To the people illegally micro-dosing: Why would you open yourself up to the liability of committing a felony crime for a placebo effect? The risk vs reward doesn’t seem to pan out for me.
You're overstating the legal status of simple possession.
Only in some US states is possession for personal use a felony. In some it is a misdemeanor or an infraction. In some legal jurisdictions these drugs are perfectly legal and are sold at retail.
Micro-dosing also feels quite nice. It has a major mood-brightening effect. It's the main reason I do it. I don't even think it improves work at all. But if you're happier you might do better work.
I tried micro-dosing for a short time in my past, but gave it up for reasons not important here.
My only parent, my mother, gave me only one rule that I had to live by. I had to abide by the law, no matter what it was or if I disagreed with it. She simply just did not want me to spend my life in jail and assured me that I would feel the same way by telling me how terrible jail is (which I did).
I say this because I sympathize with your standpoint. I could have written your comment in a past life.
In short, I would ask that you empathize with the concept that one's belief might exist outside the law.
A little more to say... the variables at play here have a wide range of interpretation on a personal level. I infer from your comment that you perceive the risk to be high. I perceived my risk associated with microdosing, including the risk of being shipped to prison, to be low.
Before microdosing, I had undergone a macrodose. That macrodosing session was a positive for me. As such, the reward and exploration of a microdose was enticing enough for me to try it.
Per the article, there seems to be a lot of value in doing something that you expect will improve your life, even if the actual effect is indiscernible from a placebo. (Plus, this ignores non-microdosing, which is certainly not placebo effect.)
I know a lot of people who have done psychedelics and I don’t think any of them have ever been prosecuted for possessing them. I’ve only ever heard of that happening to dealers. In my head, possession is in the same category as speeding or downloading movies.
I don’t have statistics to back this up, and it could be a reflection of the privilege of my social group.
The hype around microdosing has been off the charts in the past few years. The claimed benefits range from improving mood to treating depression to improving cognition.
As this study shows, that hype might actually explain some of the effect. People primed to think they were microdosing claimed to feel significant improvements, even when receiving placebo.
