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Do Recreational Drugs Help Programmers?
jfruh writes "Among the winners of last night's election: marijuana users. Voters in both Washington and Colorado approved referenda that legalized marijuana for recreational use, though the drug remains illegal under federal law. There's been a long-standing debate among programmers as to whether recreational drugs, including pot and hallucinagens like LSD, can actually help programmers code. Don't forget, there was a substantial overlap between the wave of computer professionals who came of age in the '60s and that era's counterculture." (There's even a good book on that topic.)
Absolutely.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I will program something while not being high and see if it makes a difference, later though. So far I am still collecting data points.
Is the pot free as in beer or free as in speech
---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.
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
I would expect code produced under the influence to have more bugs, less comments and generally be an unmaintainable mess.
Those who do will of course say that it does and will provide anecdotal evidence (although I'm sure most of them have not actually performed any controlled tests to verify that claim). Most studies would indicate that drugs would not aid in many of the mental processes involved in programming, but that won't change anyone's mind, and I definitive statement can't be made until studies are done to specifically test this assertion.
Voters in both Washington and Colorado approved referenda that legalized marijuana for recreational use
Valve Corporation is an American video game development and digital distribution company based in Bellevue, Washington, United States.
If HL2:EP3 finally comes out, I guess we'll know what to thank.
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
You forget how stunningly crap the spec and use cases you've been provided are?
In case you were tempted to RTFA, don't. You have to click through two ad-laden pages, and there really isn't any more information than in the summary.
But I would argue that the type of person who would try recreational drugs is also the type of person that might get into programming. Curious, risk taking and someone who doesn't want to be told what to do or fit into a mold? Yeah sounds about right.
Drugs do things to your brain that make you realize certain things.
The fallacy is assuming that the only path to these realizations come through drugs.
(It's worth mentioning that drugs have numerous downsides as well.)
If you learn to meditate, or for those with aversion to religion to "think hard," you'll get everything you could from drugs.
This isn't an anti-drug argument; that's for someone else's thread. It's an argument against assuming drugs can give you something that can't get another way.
If the potential is within the mind, clearly it's the important element, not the drugs.
You end up with a short term gain and long term problems. Anyone who tells you different has not reached the other end yet.
For example aderall lets you concentrate to a very effective degree. Until you start need to up the dose to get the same effect. Then you give up and are a wreck for it.
Cocaine makes you spazzy.
Codine sorts of things makes you relaxed and happy until you are full blown addicted to it.
Caffeine makes you a 'bit spazzy' but long term you keep having to up the dose to get the same effect. Then trying to quit = massive I am going to throw up my lungs headaches.
Weed makes you mellow. But eventually you get paranoid.
So yes you can 'hack' your body. But remember sometimes what you do can NOT be undone.
Don't forget, there was a substantial overlap between the wave of computer professionals who came of age in the '60s and that era's counterculture
And there was a non significant number that did not touch it. You are trying to justify a position with spurious thinking. This is usually the words of someone who is doing something they know is stupid yet want to justify it in some way. Just man up and say 'I am doing something stupid'.
In this case, probably non-conventional logic; computers don't operate the way human brains do, it takes a twisted head to program well. Especially if you're attempting to optimize a system using low level programming languages.
Of course, I've said before: Drug tests are mostly to attempt to filter out incompetent low level employees, trending a bit upwards when they're operating dangerous equipment. By the time you're a serious professional, I figure the general attitude is that they don't want to know, but secretly expect you to be able to handle your recreational drug use. IE the difference between a lawyer and a burger flipper is the Lawyer is expected to know how to handle his cocaine habit. IE as long as his performance doesn't degrade unacceptably, he's good.
I don't read AC A human right
As with anything, moderation is key. As I remember from my college days there are a few times where I got so out of it I was couched locked and did not want to do anything.
The typical drug war debate aside, I personally wouldn't toke up every time I had to program. I know how it affects me and sometimes being sober for work is a good thing. Just keep it simple and enjoy it as a treat when your work is done. Just like one would treat alcohol.
The body compensates to anything one throws at it to make up for the temporary gains. It's a zero sum gain sadly. Just enjoy it as a treat or treatment if you really need it for a disease/disability.
Recreational drugs serve more as a device to cope with Management than they do for any other aspects of developing code.
Your friend was doing it wrong. The intoxicant helps draw connections between things you wouldn't've necessarily thought to connect beforehand, gives you ideas, sends you off in an unexpected direction.
The work that derives from that initial idea, the actual making stuff of it, should be done sober.
http://xkcd.com/323/
What about crack cocaine and Windows ME?
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
When I was on the Windows 8 UI development team, we all were taking Meth and PCP daily. And look at the wonderful and innovative design we came up with!
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
This is your code:
This is your code on drugs:
Any questions?
Drug tests are a dumb american war on drugs phenomenon. Nobody in Canada or the rest of the world takes them.
If you can't filter out incompetent employees without a cup of urine, you fail at HR 101.
For my part, I obviously don't use illegal drugs at work and I'm doing fine. But I can see that most of the programmers, including me, using energy drinks, or shit load of coffee. It seems obvious to me that caffeine is a great drug for programming as much for most of other jobs and activities.
Sometimes at home however, I like to smoke a spliff, read some code on the Github which eventually results in coding my own projects after a while. I have never used any stronger stuff for programming, because it doesn't make much sense for me. While you can get some inspiration, programming is a very focused activity with little room for being dreamy, thus I would say that anything that is stronger than a lightly made joint would be counter-productive for coding.
I suggest, recreational drugs should belong to our recreational time. Many geeks I know has a huge problem with separating from the computer, at least a little recreational time should detach us from the matrix.
While I agree that you shouldn't mod GP down because of disagreeing...I do believe GP should be modded down. He uses inflammatory and trolling language.
"This Is Disgusting And Sick"? Filthy, vile, and destructive? Timothy is irresponsible and should be fired?
This is exactly the kind of language that stops thoughtful discussion, and should be discouraged accordingly by the mods.
Whatever your opinion is of recreational drugs, this animosity toward people minding their own business in the privacy of their own home is reminiscent of those who think violent video games caused the Columbine massacre and other real-world violence. It is a simple fact that humans generally consumes large amounts of chemicals that alter the way our mind and body work, and our society generally manages to do just fine. And just like some people will be violent psychopaths who just happen to be gamers, some people will self destruct who just happen to use recreational drugs.
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Cite your claim that Shakespeare ascribed a "profound positive effect" to cannabis on his creative process, please. (And from a publication of a university press, not a pot advocacy website or similar).
Creative programming and creative problem solving. Brian Wilson. Shakespeare, Carl Sagan, Paul McCartney...
Correlation is not causation. Maybe they were just creative people. Period.
Millions of non-creative pot smokers nationwide will back up this hypothesis.
No sig today...
Most people don't know Pot comes in a very wide variety of effects (and side effects). Some might make a person drowsy while another might make a person more alert. One might have a side effect of affecting short term memory. Another strain might not, but cause something else. Some strains might very well be useful for coding. There are lots of Sativa dominant strains that are very similar to amphetamines / caffiene, in that they have a stimulant effect and in many people tend to stimulate creativity. It's really impossible to say definitively marijuana does this or that with so many varieties around. Many American recreational users are just concerned with raw THC content when this matters very little (it's the balance of different Cannabinoids that makes the difference). The government's lack of attention to this issue in their propaganda does little to help. Medical users, on the other hand, have known these things for decades. You have one strain for the day, and one for the night time. If you're going to try pot, my recommendation is to do your research. Start off with an Indica dominant strain unlikely to cause paranoia (the most unpleasant side effect), and graduate up to something that is a little more cerebral and leaves you less drowsy. My personal recommendation is Hindu Kush. It's a very calming, typical Indica smoke but at the same time is totally like other Indicas in that it won't leave you drowsy
Creative programming and creative problem solving.
Majority of coding work is not creative. Take an interactive form with 20 fields in WPF, for example - with data binding, with triggers, with validators.
I'm not even sure what coding is creative these days. Perhaps yet another scheduler for Linux? That certainly would be very creative. But even a driver for Linux is 99% slogging through the datasheets and through the sample code. For that you need clear mind, and not this.
By the time the tasks are allocated to coders the problems are already cut into bite-sized chunks - forms, interfaces, graphics, styles, database schema, etc. Real problem solving usually starts at a higher level, during system design. What does the customer really want here? What hardware and software should we select, and why? What are the risks? How much it will cost? How could the impossible task X be done at all? What is the plan B? Who is going to do this and that? But you'd better not be drugged out of your mind when you answer those questions.
It's a fun topic to debate but the question is pretty fuzzy. "Recreational drugs" vary so widely in their effects that you can't really say anything about all of them at once. "Help" is also a subjective term that would need to be further defined to have any meaningful discussion.
I'll also put out there that anyone who hasn't done much of them is unqualified to answer.
Personally, and speaking very generally, ie. the way this question would typically be taken, I would say that they do not help. More specifically:
- Depressants such as pot and alcohol can help you think more creatively but tend to erode motivation and coding accuracy/efficiency.
- Hallucinogens (LSD, DMT, MDA, 2CB, shrooms etc) in normal doses also help creativity but will usually make interacting with the computer difficult or impossible. At very low doses (see LSD microdosing) there can be potential for augmenting sharpness of mind and attention.
- Most energetic stimulants (cocaine, meth, crystal, crack) make you too wired to sit still and focus on a task like programming. Way too little attention span.
- Speed is an exception to the above. With lower doses it can help keep you focused and awake almost indefinitely without being foggy. This the one drug I would say has the ability to help, even if it doesn't allow you to do anything you couldn't already with willpower and enough Jolt.
- MDMA (ecstasy) I consider a class on its own. Coming up with and talking about programming ideas could work very well but sitting in front of a computer doing a task that needs a clear head would definitely be problematic due to the mashy fogginess. Besides, why code when you could be hugging someone or dancing?
- I couldn't tell you about heroin but from what I've seen in movies it doesn't look like something you can code on at all!
FWIW I've been coding for about 30 years. Hope this helps :)
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree...
How about: Write something whiled doped. Read that when sobered up. Pick out the good bits. Write it into a coherent story, edit, publish. I suspect that is much closer to the way most writers use drugs to increase creativity. Good writing is only 5% creative ideas, but that 5% can destroy an otherwise gifted author's career if it just won't show up to the party. The idea is that the sober brain has a lot of filters that stop 'stupid' thoughts making it up to the conscious level, getting doped relaxes those filters letting a lot of stupid stuff through. But like any piece of filtering software, sometimes there are false positives, and those false positives are more likely to be groundbreakingly creative ideas simply by their nature of being so close to the stupid line.
Unfortunately, all of our HR employees are stoned.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
Pot takes my mind away from programming, when is time to sleep. It also makes me a lot more relaxed, and interested on the silly things my kid wants to do. After a day of blasting my brain with logic and debugging, inhaling some canabinoids through a vaporizer, helps me get my mind away from the stress from work, without the side effects of pharmaceutical headache otc medicine. I don't smoke weed when I am at work, but my best programming and design ideas come in when I am stoned. I write them down, and then review then the next day. I am one of the top contributors, get bonuses every year, and my life couldn't be happier and healthier. Also Washington state rules. Take that Oregon!
Majority of coding work should be preemptive coding for scalability.
PHB: Listen, Bill, I have a small programming task for you. We need an application that pops a dialog up, asks for a number, and appends that number, as plain text, to a file. Could you put this together before lunch?
Bill: Hey, boss, this is a major undertaking. Since we want to ensure scalability of this application I need to make it so it accepts a form definition language, parses it, executes scripts in another language, and then spits it into a variable, programmable set of databases which could be plain text files as you want, or ODBC connections, or The Cloud. Of course we want strong crypto on all that, and biometric authentication at every step. My team of ten will probably do it within a year or two.
PHB: Bill, are you high?
No Mountain Dew and you call yourself a programmer? :)
I doubt your story based on that!
I almost never drink coffee or tea with caffeine. Not that I'm against them, I just don't like them, I prefer herbal teas. No Mtn Dew or Cola either.
The problem is when I do need some caffeine (Monday overflow or something) if I drink a small cup of regular coffee, I get all anxious and shaky, my pulse increases and overall I feel bad. So, if I didn't get enough sleep, coffee does not make me feel better.
This happens to me with weed... I generally have a better experience with it if I'm using it regularly. If I let my tolerance get too low it makes me uncomfortably anxious and paranoid. I've heard other people say this too.
Well ... it's a bit of a stretch ... but quoted from Scientific American and BBC news ...
In the current issue of the South African Journal of Science, Francis Thackeray of the Transvaal Museum in Pretoria and his colleagues document the presence of cocaine and myristic acid (a plant-derived hallucinogen) in clay-pipe fragments retrieved from the beloved bard's Stratford-Upon-Avon home. Their analysis also hints at the presence of marijuana residues.
Though the pipe cannot be definitively linked to Shakespeare himself, it is certain that it dates to the 17th century. This fact came as a surprise to the scientists; previously, the earliest known record of cocaine in Europe dated to only 200 years ago.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=shakespeare-on-drugs
It is not contradictory in the least, he goes home, smokes, relaxes, and in that relaxed state he thinks about his job in a relaxed and creative state and he writes down the ideas and brings them to work.
What about that is contradictory?
If you do think it is contradictory do you have personal experience with being high?
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.
You can be a top contributor and still be stressed... dur. Most people drink a beer or a glass in the evenings to relax, what people have been saying this ENTIRE TIME is that puffing a spliff to achieve that effect is exactly the same.
The weed relieves the stress and makes him happy.
It really isn't that difficult to understand.
I have depression issues, I take anti-depressants, it is not contradictory that the end result is that I am not depressed.
Don't know something? Look it up. Still don't know? Then ask.