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I don't think this is constructive. Smoking is awesome. If only we could find a way to do it without the health problems.

elorant 11y ago
I used to be a smoker for more than a decade, smoking a pack of cigarettes every day. I quit it nine years ago. Didn't miss it for a day. It's an awful habit that takes a toll on your health, hygiene, finance, you name it. And I agree with the parent comment, just don't smoke. I don't think it's awesome, with the notable exception of pipes and some aromatic flavors most tobacco tastes like shit. It's an addiction and that makes many people think that it's awesome and cool and whatever.
- thaumasiotes 11y ago
  Why do people start?
  - chestervonwinch 11y ago
    Social factors + you catch a pretty mean buzz at first.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
  - tomhoward 11y ago
    I started (at 17) as a social aid and to deal with adolescent stress. I think both reasons are pretty common. (FWIW it took till age 32 to permanently shake the rotten habit.)
    - thaumasiotes 11y ago
      The theory "smoking is all negatives, you have to force yourself to get used to it, but people power through for the social effects" fails miserably at explaining how smoking reached the level of prevalence where social effects could exist in the first place.
  - DanBC 11y ago
    People with mental illness are over-represented in people who smoke. There's some weird to-and-fro stuff happening that they haven't worked out yet. EG: People with schizophrenia smoke a lot. And the hydrocarbons in cigarette smoke interact with anti-psychotic medication, which means people need to take more.
- spdionis 11y ago
  I argued that the problem is in the health toll, not in smoking itself.
  - tomhoward 11y ago
    Sure, but the reasons people like it are pretty closely linked to the reasons it's bad for you (aside from inhaling poisons, you're hyper-stimulating the nervous system which can lead to burnout, depression, etc), so it's kinda moot to hope to retain the awesome without any of the harm.
    - spdionis 11y ago
      The risk of lung/mouth cancer and general other physical effects far outweight the nervous system side effects (which are arguable, i never thought of smoking as a possible factor in depression).
      - tomhoward 11y ago
        You're expressing opinions ("arguable") when hard evidence is readily available. Mouth and lung cancers and cardiovascular disease get all the headlines due to their mortality rates and hideous pictures. But there's a whole spectrum of harm that exists well before you get to those extremes, and the evidence is easily found if you care to search for it. See this 1993 study "Influence of cigarette smoking on human autonomic function" [1] In habitual smokers, smoking acutely reduces baseline levels of vagal-cardiac nerve activity and completely resets vagally mediated arterial baroreceptor-cardiac reflex responses. Smoking also reduces muscle sympathetic nerve activity but augments increases of sympathetic activity triggered by brief arterial pressure reductions. This pattern of autonomic changes is likely to influence smokers' responses to acute arterial pressure reductions importantly. Also, "Endocrine Effects of Tobacco Smoking" [2] Over many years a large number of studies have demonstrated that exposure to cigarette smoke produces marked neuroendocrine changes. The effects of nicotine on the hypothalamicpituitary axis (HPA) were first studied by Balfour (1989), who showed that nicotine was a potent activator of the HPA. The basic mechanism of action of nicotine on these systems appears to be contingent on its ability to mimic the effects of acetylcholine at selected central nicotinic acetylcholinergic receptors (Rosecransland & Karin, 1998). There are at least three types of nicotine binding sites in the hypothalamus (Fuxe et al., 1989). Nicotine stimulates neuronal firing directly by acting at the binding sites or indirectly by causing the release of acetylcholine or monoaminergic neurotransmitters (such as dopamine, noradrenaline and serotonin) (Pickworth & Fant, 1998). Nicotine can thus affect HPA function through a variety of paths (Rosecransland & Karin, 1998). FYI it's often been observed that dysfunction of the HPA axis is a factor in depression, anxiety, chronic fatigue, hypothyroidism and other debilitating illnesses. Eg... One of the most enduring and replicated findings in biological psychiatry is activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis in a subset of patients with major depressive disorder. This review will discuss some of these findings and their pertinence to the assessment and treatment of depressed patients. [3] [1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/8339419/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/8339419/ [2] http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/496223_2 http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/496223_2 [3] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC181180/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC181180/
GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
What about the whole "smokers make everything smell like smoke for everybody else" problem.
- u320 11y ago
  That problem is solved by vaping.
  - brahmwg 11y ago
    I don't really agree with that. Some students would often vape behind their laptop in class (to be cool/rebelious, they could easily wait to be outside) and it definitely makes an offensive odor. Non-vapers should have the right to breathe air that isn't polluted with second-hand mystery fumes, especially in doors where ventilation isn't perfect.
Htsthbjig 11y ago
What is so good about smoking? I smoked as a teenager because for some time I was stupid in order to fit with stupid friends. I always found that a brainless bad habit, but it was interesting experience in the sense that I learned that to body could adapt to anything and even get to need it. At first it is the worst thing in the world, it makes you cough but you force yourself into it(showing you "are a man" or whatever stupid reason) and you get to tolerate it, then you need it. You probably could get used to eat shit or suck from a car exhaust pipe too. You can get used even to eat poison, like Rasputin.
- spdionis 11y ago
  Or you could even get used to drinking strong whiskies! It's called acquired taste and not all of them are bad.
- bad-joke 11y ago
  Former smoker here. One good thing is the ritual. I never thought of it as "brainless" before but that's a great way of putting it. Smoking is relaxing because you turn off your brain and go through the prescribed motions. When you finish the last motion you go back to life. It's not really relaxing in the chemically induced way (in fact smoking increases anxiety), it's more like meditation. You're allowing yourself to take a break from life for a few minutes. In fact, you're really being /given permission/ to take a break by the external mandate of addiction cravings. You can use this time to reflect, strike up a conversation, examine your surroundings, whatever you want. Another good thing is bonding with smokers. It's a shared activity. The act of smoking serves as either punctuation for a conversation, or the background noise that substitutes conversation. A cigarette can be a prop used for emphasis. Bumming a cigarette is a sort of friendly offering. Most importantly, misery loves company. All smokers know they're addicted. When you smoke with someone else, you're acknowledging each other's weakness and demonstrating acceptance. That's one of the main reasons being a smoker is like being in a big, secret club. It's very romantic. I haven't smoked in a very long time, and I realize now that it was a really stupid and damaging habit, but I do miss parts of it. I've promised myself that I can take up pipe-smoking as a reward for surviving into elderly age.
giancarlostoro 11y ago
I've never smoked cigarettes but cigars I have. They make so many claims about how addictive nicotine is, and yet cigars are supposed to have so much more nicotine than cigarettes, here I am a year without smoking a cigar (maybe I've had one or two in the past year, if anything) and I'm probably not going through what a cigarette smoker goes through, and I've gone times where I've had a cigar daily. Winston Churchill smoked daily and lived to be around 90. So I'm not an "expert" but a lot of what they say doesn't add up with what I've lived and it seems others have lived. Cigarettes aren't pure tobacco usually anyway, they're full of "tobacco sheets", just like Coca Cola isn't as full of sugar as it is "Corn Syrup." My uncle on the other hand smokes daily for quite a few years, and I never see him have the same symptoms other cigarette smokers usually do. The trick is probably the fact we don't inhale the cigar smoke into our lungs, enough of the smoke will get in there regardless.
- spdionis 11y ago
  In my opinion he addiction doesn't come from nicotine but from the act itself which is very relaxing and pleasant. Btw even if you don't inhale I understand that nicotine gets in your system anyway. Probably in smaller quantities, which is offset by the high amount of nicotine in cigar/pipe tobacco.
  - giancarlostoro 11y ago
    I do it socially really, but again, it's been a year or so since.
  - anexprogrammer 11y ago
    The psychological aspects are habit forming; the social aspects, the ritual etc. Whilst nicotine is undoubtedly addictive, there are other things in tobacco / cigarettes that seem far more addictive. There's also the additional crap added, like chemicals to ensure the cigarette doesn't go out like hand rolled and cigars do, etc. The part I missed most whilst quitting, with the aid of vaping (nicotine replacement gums, patches and inhalers were a waste of time and money for me) was something present in tobacco, but not in ecigs. Vaping never quite replaced that, or felt as nice. The occasional cig I had when out drinking with friends made it quite tempting to relapse - though I didn't. The nicotine withdrawal when I quit vaping was so minor compared to the withdrawal from stopping tobacco that I actually wonder if the various quitting aids are replacing the wrong chemical(s). I am, of course, just an anecdotal data point of one.
harel 11y ago
You'd think we can put people on the moon, land a probe on a comet, create a world wide network of computers yet we cannot make one of the best and oldest human habits healthy....

elorant 11y ago

I used to be a smoker for more than a decade, smoking a pack of cigarettes every day. I quit it nine years ago. Didn't miss it for a day. It's an awful habit that takes a toll on your health, hygiene, finance, you name it. And I agree with the parent comment, just don't smoke. I don't think it's awesome, with the notable exception of pipes and some aromatic flavors most tobacco tastes like shit. It's an addiction and that makes many people think that it's awesome and cool and whatever.

thaumasiotes 11y ago
Why do people start?
- chestervonwinch 11y ago
  Social factors + you catch a pretty mean buzz at first.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
- tomhoward 11y ago
  I started (at 17) as a social aid and to deal with adolescent stress. I think both reasons are pretty common. (FWIW it took till age 32 to permanently shake the rotten habit.)
  - thaumasiotes 11y ago
    The theory "smoking is all negatives, you have to force yourself to get used to it, but people power through for the social effects" fails miserably at explaining how smoking reached the level of prevalence where social effects could exist in the first place.
- DanBC 11y ago
  People with mental illness are over-represented in people who smoke. There's some weird to-and-fro stuff happening that they haven't worked out yet. EG: People with schizophrenia smoke a lot. And the hydrocarbons in cigarette smoke interact with anti-psychotic medication, which means people need to take more.
spdionis 11y ago
I argued that the problem is in the health toll, not in smoking itself.
- tomhoward 11y ago
  Sure, but the reasons people like it are pretty closely linked to the reasons it's bad for you (aside from inhaling poisons, you're hyper-stimulating the nervous system which can lead to burnout, depression, etc), so it's kinda moot to hope to retain the awesome without any of the harm.
  - spdionis 11y ago
    The risk of lung/mouth cancer and general other physical effects far outweight the nervous system side effects (which are arguable, i never thought of smoking as a possible factor in depression).
    - tomhoward 11y ago
      You're expressing opinions ("arguable") when hard evidence is readily available. Mouth and lung cancers and cardiovascular disease get all the headlines due to their mortality rates and hideous pictures. But there's a whole spectrum of harm that exists well before you get to those extremes, and the evidence is easily found if you care to search for it. See this 1993 study "Influence of cigarette smoking on human autonomic function" [1] In habitual smokers, smoking acutely reduces baseline levels of vagal-cardiac nerve activity and completely resets vagally mediated arterial baroreceptor-cardiac reflex responses. Smoking also reduces muscle sympathetic nerve activity but augments increases of sympathetic activity triggered by brief arterial pressure reductions. This pattern of autonomic changes is likely to influence smokers' responses to acute arterial pressure reductions importantly. Also, "Endocrine Effects of Tobacco Smoking" [2] Over many years a large number of studies have demonstrated that exposure to cigarette smoke produces marked neuroendocrine changes. The effects of nicotine on the hypothalamicpituitary axis (HPA) were first studied by Balfour (1989), who showed that nicotine was a potent activator of the HPA. The basic mechanism of action of nicotine on these systems appears to be contingent on its ability to mimic the effects of acetylcholine at selected central nicotinic acetylcholinergic receptors (Rosecransland & Karin, 1998). There are at least three types of nicotine binding sites in the hypothalamus (Fuxe et al., 1989). Nicotine stimulates neuronal firing directly by acting at the binding sites or indirectly by causing the release of acetylcholine or monoaminergic neurotransmitters (such as dopamine, noradrenaline and serotonin) (Pickworth & Fant, 1998). Nicotine can thus affect HPA function through a variety of paths (Rosecransland & Karin, 1998). FYI it's often been observed that dysfunction of the HPA axis is a factor in depression, anxiety, chronic fatigue, hypothyroidism and other debilitating illnesses. Eg... One of the most enduring and replicated findings in biological psychiatry is activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis in a subset of patients with major depressive disorder. This review will discuss some of these findings and their pertinence to the assessment and treatment of depressed patients. [3] [1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/8339419/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/8339419/ [2] http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/496223_2 http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/496223_2 [3] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC181180/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC181180/

GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago

What about the whole "smokers make everything smell like smoke for everybody else" problem.

u320 11y ago
That problem is solved by vaping.
- brahmwg 11y ago
  I don't really agree with that. Some students would often vape behind their laptop in class (to be cool/rebelious, they could easily wait to be outside) and it definitely makes an offensive odor. Non-vapers should have the right to breathe air that isn't polluted with second-hand mystery fumes, especially in doors where ventilation isn't perfect.

Htsthbjig 11y ago

What is so good about smoking? I smoked as a teenager because for some time I was stupid in order to fit with stupid friends. I always found that a brainless bad habit, but it was interesting experience in the sense that I learned that to body could adapt to anything and even get to need it. At first it is the worst thing in the world, it makes you cough but you force yourself into it(showing you "are a man" or whatever stupid reason) and you get to tolerate it, then you need it. You probably could get used to eat shit or suck from a car exhaust pipe too. You can get used even to eat poison, like Rasputin.

spdionis 11y ago
Or you could even get used to drinking strong whiskies! It's called acquired taste and not all of them are bad.
bad-joke 11y ago
Former smoker here. One good thing is the ritual. I never thought of it as "brainless" before but that's a great way of putting it. Smoking is relaxing because you turn off your brain and go through the prescribed motions. When you finish the last motion you go back to life. It's not really relaxing in the chemically induced way (in fact smoking increases anxiety), it's more like meditation. You're allowing yourself to take a break from life for a few minutes. In fact, you're really being /given permission/ to take a break by the external mandate of addiction cravings. You can use this time to reflect, strike up a conversation, examine your surroundings, whatever you want. Another good thing is bonding with smokers. It's a shared activity. The act of smoking serves as either punctuation for a conversation, or the background noise that substitutes conversation. A cigarette can be a prop used for emphasis. Bumming a cigarette is a sort of friendly offering. Most importantly, misery loves company. All smokers know they're addicted. When you smoke with someone else, you're acknowledging each other's weakness and demonstrating acceptance. That's one of the main reasons being a smoker is like being in a big, secret club. It's very romantic. I haven't smoked in a very long time, and I realize now that it was a really stupid and damaging habit, but I do miss parts of it. I've promised myself that I can take up pipe-smoking as a reward for surviving into elderly age.

giancarlostoro 11y ago

I've never smoked cigarettes but cigars I have. They make so many claims about how addictive nicotine is, and yet cigars are supposed to have so much more nicotine than cigarettes, here I am a year without smoking a cigar (maybe I've had one or two in the past year, if anything) and I'm probably not going through what a cigarette smoker goes through, and I've gone times where I've had a cigar daily. Winston Churchill smoked daily and lived to be around 90. So I'm not an "expert" but a lot of what they say doesn't add up with what I've lived and it seems others have lived. Cigarettes aren't pure tobacco usually anyway, they're full of "tobacco sheets", just like Coca Cola isn't as full of sugar as it is "Corn Syrup." My uncle on the other hand smokes daily for quite a few years, and I never see him have the same symptoms other cigarette smokers usually do. The trick is probably the fact we don't inhale the cigar smoke into our lungs, enough of the smoke will get in there regardless.

spdionis 11y ago
In my opinion he addiction doesn't come from nicotine but from the act itself which is very relaxing and pleasant. Btw even if you don't inhale I understand that nicotine gets in your system anyway. Probably in smaller quantities, which is offset by the high amount of nicotine in cigar/pipe tobacco.
- giancarlostoro 11y ago
  I do it socially really, but again, it's been a year or so since.
- anexprogrammer 11y ago
  The psychological aspects are habit forming; the social aspects, the ritual etc. Whilst nicotine is undoubtedly addictive, there are other things in tobacco / cigarettes that seem far more addictive. There's also the additional crap added, like chemicals to ensure the cigarette doesn't go out like hand rolled and cigars do, etc. The part I missed most whilst quitting, with the aid of vaping (nicotine replacement gums, patches and inhalers were a waste of time and money for me) was something present in tobacco, but not in ecigs. Vaping never quite replaced that, or felt as nice. The occasional cig I had when out drinking with friends made it quite tempting to relapse - though I didn't. The nicotine withdrawal when I quit vaping was so minor compared to the withdrawal from stopping tobacco that I actually wonder if the various quitting aids are replacing the wrong chemical(s). I am, of course, just an anecdotal data point of one.

harel 11y ago

You'd think we can put people on the moon, land a probe on a comet, create a world wide network of computers yet we cannot make one of the best and oldest human habits healthy....