4 ms·

Other commenters already pointed out that we didn’t have modern laboratory science when tobacco was brought over to Europe, not to mention that mechanized cigar

Other commenters already pointed out that we didn’t have modern laboratory science when tobacco was brought over to Europe, not to mention that mechanized cigarette production is a much more recent development that the use of tobacco by western cultures. I used to smoke, and now I vape. My lungs function so much better now that it’s easily discernible to me that smoking irritates lungs far more than vaping.

duud 7y ago
My experience is that vaping feels easier on the body than smoking but both cause coughing and congestion. It probably isn't a good idea to inhale large quantities of anything other than oxygen.
- petre 7y ago
  You probably mean air. Inhaling pure oxygen is generally bad, sometimes even harmful.
pdonis 7y ago
> we didn’t have modern laboratory science when tobacco was brought over to Europe Modern laboratory science is no help in figuring out fast whether vaping is harmful, because we don't understand how the human body works well enough to do laboratory tests that will tell us. So we're reduced to basically what we used to show that smoking was harmful: long-term data collection and analysis. > My lungs function so much better now that it’s easily discernible to me that smoking irritates lungs far more than vaping. Saying that vaping is less harmful than smoking (which is probably true) is a much weaker statement than saying that there's zero indication that vaping is harmful, so there's no reason to worry about it, which is the claim I was responding to.
tempestn 7y ago
I think it's pretty unquestionable that smoking is worse for the lungs, and almost certainly worse overall than vaping. But smoking was on the decline; if vaping had never existed or gone mainstream, eventually very few people would have smoked. Instead now, there are many young people becoming addicted to nicotine via vaping. That's almost certainly better than if they were smoking instead, but it's likely worse than if they weren't using a nicotine product at all. Now, you could argue that there's little evidence of nicotine being harmful aside from being highly addictive (although even then there would be an economic argument to be made), but if there is any harm, the addictive nature will make sure that harm is long-lasting.

duud 7y ago

My experience is that vaping feels easier on the body than smoking but both cause coughing and congestion. It probably isn't a good idea to inhale large quantities of anything other than oxygen.

petre 7y ago
You probably mean air. Inhaling pure oxygen is generally bad, sometimes even harmful.

pdonis 7y ago

> we didn’t have modern laboratory science when tobacco was brought over to Europe Modern laboratory science is no help in figuring out fast whether vaping is harmful, because we don't understand how the human body works well enough to do laboratory tests that will tell us. So we're reduced to basically what we used to show that smoking was harmful: long-term data collection and analysis. > My lungs function so much better now that it’s easily discernible to me that smoking irritates lungs far more than vaping. Saying that vaping is less harmful than smoking (which is probably true) is a much weaker statement than saying that there's zero indication that vaping is harmful, so there's no reason to worry about it, which is the claim I was responding to.

tempestn 7y ago

I think it's pretty unquestionable that smoking is worse for the lungs, and almost certainly worse overall than vaping. But smoking was on the decline; if vaping had never existed or gone mainstream, eventually very few people would have smoked. Instead now, there are many young people becoming addicted to nicotine via vaping. That's almost certainly better than if they were smoking instead, but it's likely worse than if they weren't using a nicotine product at all. Now, you could argue that there's little evidence of nicotine being harmful aside from being highly addictive (although even then there would be an economic argument to be made), but if there is any harm, the addictive nature will make sure that harm is long-lasting.