#15 Gaige Clark - Psychedelic Drugs May Treat Schizophrenia

Schizophrenia affects 20 million people worldwide and there's no treatment for it.

There is growing evidence that psychedelic drugs like psilocybin (as found in "magic mushrooms") could help treat it. I explore this fascinating topic with Gaige Clark who writes a popular blog https://mad.science.blog detailing the science of mental illnesses and their potential treatments.

== What we talk about ==
0:04 - Introduction
1:13 - How did you get interested in the science of psychedelics and the mind?
6:21 - What is schizophrenia?
9:10 - How common is schizophrenia? How does it impact people’s lives?
11:16 - The role of genetics and stress in being prone to these disorders including schizophrenia?
15:44 - Making sense of hallucinations as an aftereffect of schizophrenia
20:05 - How do you define psychedelics? And how do they work?
41:35 - It seems counterintuitive that the drugs which make you hallucinate can cure you of the hallucinations happening because of schizophrenia - how is this happening?
59:50 - How much have we progressed in using psychedelics as a therapy?
1:02:43 - Is psychedelics being researched upon to be used as a cure for anything else apart from schizophrenia and addiction? 

== About the guest == 
Gaige Clark is currently studying psychology at UC Merced, focusing on neuroscience, pharmacology, and neuropsychology, especially in relation to psychedelic therapy. He reads bucket loads of papers on the science of mental disorders and documents them on this blog. Through personal experiments and emerging support in science, he now believes in the hypothesis that psychedelics may treat schizophrenia.