Pharmacology

Il y avait même de pilules pour devenir joyeux. C’est pas très romantique, mais je trouve ça amusant, l’idée que les histoires d’amour qui finissent mal peuvent se guérir avec de la pharmacie.

François Truffaut, L'homme qui aimait les femmes, 1977

ALTRUIZINE. A metapsychotropic transmitting agent effective for all sentient homoproteinates. The drug duplicates into others, within a radius of fifty yards, whatever sensations, emotions, and mental states one may experience… According to its discoverer, ALTRUIZINE will ensure the untrammeled reign of Brotherhood, Cooperation and Compassion in any society, since the neighbors of a happy man must share his happiness, and the happier he, the happier perforce they, so it is entirely in their own interest that they wish him nothing but the best. Should he suffer any hurt, they will rush so help at once, so as to spare themselves the pain induced by his. Neither walls, fences, hedges, nor any other obstacle will weaken the altruizing influence… We assume no responsibility for results at variance with the discoverer’s claims.

Stanislaw Lem, The Cyberiad: tales from the Cybernetic age, San Diego, 1976, p. 218

Rational and kindly behavior tends to produce good results and these results remain good even when the behavior which produced them was itself produced by a pill.

Aldous Huxley, Michael Horowitz, and Cynthia Palmer, Moksha: Aldous Huxley's classic writings on psychedelics and the visionary experience, Rochester, VT, 1977, p. 99