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Cognition Enhancer Research
oschobero writes to tell us the Economist has a look at pharmaceutical research as it applies to cognition enhancers. While the research is obviously focused on things like Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and schizophrenia, the resulting drugs may also have a benefit to healthy minds. "Provigil and Ritalin really do enhance cognition in healthy people. Provigil, for example, adds the ability to remember an extra digit or so to an individual's working memory (most people can hold seven random digits in their memory, but have difficulty with eight). It also improves people's performance in tests of their ability to plan. Because of such positive effects on normal people, says the report, there is growing use of these drugs to stave off fatigue, help shift-workers, boost exam performance and aid recovery from the effects of long-distance flights."
What is the long-term (or even all of the short-term) effects of this? IIRC, Ritalin comes with a bucketload of side effects.
I guess that drugs specifically made for the mind start (at least for me) creeping deeper and deeper into questions of morality and ethics than one designed to treat any other body part. Just something that makes me a bit wary about them... For instance, is an "enhanced" person more susceptible to suggestion than otherwise? Are they more focused on the task at hand, but not as aware of their surroundings? How does it affect multitasking? Emotions? Attitude and outlook?
Dunno... but caffeine seems to work just fine for me, and I get to keep a clear mind which I retain full control of while I'm at it.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
it's probably because of how your brain works.
Maybe you are trying to memorize 7 numbers (symbol + significance in our society) instead of memorizing a 3cm x 1.5cm illustration (the area in a paper where those numbers can be written) or instead of memorizing a 10 second sound (the aprox time in wich those numbers can be pronounced).
The problem might not be your memory, but the way your brain processes and stores the information it receives.
- Human knowledge belongs to the world
"as much as scientist claim they can enhance or reduce certain abilities, it is also a reality science is just beginning to understand human metabolism."
Bull.
While we don't know everything, we are long past the "Just beginning " phase.
What are you, posting from 1950?
"It's also widely known that many of the current drugs where discovered by accident while trying to cure something else (like the discovery of viagra, and the heart benefits obtained from aspirin)"
discovered through experimentation and observation. You make it sound as if they drop something accidentally and then it cured something.
While they observed unexpected effect during the scientific process, it was the experimentation and testing that brought there discoveries to light.
"So, as much as we don't want see it, our scientist can be wrong."
This is nonsensical.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
There are no completely safe drugs, there are no drugs without side effects. That being said, even if these drugs are significantly safer, it just seems to be a bad idea to depend on drugs to run your everyday life. The line between theraputic and recreational use is blurring.
If I had to take non-theraputic medications to perform my job I'd get a different job.
I have mod points. The reign of terror begins now.
That's totally normal, don't worry about it.
Most people can retain 7 +/- 2 (5 to 9) semantic "packets" of information. A "packet" can be a part of a larger packet. Most people can reliably recall 5 random numbers or letters in a row. Or 5 groups of 5 numbers or letters. Or 5 random words. Or 5 unrelated phrases.
But don't try to memorize a paragraph worth of random letters and numbers -- that's more than 9 packets so it's almost impossible without a lot of repetition. That's why phone numbers have a dash in them, to break the number up into smaller packets that are easier to remember.
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First person anecdotes are pretty useless for this topic. Many people who have dropped acid will testify in front of the Supreme Court that it enhanced their perception. Only a well controlled, well designed double-blind test is acceptable in this context.
I didn't realize all this in a concrete manner until somewhere in my late 20s after trying some of these drugs that made things like mental crises, and the utter inability to turn my brain off to focus or sleep optional. I've since taken them on and off as necessary, but being able to intuitively understand what it means to be able to cause one's actions to align with one's intentions on a regular basis is invaluable. I can say with complete honesty that I really didn't understand how the world worked before.