“Cody Johnson beautifully balances historical knowledge with cutting-edge science to produce a thoroughly enjoyable and enlightening read which paints a holistic picture of the risks and benefits of psychedelic use in modern day medicine and culture.” —Rick Doblin, PhD, Founder and Executive Director of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). Magic Medicine explores the fascinating history of psychedelic substances and provides a contemporary update about their growing inclusion in modern medicine, science, and culture. Each chapter dives into the rich history of a single plant or compound and explores its therapeutic and spiritual uses in cultures near and far. Firsthand quotes allow glimmers of psychedelic light throughout. Learn all about: Classical psychedelics, including 2C-B, ayahuasca, LSD, and peyote The empathogenic psychedelics MDA and MDMA Dissociative psychedelics, including DXM, ketamine, and salvia Unique psychedelics, including cannabis, DiPT, and even fish and sea sponges The history of psychedelic plants and substances is full of colorful facts and stories, and intriguing questions. Did US Army Intelligence really use LSD as an enhanced military interrogation technique? How is DiPT able to make a familiar tune sound utterly foreign? Can MDMA (Ecstasy) help people overcome traumatic experiences? Many psychedelic plants and substances have a long history of being incorporated into various healing traditions—such as cannabis and opium in Traditional Chinese Medicine. Science is beginning to research what traditional cultures have told us for years: psychedelics have transformative healing properties. Anyone who has ever wondered about psychedelics—from complete neophytes to veteran trippers, seekers and sages to skeptics and scientists, therapists and patients to green thumbs and armchair anthropologists—will find something in this engrossing and beautifully designed book.

This absorbing account of the evolution of modern medicine from its roots in folk medicine will entertain and inform both scientist and general reader alike. It explains the chemical basis of pharmacology, and provides a fascinating description of how the use and abuse of natural products in various societies throughout the ages has led to the development of many of the drugs we now take for granted.

The only book that brings together: an authoritative, stunningly illustrated field guide; a how-to book for identifying, collecting, and reserving plants; the fascinating story of the legends and lore of medicinal plants; and a do-it-yourself guide to planting and using herbs in cooking, cosmetics, and health. Illustrated.

The dynamics of Traditional African Medicine/Magic, kings, mystical warriors,and priests on the rise of the Great Benin empire.

A physician offers an impassioned and meticulously researched exposé of the alternative medicine industry, separating the sense from the nonsense. A half century ago, acupuncture, homeopathy, naturopathy, Chinese herbs, Christian exorcisms, dietary supplements, chiropractic manipulations, and ayurvedic remedies were considered on the fringe of medicine. Now these practices—known variably as alternative, complementary, holistic, or integrative medicine—have become mainstream, used by half of all Americans today to treat a variety of conditions, from excess weight to cancer. But alternative medicine is an unregulated industry under no legal obligation to prove its claims or admit its risks, and many popular alternative therapies are ineffective, expensive, or even deadly. In Do You Believe in Magic?, health advocate Dr. Offit debunks the treatments that don’t work and tells us why, and takes on the media celebrities who promote alternative medicine. Using dramatic real-life stories, he separates the sense from the nonsense, explaining why any therapy—alternative or traditional—should be scrutinized. As Dr. Offit explains, some popular therapies are remarkably helpful due to the placebo response, but “there’s no such thing as alternative medicine. There’s only medicine that works and medicine that doesn’t.”

One of the most fascinating men of his generation, W.H.R. Rivers was a British doctor and psychiatrist as well as a leading ethnologist. Immortalized as the hero of Pat Barker's award-winning Regeneration trilogy, Rivers was the clinician who, in the First World War, cared for the poet Siegfried Sassoon and other infantry officers injured on the western front. His researches into the borders of psychiatry, medicine and religion made him a prominent member of the British intelligentsia of the time, a friend of H.G. Wells, George Bernard Shaw and Bertrand Russell. Part of his appeal lay in an extraordinary intellect, mixed with a very real interest in his fellow man. Medicine, Magic and Religion is a prime example of this. A social institution, it is one of Rivers' finest works. In it, Rivers introduced the then revolutionary idea that indigenous practices are indeed rational, when viewed in terms of religious beliefs.

This book illustrates in detail the range of understandings of the human condition in New Testament times and remedies for ills that prevailed when Jesus and the apostles were spreading the Christian message and launching Christian communities in the Graeco-Roman world.