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Many Scientists Using Performance Enhancing Drugs
docinthemachine is one of several readers to send word of a new poll published in Nature showing unprecedented levels of cognitive performance-enhancing drug abuse by top academic scientists. The poll, conducted among subscribers to Nature, surveyed 1,400 scientists from 60 nations (70% from the US). 20% reported using performance-enhancing drugs. Among the drug-using population, 62% used Ritalin, 44% used Provigil, and 15% used beta-blockers like Inderal. Frequency of use was evenly divided among those who used drugs daily, weekly, monthly, and once a year. All such use without a prescription is illegal.
It is "drug abuse" when drugs are used without the informed consent of an individual; it is simply "illegal drug use" (and very likely legislative abuse of personal liberties at the same time) when an adult makes an informed choice about drug use that doesn't comply with the current law.
People need to move away from the mindset where media pompously and wrongly attributes polar positions such as "right and wrong" and "use and abuse" to be a 100% lexical replacement for "legal and illegal." Anyone with any sense at all knows better than that. A significant number of the laws on the books in the country I live in (the USA) are inherently wrong, outright un- or anti-constitutional, or something even worse. Using them to define what is "right" leads directly to behaviors that are despicable — or worse.
One can be cynical and simply say that this is because our legislators aren't very good at their jobs. Both from the standpoint of making good law in the first place, and also in the sense that they seem to be almost incapable of admitting they made a mistake and taking bad law off the books. Personally, I think it's because they're not very good at liberty — and very good indeed at lawmaking.
There's an old saw that goes, "never attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence", but I think in the case of bad law, we are indeed looking at malice aforethought. It seems to me that these people have agendas that can only be construed to be "for the people" if you slept through history class and have never read any of the founding documents with any interest. Like most Americans. :(
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
We prescribe these drugs to millions of kids who most likely have nothing "wrong" with them, and people have a problem when some adults do the same thing?
This isn't athletics. The point isn't fairness. The point is advancing the science. I have serious doubts that these drugs are actually helping anybody do research who didn't already have some kind of problem, but it's none of our damn business, either.
Caffeine anyone?
Strangely absent from the list. I've known few scientists that didn't consume lots of caffeine.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Obviously these people are a terrible criminal element and must be made examples of. For the glory of the war on drugs!
The blurb makes it sound as if all this use is illegal. I would imagine most isn't: most of these people will have prescriptions but are using them for off-label purposes. Which is legal.
This just in: people use drugs.
So, will they take away your Nobel if you've been found to use science-enhancing drugs?
...next to many of the Nobel entries.
Sounds like a congressional hearing may be in order. It has been reported that Kip Thorne was seen injecting Hawking in the buttocks from time to time.
It isn't necessarily illegal to possess or use prescription medicine without a prescription unless it is a controlled substance or there are state or other laws that come into play. It is illegal to dispense it without a presecription.
Inderal is not a controlled substance.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Most beta blockers are used as a treatment for high blood pressure. Surely the stress levels that these scientists experience would justify that kind of prescription.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
By this strange scrawney man with black rimmed glases in a tan trenchcoat wearing sneakers and waving around a metal tool with a blue glowing end.
The man was apparently muttering about some kind of oil that supposedly made the brain work faster or some such nonsense.
His accomplices included a blonde bimbo, a middle aged woman resembling a sturng out housewife, her young ethnic lover, and a poorly put together RC dog.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
Performance enhancing means Viagra.... no wonder kids aren't doing science.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
They "test" them.
Wow, the quote of the day actually fits the article.
Obviously I was either onto something, or on something. -- Larry Wall on the creation of Perl
Does this mean there will be mandatory drug testing at the Science Olympiad?
:^p
Just what was in Albert Einstein's pipe?
And how did Stephen Hawking really end up in that wheelchair?
My confidence is shattered.
-- Insert witty one-liner here. --
IIIIssss ccc ooofffeeeee aaaa ppperfommmance eeeenhancingggg drug????? Bbbbeeccausse IIII fffeelll fasster....
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!
I find that 5-HTP helps me a great deal. It's a precursor of serotonin.
When I'm on it, I not only feel sharper, more alert, and better able to remember fine details, but I'm also better able to read social cues and interact with people. 5-HTP is perfectly legal, and can be purchased at general online or brick-and-mortar health stores.
Actually, lots of people use beta-blockers as a performance enhancer. The most common use is for musicians who have to do an audition. Beta-blockers really reduce any shakes that may ruin a performance.
I had a prescription for years to treat familial tremors. The drug worked well but tended to make me drowsy so I quit. As I get older, the shakes get worse and I may have to go back on them. C'est la vie. (shrugs)
I don't know why anyone would take this unless they needed to. I took it for 6 years and it was horrible each day. Not eating, weighing 145 pounds starting college at 6 foot 1 inches. Dilated pupils constantly, insomnia, muscle twitches, impotency, and so many more for all those years. It was horrible. I just don't get it why anyone would want to use these drugs. The last time I took Adderall was my last exam in college and I don't plan on ever taking them again. I'll just learn to deal with ADD some other way.
I came up with a theory of everything while on LSD once or twice... actually come to think of it every time I took acid. Unfortunately my notes were always undecipherable once the effects of the drug had worn off.
If caffeine counts as well I'm sure the percentage would be close to 100% :P
(it is a brain-boosting drug, isn't it...?)
Every expression is true, for a given value of 'true'
and not even a slap on the wrist for these lily white nerds??
Some inner city kid dealing to stay alive or using gets locked up for serious time in tough prisons. Yet these geek scientists are abusing drugs and nothing happens. Seems to be a big double standard to me!!
NOT "performance enhancing" drugs. Performance correcting drugs. The drugs listed are for ADD, ADHD, and psychological problems like bipolar disorder. This is not illegal drug use. This is prescribed medicine for people with problems. If the report was on prevalent use of PCP and cocaine in the science field I would understand. This is just chicanery.
captcha: higher
Hawhaw
You say those without a prescription are doing it illegally. Well, how many are legally taking these medications as prescribed by a physician?
Inderal is a cheap beta blocker ($4 for a month's supply) commonly used for the treatment of hypertension and various heart diseases. It can also be used on an as-needed basis for stage fright.
Adult ADHD may be treated with Ritalin. If people are prescribed these medicines, then no foul.
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
Now they'll have to start testing Nobel Prize winners to see if they cheated by using performance enhancing drugs.
It's not fair to others and sends the wrong message to young scientists.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
... that "that stuff" has been right here in the possession of my own peers and friends all this time !?
And to think of all the times I had to drive half way across town !
What a bunch of loosers to take chemical corporate drugs, while they could smoke a nice joint instead.
I would like to note that this was an online survey done in an informal setting. It has just about as much worth as any slashdot survey.
I'm a research scientist at a top-10 uni, just made assoc. professor.
While I would not say problems from use of anything "harder" than caffeine is wildly rampant, I was involved in a case with an undergraduate student who had some very severe issues with provigil (modafanil.) It was prescribed for "ADHD" in this (otherwise bright IMHO), and she simply noted her improvement, and started taking it excessively, ultimately sleeping very few hours and irregularly. After a period of great improvement she failed three successive exams and had to take some time off.
It is an anecdote, I know, but talking with the dean and admins at the undergrad part of my uni they see 20-30 cases per year of academic downfall associated with prescription stimulant use. Of course, who knows what these kids would have done *without* the drug, but the pattern of use / dependence / excessive use / "crash" is pretty established.
Among my friends / colleagues (mainly in their mid 30's) I would agree about 2/3 have tried something like ritalin or modafanil, primarily to stay up late. Personally, I keep myself on pretty low doses of caffeine so I can still use the 3 cans of mountain dew to keep up before a grant application is due, etc.
I wonder how many of those scientists made their own concoctions? And would it be illegal drug abuse?
Seven Days with Ubuntu Unity
I use Adderall damn that drug is addictive. I can stay up all night then take that and I feel good as new an hour later. Plus it has the benefit for me of allowing me to concentrate better and get more work done. It also stops me from clicking the damn stumbleupon button for hours on end. With it I get twice as much work done and can think twice as well.
Please note I do have a prescription for it and I dont even need to fake ADD to get it, just he gives me a slightly higher dose than I might need.
It's not fair that there are men who are by nature able to get far more physically fit than I ever could without using steroids. It's not fair that there are people who have better minds than I do.
But then again, life's not fair. You can either be happy with what you have, or spend your time moping like a 2 year old that it's not fair that someone is better than you can ever be at something. Given the effects of most of any type of "performance enhancing drugs" why would you ever lose sleep over being beaten by someone who uses them? Give them 20-30 years of use and see if they're still all that.
Did the author check the laws governing prescription drugs in all 60 countries before making that statement?
Plain and simple.
1. The criterion of science changed very much since Roger Bacon.
2. Majority of people in science are seeing it not as a quest for knowledge, but a race for grants, recognition, fame, fortune, "pursuit of happiness" (waLlahi, I hate that concept), whatever but true knowledge.
3. Corruption: putting down submitted manuscripts, because the author belongs to the competing school, stealing ideas from submitting manuscripts, plagiarism, plain forgery of experimental results, supporting whatever baseless theoretical crap that comes from your camp.
4. Exploitation. Postdocs are exploited like slaves.
5. Most of what is called science, is not science, it's plain vanilla technology. It might seem "potatoes/potatoes" to somebody, but it's not. The motivation SHOULD be quite different.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
taking drugs for enhancement is actually self-defeating, psychologically and philosophically. you can cut at the issue with two simple questions: how much of what you do is you? how much of it is the drug?
philosophically speaking, you lose some of your identity when you self-enhance. if you don't buy my argument, i have two words for you: barry bonds. the guy was a great athlete and probably would have made a huge impact on baseball without steroids. now you tell me what his legacy is. what would his legacy be without steroids? you say he would have achieved less physically? ok, but at least whatever he achieved be his own, and not due to a drug, which therefore tarnishes his legacy and diminishes it, to something less than what he would have achieved without steroids
the issue may seem trivial or laughable, but its not. because you not only alter how the world sees you and your accomplishments, you also alter your own self-perception, permanently and negatively. when you alter how you view yourself, you alter your sense of identity, your individualism, your sense of self-regard and your will. if you shortchange yourself, if you tell yourself that some of what you do or did is because of a drug, instead of your own creativity, perseverence, hard work, charm, etc., then you permanently diminish your own sense of self-regard. on this issue alone, enhancement through drugs is not worth it. because it's one thing to cheat and never get caught. its another to cheat, never get caught, but always know yourself that you are a fake. or even if steroids for sports or brain enhancement for science work were 100% socially acceptable: you still have to deal with how you have altered how yourself view your own accomplishments as being a product of something that is not 100% your own
i am not talking about habituation or addiction, i am talking about altering the perception of self, and belittling your own contributions. it's a psychological and philosophical trap: you eventually wind up seeking the drug to BE yourself, rather than to ENHANCE yourself. show me someone who says "no, i can always keep those two issues separate," and i'll show you someone who is low on the self-awareness scale and is in fact most vulnerable to this subtle weakening of self-regard and self-identification
get drunk, smoke marijuana, hey whatever. taking drugs for recreation is actually an act of blotting out the self, destroying oneself temporarily, for the sake of freeing the id and having pleasure. and therefore, this is behavior that is not what i am arguing against in this comment and therefore i am not your typical "just say no to drugs" prude
what i am saying is that if you do any drug to heighten yourself, you achieve the opposite: you denigrate and diminish a sense of self. it is psychologically and philosophically unavoidable. drugs do not enhance life, they blot it out. for recreation, this is fine. but in any aspect of yourself where you should be emphasizing your own contributions, enhacing yourself, you wind up in the end doing psychological harm in the realm of self-regard, removing oneself from your own calculation to yourself about how much you matter and how much you yourself change in this world, rather than some drug
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Let's get 'em!
DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
In today's news, Berry Dexter Bonds was informed that his three Nobel prizes for curing cancer and inventing a practical flying car will be revoked. Drug testing revealed that banned brain-enhancing substances were in his bloodstream just prior the prize ceremony. Testing has been standard procedure for the Nobel ceremonies since it was discovered that the inventor of the brain-enhancing drug, IQtrophine, used it to win a Nobel prize for curing the common cold.
It has also been revealed that Steven Nash of the Phoenix Suns NBA team has been taking brain enhancing drugs to help him make smarter, more accurate ball passes. One side effect is that it stunted his growth. College photos revealed that he used to be taller than Shaquille O'Neal. "I wasn't making it as a center, so I decided to become the Mother of All Point Guards", he said at a news conference.
Table-ized A.I.
As with many other areas of human endeavor, it'll be necessary for our social understanding to evolve to match our technological evolution in order for us to correctly analyze and act upon the previously unencountered situations which are going to arise from our continued growth as a species.
I mean, if you learned something from a professor who was under the influence of performance enhancing drugs, do you have to forget it?
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"
by next Friday! Scientists won't be given the excuse that a colleague has "misremembered" something. Hah, take that science!
Roger Clemens-1
Scientists-1???
I've been looking for a comment that affirms that using a prescription for non-prescription purposes is a bad thing - I expected someone to hold that position. But the responses so far have been humorous, tangential, or specifically denouncing the idea that it's wrong.
Huh! So let's take a specific example: do you think it's okay to take Ritalin to give yourself a couple of hours of extra study time, regardless of whether it's been prescribed to you? (One of the side effects of Ritalin is that it keeps you awake a few hours after you've taken it.) And if you've done it, would you be willing to admit it in public?
I can vouch for Provigil... Great stuff... It's like drinking a pot of coffee, without the jitters. It's a DEA schedule IV drug with limited abuse potential, prescription sleeps aids are also schedule IV.
I'm doing some research on Compton scattering over at Sweden's synchrotron radiation facility, and the sinister bastards have put a coffee machine that doesn't charge you in the cafeteria (presumably the cost of the coffee is countered by increased staff productivity ). I don't know how many times at 2pm I suddenly realize that perhaps 4 cups of coffee in as many hours is not going to be good for me in the long run. They should work to find a way for our dosimeters keep track of our caffeine levels, because I imagine the sweet black nectar is far more dangerous than the x-rays.
_You_ can drink drugs are "self-defeating".. But who cares? If I used drugs to save my life, then I would say that is good. I won't even stop to think about how I have degraded myself by staying alive. I don't think any cancer survivors feel any smaller because they needed to use drugs to beat cancer..
If I use drugs to clear my head to solve an important problem, then I don't consider that problem any less solved. I'm not working on solving a problem just to see if I can do it... I want to save the world for the world's sake, not my sake.
I would say that this line of thinking is kind of "selfish" in a way. The need for people to believe sports are fair and uncompromised by drugs has skewed the way people think of performance enhancment. Enhancement is good. We like enhancement. Get over it.
"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety"-B.Franklin
I know at my University for example that there is widespread use of Ritalin for studying purposes once it got out that you can learn entire courses inside and out pulling all-nighters when you're on Ritalin.
A friend of mine is a regular user of Ritalin, and because I knew the guy (and his marks) before he started using I can tell you with some confidence that Ritalin will add a very significant boost to your GPA.
I also have anecdotal evidence of many pre-med students using Ritalin when they study for the MCAT, prerequisite courses, etc. since competition for med school here is so fierce.
If the students are doing it because they're under pressure for higher grades, why wouldn't the professors and scientists be doing it when they're under (arguably greater) pressure to produce research results.
Ritalin is scary stuff. There are no good-quality long-term studies on the effects of Ritalin. And there is some evidence that ritalin is carcinogenic and can cause permanent changes in the brain. There is a partial summary of potential problems with ritalin here (mostly as it is used to treat ADHD).
This kind of talk scares me as much as the morals police of the religious right. The potential for meddling in our personal affairs will only get worse with universal healthcare.
Every element of your lifestyle can be argued to affect society.
Those arguments would start with alcohol prohibition. More overdoses and cronic conditions start there.
They could also include the number of sex partners you have and if you use protection.
Do you exercise? What is your BMI?
How is your diet? Do you engage in extreme sports?
affects someone else, or society at large, or not at all. and therefore people can "stick their nose into someone else's business" because someone else's business is affecting them
i think that taking performance enhancing drugs does not affect anyone but the user, but i at the same time sense in you a very strong sense of outrage over people getting involved in someone else's private business
yes, you can do whatever you want as long as it doesn't affect someone else. but its possible that you are not aware of all of the ways your behavior has negative consequences on other people. society has a right to get involved in your "private" business if its not really private after all, if it has negative public effects. sometimes i think some people need to reevaluate their "that's private business!" label on some behavior which obviously isn't
of course, people also invent bullshit reasons and fears to stick their nose in someone else's bedroom, this is true. and such people should be beat down. so both is true:
1. there are bullshit reasons fearful people invent to invade other people's private business
2. some behavior some people regard as totally private do in fact have public consequences that some people are unwilling or unable to admit or recognize
example: too often you see completely naive and inexperienced people arguing for the complete decriminalization of things like cocaine and heroin and methamphetamine, when it is a fact that the addiction rates and the lives destroyed by these drugs means society has every right to fight these drugs. it is nice to argue about your personal privacy in a vacuum. but at some point, you have to pay the rent, buy some food, and go to work and maintain your relationship with your girlfriend, family, etc. hardcore addictive drugs like heroin, cocaine, and meth destroy your ability to do those things, so they aren't really private behavior at all. something like marijuana isn't addictive, so it should be 100% legal. but only a complete fool thinks heroin, cocaine, or meth should be legal. they must have zero experience with these drugs and what they do to human lives, and what they do to society, which somehow must clothe and feed and house what are now zombies, but who would have been productive members of society if addictive drugs never got to them
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I think that is best single argument I have ever heard against state interference in people's behaviour (aka. the 'nanny state'). Interesting, thanks.
Python coder | PyQt Applications | Writer
This is rather different (even accepting that these drugs aren't being taken for legitimate problems) from athletes taking steroids, I think. Athletes are playing games for entertainment purposes. Allowing them to dope up ruins the game to most spectators and the cost-to-benefits ratio is highly questionable. (If the steroids had no side effects, it's not clear to me how that might shift, though.)
A better comparison than athletics might be to a job where strength is still required, like fire-fighting. If you had a fairly safe (I won't pretend that any drug will have no side-effects) steroid that fire-fighters could take to make them stronger and more effective at their jobs, would you permit it? I think it's a fairly similar situation.
And for the record, unless you count about a gallon of various teas per day and Excederin to shoo away the migraines, this scientist is clean of performance-enhancing drugs. On the other hand, I'm kind of slow compared to many colleagues. Hmm...
Leave it to some clod on /. to simply assert as fact a single side of a philosophical quandary that has puzzled all of human kind, including some of its finest minds, since long before the beginning of written history.
It's all subjective. Right. Carry on. Glad that's sorted. Care to weigh in on P = NP ?
I've certainly had a lot of help from the so-called "hippie speedball" -- i.e. caffeine-laden energy drinks or coffee in combination with cannabis (smoked or eaten). I've found that this makes design tasks very, very interesting and quite satisfying to work on. As always, specifications and designs drafted this way are drafts and should go through the usual re-drafting, rewriting and reviewing process the same as every other design document.
This might not work for everyone. I was almost diagnosed as an ADD kid a decade back. But for me, pot of tea or two + laptop + bonghits + armchair usually equals a workable design to some end.
And hey, it's not even prescription pharmaceuticals (unless you're in california)!
It's fine for you until some vicodin chompin' fool rams his car into you and you want to sue the drug manufactuer and the physician who prescribed it and the FDA and the ... on and on.
Oh... and as long as it isn't Rush Limbaugh wolfin' down the vicodin... its ok w/ you. Otherwise... "throw the hypocrite in jail!!"
"400 scientists from 60 nations (70% from the US). ... All such use without a prescription is illegal"
So you know the drug laws in all 60 nations? And what the classifications of all the drugs mentioned are in all those 60 nations?
You're not taking one of those drugs by any chance?
"we" do?
i think you need to rethink that characterization. i think you will find most people think enhancement via drugs denigrates and tarnishes whatever it is that someone is doing. i guess the example of barry bonds didn't sell that fact to you. want some more? i have plenty of examples:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tour_de_France#Doping
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=9D0CE1DA1731F930A35751C1A967958260
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
So some scientists use drugs. Big freakin' deal. Can we get over the assumption that just because a drug may be illegal (whether it's a prescription drug without a prescription, or an outright "illegal" drug) doesn't mean it's necessarily bad. Caffeine is a legal drug, but a mind enhancing drug. LSD is an illegal drug that is illegal simply because Tim Leary decided to go, well, Tim Leary, and assisted the "counter culture". They couldn't ban the counter culture so they banned LSD. Duh. Marijuana is a great mind relaxing drug that drives many people to work harder in the day during their jobs. Amphetamines have some really creepy effects of actually doing good, but you need to watch it because they're just as likely to ruin you.
When can we finally agree that consenting and informed adults should have every right to do whatever damn they please do to their own bodies and minds? I personally use marijuana, but I'm all for anyone that wants to use any other drug. Or, anyone who doesn't want to use drugs. It's just a drug, not Jesus' blood, for christ's sake!
n/t
you had me at #!
which is my whole point. give me a random sport, say javelin throws. various guys try it, a few are really good at it. they get recognition for this
now some other guys enhance. they get the recognition. but it becomes known they achieved their glory via enhancement. two things happen:
1. people think less of their individual achievement
2. people think less of the entire sport of javelin throwing
this is not a moral or prudish point, its a simply logical point: if something takes less effort to achieve, it is less remarkable. if you enhance to achieve something, something anyone can do, what you did becomes less remarkable, YOU become less remarkable. the entire field you are competing in, if enhancement is widespread, becomes less remarkable. and finally, the whole idea of human achievement becomes less remarkable. oh, so you can throw a javelin? well, if i bulked up on steroids, i can probably throw further than you, so who cares about your achievement
again, tis not a moral or prudish observation: when you make less of the equation about 100% pure human effort, and more about tricks and cheats and nonhuman biochemical intervention, then you've altered what it means to achieve. it simply means less, its simply less interesting. life itself is less interesting
that's why people try to keep drugs out of sports. it destroys the entire reason sports are interesting in the first place: an ability to identify with the human struggle, an ability to imagine the endless limits of human effort and perseverence. who cares about human effort if you can just inject something and do the same? why try at anything at all? it's all fixed, it's all a joke. humanity is lessened
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Many Scientologists Using Performance Enhancing Drugs, which would have been hilariously hypocritical. As written, it's kind of boring unless there's going to be a congressional hearing to get to the bottom of Major League Science's abuse of Performance Enhancing Drugs.
But your actions in assuming responsibility for my debts don't give you any legitimate authority over my behavior.
You've captured the essential conviction underlying current libertarian political outlooks, but there are ~160 years worth of laws on the books both in the US and in the other Western, liberal democracies which contend otherwise. The state has arrogated to itself a compelling interest in the quality of life of its subjects. This is the basis for a host of legislation and judicial precedent mandating the collectivisation of risk (insurance and bonding), outlawing suicide, abortion (pro and con), etc.
The demands of the industrialised state have militated this situation. Jefferson's idealized placement of the limits of state power were transgressed long ago. Those limits were untenable in light of the demands of industrialised production, if indeed they were ever workable or realistic.
illegitimii non ingravare
Freud was apparently an open fan of coke.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Rational_scale_to_assess_the_harm_of_drugs_(mean_physical_harm_and_mean_dependence).svg
of course alcohol is addictive. but not virally so. so its different. all drugs are different. you can't say "well this is addictive, so if you are against something addictive, you have to be against everything addictive" no. each drug is different. for example, it has been said nicotine is more addictive than heroin. but nicotine doesn't put you in a glassy eyed drooling state that makes you unable to have a job or a relationship, so it must clearly be considered separately. same with alcohol. obviously, marijuana should be legal: its less harmful than alcohol. so really, what you want to do is talk about a drug's HARM, not just it's toxic effects, or it's incapacitating effects, or its addictive effects: every drug is different
lsd is more incapacitating than heroin. but its not addictive. nicotine is more addictive than heroin. but its not incapacitating. you have to think of each drug differently
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
It is by will alone I set my mind in motion. It is by the juice of sapho that thoughts acquire speed, the lips acquire stains, the stains become a warning. It is by will alone I set my mind in motion.
While I agree that use != abuse, I think your simplifying.
... when an adult makes an informed choice about drug
Depending on what substances we are talking about, the following argument doesn't hold up IMHO.
is simply "illegal drug use"
While many drugs won't violate this, many do. A Heroin/Oxy addict, whether informed in the beginning or not, once addicted, well "choice" becomes a bit of a slippery concept. Yes, they made the decision, it's their fault and responsibility, both legally and personally, but rational thought is greatly diminished, if it exists at all, in the equation.
-William Shatner can be neither created nor destroyed.
And that certainly applies to the Drug War.
Did you eat FOOD this morning, or perhaps last night?
It so happens that proteins, sugars, lipids, and a wide array of vitamins are all all chemicals we ingest with performance-enhancing effects.
When you construct well-written comments do you ask yourself, 'Was it me, or was it the food?' You denigrate and diminish yourself whenever you use performance-enhancing chemicals. You shortchanged yourself.
*********
Define what makes certain chemicals inherently bad and others inherently good and your comment might become intelligible. Explain the difference between food and drugs, and how the psychological issues you state aren't created by the promotion of arbitrary and irrational social standards.
Hey it worked for the green goblin! Why wont it work for a real arch villain.
Sick of stupidity? http://www.patentlystupid.com
The poll defines "top academic scientist" as a reader of Nature. Obviously this has major issues. For one, very few serious scientists read Nature regularly, since it doesn't speak directly to a given field. In my "top academic" institution, almost all of the people I know who have gone to Nature's website recently are either science undergrads doing low level research for a simple presentation or non-scientists trying to figure out what was meant by article X which they saw referenced in an AP news story. In fact, the poll itself wouldn't be encountered by most scientists looking at Nature, since scientists are almost always entering through an external search portal directly to an article of interest. Scientists with real pressure (say, busy grad students or professors) don't browse Nature. They strategically read an occasional article in Nature, but in most cases the same research will have been published already in greater detail in a more field-specific journal.
Collectively, all of this means that Nature's pool of respondents was almost certainly not "top scientists." Instead, they were selecting undergrads, non-scientists, and generally people with a lot of extra time on their hands. Yes, we know undergrads use Ritalin to cheat on tests. We have no indication, however, that Ritalin helps one to do the deep creative thinking necessary for involved science.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
Did anyone else think they were referring to Enzyte?
Beta-blockers like inderal are for blood pressure and anxiety. They now consider this "performance enhancing"? So if you're born genetically predisposed for high blood pressure, and you try to bring this down so that your heartbeat doesn't keep you awake at night (as mine did), you are unfairly enhancing your performance?
prescribe to freudian psychology, let me use it as an example of why you are wrong for the sake of simplisitic analogy, just to get my point across:
say everyone has an id, an ego, and a superego
that sum total is you
say you smoke some doobage, your superego is reduced, allowing your id to predominate
that's not the real you, that's you, minus your superego
duh
the real you is let out when you sublimate a part of yourself? no, wrong: its not a moral or prudish observation, its a logical one- your superego is as much as part of you as your id
so if you sublimate your id, you are less of yourself, you are infact, blotting part of yourself out, not freeing yourself of some artificial imposition. what are you freeing yourself from? something that part of you!
your understanding of who and what you are is wrong
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Marijuana & Hallucinogens, Schedule I in the land of the free!
You wouldn't want to think for yourselves, would you?
Read Food of The Gods by Terence Mckenna and wake the fuck up!
"Squeege your third eye!" - Bill Hicks
there is no difference between putting gas in your fuel tank and tying a rocket engine to your car. nope, no difference at all there friend ;-P
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Scientists are a subset of all people. People use performance altering drugs. People always have done this and always will. This use is both (currently) legal and illegal. Focusing on the illegal use, we should think about what harm we are doing to our societies by artificially creating black markets for the things people want. The one obvious result is the awesome expense of policing this market and its consequences. Brief reflection on this topic results in the observation that perhaps freeing this market from the laws that create so many problems will eliminate these problems. Further reflection suggests new problems. I think (I am willing to concede that there is an element of hope) that these new problems would have a smaller overall impact on how we all live together. Therefore, remove all artificially imposed rules regarding such drugs and license and control their distribution. It's probably much cheaper to sweep the hopeless cases off the street than it is to fight the black market.
why are sports attractive in the first place?
because they are a microcosm of our lives: human struggle leads to success. this captures the imagination, allows us to identify with the struggle
if you remove the human struggle, if you replace hard work with a simple injection, you remove the aspect of the equation that allows us to identify our own personal struggles in what is going on on the field
say for example you made all biochemical enhancements in baseball legal. what would happen?
baseball would experience a steep decline in interest. why? because people simply don't find watching it pleasurable anymore, because they cease to see themselves in the sport
if whatever you are doing is not 100% human, its less interesting
if human scientists to constantly self-doped to increase brain power, elss people would go into science. why? because the image of the scientist would change to something that was less appealing to teenagers. who wants to spend their lives self-enhancing via drugs just to stay in the game? if you think that doesn't affect the appeal of sports or science, you simply don't understand human nature
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Even if you say that, when they get an emergency patient, they're much too busy saving that person's life to investigate whether it's all their fault and they should be left to die.
Honestly, I still prefer it that way.
To claim that drug use "diminishes the self" is not a philosophically tenable position. For instance, your argument could be reduced to saying that someone with clinical depression shouldn't receive anti-depressants. Though their "self" is depressed, drug use "blots out" the self and therefore they shouldn't take drugs that "heighten" their self.
This is nonsense. The concept of the self is an introspective faculty of the understanding, and I don't see how drug use in anyway harms this. You may not like yourself after using drugs, but that is not related to your basic understanding of the "self."
Well said, I even wrote down: "your actions in assuming responsibility for my debts don't give you any legitimate authority over my behavior' - That was beautiful
"The irony when tending a flock of sheep is the dogs you put in place to protect them are genetically mutated wolves"
baseball would experience a steep decline in interest
ask yourself: why is baseball appealing in the first place? because people self-identify with the struggle going on on the field. so when there is achievement, there is pleasure in the spectator
now if that achievement were due to a drug, rather than human perseverence, you've just destroyed the psychology of why sports are enjoyable to watch. you've severed the ability of the fan to empathize with the action on the field
so no, enhancement will never be legal in sports. or rather, if it is ever made legal in a particular sport, people will instantly stop being interested in that sport, and that sport will fade away, to replaced by interest in another sport, where the action is authentic, wher eit is about human effort, rather than a drug. because that's people are interested in seeing: human effort
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I appreciate /. linking to my post on this topic- I wanted to a share some further details of the drugs. I predict the potential for use/abuse of these agents to be unprecedented.
The primary agents to hit the streets are eugaroics. They are a class of novel stimulants that produce long-lasting mental arousal. They are unique in producing hypervigilence and alertness without peripheral effects or addidition of usual stimulants. Strangely, they have minimal effect on sleep structure, and do not cause rebound hypersomnolence (crashing).
You might also be interested in Ampakines are similar but also cause memory enhancement (just a bit of abuse potential there). One of these - a drug code-named CX717 from Cortex - reportedly enabled sleep deprived rhesus monkeys to outperform rested normal monkeys on memory tasks.
all the juicy details are here:
http://docinthemachine.com/2007/03/09/eugeroic/ and
http://docinthemachine.com/2008/02/12/enhanceperformance/
the biggest issue here is how far would you go to enhance your body's performance if risks were minimal? Would you take a drug, implant a bionic retina? or replace your limbs with bionic ones. Discussions I have had with those on the international olympic committee and DARPA indicate many many people will go the route of biomodification. A discussion of this concept is here:
http://docinthemachine.com/2007/01/22/cateye/
because putting gas in your fuel tank and tying a class ii titan rocket to your car is the same thing ;-P
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
There seems to be a prevailing opinion on this board argues that stimulants such as ritalin actually make you better. I would not be so sure that this is the case. Stimulants generally work by tricking the body into firing off flight or fight chemistry, and you are going to get the result that you pay for. Fighting or flighting is not thinking, and thinking is something of a pre-requisite for science.
Over a long period of time, stimulants, over a long period of time, make you edgier, more prone to distraction and eventually more paranoid. It's hard to be possessed with a calm and curious mindset when you are so amped up, and its really these states that leave you feeling locked in and with a lack of imagination.
The bottom line is, that, given the scope of the problem, it is time for the Federal Government to being a program of randomized drug screening for any scientist that receives federal funding. If you want to get high and make yourself less effective than your salary and education would dictate, that's fine, but don't expect taxpayers to foot the bill.
But there is a carrot to this too. The drive for for scientists to produce so much that they need speed to keep up suggests that there is a gross imbalance between the kinds of jobs we allocate to engineers and the kinds of jobs we allocate to scientists. It seems almost that scientists are too much trying to be engineers, and therefor, either the engineers we have need to get smarter, or there are not enough of them, or both.
This is my sig.
by making statements that support it
"You may not like yourself after using drugs, but that is not related to your basic understanding of the "self.""
try parsing that comment of yours a little further, then get back to me
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Because the fact they are willing to put forth the effort to do better they have already done half the battle.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
So will there be asterisks next to various papers, publications, and/or Nobel prizes?
*This achievement was reached with the help of illegal performance enhancing drugs.
Who makes that judgment? Is it the EMT responding on the scene? Is the the ambulance driver? Does the doctor decide when you are on the operating table?
You are going to ask people whose profession is to help fix people and save lives to determine who is worthy of being saved, and who isn't? This is the horribly unethical problem that is the notion of being "uninsured" in the first place. You want to compound that with subjective life style judgments?
So, a gay person with AIDS is treated by a fundamentalist doctor who believes sexuality is a lifestyle choice, and thus, AIDS treatment costs are an unnecessary burden on the tax payer. This is truly the extreme of what the US already has in place with HMOs who are constantly crunching numbers, as opposed to doing everything in their power to help people get better.
Sure, what you say is a wonderful idea. Freedom of choice, my body, and all that. But this thing is called society for a reason. If you really want to destroy yourself, do it outside the realm of society. But of course, these junkies don't hold such noble notions of personal responsibility, so you can't expect them (nor society) to act in accord with such notions.
Wow some scientist are poppin Ritalin like candy...woohooo Step up to the big leagues boys, this is how the real movers and shakers roll !!! http://www.nypost.com/seven/12012006/news/regionalnews/crystal_palace_regionalnews_todd_venezia__erika_martinez_and_stefanie_cohen.htm Your never gonna make it to VP messin with Ritalin, go big or stay home! --SMD
and you just made me think of something:
say you have two scrabble players. one is allowed to just sit there and use his mind. the other is allowed a dictionary, a computer program that looks for good letter compbinations, seven letter words, etc
who would win most of the time? obviously, the guy with the enhancements
but more importantly: WHO WOULD BE INTERESTED IN CONTINUING TO PLAY
if its not a struggle, there is no interest. the guy bumbling through the game using his own mind would find pleasure when he won on his own merits, and therefore continue playing the game based on his sense of accomplishment. without that sense of acoomplishment, there is no reason for someone to continue in the endeavour, simply because of the psychodynamics of what keeps a human being snegaged and involved and interested in an endeavour: they see themselves in it
if you achieve everything through enhancements, you disengage. its not about you anymore, so there's no interest in doing whatever it is that you do with enhancements
so the scrabble player with enhancements would probably play 10 games, and then never play again: its boring, you wouldn't get naything out of it
while the scrabble player working with just his own mind would probably play 1,000 games, and enjoy his experience, and be glad fo rit. he would have ahigher quality of life and higher sense of self-regard
science as a pursuit would get less interested college students if the image of science was a bunch of pill poppers. no one wants to get involved in that, if the whole point is to look for a pursuit where you place your own mark, rather than the mark of a pill. that's not you. therefore, you're not interested in doing that
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
With my experience in the academic setting, Ritalin faded from popularity in the late 90s and was replaced pretty much entirely by Adderall for studying. I don't know why it wouldn't be the same here. Are they by chance just grouping all ADD medications and calling them Ritalin?
Daniel Faraday ( http://www.lostpedia.com/wiki/Daniel_Faraday ) on the TV show lost is a perfect example of a scientist character that seems to be on some kind of drugs.
-- Betting on the survival of the media industry is a serious risk. I advise investing elsewhere.
at the least, different in the mind of the spectator
the whole reason sports are interesting is because it is about human struggle leading achievement. the spectator identifies with the struggle
if the athlete is using drugs, you sever that psychological connection, because the drug is seen as making the struggle easier. equipment doesn't do that psychologically
so if you had a sport where drugs were 100% legal, what you would have is an immediate drop off in interest in that sport, which would fade away. meanwhile, the fans would move on to some other sport that was more "authentic", meaning, they got more out of it by watching it
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Should we start putting an * next to the names of scientists that are found to be using these performance enhancing drugs? Its not really fair to the rest of the common folk that these guys get recognized for their break through work if they cheated to get there.
There are two issues only the first of which is whether enhancement is good. The second is competition. It might be every scientist's right to decide to take a mind altering substance to improve performance, but once this catches on it could easily become necessary to do so in order to maintain an academic appointment against ever smarter competition. Throw into the mix undesirable side effects of the drugs and now you have yourself a moral quagmire.
all human societies that have encountered what something like heroin does to those who take it have outlawed the behavior. mainly because the behavior is detrimental to that society. meanwhile, you seem to have worked out a wonderful argument about legalizing all drugs... in a vacuum. you haven't considered any of the social effects of these drugs. how the viral addictiveness spreads, how it destroys families, an ability to hold a job... the need to feed, house, and clothe zombies that would otherwise be productive parts of society
something like marijuana should be legal: its less harmful than alcohol. but meth, cocaine, heroin? if those drugs enacted their toll on addicts in a vacuum, yes, you are correct. but when you see how the behavior plays out in a human society, you see human society react in such a way that curtails the use of that specific drug. because the use of that drug hurts society in a way that your argument doesn't address
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Just thought people might get a giggle out of the April fools joke we did saying NIH was cracking down on Brain Doping among scientists which was covered in the Nature article about their survey. The original post and related posts on the April 1 joke are here . You can see the Fake NIH Press Release there too. In addition we created a fake web site for the "World Anti Brain Doping Authority" More background on the joke is here
"The Spice must flow!"
Nothing interesting to say...MUST...NOT...REPLY...ohtheheckwithit.
to a hospital bed in the ER, calling myself walt whitman, saying i live in a circus. i know what i am talking about
meanwhile, you seem to wish to portray using something like lsd and heroin as nothing more than downing a shot of whiskey. dude, your awesome. i bet you can guzzle polonium 210 and snort ricin. i think the issue here is not my false alarm, but your false complacency
who knows, maybe you have an 18/100 constitution. but your portrayal, or your experience, is far from that of the typical human body and mind, regardless of any fearmongering in the media
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
That's not what I said at all.
I said it's our business, I didn't say it should be stopped.
Of course, there won't be any side effects with taking these drugs we should be considering~
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
The poll defines "top academic scientist" as a reader of Nature.
Good point. Nature suffers when it goes outside its field. Their articles on biology tend to be excellent, but when they cover computing, the articles are weak, and Nature articles on economics are just laughable.
Your argument makes sense, but if the majority want these programs, your only option is to move.
By nature of your living in a nation, you are expected to confirm to the rules of that nation.
If you don't like being on the hook to help out those less fortunate, you could always move to a country that requires up-front payment for emergency services.
Blar.
This reminds me of a story about the famous mathematician Paul Erdös:
:)
"After 1971 he also took amphetamines, despite the concern of his friends, one of whom (Ron Graham) bet him $500 that he could not stop taking the drug for a month.[4] Erds won the bet, but complained during his abstinence that mathematics had been set back by a month: "Before, when I looked at a piece of blank paper my mind was filled with ideas. Now all I see is a blank piece of paper." After he won the bet, he promptly resumed his amphetamine habit." [wikipedia.org]
It is an interesting question what would happen if an 'intelligence boosting' drug were to be found..
I think people would have to take it, or be 'outsmarted' by the rest of the society.
Well, I'll have to do with my coffee for now
you can start with plain white bread on one end of the spectrum, and adrenalin shots directly to the brain through the eyeball on the other
simply because there is a continuum, rather than a hard break, does that mean there is no valid reason for establishing an area of chemical enhancement that should be out of reach?
and i'm not talking prudish, moral reasons, i'm talking strict utilitarian and logical reasons: toxic effects, long term deterioration, psychological alterations, etc.
so when i go "maybe this substance isn't a good idea to take" is it valid to respond to that "its the same as eating food, you're just a prude!"
no, its not. because you are responding to a point that is not the point i am actually making
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
From TFA
"Although Nature is a science journal, the poll is not a scientific study"
And I thought I was just a hypertensive who takes atenolol (a beta blocker like inderal.) What makes it even better is that I usually write my own rx for atenolol (largely since its easier than getting one from my doctor and its perfectly legal for non-scheduled drugs.)
Ooooh! I am a druggie. A rebel. D-d-d-dangerous and hip! This is so SCHWEET!
And if atenolol is drug abuse, I am sure its just a gateway drug for me... next thing you know I will be freebasing lipitor!
I can understand the drama when a competitive athelete uses performance enhancing drugs to gain an advantage. However, science is not a competition, if a scientist uses a "cognitive performance-enhancing drug", WHO CARES??? If they are obtaining these drugs illegally then sure they should be subject to the law. However, obtained legally, it's nobodies business but their own.
But honestly, taking a drug to improve your concentration is not "cheating" in the same way that taking steroids is for an athlete. The simple fact of the matter is that it does not allow you to do anything that you werent already capable of doing. Aside from that, its not as though we are talking only about students in school here. In the real world "cheating" in the sense that it is being used in this article; is not a matter of right and wrong, its a matter of getting the job done faster and more efficiently.
If some scientist working on a cure for cancer could improve his progress by taking some drug by his own choice, wouldnt you encourage him to do so? Seriously, whats the big deal?
... Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions - everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses JuvenalDude, if I tied a Titan rocket to my car, I'd be feeling pretty awesome.
The few remaining seconds of my life would be legend.
Listen buddy, drugs are technology. Are you going to get bent out of shape the first time a scientist with a computer chip embedded in his head gives the world some brilliant insight otherwise unattainable? People use tools to perform intellectual feats they could never reproduce without assistance. The fruits of the human mind can be amplified in many ways. Drugs have been a tool in the pursuit of knowledge since humans began pursuing knowledge.
I know quite a few scientists who peruse Science and/or Nature regularly. While you probably have a valid underlying point about selection bias, it's not at all clear that your assertion about the readership of Nature is remotely true. Do you have any data to back the claim up?
Let God sort it out.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
I set my mind in motion
The beans make a bitter brew
The stains are a warning
I set my mind in motion
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
"Just as one would hardly propose that a strong cup of coffee could be the secret of academic achievement or faster career advancement, the use of such drugs does not necessarily entail cheating," (From the article)
These researchers aren't thinking hard enough. Absolutely it's true that strong cups of coffee are the secrets of academic achievement and faster career advancement! In fact, double-blind studies have showed this. Caffeine is one of the best-studied drugs in the world, has been for decades and decades, and if these researchers had been drinking more of it they wouldn't have dismissed the very effect it has as preposterous out of hand. (If they just meant, "people accept coffee drinking among researchers", that would have been okay, but that's not the phrasing they used.).
I defy anyone to name one A-list researcher who hasn't drunk copious amounts of coffee throughout their career. One.
Especially if you take something that involves extreme mental concentration, like mathematics. Ever hear "a mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems?"
Well it's true.
I asked this same question when the baseball ped issues hit the newspapers. Why not ped in it?
A hand up and a foot on every chest...
That sentiment and $4 will get you a cup of Starbucks coffee. I defy any of you who talk so tough to spend a Saturday night in the ER with me and then tell me not to aid someone dying of an overdose or because they didn't wear a bike helmet, or because they have a spare tire and are having a heart attack. Or better yet, we'll do that with one of the local college kids whose health insurance doesn't pay for any of their alcohol related ER visits. When a 19 year old girl who is someone's daughter is choking on her own vomit because she doesn't have the experience to drink responsibly and got shit faced... you tell me to let her turn blue, stop breathing, and go into cardiac arrest. And after, I will let you have the pleasure of telling her weeping parents that we just let that happen because its her own fault.
You are all so full of shit and bluster you make Ann Coulter seem reasonable. Not a single one of you would have the balls to do that, and would likely be cowering in the corner screaming at me to do something! while you wet your pants.
That said, I do think that we as a society have a right to make non-punitive behavior modification strategies to improve the overall function of society. That means we should decriminalize drug use. However then spend the same money on drug treatments, prevention, and mandating treatment for dangerous behaviors (if you end up in the ER overdosed, drive stoned, etc. we should be able to force you to seek some sort of drug treatment.) Like everything else, black and white don't cut it. Locking up people for 20 years for smoking a doobie is as retarded as making heroin available to anyone at the 7-11.
Wow, you have no idea what you're talking about. Whomever sold you that line of BS you're repeating was playing a joke on you.
Nature and Science are the two most important scientific research publications around. Any scientist who does not make an effort to read those journals is removing himself from the scientific community.
To claim that the articles in Nature are not as important as in other journals is demonstrably wrong. The impact factor (a measure of journal importance) for Nature is one of the three highest in the world (Nature, Science and The New England Journal of Medicine). A good scientist may not produce important enough results to get even one publication in Nature during their career.
if everyone were allowed to enhance
1. the image of the sport would change, and less people would be interested in getting into the sport (the athlete derives pleasure form exertion, not doping)
2. the image of the sport would change, and less people would be interested in watching the sport (the fan's psychological connection the human struggle would lessen, as you demonstrate with weightlifting)
ok, so a lot of baseball has steroids, but few people know the extent. but the hoopla around barry bonds, andy petite, etc., is still breaking: people are learning about it. baseball managment could allow the drugs, but then sport would fade in interest, as you show with weightlifting, people would watch soccer instead, because its more "authentic". and if soccer was found to be full of amphetamines, or whatever, guess what? people would be disinterested in that as well, and move on to some other sport they found more pleasurable to watch. pleasurable to watch, ebcause it is AUTHENTIC: about a human struggle. rather than about doping
if any sport wants to retain interest, simple human interest in any sport which is where the money comes from, it needs to crack down on drug use. there's no way around that. you can't keep it secret
its a central point about drug use people consistently don't understand: we all think of it as cheating life. some of us may take it anyways, and not care, but we also think less of ourselves in subtle ways. if you say that is not true of yourself, then perhaps you never had any self-regard, or aren't that self-aware. those who are aware of us, they think less of us too. fans think less of athletes. people are less interested in getting in science if the image of science becomes one of a bunch of pill poppers, etc.
and none of this is out of moral prudishness. its simply identity politics, its about psychology of how one thinks about who and what they are. simply because if less of your achievement is about YOU, less is interesting about you too. and there's just no way around that philosophical point other than to stop taking drugs
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Are you kidding? It's not 1/10th of a percent. Try an order of magnitude bigger. More like 1% of the entire population.
The US has THE largest prison population in the world. Bigger than China. Bigger than N Korea. Bigger than Russia. Bigger than any foe you can come up with.
Pffft. I wish it was 1/10th of a percent. Maybe then I wouldn't have to entertain these police state conspiracy theories I keep coming up with. One percent of the total population is a huge number and you can't help but wonder how it got that way.
EMTALA is an unfunded mandate that says that the nurses who work in an ER, the hospital who runs the ER, and ER physicians like me have to pay for uninsured emergency care. It takes a segment of the US economy and says we have to take responsibility for and subsidize what everyone else doesn't. That cheap McDonalds hamburger you ate today that is less expensive because McDonalds doesn't offer health insurance? I paid for a part of that.
Of course I am thankful for EMTALA every time that I use it to force a surgeon to take the appendix out of an uninsured teenager. I also feel that I am paid quite well enough even though about 30% of the ER care and 50% of the overall care I provide is uncompensated (I volunteer two days a week at a low income clinic that sees a lot of uninsured patients so that bumps the % up.) However overall I hate EMTALA precisely because its used as a crutch: I'm sure Bush slept very well at night after vetoing SCHIP because he thinks that every American gets health care since even if we are uninsured we can go to the ER (where most of the care people need - like prevention and treatment of chronic disease can't be done).
Can you stamp an asterisk on a Nobel Prize?
welcome to life: it's complex, and it isn't easy. and if i told you my definitions, you might not agree on it, or maybe you would, depending on the substance
and because it isn't easy, and it's hard to define anything clear cut, and people constantly bicker, doesn't mean that there still isn't a need to draw boundaries
life is not black and white, there are a lot of grey areas. a lot of choices in life are not between roses and shit, but between roses with centipedes on it versus roses with spiders on it, or between shit with tiny flecks of gold in it and shit and with tiny blobs of gold in it
it is hard to draw boundaries. but most importantly, because it is hard to draw boundaries, DOESN'T MEAN WE DON'T DRAW BOUNDARIES in some vain attempt to offend no one. because no boundaries at all is worse than boundaries that don't please everyone
i am 100% certain that in this thread on slashdot it is impossible to convince you 100% of what i think is wrong. but perhaps you would agree with 90% or 75% of my thinking
and of that remaining 10%, or 25%, it doesn't matter to me. because what is most important to me is that you agree with me that there are in fact SOME substances no one should take. because if you think that just because it is a continuum and it is hard to draw the line, that all substances are ok. if you think that, then you're clearly failing to understand all of the variables in this subject matter
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Many people go to Mexico to do this, as there are many drugs that require prescriptions here but are available over-the-counter in Mexico, including the equivalent of Provigil.
Note that this generally does NOT include narcotics, and trying to buy narcotics without a prescription in Mexico and bring them into the US will get you into a LOT of trouble.
I'm not advocating this, and there may be some pitfalls.
more of an issue than ritalin are eugaroics such as provigil. Already given out to pilots by the airforce it is being used with increasing frequency by students for exams, shift workers in factories and doctors on long duty schedules. I know of prominant physician researchers and academics who have iused it in situations of sleep deprivation. It allows one to function for extended periods without sleep without losing performance, it keeps mental acuity and raction times and recall stable (newer DARPA funded versions actually increase performance) and has no rebound effects.
I would say that this line of thinking is kind of "selfish" in a way. The need for people to believe sports are fair and uncompromised by drugs has skewed the way people think of performance enhancment. Enhancement is good. We like enhancement. Get over it.
Um, you are saying sports enhancement drugs are the same a cancer drugs? It's a bit of a stretch for me. Using some that has bad effects to save my or some one else life is generally good. Unless it the side effects are extreme and the life extension isn't worth it. Would you choose to live one week longer in intense pain the entire time?
I'd be mixed on solider boost drugs. If I knew that I'm in a time and place that I'm likely to die in the next few minutes, I'd use some drugs that might get me through that situation. I'd want to be informed about the known side effects and if years after the war/conflict my health suffers, will I'd know that I'm only alive because of the solider booster.
Athletes are crazy people. Generally they do things that for their long term good, but they'll do things that are really stupid just for scoring a bit higher in one sporting event. Scoring a bit higher in a sporting event is not the same as saving a life that would die without said drugs. That's the best that I can state it.
No science has ever been achieved by "100% pure human effort". Certainly, to perform science one must record observations somewhere other than in one's memory. Are the scientists with pencils cheating those without? Are the scientists with computers pussies compared to the ones with sliderules? Why do you care how knowledge is acquired? The only integrity in science is objectivity and reproducibility - truth. What about AI? It's coming. What will you think when your desktop computer is 100x smarter and more insightful than you? Will you embrace that tool? Or is it trash because it's not "human"? Drugs are a technology and tool for amplifying the output of the human mind.
This is complete garbage!
/.
This piece implies that it is all illegal, without ever addressing the legality.
Many (Most?) of these people are probubly ADHD. They use drugs to focus? Well duh, that is what they are for!
They use it occasionally to all the time? DUH, anyone who knows ADD would accept that some should use Ritilin once a month when they really need it, and some should use it EVERY DAY!
Many (Most?) ADD people are quite bright, but they have problems staying on task. With the drugs, they can be top scientists, without... they will be shady used car salespeople.
Why? You can't keep a regular job if you can't Focus.
Anyone who works with ADD will tell you most of the kids tend to do well in engineering and the sciences IF they are medicated properly. (what they often have problems with is reading peoples emotions,etc.)
nuf said - keep this garbage out of
And from the horrible quality of the writing and the science, I would say that cyanide would be the best performance enhancer for many University departments.
Um, you are saying sports enhancement drugs are the same a cancer drugs?
No, that is the exact opposite of what he's saying. I recommend Ritalin to improve your reading comprehension.
sic transit gloria mundi
It's called caffeine. It's a brilliant drug that can keep the science train rolling long into the night. Sometimes science just won't let you sleep, and caffeine is a perfect boost.
I also drink orange juice in the morning, which supposedly improves cognitive abilities. Does that count?
All such use without a prescription is illegal.
Can we get 'consentingadults' as a tag for this story plox?
If you check some of these researchers they are also Medical Doctors with authority to prescribe. Some of them take liberty to self-medicate, violating DEA rules. ,mis-developed body structures (ie large muscules but bones haven't developed to compensate) and other issues. However some researchers think of themselves "immune" to bad consequences and gamble with their lives. There is no such thing as an "prefect" drug that has no side effects and doctors and pharmacist prescribe drugs understanding these and hopefully that the good outdoes the bad in their prescription.
Most sensible researchers know the consequences of most of these drugs and the effect they have on them so it is strange for them to take such a gamble just for a few more "performance points". The bad consequences are high for most performance enhancing drugs like cancer, behavior problems
So if someone uses drugs and contracts a communicable disease as a result, you would not have society treat them, and let them continue to spread the disease until someone catches it who can't be blamed for taking unnecessary risks? Do you see the problem here? It is in society's best interest to address the health problems of individuals even if they got those problems through objectionable behavior. You can address the behavior in other ways, but trying to punish individuals by not taking care of the sick actually punishes the whole society. You're asking society to pay a bigger price in the long run just so you can feel good about having taken a punitive (and, as you yourself acknowledge, somewhat mean-spirited) stance.
I remember that Bob Wallace (ninth Microsoft employee) posted in alt.drugs.psychedelics years ago that Microsoft experimented with I believe 2C-* phenethylamines as enhancers for creativity and concentration for programming. Unfortunately most of his posts got deleted from the google groups archive after or shortly before his untimely death a few years ago. I did copy most of his posts before they went offline, but they are on some lost harddisk/zipdrive somewhere... which would take longer to find then this topic will stay alive and read on slashdot.
Sure, enhancement is awesome. But in the context of competition, we have come to consider some artificial aids to be equivalent to cheating. The purpose of a competition or test is to measure something, and, frequently, to confer rewards based on that measurement. For example, if someone was taking an English test, I would consider the use of a drug which gave them the ability to recall the text perfectly just as unfair as if they were hiding the book in their lap. While ultimately circular, part of my justification for considering this cheating would be the fact that they are breaking the law, and I am reluctant to do so myself. Part of it is that I understand Ritalin acts like meth on most adults, and I have a very low opinion of tweakers. But the bulk of it is that it effectively makes the test a poor representation of a person's baseline ability in the subject.
This is as opposed to saving lives, or inventing medicines, or solving important problems. Despite the quixotic justifications many students use, their biggest reason for cheating is to secure a better future for themselves at the expense of someone else's. I can't really see a net benefit to society there. In fact, it might be argued that by trying to place themselves in "better" programs, they are ultimately doing themselves a disservice, as people poorly matched in ability to their program are likely to drop out.
Now, if we're not talking about a competition, I think it's more acceptable.
The most famous self-fulfilling prophecy in the United States is that our system is run by corruption and lobbyists, and that everyday citizens are cut out. The reason it is a self-fulfilling prophecy is because people lean on this meme as crutch every time they are confronted about why they don't try to change things. "Why bother? The system is rigged," they say, and then carry on doing the same thing they were.
But it's all a ruse. Citizens can easily impact their government, it's just that most don't take the time to bother. Voting is important but if you want to have an impact you have to work between the elections too. A member of the House of Representatives will receive hundreds of thousands of votes from citizens, but only a few thousand phone calls or visits between elections. If you can call them, or write to them, or get in to see them, you can have an impact. Especially if you can show that many voters feel the same way you do.
And if you don't want to go it alone, there are tens of thousands of chambers of commerce, associations, nonprofits, unions, advocacy groups, political action committees etc, ready and waiting for you to plug into and get involved. ExxonMobil has lobbyists, but so do the AFL-CIO and the Sierra Club (and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and NORML, since we're on the subject).
There are numerous examples of citizen lobbying carrying the day. ANWR still has not been drilled for oil despite massive effort and spending by the oil lobby. And on the other side, citizen action has killed a number of immigration reform bills that were strongly supported by corporate lobbies. Were you part of either of those? What about the issues you care about most?
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
work with me here.. small mental leap required before you start calling people names:
"Under your idiotic definition, a fully informed heroin junkie isn't abusing drugs."
this would hold very true, because a the moment any junkie could become "fully informed" they would be abusing themselves. this is a subtle, but very important difference.
im not gonna take the credit for the simple illustration here, this guy did a lot more thought than you, with your knee jerk reaction of name calling...
time for you to goto soviet russia
What does this have to do with anything? The courts don't make the diagnostic criteria for diseases. What they think about it, outside very narrow legal channels, is totally irrelevant.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substance_abuse
That bolded part is the meat of the definition. If you meet that criteria, you're abusing.
By your explanation of your own behavior patterns, you too were a substance abuser.
So in short, when you said "He's not. ", if he meets the criteria, he most certainly is, and your opinion on the subject doesn't change it, even with the anecdote about your own abuse.
I have no problem with having a "we use drugs" league and a "we are normal humans" league.
The lie the sports figures engage in is to compare to them selves to the truly great players before them who were not using steroids.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Oh Geeks! What about Viagra, penis enlargement and sexual drugs?
By using it until you've destroyed your body? You know, by not getting sufficient nutrition because you're spending all your money on junk, or by using it so frequently you fail to notice your health deteriorating because you're nodding all the time.
Honestly, your question is just stupid.
Has a specific medical definition. Yours is nowhere close, and doesn't have anything to do with this discussion.
DO you ever see one of those posts that are so wrong they make your head hurt? Thanks, yours just did that for me.
No it is NOT a way of stifling debate, it is a way of identifying when a pattern of healthy use has changed into a pattern of unhealthy use otherwise known as abuse.
It's pretty obvious you're a user with an axe to grind. You're totally wrong though, and it makes me angry to see you disseminating faulty information.
Obviously this does not cover the famous exceptions like LSD, heroin, pot, etc. But that's not what this story is about--the story is about the use of drugs outside their profiles or outside the care of a doctor. Ritalin is not approved as a stimulant or to increase concentration. It is approved only as a drug to control medically-based hyperactivity. Using it outside this profile does constitute "abuse" (as defined with respect to drugs not kids).
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Just imagine those congressional hearings. Scientists being grilled over whether or not thier breakthrough studies were based on performance enhancing drugs.
Fixed that for you.
I would however argue that the sensory impairment that drugs cause could be a mitigating factor that sports don't have. They really aren't comparable outside of an academic discussion, even then the comparison fails as I just demonstrated.
I notice you leave the rest of the taxpayers out. Care to elaborate on why you make it seem like it's only you?
http://www.mnforsustain.org/immg_healthcare_costs_southwest_us_exec_sum.htm
There's one example of where the money REALLY comes from. It's no wonder you're an ER doc, all the smart docs run from that job like it's contagious (LOL!).
I'll give concrete example. I love to fly on airplanes, and I love to camp in the backcountry. Mentally, sitting here at my computer, I get a little surge of joy as I think about them.
But about a year ago I started having panic attacks on airplanes and when sleeping in the backcountry. They come on with seemingly no trigger and I have no idea how to stop them or why they happen. As far as I'm concerned--that is, in my conscious mind--they are alien, unexpected, and unwelcome. They are not part of "me", they are something nasty that happens to "me."
I felt the way you do about drugs and just suffered through a few attacks (if you've never had one--they suck, it's absolute terror and fight/flight for about 20 minutes). Finally I went to a doctor, who prescribed a very low dose of a lorazepam. I take one before I fly, or before I bed down in the tent at night. It works great.
You might consider it rationalization, but my perspective is that somehow my body has failed my mind, and the drug simply patches the problem. My view of myself, my desires and what I enjoy has not changed, it's just that something has gone slightly wrong in the wiring, and it needs a slight fix sometimes.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
I have 2 comments, but I didn't read all of the 600 comments, so I apologize if I duplicate another's thoughts.
1) What kind of response bias is there in this? They survey Nature's readers, but is the 1400 the number of responses? If so, perhaps people with a history of use or knowing someone who used an enhancing substance responded preferentially. Maybe someone needs to be on a performance enhancing drug to even subscribe with institutional subscriptions now-a-days.
2) Beta-blockers like propranolol [trade name-Inderal] can be used for anxiety, hypertension, tachycardia, etc. I've never heard them described as drugs of abuse or performance enhancing drugs, save perhaps for someone doing public speaking. In fact, beta-blockers are given to drug addicts/alcoholics for the treatment of anxiety instead of Xanax or other benzodiazepines. I tried to find a the statistics on Beta-blocker prescription numbers, but could only find that there were >$3 billion in sales for beta blockers within the last few years (It was like looking for a needle in a Viagra-stack). I have to wonder, what is the baseline rate of beta-blocker usage that is not performance-enhancing in a group of people that may be type-A personalities, have high stress jobs if they are writing grants with 8-9% funding success rates, and may be of an older age bracket if they are personal vs institutional subscribers and also have the time and interest in replying to an unsolicited survey?
That would be an injury, not a sport.
And as far as I'm aware, there's no sport for which the description of your desired activity is, "receive multiple blows to the head".
In fact, in every sport where such a thing occurs, it is a consequence of incorrect performance of a task.
So, again, the answer to your question is "no". And it really wasn't even a very good try.
It depends on what do you mean by read.
A scientist, which I happen to be one, will usually just look at the table of content of Science or Nature. If they saw anything related to their field, they would go deeper and read more carefully. Most articles in these journals are so remote from one's research that you won't give a second glance.
It was an online poll. I think the parent is correct to assert that most scientists wouldn't pay any attention. Yes, you do sometimes browse the few scientific-related news item or commentary. But really you have better and more reliable source of news than them.
If they're serious, they should do it in a statistically correct way. What they're doing is analogous to survey the drug-use habit of IT workers in a slash-dot poll... doing a highly controversial survey this way in one of the top journal in science.
Sigh... Be real.
The drugs! Won't ANYONE think of the drugs!
I am a grad student. To help me plan my research strategy and predict the outcome of my experimental setups, I highly recommend my brother grad students to take the spice melange. Not only has it drastically reduced the probability of failure in my lab setups (I can find out before hand if the experiment will or will not work), I also now have the ability to navigate my car better and forsee if there will be a traffic jam on the highway even before I step into the car. I also now have the baby blue eyes that all the chicks love. I was even told that I will live longer. Even better, this product is 100% natural and organic. So what are you waiting for?
Are you a biologist? I'm one, and I wouldn't really calling their articles in life science excellent. Not that they're not good but Nature tends to publish only the flashy and catchy types of research.
Is it the same reason you call their articles on computing and economics poor? I'm curious whether they have the same issue in other disciplines.
The word "abuse" appears nowhere in the linked article.
I'm not about buying anything on the street, but my research could use a boost ;-)
But it definitiely did have a side effect on my mood. I found that I became panicky and frantic very easily. I spent a lot of nights upset and worried that I wasn't getting anywhere before I finally realized what was causing it. It definitely did not improve my academic output.
Incidentally, the listed side effects of modafinil do include nervousness (7%) and anxiety (5%) and at lower levels agitation, confusion, and emotional lability (all 1%). All those numbers are significantly above placebo.
Nobody ever thinks they're going to be one of the 1% or 5%, but obviously it happens to some or the numbers wouldn't be there. has less side effects when compared in side by side studies with caffeine. Actually, I've seen studies that showed the opposite. And combined with the cost, at least one study I recommended argued that caffeine is a better drug for people with excessive daytime sleepiness than modafinil - similar side effect profile, dramatically cheaper.
I stole this sig from someone cleverer than me.
Nobody said anybody broke the law. An English test is not a competition. It's a measurement. I will hurt nobody if I get a perfect grade on an English test.
_You_ need some brain enhancement drugs if you can't see a net benefit to society in making our scientists smarter. Our scientists are going to cure cancer, diabetes, and heart disease, combat global warming, and find safer ways to produce energy.
"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety"-B.Franklin
Funny, I was under the impression that some of the most popular study drugs, Ritalin and Adderol, were Schedule II Controlled Substances in the United States (along with Meth, Cocaine, Morphine, and OxyContin) meaning if you use these drugs you are, in fact, breaking the law. I know nobody said anybody broke the law, but it's a sound inference from the facts at hand.
An English test, or an Engineering or Science or Underwater basketweaving test for that matter, is competitive. If you get a perfect grade on a test, you will have a better chance at getting into a good graduate or professional school than someone who is not cheating. Since there are a finite number of spots, for every person who gets a spot in a top school, someone else loses that spot. An undergrad is probably not going to cure cancer, but they might cheat someone smarter than them who would eventually go on to cure cancer out of that spot. And that's what it's all about: trying to determine who is the most deserving. Does a dumber, more unscruplous person deserve a fellowship over their smarter, more principled colleague? That's why in academia you hear all these words like "test" and "grade" and "degree." They're trying to see how people measure up. When you cheat, you make the measurement invalid.
When you're a bona fide scientist, it's a whole different ballgame. But since undergraduate grades determine who gets to do the real research, I think cheating in that arena is unquestionably wrong.
Hey, before they dump the survey results into a shreader, I'd like to know if there is any correlation between the use of -each- of the drugs (ie, at least 3 more data analyses needed here) and some reasonable measure of performance, eg:
1. # of papers published,
2. ever held a leadership position in their dep't or company,
3. ever won a Nobel prize, and/or
4. ever (and/or 3 of times) nominated for a Nobel, etc.)
Has anyone done similar analyses, as yet?
>Without artificially high prices,
>heroin would be pure, clean, safe
Without high prices, heroin would still destroy your life, and kill you dead, it would just be cheaper to do it.
>Millions of people buy these drugs illegally,
>because they think it improves their lives.
Your post should have been titled, "in defense of tweaking." Seriously meth is bad for you, and heroin *will* kill you. Don't try to push this crap on me. I've watched enough people ruin there lives because they thought it was no big deal and they had it under control.
If you don't *need* adderal for a medical condition and you are still taking it, you have a problem. I know plenty of people on that stuff, and I know they wouldn't be if they had much of a choice. Amphetamines aren't recreational drugs (no matter how some people choose to treat them), they will fuck you up hard. Adderal might not be as bad as meth, but you aren't doing yourself any favors.
Maybe you live in too nice a neighborhood to see the effects of hard drugs, but don't spread this bullshit.
u r telling ur car needs a turbo booster
just as *nix tradition
dun do anything unless u no wat u r doin
Cut your finger? Apply principals of first aid, go see your regular doctar as soon as available. If you can't stich it yourself, I guess you have to go somewhere... Go to a doc in the box!
The thing we treat a lot of too is MENTAL ILLNESS. How do you turn away a victim of mental illness because they can't hold a job? How do you turn away a retarted person who was forced out on the streets, and has no clue how society works?
You my friend are not a troll as your scored by these peers, you should be modded insightfull. I really wish that more people would see things this way too. "that means we should decriminalize drug use. However then spend the same money on drug treatments, prevention, and mandating treatment for dangerous behaviors (if you end up in the ER overdosed, drive stoned, etc. we should be able to force you to seek some sort of drug treatment.) Like everything else, black and white don't cut it. Locking up people for 20 years for smoking a doobie is as retarded as making heroin available to anyone at the 7-11." Life is a terminal illness even for you fellow readers. Have some Fucking compassion.
You're right about the poll. I was thinking about the original article which was last December. I'm very surprised they did an online poll and then published it.
I don't expect anyone reads all of the scientific articles in Nature. By reading, I meant looking through the news, summaries and commentary. I've found that information helpful in the past.
It seems in vogue these days for biologists to trash Nature and Science; my wife is a biologist, and she's expressed her ambivalence about those journals. I find the physics articles good.
Does Pinot Noir count?
Some people start out on Ritalin when they are young because their teachers do not like thier hyperactive behavior. Eventually, it becomes part of the daily routine, through out education.
But by no means should that be a reason to discriminate a person academically who actually does need it. It is the abuse of the drugs that is the problem. The stupid roomate who is taking your Zoloft because he thinks he can get high off it when you actually need it for your depression.
Then you have the cult of Scientology that demonizes the usage by manipulating the mass media to publish false stories about how prescription drugs are bad and then the drug companies come back with an argument on why you should take more of it.
There is no moderation or equilibrium. It's like being damned if you do and damned if you don't.
I need to take my medication in the morning to focus, get my head in the game, and get in the zone, but the price to my health and to my wallet is now threatened with new threats of discrimination for something I actually do need.
But I take care of myself and do the best I can. I am responisbile and try not to let those fears get the upper hand.
The Rapture is NOT an exit strategy.
Any scientist caught using illegal performance enhancing substances should be banned from the next four experiments, research projects, or scientific seminars. Second offense ban for one year!
Open Source: Eroding the Digital Divide
Your kind are worse than emo kids. You whine and whine, but you never back up your claims. You are self righteous and self centered. You squeal like little piggies when your precious 'rights' are trampled, which is all the time because your 'rights' amount to 'you're not the boss of me!' But you never stand up for other people's rights, we're all on our own, not your responsibility.
I know you have an account here, or should have one if you've been here long enough to think you know me. Yet you choose to post anonymously. You deserve the label.
You've made all kind of assertions that you can't back up. When I accuse libertarians of having secret fascist leanings, I show my work. I back up my assertions with chains of reasoning. I'd love to see you try to back up yours.
I'm describing not a government but a system of contracts freely entered into. That is the basis of freedom, but do go on, please, show how what I wrote supports tyrrany. Because what I wrote is about contracts, the very basis of libertarian thought. So even if you do manage to tie what I've written to tyranny, you've also tied libertarianism to it. Have fun!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Maximal intelligence, creativity, productivity especially among scientists and various knowledge workers is arguably essential to our wellbeing as a species. What is "abuse" about this exactly? If a scientists used some cognitive technique to increase effective intelligence and productivity no one would I trust object. So what is the difference in using some chemical concoction that has enhances some part of the cognitive process? What precisely is the beef?
There is a lot of arguing back and forth over what is right and what is wrong, not to mention defining drug abuse.
First, the concept of right and wrong has changed over the years. In Anthropology, we used to have this idea of Cultural Relativity. Basically, if it's part of your culture, we can't define it as wrong. Ya, sure... Then we started contemplating things like female circumcision (aka, female genital mutilation), women's rights, child labor laws, slavery, etc. Nope, there ARE hard lines of right and wrong. Cultural Relativity be damned, there are practices we need to stamp out. Along these lines, don't try to tell me that drug abuse is OK and it's only society that defines it as wrong. That leads us to drug abuse...
Drug use and drug abuse are very different. (OK, drug abuse is drug use taken too far, but let's go with 'different' for ease of use... same thing.) Drug use falls under a couple of categories: prescription, over-the-counter (OTC), and illegal. Prescription drug use is, obviously, the proper use of drugs by a patient that have been prescribed by the patient's doctor. That's it. Simple. OTC drug use is similar, but without the doc. OTC includes your basic nasal spray, your vitamins, you energy drinks, coffee/caffeine, alcohol, aspirin/ibuprofen, etc. Illegal drug use is the use of 'recreational pharmaceuticals' such as pot (obviously excluding medicinal marijuana), coke, crack, etc. It also includes prescription drugs not properly prescribed to the actual user. Most of this is legal, beneficial, and/or medically necessary. Some of it most certainly is not. None of this is, by default, abuse.
Drug abuse is different. Drug abuse is any of the above drug use for unhealthy reasons or used in an inherently unhealthy manner. Drink to drown your sorrows? Abuse. Drink often for any reason and have difficulty controlling it? Definite abuse! Same goes for pot, coke, heroin, ritalin, provigil (which, by the way, I'm on by prescription), pseudophed, nyquil, etc. It's abuse when it becomes an addiction. It's abuse when it is used to the detriment of the user's physical or mental health. It's abuse when it is used to the detriment of society.
Assume you become a meth addict. Then, you recover. Cool. You're fine now. Well, many can't function in society, even after recovery. You are now a burden. Yep, that was drug abuse.
The problem with many of the illicit drugs is the power they have over the user, power that takes over so quickly. As I understand it (and yes, I have known exceptions), coke hooks you after one snort. One snort, and you want more... then more and more... then you lose your house, freedom, everything. That is why it is illegal. This is not arbitrary. Hell, I hate motorcycle helmet laws, but, you know what? Like laws against certain drugs, they keep some of our populace from becoming wards of the state by protecting their health. The law really doesn't give a damn about the motorcyclist; it protects society from having to take care of his dumb ass when he gets hit (regardless of fault) and he's not wearing a helmet. (I am a motorcyclist: it matters not, right-of-way; be a chicken and live another day!)
So, you want your freedom to smoke out, snort, and shoot up whatever the hell you want? Then I require a few things from you.
1) A signed, witnessed affidavit releasing society from any responsibility to take care of you after you quickly become a veg. No government money; no government health care.
2) Since you will become desperate for money for the basics and more drugs, you have a high chance of becoming a criminal. Therefore, I demand that, when you turn in the above affidavit, you also relinquish any and all weapons you have in your possession. I won't even ask where they came from or how you acquired them. Get found with a weapon after this point, and you lose your freedom to do drugs.
3) A second affidavit that releases all members of society from any responsibility in your death when
One can only wonder when the drugs legislation is going to reflect reality. I personally am not sure that I think all drugs should simply be legalised, no matter what, but the law has to make sense, and to make sense, it has to follow the general shape of what people actually do. A large percentage of the population has clearly decided that using certain drugs is OK, whether they are illegal or not.
The other part of this argument is that the drug laws don't reflect the objective harmfulness of the substances - nicotine and alcohol are clearly a lot more dangerous than some of the substances that are currently illegal. When the legislation is so obviously out of touch with reality, it is very difficult to persuade people, especially young people, that they shouldn't use drugs.
The intention of criminal law is to protect people - but the drug laws don't. As it is, people can say "Cannabis is clearly not as dangerous as nicotine" - unfortunately it is all too easy to go on to say "- so all this about drugs being dangerous is just a load of crap".
Why?
Can you give a logical, informed, scientific reason why this should be the case?
Dude.. Ritalin, and Adderal can be commonly obtained legally in the United States with a perscription. I've yet to hear anybody say Meth, Coke, Morphine, or OxyContin make you smarter.. If you read the source article carefully they never suggest the drugs were used illegally. I'm sure they would have printed that if they could have.
In the real world the issue of who is the most "deserving" is a bunch of crap and is irelevant.
You can make yourself "smarter" by studying hard, then you can get a better grade. I know some poeple with only average intelligence who have spent 2-3 hours per night through their entire high school and college careers in order to make decent grades. That's great, I respect the effort. A lot of people will say they "deserve" a good spot.
Some smart people I know got the same grades or better with a small fraction of the effort.
I work with some people who got ahead by having the extra time and energy to put forth 2 - 3 hours per night in order to make decent grades. Those people don't have anymore time to do their jobs than I do. They can't get their work done. There is nobody to hold their hand to help them make the grade. They have used that extra effort to get a job that they can only do with a lot of extra effort, and they don't have time to put forth the effort.
But If someone with average intelligence can take a pill that gives them a significant advantage, I'm all for it. My expection would be that if they get a better spot due to better grades, due to smart pills, they will probably keep taking the pills, even at work. They will keep performaing at a higher level.. They'll just "be" smarter. Win. Win. Win.
Do you think a student diagnosed with Attention Deficiet Disorder should be allowed to take Ritalin in order to clear their head? By your measure they probably shouldn't... Right?
"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety"-B.Franklin
I'm surprised to see no mention in the comments of Paul Erdos (the 'o' with two dots on top, but Slashdot seems not to be in unicode), one of the most important mathematicians of the century, who might have been responsible for the definition of a mathematician as a machine for turning coffee into theorems. He took Benzedrine or Ritalin almost every day for the last twenty five years of his life. His description of his inability to produce mathematics without these drugs has the fascinating implication that the current state of the mathematical landscape would be noticeably different had they not been available to him
Most people would find monotonous activities, well, monotonous, and would look for a way to avoid them. Clever folks would find a creative way around performing the monotonous activity.
But under the influence of drugs like Ritalin or Methamphetamine they would likely pull an allnighter plowing through the monotony manually, but less efficiently than if they'd spent the time to find a better way.
So over the long term, the drugged out dummy will get less done than the person who's normal monotony averse brain was spurred to think of better ways to get the job done.
But the meth/ritalin addict would feel very *productive* since under the drug they were able to perform impressive amounts of monotonous work far exceeding what they would have been able to endure without the drugs. So they feel 'smarter' on the drugs, that like the Miracle Berry made a sour task taste sweet, missing the crucial fact that eating lemons is dumb, whereas finding something sweet and yummy is smart, and will get you fatter than lemons in the end. Which is the real point.
...
Here is the correct link to miracle berry entry on wikipedia
...
This is exactly what I meant in my original post. Academics don't just go browsing Nature - they read an occasional article (whenever there's an article in the field).
Also, Nature and Science produce huge impact factors, but in my field, at least, the cover story in Nature is always an article that shows up as a more detailed article in something like PRL. My group had the cover of Nature not so long ago, and this was true of our article, too. I didn't mean to get in a pissing match about Nature though, I meant to point out that browsing the Nature web page to kill time was likely not an activity that the academic powerhouses partake in.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
Just anecdotal, but that's all their poll was, too. In my department, people read a lot of journals cover-to-cover (often online), but I've never known anyone to do so with Nature other than board undergrads trying to ignore me while I teach a class.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
... but TetraHydro Cannabi-diol COULD THEORICALLY be harmfull to health ... at a dosage of about 5kg taken in ONE STEP ... ... So, with THC levels commonly advertised in the media (20%), it leaves us with the task of finding someone who COULD roll, and smoke (alone) a pure-Cannabis joint of about 25kg in less than an hour (otherwise, the THC would disappear) ...
... still (04/2008) NO DEATH in the latest 5'000 years of usage reported so far ... but its use could be more ancient than that !!!
That is the precise reason why some WHO representative called Cannabis the most harmless substance on earth (about on par with the infamous di-Hydrogene Oxyde)
Good catch...you're right. 1% of adults. Not 1% of all people.
- Polluted rivers (brought by army contractors, dumping Trichroletylene, and the lack of action from the EPA)
... how different is that from CIA-sponsored cocaine & LSD trafficking in the '80s (and resulting drug addiction) ??
- Climate change, triggering most of the following (brought by generous lobbying in Wash,DC)
- Refugees (brought by US armies around the world on false pretense)
- Crime waves in the US (brought by NRA, and the general discrimination against so-called ethnic minorties & imbalanced wealth distribution)
All those, and much other are paid for by society, and the resulting compensation for damages are also paid by society (that is, you)
yep.. i voted and i'm just a grad student..
but thanks to these performance enhancing drugs I take i will soon be a top scientist, oh yes!
Say anything you like about me, it's all made up bullshit anyway, and everyone here but a handful of loons knows it. It makes me so happy when I piss off clueless assholes who project their own bad behavior onto others rather than face up to what they are. You call me names and whine about what I post because you can't refute what I write. This also makes me very happy. Thanks!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
"Not when it affects those in society. Ie, if you overdose and cannot afford health insurance, are rushed to the ER and tax payer money pays for your treatment and recovery, then it is our business."
Oh, so is it your assertion that every time somebody does something that possibly might injure themselves, thus costing the taxpayer money, that the government should have a say?
If what's at issue is how likely you are to injure yourself and cost the taxpayer money, then how is it that alcohol is legal and pot is not?
C'mon, don't start that "you cost the taxpayers $$, therefore we get to regulate your behavior". Once you start down that road, you're opening the door for every neo-puritan zealot to try and legislate their pet issue, from smoking to drinking to diet and exercise.
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".
"EMTALA is an unfunded mandate that says that the nurses who work in an ER, the hospital who runs the ER, and ER physicians like me have to pay for uninsured emergency care. It takes a segment of the US economy and says we have to take responsibility for and subsidize what everyone else doesn't. That cheap McDonalds hamburger you ate today that is less expensive because McDonalds doesn't offer health insurance? I paid for a part of that. "
Um, at the risk of side-tracking this discussion even more than it already is, why don't you guys in the US just do what every other industrialized country does, and put health care in the same category as roads, police, and firefighters?
How do people conclude that firefighters and cops and 50 other government services are necessary but that cancer treatment is a luxury?
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".
If you had bothered to read my post, you'd see I mentioned that head shots are a result of incorrect performance.
In boxing, if you get hit in the head, it's because you didn't get out of the way. No part of boxing correctly requires you to take head shots EVER. You're supposed to dodge or block, not allow yourself to be hit. Incorrect performance, as I said.
Of course there's the rope-a-dope, but you couldn't have been talking about that because a) you didn't say it, you said boxing b) it entails getting hit on the FOREARMS AND BODY not the head.
Frankly, your post was stupid.
You are wrong. I am right. Go away now.
Couchslug you are a pitiful douchebag from arstechnica which speaks for itself. You are such an ass.
You seem to think your opinion on the subject matters. It doesn't.
"That would be abusing yourself with heroin."
A distinction without a difference, playing semantics is a ploy used by desperate people when their arguments fail like yours has.
The rest of your post is more useless opining unsupported by fact or logic, and buoyed only by your overly inflated assessment of the worth of your observations.
You don't know what you're talking about. Repeating your ignorant observations doesn't make them any less ignorant.
"My axe to grind is..."
No one cares. If you're not going to bother actually learning about a subject before shooting your mouth off in a way that displays your ignorance, you won't get many people who give you or your opinions any credibility.
The "effects of hard drugs" to which you aver are in fact the effects of criminalization. I've been addicted to opiates in the past, and highly recommend it to anyone who is suffering from severe chronic pain.
There is no substantive material difference between dilaudid and heroin, except that heroin is illegal in the US (not so in the UK, for example). I lost some hearing, but if I hadn't had the drugs, I probably would have killed myself to escape the depression caused by unrelenting pain.
Driving will fuck you up. In fact, driving is vastly more dangerous than intelligently using unadulterated heroin in the presence of plenty of cash money.
Drugs are good if used well, and bad if used ill, just like guns or toothpicks or pretty girls.
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
As this guy:
http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2008/04/nature_says_scientists_use_per.html
Points out
1) These are drugs that millions of well-meaning, loving, parents cheerfully give to their 9-year old for ADHD
2) If anyone can tell me why it is more logical, medical, ethical, efficacious, or safe to force it on a kid who scores high on a reliable but totally invalid ADHD checklist; but less so for a "scientist" with considerably more insight into his own condition-- and, by the way, the autonomy to decide for himself-- I'm listening.
3)why not encourage the use of the drugs? Beyond safety issues, is it just that we're worried about unfair advantage in science? That's the debate in sports, that it doesn't allow for a level playing field. You want a fair competition. But why would you care about that in science? I mean, if it takes 800mg of Provigil a day to find the cure to cancer a month earlier, well...?
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".