It is always a good time when I visit the 'Melissa Harris Perry Show' on MSNBC.
In the mainstream, I'm suspect because I'm black. I have dreadlocks, I have a goatee. I mean, I'm just suspect. In my classroom and at Columbia, I'm not as suspect because it's clear I know what I'm doing, but I am still suspect.
It's not a crime to make a mistake; in fact, it's human. I certainly have made mistakes.
Drug reformers get seduced by politicians who co-opt our language but who make no meaningful change. And when we don't hold politicians accountable, we contribute to harm.
When patients reject official advice and proved medicine, they become more susceptible to quackery.
When you go to jail, you are under the supervision of the state. You are housed with people who are criminals, so that becomes the expectation. People learn to become better criminals in jail and prison.
If we stay focused on data and the real issues, we can tailor our inventions to enhance public health and safety while decreasing the likelihood of racial discrimination.
Most of the stuff that parades as drug education in this country is just rubbish with no foundation in evidence.
Skills that are employable or marketable, education, having a stake or meaningful role in society, not being marginalized - all of those things are very important.
I am a drug expert and the father of 3 black males.
The way we have been thinking about brain science is that people show you pretty pictures, pretty images, and you think that that tells you something about how they behave. It doesn't.
I went into the military because I didn't get a scholarship, a basketball scholarship I thought that I would get.
I had a grandmother who was really strong, who doted on me, who wanted to make sure that I didn't go off the beaten path, although I did.
I grew up in the hood in Miami in a poor neighborhood.
When we make decisions based on factors other than the available empirical evidence, we are less than objective, which means we are no longer acting as scientists.
Researchers, treatment providers - we all have a stake in the drug hysteria game.
When I got out of the military, I finished up my education at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, and I had some mentors who said, 'You got what it takes. You should consider going to graduate school, getting a Ph.D. in neuroscience.' I didn't think I had what it took until somebody who had a Ph.D. told me I had what it takes.
It is my mission to put sensible and evidence-based information above politics and exaggeration.
Teaching university students affords me the opportunity to demonstrate to young adults that they don't have to be perfect to make contributions to their country.
My research has taught me many important lessons, but perhaps none more important than this: drug effects, like semesters, are predictable; police interactions with black people are not.
