The cerebral field.

• +..Krautrock
• +..synth
• +..science fiction, crime noir and epic film

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It was also in the year 1957 that the idea of the ‘psychic energiser’ was first elucidated by a group of American researchers, including psychiatrist Nathan Kline. Kline, who became an avid evangelist for the use of iproniazid and similar drugs in depressive states (Healy 1997), suggested that a ‘psychic energiser’ was a drug that stimulated the psyche without stimulating the body. In a paper describing the effects of iproniazid in depressed outpatients, Kline and colleagues contrasted ‘psychic energisers’ with ‘general energisers’ by which they meant stimulants, such as amphetamine. According to their theory stimulants effected motor function and arousal as well as psychological state, thus exerting a ‘general rather than a specific action’ (Loomer, Saunders, + Kline 1957, p. 130). The authors went on, ‘it has heretofore been impossible to increase psychic energy without simultaneously increasing motor, alerting and cerebral activity – without resulting undesirable side effects when a certain level is reached’. ‘But’ they continued ‘it is our conviction that the present preparation, iproniazid, acts more selectively than any of the others’ (Loomer, Saunders, + Kline 1957, p. 130). They speculated that a purely or predominantly ‘psychic energizer’ energizer’ would increase appetite, in contrast to the appetite suppressant effects of general stimulants, and through similar mechanisms would also increase sexual desire. Although the anti-tuberculous drugs were noted to increase appetite, which does distinguish them from classical stimulants, these observations were made in patients with tuberculosis, and may have been due to improvement of the disease, which is well known to suppress appetite.
Moncrieff, J.. The Myth of the Chemical Cure: A Critique of Psychiatric Drug Treatment