Uploaded August 2025 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
Psychedelic hormesis: the transformative potential of pain and discomort, and the perils of experiential sterilization
Pain, discomfort and unease are among the defining features of psychedelic experiences. Though widely recognized as common, little attention has been given to their role in psychedelic transformation, and the implications of attempts to nullify them. To understand why these features of the psychedelic experience are key to its transformative potential, the concept of Hormesis proves useful. Looking at recent attempts to produce non-psychoactive psychedelics, this talk will applies the idea of Hormesis to the field of psychedelics and ask what happens when contemporary culture’s logics of safetyism and consumerism clash with a fundamental mechanism of psychedelic healing.
Bio:
Ido Hartogsohn is a senior lecturer in the Graduate Program in Science Technology and Society at Bar Ilan University. He has written extensively on the role of context (set and setting) in shaping the effects of psychedelics across diverse sociocultural conditions. His book American Trip: Set, Setting and the Psychedelic Experience in the Twentieth Century (MIT Press) appeared in 2020. Hartogsohn writes a newspaper column on the psychedelic renaissance and runs the Psychedelic Video Museum.
Psychedelic hormesis: the transformative potential of pain and discomort, and the perils of experiential sterilization
Pain, discomfort and unease are among the defining features of psychedelic experiences. Though widely recognized as common, little attention has been given to their role in psychedelic transformation, and the implications of attempts to nullify them. To understand why these features of the psychedelic experience are key to its transformative potential, the concept of Hormesis proves useful. Looking at recent attempts to produce non-psychoactive psychedelics, this talk will applies the idea of Hormesis to the field of psychedelics and ask what happens when contemporary culture’s logics of safetyism and consumerism clash with a fundamental mechanism of psychedelic healing.
Bio:
Ido Hartogsohn is a senior lecturer in the Graduate Program in Science Technology and Society at Bar Ilan University. He has written extensively on the role of context (set and setting) in shaping the effects of psychedelics across diverse sociocultural conditions. His book American Trip: Set, Setting and the Psychedelic Experience in the Twentieth Century (MIT Press) appeared in 2020. Hartogsohn writes a newspaper column on the psychedelic renaissance and runs the Psychedelic Video Museum.
