Hope International University

Abstract Background Psychedelics exert widespread effects on brain activity, but their impact on motor function is unclear. This is clinically relevant given the emerging interest in psychedelic-assisted physical therapy for disorders of motor function. This study’s primary objectives examined the feasibility and safety of administering movement tasks following low-to-moderate doses of psilocybin in healthy volunteers. Methods Healthy participants were randomly assigned three psilocybin doses consisting of either (1) 5mg, 10mg, and 15mg, or (2) 10mg, 15mg, and 20mg, with at least one week between doses. Movement tasks were administered during the acute drug effects. Participants, physiotherapists, and statisticians were blinded to the dosing order. Feasibility was assessed by evaluating completion of the de Morton Mobility Index and Functional Movement Exploration (measures of gross motor function). Safety outcomes included vital signs and adverse events. Additional exploratory motor outcomes included the Action Research Arm Test (assessing dexterity), Box and Block Test (Original and Modified versions) (combining dexterity with motor speed), Digit Symbol Substitution Test (combining motor speed with intellectual functions), and Reaction Time Ruler Drop Test (assessing reaction time). The 5-Dimensional Altered States of Consciousness and Ego-Dissolution Inventory assessed changes in states of consciousness. Blinding efficacy was assessed by asking participants and physiotherapists to guess the doses administered. Results Thirteen participants were randomised: seven to 5mg, 10mg, and 15mg; six to 10mg, 15mg, and 20mg. One participant was unable to complete several movement tasks at 20mg. Nausea (n=8, 62%) and headache (n=7, 54%) were the most common adverse events. No serious adverse events or adverse events related to movement task administration occurred. Median values [interquartile ranges] remained near-perfect across doses for the de Morton Mobility Index (92.5-100.0 [85.0-100.0]), Functional Movement Exploration (100.0 [96.0-100.0]), and Action Research Arm Test (56.0-57.0 [52.0-57.0]). Baseline Box and Block Test (Original) median scores (65.0 [60.0-67.0]) improved to 79.0 [70.0-83.0] at 5mg and 4.5 hours post-dose (5mg-4.5H), and worsened to 57.5 [51.0-64.0] at 20mg-1.5H. Baseline Box and Block Test (Modified) median scores (48.0 [47.0-53.0]) worsened to 43.0 [35.0-45.0] at 20mg-1.5H. Baseline Digit Symbol Substitution Test median scores (73.0 [66.0-77.0]) improved to 87.0 [81.0-90.0] at 10mg-4.5H, and worsened to 62.0 [54.0-86.0] at 20mg-1.5H. Reaction Time Ruler Drop Test scores lacked consistent dose-related changes across participants. Changes in states of consciousness were greatest at 20mg. Participants and physiotherapists correctly guessed the administered dose 53% and 50% of the time, respectively. Conclusions Movement tasks were feasible during psilocybin dosing up to 15mg. Impairments emerged at 20mg in tasks that combined motor and additional cognitive functions. These findings support the feasibility of performing complex movement tasks during psilocybin dosing and will inform the conduct of trials utilising psilocybin-assisted physical rehabilitation in neuropsychiatric disorders. Trial Registration Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry: ACTRN12621000560897 Date registered: 12 May 2021 URL: https://www.anzctr.org.au/Trial/Registration/TrialReview.aspx?id=381526&isReview=true Key Findings There is growing interest for psychedelic-assisted physical therapy in neuropsychiatric disorders of motor dysfunction, however, the impact of psychedelics on motor function remains unclear. This study investigated the feasibility, safety, and impact on motor function of administering movement tasks following low-to-moderate doses of psilocybin in healthy volunteers. These findings support the feasibility of performing complex movement tasks during psilocybin dosing up to 15mg and will inform the conduct of trials utilising psilocybin-assisted physical therapy in neuropsychiatric disorders.

This paper compares the physical, social, psychological, and legal developmental milestones experienced by youth that demonstrate their gradual ‘passage’ into young adulthood to the existing communal rites that celebrate these milestone transitions. This comparison shows the scarcity of such vital rite celebrations in contemporary America. Instead, there has been a switch to age-focused ritualization activities for youth becoming adults. This has led to an ineffective and unfulfilling coming-of-age experience for many. Self-oriented or group-oriented rites have emerged to meet the current felt need that are enacted by youth themselves. This has created a lack of a solid sense of adult identity and contributes to the formation of a new life-stage known as “emerging adulthood.” Considering the potential for transformative rites, I argue we need to construct new ways of acknowledging and ritualizing the important transitions youth experience, utilizing the already existing developmental milestones they experience as our basis.

This essay explores ‘territories of accelerated development’ (TORs) to reconstruct the economic policy-making, development institutions and macroeconomic framework of late Putinism since the 2010s. It argues that even with Russia’s integration into the world economy and the developmental rhetoric of state elites, TORs and the national developmental regime around them reproduce the patronal management and recycling of rents rather than the transformative and state-permeated facilitation of productive investments and capitalist profits. This upscaling of rents has been systemic. The result—rentierism—challenges common understandings of rent-seeking and commodity rents as incidental features of Russian ‘state capitalism’, and, instead places them at the centre of a non-capitalist order of its own.

Functional neurological disorder (FND) is common, and symptoms can be severe. There have been no international large-scale studies of patient experiences of FND. A patient questionnaire was created to assess FND patient characteristics, symptom comorbidities and illness perceptions. Respondents were recruited internationally through an open access questionnaire via social media and patient groups over a month-long period. In total, 1048 respondents from 16 countries participated. Mean age was 42years (86% female). Median FND symptom duration was 5years, and median time from first symptom to diagnosis was 2years. Mean number of current symptoms (core FND and associated) was 9.9. Many respondents had associated symptoms, for example fatigue (93%), memory difficulties (80%) and headache (70%). Self-reported psychiatric comorbidities were relatively common (depression, 43%; anxiety, 51%; panic, 20%; and post-traumatic stress disorder, 22%). Most respondents reported that FND had multiple causes, including physical and psychological. This large survey adds further evidence that people with FND typically have high levels of multiple symptom comorbidity with resultant distress. It also supports the notion that associated physical symptoms are of particular clinical significance in FND patients. Dualistic ideas of FND were not supported by respondents, who generally preferred to conceptualize the disorder as one at the interface of mind and brain. The need for a broad approach to this poorly served patient group is highlighted. Potential selection and response biases due to distribution of the survey online, mostly via FND patient groups, are a key limitation.

Jesus's refusal to be defended by the sword at his arrest plays a significant role in popular and scholarly understandings of Jesus as a committed pacifist. Of the four NT accounts, the Gospel of Luke offers Jesus's most forceful and unequivocal rebuke: “No more of this!” (Luke 22:51 NRSV), translating ἐᾶτε ἓως τούτου. Such a translation, however, is tendentious and misleading, seemingly the result of a twentieth-century translational bias that has exerted enormous influence on subsequent biblical translation and interpretation. An analysis of Luke's lexical usage, grammar, and context rather suggests that, instead of rebuking his disciples, Jesus is reminding them of the divine plan to which Jesus must not only submit, but which he must actively carry out. In Luke's narrative framework, Satan has received permission to sift the disciples in the present hour of darkness, and the disciples must not interfere with the divine permissio. This apocalyptic reading allows the words ἐᾶτε ἓως τούτου their more natural force: “permit until this,” or, more pointedly, “allow the arrest to continue.” The subsequent healing of the high priest's slave guarantees the continuation of the plan and expresses Jesus's control over the situation more than his presumed compassion or love. The implications for Christian ethics are considerable: Jesus may have been a “pacifist” but not in the way one might think.

One of the core findings in the sociology of religion literature regarding evangelicals is the penchant for the adoption of traditional family values. Despite the availability of alternative gender ideology models, evangelicals in general espouse a male headship and female domestic understanding of gender and concomitant domestic division of labor. There has been a "softening" of male headship language as this language is translated into a servant leadership model. This essay asks the question: What is the cost or impact for evangelicals to espouse a traditional model for gender ideology?

Spirituality is an important aspect of being a human. One may approach this topic from a purely psychological or religious perspective. In this paper, it is argued that spirituality as defined from a purely psychological perspective is inadequate to capture the depth of this human experience because it misses the core of spirituality—discipleship. Following Foster’s (1998) Streams of Living Water, it will be argued that discipleship is the core of Christian spirituality, and each of these streams provides an important context for fostering one’s relationship to the transcendent.

In this paper I construct Confucian moral realism as a metaethical theory that is compatible with, or even derivable from, traditional Confucianism. The paper is at once interpretative and constructive. In my analysis, Confucians can establish the realist's claims on moral properties because they embrace the view of a moralistic universe. Moral properties in Confucian ethics not only are presented as objective, naturalistic properties, but also are seen as ‘causally efficacious’. There are several theses commonly endorsed by contemporary moral realists. I will explain how many of the remarks by Confucius, Mencius, in Yijing, The Great Learning and The Doctrine of the Mean can be understood as implicit endorsements of these theses. I will also analyze the theses specific to Confucian moral realism. The paper will end with a brief defense of this form of realism.