped. The inability to imagine a different life.

That’s why we’re seeing promising signals not only in cocaine addiction, but also in smoking & alcohol use disorder (for most of our recent conversation we focused on Matt’s new study examining psilocybin therapy for smoking addiction).

This is not a magic cure. It requires preparation, support, integration, and serious clinical safeguards. Some people have difficult experiences. Larger studies are needed.

But the implications are enormous.

If psilocybin therapy can help people with severe cocaine addiction — including poor, marginalized people with little prior interest in psychedelics — achieve sustained abstinence, then we may be looking at one of the most important frontiers in addiction treatment.

And the Jesus experiences add another layer: maybe psychedelic therapy doesn’t replace religion or spirituality. Maybe, in some cases, it activates the deepest spiritual language people already carry — and helps them use it to heal.

Watch the full conversation where we discuss this new study (starting at 1 hr 9 min):

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The Illusion of Consensus is a fully reader-supported publication. If you support the original, fearless journalism on this site, consider becoming a paid or founding member to receive exclusive articles, early-access episodes, and ask questions for future episodes. Or support The Illusion of Consensus with a one-time donation.

Bret Weinstein joins the podcast to discuss dating, mating, sex, relationships, marriage, pornography, OnlyFans, dating apps and the collapse of courtship among Gen Z. The conversation also covers sexual signals, promiscuity, long-term commitment, the rise of the “sex recession”, and new concerns around declining dating among young people. We also discuss Andrew Tate, Nick Fuentes, The Weeknd, Zayn Malik and Gigi Hadid while examining how pop culture, social media and technology shape relationships today.

Chapters:

0:00 - Intro
3:11 - Gen Z’s Dating and Sexual Culture Crisis
6:12 - ‘Dating’ Is an Artificial Modern Construct
12:44 - Why Sex Education Fails Young People
20:15 - How Birth Control Changed Attitudes to Sex
27:10 - When Sex Had Higher Stakes
37:55 - The Evolutionary Case Against Hookup Culture
47:42 - Is Casual Sex Ever Beneficial?
1:04:38 - The Case for Finding the Right Partner Early
1:19:50 - The Weeknd’s “Lonely Star” Through an Evolutionary Lens
1:34:20 - Brett on Valentine’s Day

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The Illusion of Consensus is a fully reader-supported publication. If you support the original, fearless journalism on this site, consider becoming a paid or founding member to receive exclusive articles, early-access episodes, and ask questions for future episodes. Or support The Illusion of Consensus with a one-time donation.

In this recent clip from my debate with former Bush/Obama drug policy advisor Kevin Sabet, he argued that comedian-podcasters like Joe Rogan ought not to decide national drug policy.

I took the opposing stance and argued various high-profile individuals have been pushing this for decades & this new executive order is quite conservative in that it only accelerates research and FDA approvals rather than outright decriminalizing these substances.

Watch the full clip here now

Full episode here: