r/todayilearned • u/its-a-Luigi-time • 20h ago
TIL that Carl Sagan was an occasional user of cannabis, and wrote an essay under the pseudonym ‘Mr. X’ to try and help dispel common myths about the effects of cannabis.
https://www.organism.earth/library/document/mr-x159
u/SemiHemiDemiDumb 20h ago
He also used lsd and was friends with the talking dolphin guy that thought he was talking to aliens in his deprivation chamber while high on lsd.
79
u/Manos_Of_Fate 20h ago
in his deprivation chamber while high on lsd
Frankly, under those circumstances it’s kind of amazing that he only wound up “talking to aliens”.
8
u/TimeisaLie 17h ago
Who was this friend?
20
u/SemiHemiDemiDumb 17h ago
10
u/Hairy-Association636 12h ago
I read that as John C. Reilly.
12
95
u/Remarkable_Tale_7554 20h ago
I recently had an image in which two people were talking, and the words they were saying would form and disappear in yellow above their heads, at about a sentence per heartbeat. In this way it was possible to follow the conversation. At the same time an occasional word would appear in red letters among the yellows above their heads, perfectly in context with the conversation; but if one remembered these red words, they would enunciate a quite different set of statements, penetratingly critical of the conversation.
Man even got high in a genius fashion. I just get happy-wobbly and stumble around a lot.
10
2
36
u/Vonneguts_Ghost 19h ago
Sure reads like him. Hard to believe that it wasn't instantly recognizable to some.
His widow Ann Druyan was on the talk show circuit for a long time for NORML
12
57
u/PoopMobile9000 19h ago
In college I was co-founder of a group advocating for marijuana legalization (ie we took our student activity budget and bought weed with it), and one of our faculty advisors (the first Volcano owner in the US) used to get stoned with Carl Sagan.
12
u/dragon_bacon 19h ago
First what?
29
u/Sciuridaeno3 18h ago
An early vaporizor that fills up a plastic bag with a mouthpiece that can be passed around
20
5
u/wrathful-anus 13h ago
Man I miss my volcano. Figured when my kids got born I couldn’t really continue to fill rooms in the house up from gigantic plastic bags full of THC vapour.
3
u/0bamaBinSmokin 18h ago
Volcano it's a weed vape that has a large bag you can inhale from and pass around
5
u/RockItGuyDC 16h ago
NORML?
6
u/3232330 16h ago
National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. founded in 1970 it’s the oldest and largest national grassroots advocacy group dedicated solely to the cause of marijuana law reform.
7
u/RockItGuyDC 16h ago
I know. I was asking the poster if they were organizing for NORML. They didn't name the organization they were with. But thanks.
19
u/Bubbly_Safety2219 13h ago
people handle it differently, kinda think kids under 20 should take it easy on it as it can stunt mental functions
7
u/Thing_fish_80 6h ago
He also talked about his use publicly. I remember reading an interview with him in High Times (the magazine for the "marijuana enthusiast") where he said that his mind was very analytical and always working a mile a minute and he could never enjoy art or music because of it.... until he smoked some pot, which would calm his mind enough for him to slow down and enjoy art & music etc.
5
u/CarISatan 18h ago
Based on the music and visuals in Cosmos, he also did a bunch of mushroom. Source: me
1
7
7
u/GearHead54 19h ago edited 18h ago
I remember taking a fields and waves class in college, which uses maxwell's equations to solve for electromagnetic waves.. and at one point I asked "how did people even think of some of this?"
She replied "um... many of them had help [making weed smoking motion]" - the professor was referring to hallucinogenics, not weed, but it makes a lot of sense
3
3
u/Tha_Watcher 2h ago
Carl Sagan was a modern day sage along the likes of the ancient Vedic authors who experimented with pragmatic approaches to conceptualizing theoretical hypotheses.
2
1
1
u/cylonfrakbbq 3h ago
Now I am envisioning a jacked up Carl Sagan busting through walls to jump scare Leon Kennedy
1
u/xHawk13 11h ago
I’ve always shared similar thoughts on cannabis. It’s a perspective tool and can really change how you think about things if you’re intentional in your use.
99% of users are not doing what Carl was doing while High and digging into these complex thoughts and ideas. Most people smoke weed to tune out things these days and eat a bunch of food. Y’all in that boat can’t use this to justify your shitty habits.
131
u/socialistlumberjack 17h ago
In hindsight, the phrase "in order to bake an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe" is incredibly stoner-coded