Carl Hart

Carl L. Hart (born October 30, 1966) is an American neuroscientist. He is a professor of neuroscience and psychology at Columbia University.[1] Hart is known for his research in drug abuse and drug addiction. Hart was the first tenured African American professor of sciences at Columbia University.

Carl Hart
Born (1966-10-30) October 30, 1966
Miami, Florida, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Alma materUniversity of Maryland, College Park (BS)
University of North Carolina, Wilmington
University of Wyoming (MS and PhD)
Known forResearch about recreational drug use, drug abuse, and addiction
Spouse(s)Robin Hart
Scientific career
FieldsNeuroscience and psychology
InstitutionsColumbia University
New York State Psychiatric Institute
ThesisRole of the L-type calcium channel in nicotine-induced locomotion in rats (1996)
Doctoral advisorCharlie Ksir
WebsiteOfficial website

Early life and education

Hart grew up in an impoverished Miami neighborhood, engaging in petty crime and the use and sale of drugs. His parents were divorced during his childhood, and he was raised by a single mother.[2] This environment influenced his world view, and he came to believe drugs were the reason for poverty and crime in most neighborhoods. Only later did he come to believe that "crime and poverty were mostly independent of drug use".[3] After high school, he served in the United States Air Force,[4][5] which became his path to higher education.

Hart earned a bachelor of science degree in psychology from the University of Maryland. He then earned his master of science and Ph.D. in neuroscience from the University of Wyoming. Hart attended UNC Wilmington, where he worked with Robert Hakan, before attending the University of Wyoming.[2]

Career

Hart is the Chair of the Department of Psychology and the Dirk Ziff Professor of Psychology (in Psychiatry) at Columbia University. His research is focused on understanding factors and circumstances that lead to decisions about whether or not to self-administer drugs.[6]

In September 2014, Hart was featured in an article discussing how he is debunking drug addiction.[7] He also presented at the TEDMED conference[8] on myths about drug addictions and is featured in the documentary The House I Live In (2012 film).

Carl Hart has given testimony to the United States Congress' Committee On Oversight and Government Reform.[9] He has been featured as a guest speaker at Talks@Google,[10] The Reason Foundation,[11] and The Nobel Conference.[12] Hart has also been interviewed or otherwise featured on CNN, "Stossel"[13] and "The Independents" on Fox Business, "All In with Chris Hayes" on MSNBC, Reason TV,[14] "The O'Reilly Factor" on Fox News, "Democracy Now!", and The Joe Rogan Experience.[15]

Research

Hart's research focuses on the behavioral and neuropharmalogical effects of psychoactive drugs. He is particularly interested in what social and psychological factors influence self-administration of drugs.[5] He uses his research as a scientific basis for his presentations on the importance of decriminalizing drugs. He cites the criminalization of crack cocaine (typically associated with black communities) and lack of similar criminalization of powder cocaine (traditionally associated with white communities) as an example of how drug criminalization has been based on social problems rather than scientific fact.[8] His work provides the scientific evidence to debunk the myths about hard drugs, and to work toward more lenient and humane policies.[16]

Hart's research acknowledges structural injustices, but also plays into an oppression analysis perspective of psychology. His research in some ways mirrors the work of Martin Seligman. Seligman did research on dogs, later used as a human model, finding that dogs placed in a situation where they cannot escape pain learn helplessness and lose the ability to escape when the option is reopened to them.[17] Hart's research has similar tones, in that he indicates a lack of positive outlets and activities as a reason for drug use in communities. His work differs in acknowledging the extreme structural injustices that further oppress and imprison black people. He uses his research to argue that laws intended to make a society safer based on empirical evidence, rather than an oppressive legal system that promotes white supremacy, will move us closer to justice.[8]

"Predictors of Drug Use in Prison among Incarcerated Black Men"

In 2012, Hart co-published research on drug use in U.S. prisons.[18] Black men are disproportionately incarcerated for drug use: 13.6% of the population is Black,[19] but 37.8% of prisoners are black[20] and 79% of people incarcerated for crack use are black.[21] Prison is not solving drug use. Hart's research finds that drug use continues in prisons, and those with more extensive drug histories tend to use more in prison than those with lesserdrug histories. Decriminalization of drug use and alternative policies that emphasize effective treatments are called for.[18]

"Developing Pharmacotherapies for Cannabis and Cocaine Use Disorders"

In this review, Hart and Lynch discuss a variety of treatments that have been attempted for cannabis and cocaine addiction. Multiple treatments have been found effective in reducing the symptoms of withdrawal for lab animals with cannabinoid addictions, but cocaine addiction has had notably less success.[22] Hart argues that the varied results across cocaine users need to serve as a reminder of the heterogeneity of cocaine users ranging from frequency of use and method of administration to habits and purposes for use.[22] This article is one example of his extensive research in drug addictions, and serves as a framework for looking at addiction as a disease rather than a crime.

High Price

In 2013, Hart published High Price: A Neuroscientist's Journey of Self-Discovery That Challenges Everything You Know About Drugs and Society.[2] In the first chapters of his book, Hart discusses his upbringing, time in the military, and years in college and grad school. He chronicles his journey to his PhD and his tenured professorship at Columbia, and discusses the sacrifices and challenges he had to make. A difficult aspect of succeeding in academia for a black man was to assimilate to white cultural standards. He discusses the challenge of learning white cultural norms and language, and then returning to his family and feeling alienated and unable to connect.[2]

Hart discusses how Fordham and Ogbu's idea of "Acting White" played into his early education.[23] In high school, he understood "Acting White" as students treating their communities with disdain. He argues that experts to some extent missed the mark with their claims that intellectualism is a rejection of blackness. Rather, it is removing oneself from one's own community, or as Fordham and Ogbu explained, disregarding the fictive kinship between Black people, that leads to the label of Acting White. Maintaining Eurocentric ideals and language can, Hart felt, strain those ties with the black community. In High Price, he discusses how his family often perceived that he was acting superior to them because of his language patterns and lifestyle.[2]

Hart ends the book with an argument for decriminalization of drugs. His research has shown that the dangers associated with drugs are largely misunderstood, and a decrease in stigma and increase in conversation would likely decrease the number of drug related deaths. Misconceptions about hard drugs are common, and countries such as Portugal and Thailand have decriminalized and begun the process of decriminalizing hard drug use.[24]

Drug Use for Grown-Ups

In 2021, Hart published Drug Use for Grown-Ups: Chasing Liberty in the Land of Fear.[25] In the book's prologue, Hart openly acknowledges that he personally uses heroin for recreational purposes. He further argues that for the majority of individuals, recreational use of drugs has a positive effect, and that journalists and researchers overstate the harms of recreational drug use.[26][27]

Implications and Influence

Hart recognizes how drugs may have been criminalized in the United States to specifically target minorities. One such example is the difference in sentencing between crack and cocaine, which are essentially the same drug. Hart is working to expose racism embedded in drug laws and to decriminalize drug use through policies that are scientifically based rather than heavily influenced by social determinants of the era.,[28][29] Hart has lectured in Africa, Asia, Europe, and North and South America and has testified before the United States Congress and around the world as an expert witness on psychoactive drugs.[29]

He also uses the intersection of his understanding about the systemic racism inherent in drug criminalization, in combination with his extensive knowledge about drugs, to combat mainstream stories which perpetuate myths of black (and other minority) inferiority.[29] One such example was a response to the Toxicology report presented in the case of Trayvon Martin. The extremely low levels of marijuana in Martin's blood were seen as evidence that he might have been paranoid the night of his shooting, causing him to attack Zimmerman.[30] Hart spoke out about this ruling—explaining that it ascribed to old notions of marijuana use, such as those implied in Reefer Madness, and failed to recognize the seven decades of research on marijuana that would 1) show the levels of marijuana present in Martin's blood were insufficient to cause the aforementioned side effects, and 2) disavow the side effects mentioned which are extremely uncommon in marijuana users.[31]

Hart calls for the use of empirical research in determining drug-related incidents across greatly varying scenarios, with the hope that scientifically grounded research will trump the racist policies currently in place, and decrease the unjust incarceration and punishment of black communities for drug use.

In May 2017, Hart was invited to speak at a drug policy forum conference held at the University of the Philippines Diliman. In his speech, he addressed the misconceptions about methamphetamine in the Philippines amidst President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs. Citing laboratory tests on animals, Hart refuted Duterte's claim that methamphetamine shrinks people's brains and causes them to become violent. In the aftermath of his speech, Hart began to receive online death threats which forced him to leave the Philippines shortly thereafter.[32][33][34] Duterte commented on Hart's claims, saying: "That's all bullshit to me". Duterte also called Hart a "son of a bitch who has gone crazy".[35] In an interview with Public Radio International, Hart described Duterte as "a president making such ignorant comments about drugs — like he’s a pharmacologist" and added that Duterte was "out of his league when he talks about drugs".[33][34]

In 2021, Hart appeared in the Netflix documentary Crack: Cocaine, Corruption & Conspiracy where he talked about the complex history of crack in the 1980s.[36]

Personal life

Hart lives in New York City and Switzerland.[37] He has three children.

Awards and honors

References
  1. "Columbia University psychology department faculty bio". Retrieved November 20, 2015.
  2. Hart, Carl (2013). High Price. New York, NY: Harper Collins. ISBN 978-0-06-201588-4.
  3. Hart, Carl. "Let's quit abusing drug users". Tedmed. Ted conferences. Retrieved November 21, 2016.
  4. "Carl Hart: Drugs don't turn people into criminals". Salon.com. June 17, 2013. Retrieved December 4, 2013.
  5. Columbia College Today: The Truth Teller.
  6. Hart, Carl. "Carl Hart". University of Columbia: Department of Psychology. Retrieved November 21, 2016.
  7. Lopez, German, Watch: A neuroscientist debunks common beliefs about drug addiction, Vox, September 18, 2014
  8. Carl Hart's Ted Talk TEDMED, September 11, 2014
  9. "Mixed Signals: the Administration's Policy on Marijuana, Part Four – the Health Effects and Science". Archived from the original on February 1, 2015. Retrieved February 1, 2015.
  10. Carl Hart, "HIGH PRICE: A Neuroscientist's Journey of Self-Discovery That ..." | Talks At Google Google, July 22, 2013
  11. "ReasonNYC – Carl Hart, author of High Price". Archived from the original on February 1, 2015. Retrieved February 1, 2015.
  12. "Carl Hart, PHD - Nobel Conference 51".
  13. "War on...(Airs Sunday at 10PM ET on FNC)". Archived from the original on June 28, 2015. Retrieved February 1, 2015.
  14. Neuroscientist Carl Hart: Science Says We Should Decriminalize Drugs Reason TV, July 15, 2013
  15. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5jMC8j7ElI
  16. Hart, Carl (2018). Drugs, Society & Human Behavior. McGraw Hill Education. ISBN 9781259913860.
  17. Seligman, Martin (1974). "27: Learned Helplessness". In Friedman, Raymond J; Katz, Martin M. (eds.). The Psychology of Depression. Oxford, England: Wiley and Sons. p. 318.
  18. Rowell, Tawandra L.; Wu, Elwin; Hart, Carl L.; Haile, Rahwa; El-Bassel, Nabila (2012). "Predictors of Drug Use in Prison among Incarcerated Black Men". The American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse. 38 (6): 593–597. doi:10.3109/00952990.2012.694536. PMC 3582218. PMID 22746253.
  19. Rastogi, Sonya. "The Black Population: 2010" (PDF). Census.gov. US government. Retrieved December 8, 2016.
  20. "InmateRace". Federal Bureau of Prisons. National Institute of Corrections. Retrieved November 22, 2016.
  21. Kurtzelen, Danielle. "Data Show Racial Disparity in Crack Sentencing". US News & World Report. Archived from the original on July 6, 2015. Retrieved December 8, 2016.
  22. Hart, Carl L.; Lynch, Wendy J. (2005). "Developing Pharmacotherapies for Cannabis and Cocaine Use Disorders". Current Neuropharmacology. 3 (2): 95–114. doi:10.2174/1570159053586726.
  23. Fordham, Signithia; Ogbu, John U. (1986). "Black Student's School Success: Coping with the "Burden of 'Acting White'"". The Urban Review. 18 (3): 176. doi:10.1007/bf01112192. S2CID 144414814.
  24. OPaungsawad, Gamjad; Hart, Carl (October 1, 2016). "Bangkok 2016: From overly punitive to deeply humane drug policies". Drug and Alcohol Dependence. 167: 223–234. doi:10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2016.08.004.
  25. Sally Satel (January 13, 2021). "'Drug Use for Grown-Ups' Review: A Dose of Dissent". The Wall Street Journal (book review).
  26. Casey Schwartz (January 12, 2021). "When Getting High Is a Hobby, Not a Habit". The New York Times (book review).
  27. Anthony, Andrew (February 6, 2021). "Meet Carl Hart: parent, Columbia professor – and heroin user". The Guardian. Retrieved February 7, 2021.
  28. "Race and the Drug War". We are the Drug Policy Alliance: Issues. Drug Policy Alliance. Retrieved December 8, 2016.
  29. Hart, Carl. "Short Bio". drcarlhart.com. Retrieved November 24, 2016.
  30. Sloane, Amanda; Winch, Graham (July 9, 2013). "Judge allow evidence of Trayvon Martin's marijuana use". CNN. Retrieved December 8, 2016.
  31. Hart, Carl L. (July 11, 2013). "Reefer Madness, an Unfortunate Redux". The New York Times. Retrieved December 8, 2016.
  32. Cupin, Bea (May 6, 2017). "Shabu shrinks brains? Drug abuse expert debunks 'myth'". Rappler. Archived from the original on December 12, 2018. Retrieved June 9, 2017.
  33. Winn, Patrick (June 6, 2017). "Neuroscientist Carl Hart says 'infant thinking' drives Philippines meth war". GlobalPost. Public Radio International. Archived from the original on December 30, 2019. Retrieved June 9, 2017.
  34. Dimacali, TJ (June 8, 2017). "Duterte 'ignorant' about drugs, says neuroscientist". GMA News. Archived from the original on June 11, 2017. Retrieved June 9, 2017.
  35. Romero, Alexis (May 10, 2017). "Duterte defends claim shabu shrinks brains with tirade". The Philippine Star. Archived from the original on May 15, 2017. Retrieved June 9, 2017.
  36. https://variety.com/2021/film/reviews/crack-cocaine-corruption-conspiracy-review-stanley-nelson-1234881879/#!
  37. High Price by Dr. Carl Hart: AUTHOR. Archived July 6, 2013, at the Wayback Machine
  38. "about carl hart". dr.carlhart. Retrieved June 11, 2018.
  39. "Addiction Recovery Resources: Dr. Gabor Maté Author & Speaker". Dr. Gabor Maté. Retrieved November 11, 2018.
  40. Ron Charles (July 30, 2014). "Winners of the 2014 PEN Literary Awards". The Washington Post. Retrieved August 1, 2014.
  41. "2014 PEN/E. O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award". pen.org. April 16, 2014. Retrieved August 1, 2014.
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