it is hugely influential. it's clearly doing something right, even if the makers of those who don't get a look-in perhaps think otherwise. al jazeera, hollywood. >> there's plenty more real news from al jazeera at our website aljazeera.com.

>> we realize the best way to actually immunize yuk people against the narrative, the best way to innoc late them is to use traditional islamic education from the traditional sources to immunize, narrative, so when they are exposed to radical features and radical ideas, they can recognize the perversion, it's a very simply methodology. it's been the most effective methodology to date. >> does the muslim american community have confidence in the government's ability to execute an effective strategy when it comes to countering extremeismextremism?

>> i think the american people rarely have confidence in the government to implement complex programs. when it comes to ideology and social factors like the issue of violent extremism is built on, it's difficult for government to implement a successfulphram program. >> what you are saying here is it's a grats roots program. but if they don't trust the government's creation why would they get involved? >> i think what needs to happen is communities need to come up with the programs. community-led and community driven. it should not be government-led and government-driven. the most successful programs we have seen both internationally and domestically are the ones that are community-driven. >> local? >> they have to be local like gang intervention programs like school shooting intervention programs. they have to be local and authentic. government cannot come in and impose a program. we saw the unsuccessful program of kwae "prevent" where the u.k.

government spent millions of pounds. it really did not have the intended i am packet. it needs to be community-led and driven. >> we asked our community: is it unfair for the government to ask muslim citizens to fight against isis? sigh crus says feels unfair and in the united states unconstitutional. am i the only one nervous that the government is deciding which islam is acceptable? governments shouldn't have to ask. it's the duty of every muslim to fight this evil ideology of isis/isil and heather says it's unfear to single out muslims and we have to bear the burden. >> i think it's a bit disingenuous to say the government is imposing state islam or state religion. i think that's not what the government is intended to do and what muslims will allow the government to do. what we see, what we talk about is the leadership in this problem. when the bochton marathon bombings happened, who were the ones impacted mostly? it was american muslims.

leadership not responsibility. >> all right. thanks foall of our guests washington director of the muslim public affairs council and ibrahim, founder of the solace foundation. next, psyche delde willauic healing. why cancer patients are turning to lsd and the bioethical concerns around taking a trip with your doctor. later, virtual reality isn't just fun and games. some say it could be the next frontier for how you get your news. talk to al jazeera part of our special black history month coverage on al jazeera america

>> tomorrow, studying deadly viruses. >> these facilities are incredibly safe, incredibly secure. >> go inside the study of infectious diseases. >> ventilated footy pajamas. >> protecting those working to protect us. >> we always have to stay one step ahead of them because they're out there. >> techknow's team of experts show you how the miracles of science... >> this is my selfie, what can you tell me about my future? >> can affect and surprise us. >> don't try this at home. >> "techknow" where technology meets humanity. tomorrow, 5:30 eastern. only on al jazeera america. welcome back. psychodelic drugs are gaining in popularity on some of the nation's most prestigious campuses. researchers are exploring potential therapeutic value for treating depression, addiction, and post-traumatic stress

disorder. the documentary, a new understanding, the science that details groundbreaking research of how psychedelic did are being used to ease anxiety of terminally ill-cancer patients. >> annie levy before her treatment. >> i had lost my faith because of anxiety. i was just terrified. i was so anxious that it was hard to think about anything else. yes thinkists so worried about death, but i was worried about the process of dying, about suffering and being in pain and having all kind of horrible medical procedures. it was very gentle and there were people right there if i got upset. i certainly felt that if anything scary happened i wasn't alone. but with my eyes covered, i saw patterns and visions and sort of faces. i thought about being involved with people i love and everything looked absolutely beautiful. >> when we came back it was

like someone had put on a light bulb inside annie's head. she was literally glowing. >> i felt wonderful. >> here to discuss this more on skype from torens california is dr. charles grove at the ucla school of medicine. he has been a frontrunner in psyche deltic research. he is here to share experiences with patients. >> james girodano at georgetown university. thank you for being here. dr. grove, when you think about psycheodelic drugs one things of the 1960s, counter culture and tom wolfe's "the electric cool aid acid test." why the study around compounds that were deemed dangerous and abandoned in the 1960s. >> i think that's not often appreciated is that during the 50s and 60s, into the early '70 did, there were some compelling and potentially valuable

research with psychodelics being conducted with psychiatrists and other mental health and health professionals around the world. there was very very exciting promise that this treatment model held. however, it went off of the rails with the culture because of cultural turmoil and the politization, research had to be shut down by the late '60s and, early '70 did. it took a few decades for enough time to elapse to be able to open up this area of i hope vestgation in a more objective manner and subsequently in recent years, my college and i at the heftor institute and other colleagues have been able to get f.d.a. approval, other regulatory approval and scrape together sufficient funding to conduct a series of stud i recognize which, number 1,

established feasibility. we're able to get this research off the ground and establishing effectist safety parameters within the context. >> dr. grob what kind of things specifically are you feeling optimistic about? i know there was promising work in the '60s on alcoholism. what specifically are you looking at now? >> my colleague has completed a study, bobenschutz, a treatment of hard-core alcoholics with a treatment model. so some of the more promising work from the '50s, '60s is being started again. other colleagues at ny. u, particularly steven russ are preparing new investigations do you have concerns about that?

>> you know, he raised some very interesting points. some of the early research although contemporary for the time, was plagued by a number of problems and some of the research was not done very well. so some of the early ideas some of the work, some of the subsequent studies were flawed. now the great studies done by dr. groebe, and the east coast, i think really drill down to the fact that we need to be cautious in really running up a red flag some of the side effects were not universal, and there may have been probables with methodology. so there is underlying current, that they can be far safer than weening maaed. with the right patients being selected and the right people to supervisor. >> of course, so there still

continues to be some worry about potential side effects but obviously, with the adequate controls we can also engang of the type needed much more carefully in determines what they are, what dose, and whom. >> talking about some of the risks, risks are inherent to all experimental treatments especially with regard to the neurological issues. there. sits complex. searching for viable treatments for anxiety is great if done responsibly. we have this great facebook comment from veronica: this is a temporary fix. i have done it obviously without the help of a mental health professional. the psychodelics allow your mind to let go of pre-conceived notions that is probably causing the stress. this is blurry beyond recreational drugs with these types of drugs, lsd and people like veronica have used it. how do we, if you will regulate if it's possible in this terrain to make sure we can really get

some solid analysis to help people who are surring? >> i think it's important to distinguish the model it is we created for approved research studies which optimize safety and dr. giordano said we are adhering to state-of-the-artery search methodology. in this manner i think we will be able to get adequate information by rigorously patrolling settings opinionmizing conditions focusing on safety parameters. i think that's -- that's the proper way to proceed, very cautiously very carefully and very clearly focus on not repeating some of the mistakes of the past. >> james, one of the things that's fascinating to me in the research is that a lot of people who are treated with sylisibin only need one or two treatments. why makes it so effective in a short-term? >> its effective. the two buzz words is it has to

be pragmatically done very very sound and it needs to be prudently carried through. i think the first step, the pragmatism is interesting because in the past 10 or 15 years, we have learned so much more about mechanisms of the brain on a variety of levels from the very very small to the very, very large and understanding more about how these compounds works. >> helps us adjust the dotes. what happens to happen is come pounldz such as psi lisibin that work through the seratonin system reset it particularly in the right conditions. so a single dose or a fairly longitudinal doting trial over a short period of time may create a neurological reset in these areas that have become broken or fixed in a strange pattern or strange neurological loop and it needs to be jarred out of that phenomenon. these drugs do a very very good job in doing that we have been a single trial or short-term trials. >> dr. grob i understand you are doing some ground breaking

work with adult autism patients? >> at the los angeles biomedical research institute, we have created a pilot investigation treating patients with advanced cancer who have severe reactive existential anxiety depression demoralization with a single session, psi lisybin treatment and a plats eastbound 0 control. we have published our results and we did find significance at various points during the six-month follow up of significantly reduced anxiety, improved mood and overall improved quality of life. >> okay. quickly, with the adult autism patients, what are you finding? >> okay. this is a different setting, using a mda treatment model with sdult ought youistics with overwhelming social anxiety. we are engaged in this study.

we have not broken our blind, so we don't know what the outcome is, but so far, at least, we have established strong safety parameters in all of the, you know, we have treated and, again, once we break the blind, we will be able to see if we have evidence of significant reduction of this overwhelming -- >> breaking the blind, determining who is on the placebo and who is not. georgetown university and dr. charles grob from the ucla school of medicine thanks. next, if reading the news and watching the news isn't enough for you, an evolution in gaming wants you to experience the news virtually, that is. >> not even resisting.

♪ ♪ welcome back. ♪ welcome back. the immediacy of news coverage

exposes viewers from the comfort of their living rooms. does too much information running around in your brain ultimately desense ties you? a new type of gaming called news gaming aims to increase your empathy by putting you at the scene. with us from los angeles is the nadadaly pena with a group that experiences in virtual reality story telling. people real available with video games. the action looks real. you had created virtual reality around news stories. >> my background wasn't a traditional correspondent. i was a journalist for "newsweek," made documentary films. i felt like gaming environment e really visceral dueality . >> giving people the ability

to be on scene, more raptly than reading nit the paper. >> how powerful have you discovered this is? is i know that senator mccain experienced it, the musician peter gabe reel experienced it what have been people's reactions in. >> the re, have been extraordinary i knew that i was going out on a limb. but very quickly, after i got thousands of people commentary documented it became very clear that it is a powerful format. >> we have asked our community about this, a lot of response, but if you need a v.r. engine, to discover empathy and compassion, you have real issues. what's your response to that. >> no, i think it's an obvious one, people are thinking of games as being grand theft auto, and they don't realize this is very carefully real stories that aren't getting

any attention. for example, people on the street in aleppo, we can get multiple archive sources so nobody was paying attention to the story. simply, the story that we did on the migrant alejandro who was killed more than a dozen patrol officers that just went right past people, now we have seen over 550,000 views about that piece way more attention. >> we know the technology is evolving quickly, we will look forward to seeing what you do with it, thank you for being on the show, and thank you for introducing virtual reality story telling to us. a final word about gaming though, before we go, we asked our community members what do they do the most, gaming or consuming the news. and the result, give hope to people who bring you the news. it is a small sample, but 65% say they spend more time paying attention to the news. until next time, we will see you online.

tripoli. >> adrienne finnegan ahead. a turkish operation into syria as an aggression and says that there will be repercussions. thousands gather to remember the maidan protest and a blast kills two. plus, i am phil lavell at the oscars in hollywood where we have not a long now t