Originally Posted by MrSelfDestruct

It's a myth, van Gogh hallucinated because he'd run out of absinthe and start drinking paint and paint thinner. Any hallucination is from something not in traditional absinthe or is from the placebo effect. You get a different, more lucid drunkenness than with other liquors, but not only is thujone not the active ingredient in absinthe, it will cause kidney failure at lower doses than it takes to have other noticeable effect.