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Coffee is Addictive
zpok writes "According to scientists, coffee is really addictive, which I guess must mean they'll come in and confiscate your latte any moment now..." Can't wait for the study proving sugar is sweet.
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Seriously... is there ANYONE in ANY part of this country anymore that just takes a little bit of responsibility for their own goddamn actions? The idea that the effects of drinking a cup of coffee could even be considered being classified as a "disease" is absolutely ludicrous.
People are so pathetic these days. I think the only disease involved in all this "you're not an irresponsible jackass, you just need medical help!" attitude is an acute affliction of stupid.
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And cigarettes etc etc.
Course the failed War on Drugs should be canned, all drugs should be legalised, taxed and the cash used for rehabilitation services.
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...given that it has so much caffeine as well. I haven't had any soda in three and a half years, and I can tell you that it's still difficult not to drink it. Just smelling it really makes me want to drink some, so it definitely had an effect on me, regardless of whether that could be officially classified as addiction.
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All of you people that say that quitting something is easy, should actually try before saying anything.
It actually is VERY addictive. It beats almost anything else. Hence all the fat people.
It's easy to stop when you have a reason for doing so.
And there's less money spent on a demonstrably failed policy. And the product would have to be quality controlled, so fewer health problems, and junkies would be less likely to share needles, so fewer disease problems.
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"Can't wait for the study proving sugar is sweet."
So your statement is saying that you think this study is useless. Then why post it to the front page if you think it's useless?
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
Honestly, who here didn't know caffeine is majorly addictive, just like sugar? Anything that gives you a "buzz" is majorly addictive. Most of the soft drinks sell not based on taste (other than tasting sweet they don't really offer much taste qualities), but based on how addicted people are to the buzz they get from drinking them. I know a lot of people with cola or coffee addictions, and those addictions are tolerated (or not even recognized) because a caffeine and sugar addiction tends to not obviously harm society.
This may be obvious to some, but I think you can't blame the drug, you have to blame the person's chemical makeup.
Different people have varying levels of susceptibility to becoming addicted to drugs. Some people can't have a beer without becoming addicted to the alcohol, some people can handle beer but can't resist pot, some people can handle beer and pot but cocaine does them in, and some people can pretty much take anything without becoming addicted to it. If they can't handle a drug of lower addictiveness, they most likely won't be able to handle a more highly addictive drug.
I've noticed that most alcoholics also smoke cigarettes because if they can't break free of lure of alcohol, they surely can't break free of the hold of nicotine. It would be in their best interest not to even try any other drugs, because they'll get hooked easily.
There are those who can recreationally use cocaine or heroine and not become addicted. Since I'm posting as an anonymous coward, I'll tell you that I've hung out with people who did hard drugs, and partook in their activities, but I never developed a feeling of "need" for those drugs while they did. I don't smoke cigarettes and I only drink on an occasional weekend, yet I can go to a party and party hard and take whatever's on the table without becoming addicted- I realized this about 10 years ago.
But that's just me, don't try this at home.
...sorry, just had to say it. Prohibition funds organized crime of all sorts.
"That, and I think people would be happier :D"
Would they now? The drug problem isn't just about "cost of drugs", but the social problems that they bring. Never had a family torn apart by drug addiction, have you? It's easy to keep deluding ourselves "If only we follow our natures, we'll all be so happy."(1) Even those countries that have legalized drugs (and sex) have found that such a decision isn't "consequence free" for the individuals nor society.
(1) Just look at what food addiction is doing to America, and you can get that free of restrictions.
How did the parent post get a +4 for Insightful, anyway? I guess there are at least 5 of you out there who believe this B.S. statement.
Seriously, sugar is hardly the problem with obesity in America. The problem is primarily one of poor eating habits, coupled with lack of exercise. (Not that anecdotes prove anything, but just to pull out one random example; I used to know a gal who was a strict vegetarian, and I *never* once saw her eat a piece of candy or "junk food" - yet she was overweight.)
If you consume more calories than you use, you gain weight. It's really that simple. It doesn't matter if those calories come in the form of sugar or "healthy foods". If you're eating more than you're burning off - you'll eventually get fat.
If sugary foods are contributing to the obesity problem, it's only in a more indirect way. (Snack foods tend to be "ready to eat" and conveniently packaged. When you can just grab it, unwrap it, and stuff it in your mouth - you're more likely to do so often, hence increasing your overall intake of calories.)
Sugar is a serious part of the obesity problem in America. It's not the whole thing - our eating habits are the real problem. Regardless, sugar is a carbohydrate and when your body is functioning "normally" your body will store unused carbohydrates as fat, barring those which are expelled from the body as waste.
Put simply, most americans have been relegated to eating prepackaged foods. Who makes their own spaghetti sauce any more, for example? I know several of you out there are jumping up and down in your chair saying "me! me! ima post and tell this fucker off!" but the fact is that you are statistically insignificant. But spaghetti sauce is loaded with excess sugar and so is just about everything else we eat. Even hot dogs tend to have a ton of sugar added to them - someone please explain to me why little fine-ground sausages need sugar.
Well, actually, don't explain it, because I know the answer: they don't need sugar but focus groups, taste tests, and other forms of research have shown that we like to eat food with sugar added to it. So, the food industry in America (and other places) adds a grip of sugar to just about everything, including many foods that ordinarily wouldn't contain any.
In short, everything you eat is sugary unless you make it yourself. This IS a serious problem and it IS totally unnecessary.
The problem really goes beyond sugar though, which after all is just a carbohydrate. No matter how you feel about no- or low-carb diets like atkins (which is just a new name on an old diet, which can be referred to as a low-carb modified fast) the fact is that we eat too many carbohydrates. As early as the 1700s you can find literary examples with people making observations that people who eat a lot of starch are fatter on average than people who eat a lot of meat. You can find carbohydrate-based fillers in just about everything on the store shelves; anything that doesn't have carb-based fillers is probably primarily a carbohydrate to begin with, like bread. The USDA food pyramid, promoted by the NIH after several billion dollars were spent trying to prove that eating fat makes you fat and failing, yet promoted on the "strength" of a study which showed that taking drugs to reduce your cholesterol decreased your risk of heart disease, suggests that we eat more carbohydrates than anything else. This is not only totally unnecessary (your body can quite efficiently derive energy from fats, it just doesn't do it as quickly) but completely ridiculous and utterly unfounded.
I don't know how you got a +4, Insightful for saying that sugar isn't a big problem, because it is. It's only a part of the problem, but the aggressive promotion of sugar-laden foods in the US is a big part of why we're fat. C&H sugar will happily tell you via a message printed on the packaging that SUGAR CONTAINS NO FAT. Well, whoop-de-do, it still makes you fat.
Come down off your high horse, which is headed in the wrong direction anyway, and join the parade.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I use caffeine. I am addicted.
However I control my addiction by controlling my intake. I'll go cold turkey every once in a while to bring my quantity needs back down, especially after a long project.
I've stayed at two good sized mugs of coffee a day for years now. I've never climbed up to a pot a day.
Sure, I get a headache every once in a while, but by far the extra brain power and awareness is worth it.
vk.
This presumes that the body is a perfect translator of calories into energy.
If you reduce the ability of your body to effectively translate calories into energy, then variance in consumption has little effect on energy output.
Like a car with a carburetor turned way too rich, it consumes scads of fuel but doesn't produce much energy output.
For years, mankind only saw the connection between the gas pedal and the engine. Now we see the connection between the gas pedal and the carburetor and the engine.
This is what low-carbohydrate diets do.