5 ms·

I have never understood the mechanics of 'drug is bad if use equal entertainment'. It will be interesting to see if the release of this information and the refe

by hsmyers 15y ago

I have never understood the mechanics of 'drug is bad if use equal entertainment'. It will be interesting to see if the release of this information and the refereed to thaw in the taboo will lead anywhere...

Alex3917 15y ago
"It will be interesting to see if the release of this information and the refereed to thaw in the taboo will lead anywhere..." This document shows the projected timeline for legalizing MDMA for medical purposes: http://maps.org/prospectus.pdf http://maps.org/prospectus.pdf Essentially the MDMA phase 2 trials are going to continue for another 2 - 3 years, at which point there will be an end-of-phase-2 meeting with the FDA, where they will come up with a plan for phase 3 studies. Phase 3 will take another 3 - 5 years, and that's assuming they're able to raise all the money it's going to take. However, it's looking like there is a good chance of getting MDMA legalized within ten years for medical use if MAPS can raise the money. Psilocybin is also close to getting moved to schedule 2 or even schedule 3. However, AFAIK the research that's being done isn't formally designed to turn psilocybin into a prescription drug, so I'm not entirely sure how the current research gets used going forward. Most research into the medical benefits of marijuana has been stalled because of Obama. Essentially the person Obama appointed has decided to block MAPS from getting any marijuana to use for studies that might show potential benefits from marijuana, so even though the FDA keeps approving their studies they can't actually go forward with any of them.
sp332 15y ago
Aren't most recreational drugs addictive and destructive? It's not too hard to understand why there's a stigma.
- Alex3917 15y ago
  "There are no good or bad drugs. Drugs are what we make of them. They have good and bad uses." http://www.matrixmasters.net/salon/?p=129 http://www.matrixmasters.net/salon/?p=129
  - sp332 15y ago
    Exactly, so using (e.g.) oxycodone recreationally is a bad use, and is thus stigmatized.
    - burgerbrain 15y ago
      Why do you say that using oxycodone recreationally is bad?
      - rms 15y ago
        It depends on the meaning of the word bad.
      - sp332 15y ago
        It's extremely addictive, similar to heroin. https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Oxycodone#Recreational_use https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Oxycodone#Rec...
        burgerbrain 15y ago
        Ethanol is so absurdly addictive that trying to quit can literally kill you. Heroin? You'll just wish you were dead. It's dangerous enough that ethanol related death is the number one cause of death in some modern countries, before even heart disease. Yet most of society would hesitate to label having a beer "bad use". Why? Probably because we're used to it, it's not a boogyman. https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Alcohol_withdrawal_syndrome https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Alcohol_withd...
        derleth 15y ago
        OK, drinking alcohol is bad. I don't. What now?
        burgerbrain 15y ago
        You misunderstand me. Ethanol is not bad. Very rarely are substances at all actually bad. Addiction is bad. In the case of common substances such as ethanol, society at large is generally pretty good at separating the two concepts, but when the substance becomes somewhat more obscure people freak the shit out for no apparent reason.
- maaku 15y ago
  Primarily just those which result in dopamine production are addictive. Psychedelic drugs do not, and are generally not addictive.
  - wheels 15y ago
    That's false, actually. The most dangerous additive things are generally GABA agonists (alcohol, GHB, etc.) and things that futz with opioid receptors (heroine, etc.). Those classes of drugs produce physical dependance and in extreme cases withdrawal can be fatal. Dependence on drugs that mess with the dopamine system (nicotine, caffeine, amphetamines, cocaine, etc.) is almost completely psychological. The physical withdrawal symptoms are slight in comparison to the category above. Psychedelic drugs mostly mess with the serotonin system, which has a lower (but non-zero) propensity for producing psychological addiction, owing largely to the fact that the tolerance curve is very steep and it takes the brain a few days to reset.
    - timmm 15y ago
      He's actually right; dopamine is our primary pleasure reward system. In addition to interacting with GABA alcohol triggers dopamine in the same way caffeine, amphetamines, and even ecstasy do. And please don't tell me you think Opiates have no effect on dopamine...most drugs just keep dopamine around longer by blocking the reuptake. Opiates literally release the stuff. Hence the massice euphoric state. You have a case with benzos, I suppose but in that case physical addiction is far more prominent than psychological. LSD/halluconigens act on the 5-HT receptors and is not psychologically addictive nor pragmatically possible for physical dependence.
- sp332 15y ago
  Wow, that's a lot of downvotes and only one counter-point. What sorts of recreational drugs are not addictive? And what sorts of drugs will not mess you up when taken in "recreational" dosages?
  - anonLSD 15y ago
    Pot, LSD, and mushrooms, for starters. Except for expansive and distorted definitions of the word "addictive", and except for that one friend everyone seems to have who couldn't handle their acid.
    - jquery 15y ago
      > that one friend everyone seems to have who couldn't handle their acid. Do you characterize people with other drug sensitivities as "unable to handle their [Advil/Codeine/Penicillin/Accutane/etc]" ? A drug makes 1% or 0.1% of its users go insane can still reasonably be characterized as very dangerous.
  - Alex3917 15y ago
    1) Addiction has a lot to do with the person and their community, and very little to do with the molecule in question. Basically 10% of users will get addicted to any drug regardless of what it is: caffeine, heroin, alcohol, crack, etc. While each molecule has wildly different properties, these properties have almost no impact on the percentage of people who will go on to abuse and/or become addicted to the drug. I provide some cites for this here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2186033 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2186033 Basically the best predictor of serious drug abuse is whether someone had a highly adverse childhood. Those who do are 4600% more likely to use injection drugs then those who didn't. Essentially every single street level drug addict was abused as a child. If you didn't suffer serious abuse as a child then you could use the same drug without developing an abusive relationship with it. (Listen to the public radio interview with the Mator Gabe I linked to, and also read the adverse childhood experience study and specifically the analysis of the drug addiction portion.) 2) The norms of a person's peer group and also why the person is using the drug are also very good predictors of how likely a person is to get addicted. E.g. someone using a drug to escape from emotional pain is much more likely to get addicted to a drug than someone using it for analgesic or spiritual purposes. 3) The method of consumption also plays an enormous role in how likely someone is to become addicted. The faster the drug hits you, the more likely you are to become addicted. Taking a drug transdermally is less addictive than eating it, eating a drug is less addictive than taking it sublingually or snorting it, snorting a drug is less addicting than injecting it, and injecting a drug is less addictive than smoking it. That's why you can drink coca tea several times a day indefinitely without becoming addicted, whereas people smoking crack get addicted extremely quickly. 4) There are basically two components of addiction, physical addiction and 'moreishness'. Physical addiction is a result of how increasing your neurotransmitter levels decreases your density of receptors for those neurotransmitters, so once you stop taking a drug you don't have enough neurotransmitters anymore so you can be in enormous pain (depending on the drug, the method of administration, etc.)[1]. The vast majority of people can just deal with the pain and it's not a big deal. But for those with severe depression, a history of abuse, or other mental problems, they don't have enough inner strength to deal with this pain so they just keep using the drug until it kills them. It's actually very very similar to the studies on 'learned helplessness' that they do with rats, where they see how long they swim before they drown. (The rats with depression just give up and drown much faster than the normal rats, even though they can physically swim just as well.) The second issue is with the 'moreishness' of a drug. There are a few drugs, especially stimulants, where there is a very short high followed by a ridiculously wicked comedown. With these drugs people tend to just keep doing the drug until they run out of it. The best example of this is probably MDPV, which is usually marketed as 'bath salts'. When people tell you that quitting crack is a joke compared to quitting this drug, you know it's probably bad news. But again, those without severe mental issues do eventually manage, they're just in a world of pain for about a week. 5) The worst drugs to quit if you've been severely addicted are benzos (e.g. xanax, ativan, valium, etc.), and also methadone and some of the other synthetic opiates. Even heroin addicts get through the worst of their symptoms in a week or so, whereas xanax addicts can't sleep for up to a year or more. And what's worse, they feel like they're constantly being electrocuted over and over, they can't think straight, and there are plenty of other horrific issues as well. So basically you don't want to get addicted to drugs with horrific physical withdrawals like xanax, and you don't want to use drugs that are ridiculously moreish, like MDPV, but other than that drug addiction is almost entirely a function of the person and not the molecule. Obviously you want to follow best practices when using any drug. E.g. if you want to try psychedelics then read Neal Goldsmith's new book Psychedelic Healing, which explains how to use the substances safely and effectively. But if you don't have any mental issues, and if you know how to use a given drug safely, then the risks can be minimal as long as you're disciplined enough to actually do everything correctly every time. (Not unlike driving, rock climbing, skiing, etc.) That's not to say that everyone should go out and start using drugs. But the fact is that according to government estimates, around 89% of Americans use illegal drugs at some point during their lives (at least once). And making poor decisions about drug usage (including legal drugs) kills around 30% of Americans.[2] So while people say you should eat healthy and exercise, and they're right, in fact learning how to use drugs safely has a much better bang for your buck in terms of improving your overall expected health and lifespan. It's undeniable that when used properly drugs can have enormous benefits for treating medical issues, relaxing, socializing, gaining spiritual understanding, etc. And what's more, I would argue that if you haven't read extensively about and also tried (for most of them) the drugs that have shaped western civilization (alcohol, tobacco, cannabis, sugar, chocolate, tea, coffee, cocaine, lsd, psilocybin, MDMA, mescaline, and opium), you aren't even really fully capable of understanding the world we live in and why society is the way it is.[3] Which isn't to say that everyone should use all the drugs I just mentioned, but I think taking the time to understand not only the health aspects of drugs, but also how these drugs have affected art, architecture, music, the law, medicine, philosophy, psychology, technology, etc. is probably the single best investment one could make in terms of becoming a self-actualized and well-educated person. [1] With opiates you also get oxidative damage to receptors. It's effectively the same as having their density reduced, but it's worth mentioning because it can be largely preventing with certain supplements, and also possibly reversed with ibogaine. [2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1877771 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1877771. N.b. it's possible that alcohol-related fatalities have been wildly exaggerated by the NHTSA. [3] I might actually add ayahuasca to this list as well, though I didn't include it because it hasn't really had any impact on western civilization, at least not yet. It seems like smoked DMT may end up being important as well, though as of yet its contributions have been fairly peripheral.
- gnosis 15y ago
  Food can be addictive and destructive. Sex can be addictive and destructive. Money and power can be addictive and destructive. "Recreational drugs" can be used in respectful ways. To many they are holy and sacred. They can enhance your creativity, open your eyes to the wonder of the universe around you, and gift you with empathy for all living creatures. With them you can experience death and rebirth and profoundly transform the way you understand and relate to the world. They can be intensely therapeutic. There is certainly a stigma against all that, and against certain drugs and experiences which buck against the need for many people to reduce life to a little tiny and orderly box under their command where they can channel your world view and your understanding of yourself and others in a manner of their liking. Yet despite all of their efforts they can not fully resist the deep need of humanity to transcend their ordinary state of consciousness. Each society has sanctioned ways of doing this, whether it's through certain approved substances (like alcohol), rituals, or ordeals. Curiously, societies tend to differ as to which mind altering substances are prohibited and which are allowed. Usually it's the substances with a long tradition of use in the given society that are allowed, and the newer substances which are prohibited. The very same substances which are allowed and even praised in one society might be despised and prohibited in others (alcohol, mushrooms, and marijuana are some great examples). Mind altering substances which a particular society is encountering for the first time and the use of which can not be easily fit in to the dominant culture's traditions are usually seen as a threat. But this can change over time as the members of that society get more familiar with the substances and learn to use them in socially sanctioned ways.

by hsmyers 15y ago

Alex3917 15y ago

"It will be interesting to see if the release of this information and the refereed to thaw in the taboo will lead anywhere..." This document shows the projected timeline for legalizing MDMA for medical purposes: http://maps.org/prospectus.pdf http://maps.org/prospectus.pdf Essentially the MDMA phase 2 trials are going to continue for another 2 - 3 years, at which point there will be an end-of-phase-2 meeting with the FDA, where they will come up with a plan for phase 3 studies. Phase 3 will take another 3 - 5 years, and that's assuming they're able to raise all the money it's going to take. However, it's looking like there is a good chance of getting MDMA legalized within ten years for medical use if MAPS can raise the money. Psilocybin is also close to getting moved to schedule 2 or even schedule 3. However, AFAIK the research that's being done isn't formally designed to turn psilocybin into a prescription drug, so I'm not entirely sure how the current research gets used going forward. Most research into the medical benefits of marijuana has been stalled because of Obama. Essentially the person Obama appointed has decided to block MAPS from getting any marijuana to use for studies that might show potential benefits from marijuana, so even though the FDA keeps approving their studies they can't actually go forward with any of them.

sp332 15y ago

Aren't most recreational drugs addictive and destructive? It's not too hard to understand why there's a stigma.

Alex3917 15y ago
"There are no good or bad drugs. Drugs are what we make of them. They have good and bad uses." http://www.matrixmasters.net/salon/?p=129 http://www.matrixmasters.net/salon/?p=129
- sp332 15y ago
  Exactly, so using (e.g.) oxycodone recreationally is a bad use, and is thus stigmatized.
  - burgerbrain 15y ago
    Why do you say that using oxycodone recreationally is bad?
    - rms 15y ago
      It depends on the meaning of the word bad.
    - sp332 15y ago
      It's extremely addictive, similar to heroin. https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Oxycodone#Recreational_use https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Oxycodone#Rec...
      - burgerbrain 15y ago
        Ethanol is so absurdly addictive that trying to quit can literally kill you. Heroin? You'll just wish you were dead. It's dangerous enough that ethanol related death is the number one cause of death in some modern countries, before even heart disease. Yet most of society would hesitate to label having a beer "bad use". Why? Probably because we're used to it, it's not a boogyman. https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Alcohol_withdrawal_syndrome https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Alcohol_withd...
        derleth 15y ago
        OK, drinking alcohol is bad. I don't. What now?
        burgerbrain 15y ago
        You misunderstand me. Ethanol is not bad. Very rarely are substances at all actually bad. Addiction is bad. In the case of common substances such as ethanol, society at large is generally pretty good at separating the two concepts, but when the substance becomes somewhat more obscure people freak the shit out for no apparent reason.
maaku 15y ago
Primarily just those which result in dopamine production are addictive. Psychedelic drugs do not, and are generally not addictive.
- wheels 15y ago
  That's false, actually. The most dangerous additive things are generally GABA agonists (alcohol, GHB, etc.) and things that futz with opioid receptors (heroine, etc.). Those classes of drugs produce physical dependance and in extreme cases withdrawal can be fatal. Dependence on drugs that mess with the dopamine system (nicotine, caffeine, amphetamines, cocaine, etc.) is almost completely psychological. The physical withdrawal symptoms are slight in comparison to the category above. Psychedelic drugs mostly mess with the serotonin system, which has a lower (but non-zero) propensity for producing psychological addiction, owing largely to the fact that the tolerance curve is very steep and it takes the brain a few days to reset.
  - timmm 15y ago
    He's actually right; dopamine is our primary pleasure reward system. In addition to interacting with GABA alcohol triggers dopamine in the same way caffeine, amphetamines, and even ecstasy do. And please don't tell me you think Opiates have no effect on dopamine...most drugs just keep dopamine around longer by blocking the reuptake. Opiates literally release the stuff. Hence the massice euphoric state. You have a case with benzos, I suppose but in that case physical addiction is far more prominent than psychological. LSD/halluconigens act on the 5-HT receptors and is not psychologically addictive nor pragmatically possible for physical dependence.
sp332 15y ago
Wow, that's a lot of downvotes and only one counter-point. What sorts of recreational drugs are not addictive? And what sorts of drugs will not mess you up when taken in "recreational" dosages?
- anonLSD 15y ago
  Pot, LSD, and mushrooms, for starters. Except for expansive and distorted definitions of the word "addictive", and except for that one friend everyone seems to have who couldn't handle their acid.
  - jquery 15y ago
    > that one friend everyone seems to have who couldn't handle their acid. Do you characterize people with other drug sensitivities as "unable to handle their [Advil/Codeine/Penicillin/Accutane/etc]" ? A drug makes 1% or 0.1% of its users go insane can still reasonably be characterized as very dangerous.
- Alex3917 15y ago
  1) Addiction has a lot to do with the person and their community, and very little to do with the molecule in question. Basically 10% of users will get addicted to any drug regardless of what it is: caffeine, heroin, alcohol, crack, etc. While each molecule has wildly different properties, these properties have almost no impact on the percentage of people who will go on to abuse and/or become addicted to the drug. I provide some cites for this here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2186033 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2186033 Basically the best predictor of serious drug abuse is whether someone had a highly adverse childhood. Those who do are 4600% more likely to use injection drugs then those who didn't. Essentially every single street level drug addict was abused as a child. If you didn't suffer serious abuse as a child then you could use the same drug without developing an abusive relationship with it. (Listen to the public radio interview with the Mator Gabe I linked to, and also read the adverse childhood experience study and specifically the analysis of the drug addiction portion.) 2) The norms of a person's peer group and also why the person is using the drug are also very good predictors of how likely a person is to get addicted. E.g. someone using a drug to escape from emotional pain is much more likely to get addicted to a drug than someone using it for analgesic or spiritual purposes. 3) The method of consumption also plays an enormous role in how likely someone is to become addicted. The faster the drug hits you, the more likely you are to become addicted. Taking a drug transdermally is less addictive than eating it, eating a drug is less addictive than taking it sublingually or snorting it, snorting a drug is less addicting than injecting it, and injecting a drug is less addictive than smoking it. That's why you can drink coca tea several times a day indefinitely without becoming addicted, whereas people smoking crack get addicted extremely quickly. 4) There are basically two components of addiction, physical addiction and 'moreishness'. Physical addiction is a result of how increasing your neurotransmitter levels decreases your density of receptors for those neurotransmitters, so once you stop taking a drug you don't have enough neurotransmitters anymore so you can be in enormous pain (depending on the drug, the method of administration, etc.)[1]. The vast majority of people can just deal with the pain and it's not a big deal. But for those with severe depression, a history of abuse, or other mental problems, they don't have enough inner strength to deal with this pain so they just keep using the drug until it kills them. It's actually very very similar to the studies on 'learned helplessness' that they do with rats, where they see how long they swim before they drown. (The rats with depression just give up and drown much faster than the normal rats, even though they can physically swim just as well.) The second issue is with the 'moreishness' of a drug. There are a few drugs, especially stimulants, where there is a very short high followed by a ridiculously wicked comedown. With these drugs people tend to just keep doing the drug until they run out of it. The best example of this is probably MDPV, which is usually marketed as 'bath salts'. When people tell you that quitting crack is a joke compared to quitting this drug, you know it's probably bad news. But again, those without severe mental issues do eventually manage, they're just in a world of pain for about a week. 5) The worst drugs to quit if you've been severely addicted are benzos (e.g. xanax, ativan, valium, etc.), and also methadone and some of the other synthetic opiates. Even heroin addicts get through the worst of their symptoms in a week or so, whereas xanax addicts can't sleep for up to a year or more. And what's worse, they feel like they're constantly being electrocuted over and over, they can't think straight, and there are plenty of other horrific issues as well. So basically you don't want to get addicted to drugs with horrific physical withdrawals like xanax, and you don't want to use drugs that are ridiculously moreish, like MDPV, but other than that drug addiction is almost entirely a function of the person and not the molecule. Obviously you want to follow best practices when using any drug. E.g. if you want to try psychedelics then read Neal Goldsmith's new book Psychedelic Healing, which explains how to use the substances safely and effectively. But if you don't have any mental issues, and if you know how to use a given drug safely, then the risks can be minimal as long as you're disciplined enough to actually do everything correctly every time. (Not unlike driving, rock climbing, skiing, etc.) That's not to say that everyone should go out and start using drugs. But the fact is that according to government estimates, around 89% of Americans use illegal drugs at some point during their lives (at least once). And making poor decisions about drug usage (including legal drugs) kills around 30% of Americans.[2] So while people say you should eat healthy and exercise, and they're right, in fact learning how to use drugs safely has a much better bang for your buck in terms of improving your overall expected health and lifespan. It's undeniable that when used properly drugs can have enormous benefits for treating medical issues, relaxing, socializing, gaining spiritual understanding, etc. And what's more, I would argue that if you haven't read extensively about and also tried (for most of them) the drugs that have shaped western civilization (alcohol, tobacco, cannabis, sugar, chocolate, tea, coffee, cocaine, lsd, psilocybin, MDMA, mescaline, and opium), you aren't even really fully capable of understanding the world we live in and why society is the way it is.[3] Which isn't to say that everyone should use all the drugs I just mentioned, but I think taking the time to understand not only the health aspects of drugs, but also how these drugs have affected art, architecture, music, the law, medicine, philosophy, psychology, technology, etc. is probably the single best investment one could make in terms of becoming a self-actualized and well-educated person. [1] With opiates you also get oxidative damage to receptors. It's effectively the same as having their density reduced, but it's worth mentioning because it can be largely preventing with certain supplements, and also possibly reversed with ibogaine. [2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1877771 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1877771. N.b. it's possible that alcohol-related fatalities have been wildly exaggerated by the NHTSA. [3] I might actually add ayahuasca to this list as well, though I didn't include it because it hasn't really had any impact on western civilization, at least not yet. It seems like smoked DMT may end up being important as well, though as of yet its contributions have been fairly peripheral.
gnosis 15y ago
Food can be addictive and destructive. Sex can be addictive and destructive. Money and power can be addictive and destructive. "Recreational drugs" can be used in respectful ways. To many they are holy and sacred. They can enhance your creativity, open your eyes to the wonder of the universe around you, and gift you with empathy for all living creatures. With them you can experience death and rebirth and profoundly transform the way you understand and relate to the world. They can be intensely therapeutic. There is certainly a stigma against all that, and against certain drugs and experiences which buck against the need for many people to reduce life to a little tiny and orderly box under their command where they can channel your world view and your understanding of yourself and others in a manner of their liking. Yet despite all of their efforts they can not fully resist the deep need of humanity to transcend their ordinary state of consciousness. Each society has sanctioned ways of doing this, whether it's through certain approved substances (like alcohol), rituals, or ordeals. Curiously, societies tend to differ as to which mind altering substances are prohibited and which are allowed. Usually it's the substances with a long tradition of use in the given society that are allowed, and the newer substances which are prohibited. The very same substances which are allowed and even praised in one society might be despised and prohibited in others (alcohol, mushrooms, and marijuana are some great examples). Mind altering substances which a particular society is encountering for the first time and the use of which can not be easily fit in to the dominant culture's traditions are usually seen as a threat. But this can change over time as the members of that society get more familiar with the substances and learn to use them in socially sanctioned ways.