From: http://www.maps.org/news-letters/v18n1/v18n1-MAPS_24.pdf
Use of LSD-25 for Computer ProgrammingHere is a way I used LSD-25 for a complex programming project
in 1975. I was working in New York developing a compiler for an
application language called "MARLAN". This application was for
the then popular IBM 360 and was written in 360 Assembler
Language. There were six large phases for this application, and
I was the responsible chief architect and programmer for the
project. There were approximately eight hundred subroutines
in the entire system.At one point in the project I could not
get an overall viewpoint for the operation
of the entire system. It really was too much
for my brain to keep all the subtle aspects
and processing nuances clear so I could get
a processing and design overview. After
struggling with this problem for a few
weeks, I decided to use a little acid to see if
it would enable a breakthrough, because
otherwise, I would not be able to complete
the project and be certain of a consistent
overall design. Overall design consistency
was important to reduce program and
design errors.
I used only seventy-five micrograms
because I was not interested in tripping, as
I had a specific, limited and definite
purpose for the use of LSD. While stimu-
lated by the LSD I was able to get the
entire system wholly in my mind at the
same time. I spent some time mentally
visualizing various aspects of the compiler,
the language and the processing which
would take place. I did discover three or
four design inconsistencies while being
stimulated by the effect of the LSD, and I
made notes for later checking. | | After twenty-four hours when the
effect of the LSD was completely gone, I
went over my notes. I needed to have a
measure of ÔfaithÕ that the design changes
suggested by my notes would produce the
beneficial effects they seemed to imply;
that is, I was again in the condition of
being not able to conceive of the entire
system at the same time in my mind.
Once all the changes were made, I was
able to successfully complete the program-
ming of this huge system. The design
changes I made reduced future program
modification errors and contributed to the
elegance of the design. The system was a
commercial success for my employer and
was used for many years by them. Al-
though the use of LSD was an important
component of the success of the system,
no one knew of its use except me. |
I wonder, any of you coder-people ever tried this?
I haven't tried LSD ever myself, just shrooms, and from what I remembered when I once took a low dosage, I got rather giggly and easily distracted, without much visual things happening (apart from colours intensified somewhat). I might have been able to think more symbolically or something, but the ADHD-like effect would probably have negated much useful coding, either that or I might have ended up with optimizing one single
for-loop in a really pretty way, probably making a nice pattern with indents, operators and comments :-P
I wouldn't think of combining it with dex or ritalin to combat the lack of focus, wouldn't dare to. I had a real bad experience combining shrooms with some real strong hashish, which I realize is very different, but the hours-long discomfort and bad trip it caused--while very educational in hindsight--doesn't make me want to risk mixing up things with shrooms ever more.
OTOH maybe if I took an even lower dose, together with a good friend who's also an excellent coder, reserve an entire day + evening, and perhaps recharge with another low dose halfway the day (if that would work? I read resistance builds up pretty quick?), and lots and lots of comfort-food (I found that unsalted mixed nuts and chocolate raisins are pretty much the only stuff I could bring myself to eat during heavy tripping, after having giggled at the funny face the half-open pistachios were making at me for some minutes).
Probably prepare that with building a nice experimental framework of code beforehand, so you can just write simple functions and procedures and experiment the fuck out of it. I'm thinking fractal renderers, cellular automata, perhaps some artificial life and/or PyBox2D physical simulations, would make us come up with some pretty wild generative art, and perhaps even more awesome. I'll bounce the idea off him, he was with me the evening on the low-dosage trip, but that was like 8 years ago.
Also a problem is shrooms have been illegal since a year (or 2?) in the Netherlands, fuck you fucking drug tourists and underaged french girls tripped out on booze coke weed and shrooms jumping off bridges in Amsterdam. Though I think you can still order starter grow kits off the Internets. (Or maybe the smart-shops that used to sell shrooms are able to offer information on how/where to get them still, or maybe they'll kick me out the same way a coffeeshop would if you'd ask them if they sell pills or coke.)
I could not imagine coding and tripping.
That said the dose this guy took was low and he did not code while under the influence, he coded after the fact.
I think he needed to give his mind a rest and after the fact had a clearer view of the project. Maybe?
Oh and I'm not sure about the eating bit-the last time I dosed was when I was in my teens and ugh-food was the furthest thing from my mind set.
If you try it-Keep notes and let us know how it goes. I'm interested in the results. (just curious is all)
I've definitely been able to come up with original elegant solutions to software design issues while under the influence of weed - big picture stuff. But actual coding has always been a fun farce - that has to wait until the effects have worn off.
I don't know whether it's possible with LSD to zoom in and out, or work at more than one level of symbolism concurrently, since I've never tried it. From second-hand accounts though, I think this would take a certain amount of familiarity with the drug. I've heard people say that they could go to school, sit through class, and work under the influence, but this is from people for whom during a certain period of time it would be an almost daily occurrence. I did infer a familiarity with the drug from the quoted passage.
Agreed with CU - this could be done under LSD, I guess, but you'd need to have used it before multiple times, and with the intent to do something other than just get high.
That said, I'd love to see the code that someone who unknowingly took LSD would write - I imagine it to be the programming equivalent of those webs that spiders on LSD make.
10 GOTO 10
:ohnotache:
:lulz:
I occasionally do design work under the influence of some sort of drug... but not the implementation. LSD in very small doses seems to work...pot seems to work... shrooms I can't imagine working... I would be too busy enjoying the trip ;-)
Though on shrooms once, I did come up with a concept for a cool solution that would basically create a gaming system using smartphones as the communication medium... never got past the prototype though.
I have had LSD help me understand Crowley's work on the Tarot. Not the same field obviously, but he does use pretty strict systems for tarot, it's not touchy feely wiccan type stuff. I have never done coding that was complicated enough that I think LSD would be beneficial, but I intend to, and if possible I may try this approach at some time. if I do I'll let you know.
I haven't touched any drugs.. but when I do want to solve a coding issue, I do a poo. It has never failed me.
Quote from: NotPublished on August 06, 2010, 01:48:36 AM
I haven't touched any drugs.. but when I do want to solve a coding issue, I do a poo. It has never failed me.
Heh, this has worked for me in the past. As has taking a masturbation break.
Working through a tough problem right now, I think I'll combine the last two suggestions.
The problem is if I do it during masturbation, then half way through I get a "OHHHHHHHHHHH" moment and then I end up confused ~ do I go and solve or do I finish what I'm doing?
Quote from: NotPublished on August 06, 2010, 01:58:04 AM
The problem is if I do it during masturbation, then half way through I get a "OHHHHHHHHHHH" moment and then I end up confused ~ do I go and solve or do I finish what I'm doing?
If that happens UR DOIN IT RONG
Quote from: NotPublished on August 06, 2010, 01:48:36 AM
I haven't touched any drugs.. but when I do want to solve a coding issue, I do a poo. It has never failed me.
The Djenkem method!
Quote from: Captain Dystopia on August 06, 2010, 01:56:32 AM
Working through a tough problem right now, I think I'll combine the last two suggestions.
you're going to poo out your dick?? :fap:
I love this board :lulz:
I wish. But after jizz shot out of my ass, I just kinda lost interest in the experiment.
PD.com - DOES NOT DELIVER!
btw trip, I award you mittens for figuring out how to post in two columns. Srsly, you're like some kind of sorcerer.
Quote from: Cramulus on August 06, 2010, 03:00:37 PM
btw trip, I award you mittens for figuring out how to post in two columns. Srsly, you're like some kind of sorcerer.
heehee hihi :D
if you quote-reply that post, you can see the BB-code and how it was done :)
it was just, the PDF already looked like that, and therefore it had really really short lines, and I didn't feel like removing half of the linebreaks or something, so I used the table tags to recreate the layout. IMO two-column layout with one column continuing into the next one doesn't really work as a format on the web, but it's cool that it can be done :)
I remember hearing that DNA was conceptually visualised on LSD.
Quote from: Cramulus on August 06, 2010, 02:32:57 PM
Quote from: Captain Dystopia on August 06, 2010, 01:56:32 AM
Working through a tough problem right now, I think I'll combine the last two suggestions.
you're going to poo out your dick?? :fap:
I love this board :lulz:
Careful. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vq63q45qfk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8vujRR-9zE
this is a great documentary film focusing on ted kaczynski, the 'unibomber' which goes into a lot of depth regarding the birth(ers) of the internet, government funding for the use of lsd by those individuals in programs, etc.
Quote from: Placid Dingo on October 10, 2010, 12:51:54 PM
I remember hearing that DNA was conceptually visualised on LSD.
Yes, there was some article about it...The writer claimed he broached the subject with Watson and was told never to bring it up again on pain of death or some such thing.
Quote from: Triple Zero on August 05, 2010, 11:55:57 AM
Also a problem is shrooms have been illegal since a year (or 2?) in the Netherlands, fuck you fucking drug tourists and underaged french girls tripped out on booze coke weed and shrooms jumping off bridges in Amsterdam. Though I think you can still order starter grow kits off the Internets. (Or maybe the smart-shops that used to sell shrooms are able to offer information on how/where to get them still, or maybe they'll kick me out the same way a coffeeshop would if you'd ask them if they sell pills or coke.)
I was in Amsterdam this spring and in the smaller alleys there were a lot of coffeshops that sold shrooms, shroom growth kits and even LSD.
Quote from: Aleister Growly on October 10, 2010, 07:07:58 PM
Quote from: Placid Dingo on October 10, 2010, 12:51:54 PM
I remember hearing that DNA was conceptually visualised on LSD.
Yes, there was some article about it...The writer claimed he broached the subject with Watson and was told never to bring it up again on pain of death or some such thing.
How much LSD was actually being used at the time? I was under the impression it didn't become popular until the late 50s.
The government were experimenting with it here in the early 50s, and many of those experiments were farmed out to University departments. Cambridge would've likely been one of the first places they would've given the drug to for testing, along with Oxford, and we know many of the first wave of users were scientists and other academic professionals. It's not implausible that Watson got his hands on some there, taking that into account, though agreeing with a theory whose first hit on Google is David Icke's website does worry me a bit.
Kary Mullis, who invented the polymerase chain reaction, on the other hand, was inspired by LSD and fully admits so.
Quote from: Cain on October 11, 2010, 07:35:19 AM
though agreeing with a theory whose first hit on Google is David Icke's website does worry me a bit.
This is the correct motorcycle of Paranoia. :)
Quote from: Cain on October 11, 2010, 07:35:19 AM
though agreeing with a theory whose first hit on Google is David Icke's website does worry me a bit.
Icke maybe out there, (even by Discordian standards) but I think he's probably one of the good guys. And entertaining as fuck. Occasionally, he's utterly convincing. Even whilst spouting the most incredulous bullshit.
Quote from: BadBeast on October 13, 2010, 01:26:36 AM
Icke maybe out there, (even by Discordian standards) but I think he's probably one of the good guys
What does that mean, exactly? He's not a reptilian? :lol:
Quote from: Aleister Growly on October 13, 2010, 06:55:48 AM
Quote from: BadBeast on October 13, 2010, 01:26:36 AM
Icke maybe out there, (even by Discordian standards) but I think he's probably one of the good guys
What does that mean, exactly? He's not a reptilian? :lol:
I don't think he is, no. Although he might be, in some triple bluff misinformation, discredit the opposition way. But he usually makes me laugh in a way that lizards don't, so my money's on him being Human.
Quote from: Dalekk on October 10, 2010, 09:00:37 PM
Quote from: Triple Zero on August 05, 2010, 11:55:57 AM
Also a problem is shrooms have been illegal since a year (or 2?) in the Netherlands, fuck you fucking drug tourists and underaged french girls tripped out on booze coke weed and shrooms jumping off bridges in Amsterdam. Though I think you can still order starter grow kits off the Internets. (Or maybe the smart-shops that used to sell shrooms are able to offer information on how/where to get them still, or maybe they'll kick me out the same way a coffeeshop would if you'd ask them if they sell pills or coke.)
I was in Amsterdam this spring and in the smaller alleys there were a lot of coffeshops that sold shrooms, shroom growth kits and even LSD.
Thanks, that's good info to know. Then it should be available under-the-counter in smartshops in other cities (like mine) as well. It's been many years since I used psychedelics, and I've never as much as asked around.
Although a regular coffeeshop should not sell anything except cannabis, because they can get their license revoked for much, much less.
Quote from: BabylonHoruv on August 06, 2010, 12:57:49 AM
I have had LSD help me understand Crowley's work on the Tarot. Not the same field obviously, but he does use pretty strict systems for tarot, it's not touchy feely wiccan type stuff. I have never done coding that was complicated enough that I think LSD would be beneficial, but I intend to, and if possible I may try this approach at some time. if I do I'll let you know.
Words fail me.