Some accomplishments that don't get nearly enough credit in discussions like this are art, movies and music.

Countless artists, writers and musicians were influenced by psychedelics. It's not hard to make an argument that the music most people listen to and love today would not exist without the influence of psychedelics.

The Beatles are just one super famous example, where the influence of psychedelics on their music is super obvious and the tremendous influence of The Beatles is undeniable, but the same could be said of many if not most 60's/70's musicians, which in turn had huge influence on what followed, not to mention the obvious influence of psychedelics on psytrance and dance/club music in general.

Something else to consider is that from the time psychedelics were outlawed until very recently admitting psychedelic use was taboo, and so many psychedelic users were in the closet.

These are more open times, so some people are admitting it now, but many are still in the closet because coming out as a psychedelic user could still negatively impact your job prospects, the way society in general views you, and perhaps your relationships with people you care about.

So there are probably way more psychedelic users out there than most people realize, and their accomplishments when taken as a whole are very significant.

How much of such accomplishments were due to the influence of psychedelics? We don't have enough information to say for certain, but there have been studies on the effects of psychedelics on creativity[1][2][3] which show a positive effect. That's not to mention the well demonstrated potential of psychedelics to help with depression, the alleviation of which could also help users to create and contribute to society.

[1] - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35105186/

[2] - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2723891/

[3] - https://www.amazon.com/LSD-Spirituality-Creative-Process-Gro...

There have been some studies on the effect of psychedelics on creativity. A particularly relevant study by Oscar Janiger has been documented in LSD, Spirituality, and the Creative Process.[1] Other studies (including ones on microdosing) are discussed in The Psychedelic Explorer's Guide by James Fadiman.[2]

That said, this is a wide open field that could greatly benefit from more research. I am hopeful that such research will once again become acceptable to the scientific establishment before too long, as a number of studies on other effects of psychedelics have recently been completed with much success.

[1] - https://www.amazon.com/LSD-Spirituality-Creative-Process-Gro...

[2] - https://www.amazon.com/Psychedelic-Explorers-Guide-Therapeut...