Can a Hole in Your Head Get You High?

Trepanation is presented as an unusual practice Amanda Feilding links to expanding consciousness and enhancing psychedelic effects. John Horgan recounts meeting Feilding at a 2001 conference on altered states of consciousness and learning she supported research via the Beckley Foundation and believed a skull hole could change brain blood flow and circulation. The piece mentions Feilding having been trepanned since 1970, needing repeat procedures as the tissue grows back, and her hope that trepanation could become accepted as standard medical practice, while also urging caution. It also connects her claims to the idea that cannabis and psychedelics may operate similarly, implying overlapping mechanisms related to brain physiology.