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I love my caffeine. But caffeine is an addictive, highly profitable substance. So advertising it and trying to promote it as somehow having real health benefits

by ilaksh 2y ago

I love my caffeine. But caffeine is an addictive, highly profitable substance. So advertising it and trying to promote it as somehow having real health benefits is widespread. I would not be surprised if routine consumption of caffeine was at least mildly detrimental to health. I think some drugs have managed to gain a special place in our society . Advertising and lobbying warps our perception of these drugs. I even saw a comment in this thread suggesting that if caffeine has a prolonged affect on you, then you have some unique genetics and it's essentially your problem, not the drug. Similar to the narrative about alcohol. It's interesting to compare that attitude to the way illegal drugs that can't advertise or lobby are viewed.

2OEH8eoCRo0 2y ago
It's interesting that coffee (black) is essentially perfect (mostly pros, few or no cons) yet there is a small crowd bent on demonizing it.
seoulmetro 2y ago
>Advertising and lobbying warps our perception of these drugs. More like, our own preference and enjoyment of the drugs compared to their detriments constructs our perception of these drugs. Coffee, alcohol, pain killers, etc. These are all drugs that give the user enjoyment with very little down sides. This means that society has reserved a place for them.
mensetmanusman 2y ago
Alcohol reduces functions, caffeine clearly enhances functions. If caffeine was involved in nearly all violent crime like alcohol is, we would think differently of it.
- m463 2y ago
  I think it is a matter of perception. For example, lots of DUI type accidents are blamed on alcohol, but it might actually be sleep deprivation that is the most fundamental cause of the accident. In a similar way, I wonder if similar sleep-related accidents or incidents could more properly have caffeine as a root cause (after it has worn off)
- andor 2y ago
  I would claim that for regular users of caffeine, it merely restores function to a baseline level.
  - jwells89 2y ago
    While I don’t have hard evidence to support the idea, I believe this is highly variable between individuals. I’m not a heavy coffee drinker, but I do have a cup in the mornings some time between 6:30-8:00. This makes it easy to stop as needed; there are some days where I skip it out of necessity (too busy), and occasionally I’ll go a weekend without it just to keep my tolerance in check. During these periods, I never experience adverse effects. The main benefit I glean from coffee is not feeling awake, but notably improved ability to focus. In my experience, my baseline ability is just not as good; there’s no “bounce back” after extended periods of going without, it just stays somewhere between bad and average indefinitely.
    - NBJack 2y ago
      I strongly suspect this manifests more in folks that consistently intake > 100mg per day. I used to regularly intake 200mg total across ~2 beverages (mostly because I just enjoyed the flavor), and suffered mild headaches if I skipped my schedule. I know others that start their day with 200mg in a single, quad shot beverage.
  - riversflow 2y ago
    Everybody is different. 3 years ago I took a summer and then autumn off of caffeine; my intent was to quit and only use caffeine in "times of need". This would be an on-brand thing for me to do as a person, and something I wanted pretty bad. But after 4 full months without touching any caffeine, my mood/energy levels never returned or even really rebounded any further than they did after the first month. I'm just a different person with caffeine, even after I'm addicted/habituated/develop tolerance. Notably I have a lot more energy, and I'm not a high energy person to start with. This energy allows me to better take care of myself, exercise, and be social, all things that I struggle with in its absence. From experience, I can function fine without caffeine, even under an acute withdrawal scenario. In fact, some of my greatest achievements were done without caffeine for one reason or another. Not having caffeine just makes those things more miserable in the moment, at least for me.
- austin-cheney 2y ago
  All stimulants enhance some functions to some degree, so that is a poor metric of value. Cocaine, for example, temporarily boosts intelligence, but consuming cocaine is not recommended.
  - eightysixfour 2y ago
    Does cocaine temporarily boost intelligence? I thought it boosted the feeling of being intelligent.
    - austin-cheney 2y ago
      It does. Intelligence is the capacity for learning potential and cocaine boosts the ability to retain and process learned sensory matter, even when sleepy. That is really the greatest appeal of that drug. Again, I strongly do not recommend reliance on any stimulants, especially powerful ones like cocaine.
      - eightysixfour 2y ago
        Interesting can you cite a source? I found this: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2096405/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2096405/ which shows a consistent improvement in tests, but the performance increase was only 4%. I'd be willing to guess that the improvement would be higher when sleepy/fatigued (up to a point!) since it would increase the alertness of the user, but I have never seen anything that suggests cocaine boosts the ability to retain information.
        zhengyi13 2y ago
        Anecdata here, but I met a person in university in the 90s who claimed: 1) they had access to really, really pure cocaine, and 2) they used it to study for tests. If I recall correctly, they were only using cocaine for the studying, not the test taking, and that they had good recall on tests.
    - chmod775 2y ago
- lolinder 2y ago
  > Alcohol reduces functions, caffeine clearly enhances functions. In occasional users this might be true, but is it true in regular users? Anecdotally, I hear far more people complaining about being completely unable to function (and I've often recognized that they're perceptibly out of it) until they've had their next cup of coffee than I have heard people talk about getting great productivity gains from it. I don't use caffeine regularly in part to keep it available for when I really need it, and I have never once felt like I was lower functioning than my coworkers as a result—on the contrary, my energy levels seem to be far more stable throughout the workday.
  - cassianoleal 2y ago
    > I hear far more people complaining about being completely unable to function (and I've often recognized that they're perceptibly out of it) until they've had their next cup of coffee than I have heard people talk about getting great productivity gains from it. Unable to function == 0 productivity. How is getting over that not effecting productivity gains?
    - lolinder 2y ago
      It depends on if some significant chunk of the population naturally can't function on a regular basis and caffeine solves that or if caffeine withdrawals cause someone to be unable to function until they get the next dose. If it's withdrawals then caffeine is creating the problem that it later solves, which means that consuming it regularly is not a net productivity gain over not using or using rarely.
- BossingAround 2y ago
  Caffeine doesn't enhance any function, it simply masks tiredness in the short term, at the cost of reduced quality of sleep. The question is, does caffeine "clearly enhance" cognitive functions long-term.
  - pcai 2y ago
    Actually caffeine is a well known and widely studied performance enhancing drug, for example in endurance sports
  - mensetmanusman 2y ago
    If you haven’t done long-haul driving, you might think caffeine doesn’t enhance any function.
  - boringg 2y ago
    "cost of reduced quality of sleep" - very dependent on dosage and timing.
- m0llusk 2y ago
  It is not clear that a boost to speed is always an enhancement. Really deep expression and learning often involves slowing down.
- pengaru 2y ago
  relevant: https://xkcd.com/323/ https://xkcd.com/323/
nikanj 2y ago
People do joke about being dangerous without their morning coffee, but I have yet to see a coffee addict breaking into vehicles to score their morning fix. Also I have never had to worry someone is going to mug my loved ones to get some quick cash for a double-double. And have you ever heard of someone who skips important appointments because they stayed out getting high on caffeine instead Pretending caffeine is as detrimental to our society as e.g. fentanyl is prime intellectual dishonesty.
- lolinder 2y ago
  > Pretending caffeine is as detrimental to our society as e.g. fentanyl is prime intellectual dishonesty. These are your words, not OP's. OP isn't claiming that caffeine is as bad as any other drug. They're claiming that it, like other drugs, is likely to have negative health effects that outweigh positive ones and that it's interesting that it gets a special place in our culture while other drugs get banned and shunned. Nothing in that claim says that caffeine is as bad as the worst illegal drugs.
  - anthony_d 2y ago
    > They're claiming that it, like other drugs, is likely to have negative health effects that outweigh positive ones That alone is a strong and unsupported statement. Drugs frequently involve tradeoffs, but saying the negative out weighs the positive is not the same thing.
- amanaplanacanal 2y ago
  Only drugs that have artificially high prices caused by having no legal source lead to addicts committing crime to find their habit. Caffeine and alcohol are cheap and easily available.
  - gunapologist99 2y ago
    With all due respect, I wouldn't commit any crimes if caffeine was suddenly illegal. I'd have headaches for a few days and that'd be it.
kkielhofner 2y ago
> highly profitable substance Yes and no. I've been a fan of caffeine pills for years. They are very cheap, readily available (portable), and most importantly to me offer completely consistent dosing. With caffeine pills I'm able to ensure I stay below the FDA recommended maximum daily intake of 400 mg (worst case). Another fun bonus - when a physician asks you what your caffeine intake is and you respond in milligrams they look at you funny. Otherwise I completely agree with you. Every time I'm at an airport, etc I marvel at how many caffeine addicts are standing in line at Starbucks for however long ready to drop $10 (or whatever it costs) for a beverage with a completely unknown and highly variable dose of what is fundamentally a drug. Doubly so for variations that have other negative things like adulterations and calories. Caffeine is a drug and should be treated as such. If you were taking any other drug (over the counter or RX) would anyone tolerate "today it's 100 mg, tomorrow it's 400 mg"?
- snikeris 2y ago
  You’re missing out on the phytochemicals that contribute to the positive effects of drinking tea or coffee. You’re getting all the bad (and good) of chronic caffeine stimulation, with none of the plant medicine benefits that tea and coffee drinkers receive.
- silverpepsi 2y ago
  >If you were taking any other drug (over the counter or RX) would anyone tolerate "today it's 100 mg, tomorrow it's 400 mg"? afaik melatonin. Not super happy about it but it is what it is, giving it up has a high cost too.
- lostmsu 2y ago
  > caffeine addicts are standing in line at Starbucks I believe Starbucks is selling sugar under the guise of caffeine.
- NoPicklez 2y ago
  If you buy caffeine pills as a stimulant, you are no better than those "addicts" at Starbucks at the airport. I like coffee because it's a warm beverage, it tastes nice and of course there is the added benefit of the caffeine in the morning. That's about it. There's no way I would be getting close to 400mg of caffeine and doing so by pills is something I marvel at. I would say the majority of people drinking a normal cup of coffee (standard latte) a couple of times a day aren't getting anywhere near 400mg of caffeine. One shot of espresso is lucky to have 80mg of caffeine in it.
ericmcer 2y ago
This really hit home when I started swapping caffeine out for Adderall on work days. Literal amphetamines have a more mild effect on me than a strong coffee.
- theragra 2y ago
  I agree, reasonable amphetamine dose is easier on me than too much tea and coffee.
smrtinsert 2y ago
Anecdotal: I gave up my caffeine when it got the point that I was consuming 3-4 cups a day to combat persistent sleep deprivation and I noticed my stomach no longer would cooperate with it. Immediately, I began having dreams again which I hadn't had in years and didn't notice when they disappeared. I had bad headaches that tapered off after about 2-3 months. I awake usually refreshed, and my sleep patterns are much more regular, my body no longer can deal with less than 7 hours of sleep and will complain to me if I try to get away with less. My experience was ultimately that caffeine kept me awake but not at my cognitive best. I think it only worked before because I was younger and I'm now middle-aged. My stomach, brain, and body are better without a doubt. I still have small glasses of tea every once in a while when I really miss a hot drink and a pick me up. Hope this helps anyone else considering.
audunw 2y ago
Spinach is also mildly detrimental to health. (Oxylates) Doesn’t mean you should think that it’s bad for you unless you have a problem with kidney stones. Both black coffee and tea have several well documented health benefits. Even caffeine in isolation can probably have benefits when used correctly.

by ilaksh 2y ago

2OEH8eoCRo0 2y ago

It's interesting that coffee (black) is essentially perfect (mostly pros, few or no cons) yet there is a small crowd bent on demonizing it.

seoulmetro 2y ago

>Advertising and lobbying warps our perception of these drugs. More like, our own preference and enjoyment of the drugs compared to their detriments constructs our perception of these drugs. Coffee, alcohol, pain killers, etc. These are all drugs that give the user enjoyment with very little down sides. This means that society has reserved a place for them.

mensetmanusman 2y ago

Alcohol reduces functions, caffeine clearly enhances functions. If caffeine was involved in nearly all violent crime like alcohol is, we would think differently of it.

m463 2y ago
I think it is a matter of perception. For example, lots of DUI type accidents are blamed on alcohol, but it might actually be sleep deprivation that is the most fundamental cause of the accident. In a similar way, I wonder if similar sleep-related accidents or incidents could more properly have caffeine as a root cause (after it has worn off)
andor 2y ago
I would claim that for regular users of caffeine, it merely restores function to a baseline level.
- jwells89 2y ago
  While I don’t have hard evidence to support the idea, I believe this is highly variable between individuals. I’m not a heavy coffee drinker, but I do have a cup in the mornings some time between 6:30-8:00. This makes it easy to stop as needed; there are some days where I skip it out of necessity (too busy), and occasionally I’ll go a weekend without it just to keep my tolerance in check. During these periods, I never experience adverse effects. The main benefit I glean from coffee is not feeling awake, but notably improved ability to focus. In my experience, my baseline ability is just not as good; there’s no “bounce back” after extended periods of going without, it just stays somewhere between bad and average indefinitely.
  - NBJack 2y ago
    I strongly suspect this manifests more in folks that consistently intake > 100mg per day. I used to regularly intake 200mg total across ~2 beverages (mostly because I just enjoyed the flavor), and suffered mild headaches if I skipped my schedule. I know others that start their day with 200mg in a single, quad shot beverage.
- riversflow 2y ago
  Everybody is different. 3 years ago I took a summer and then autumn off of caffeine; my intent was to quit and only use caffeine in "times of need". This would be an on-brand thing for me to do as a person, and something I wanted pretty bad. But after 4 full months without touching any caffeine, my mood/energy levels never returned or even really rebounded any further than they did after the first month. I'm just a different person with caffeine, even after I'm addicted/habituated/develop tolerance. Notably I have a lot more energy, and I'm not a high energy person to start with. This energy allows me to better take care of myself, exercise, and be social, all things that I struggle with in its absence. From experience, I can function fine without caffeine, even under an acute withdrawal scenario. In fact, some of my greatest achievements were done without caffeine for one reason or another. Not having caffeine just makes those things more miserable in the moment, at least for me.
austin-cheney 2y ago
All stimulants enhance some functions to some degree, so that is a poor metric of value. Cocaine, for example, temporarily boosts intelligence, but consuming cocaine is not recommended.
- eightysixfour 2y ago
  Does cocaine temporarily boost intelligence? I thought it boosted the feeling of being intelligent.
  - austin-cheney 2y ago
    It does. Intelligence is the capacity for learning potential and cocaine boosts the ability to retain and process learned sensory matter, even when sleepy. That is really the greatest appeal of that drug. Again, I strongly do not recommend reliance on any stimulants, especially powerful ones like cocaine.
    - eightysixfour 2y ago
      Interesting can you cite a source? I found this: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2096405/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2096405/ which shows a consistent improvement in tests, but the performance increase was only 4%. I'd be willing to guess that the improvement would be higher when sleepy/fatigued (up to a point!) since it would increase the alertness of the user, but I have never seen anything that suggests cocaine boosts the ability to retain information.
      - zhengyi13 2y ago
        Anecdata here, but I met a person in university in the 90s who claimed: 1) they had access to really, really pure cocaine, and 2) they used it to study for tests. If I recall correctly, they were only using cocaine for the studying, not the test taking, and that they had good recall on tests.
  - chmod775 2y ago
lolinder 2y ago
> Alcohol reduces functions, caffeine clearly enhances functions. In occasional users this might be true, but is it true in regular users? Anecdotally, I hear far more people complaining about being completely unable to function (and I've often recognized that they're perceptibly out of it) until they've had their next cup of coffee than I have heard people talk about getting great productivity gains from it. I don't use caffeine regularly in part to keep it available for when I really need it, and I have never once felt like I was lower functioning than my coworkers as a result—on the contrary, my energy levels seem to be far more stable throughout the workday.
- cassianoleal 2y ago
  > I hear far more people complaining about being completely unable to function (and I've often recognized that they're perceptibly out of it) until they've had their next cup of coffee than I have heard people talk about getting great productivity gains from it. Unable to function == 0 productivity. How is getting over that not effecting productivity gains?
  - lolinder 2y ago
    It depends on if some significant chunk of the population naturally can't function on a regular basis and caffeine solves that or if caffeine withdrawals cause someone to be unable to function until they get the next dose. If it's withdrawals then caffeine is creating the problem that it later solves, which means that consuming it regularly is not a net productivity gain over not using or using rarely.
BossingAround 2y ago
Caffeine doesn't enhance any function, it simply masks tiredness in the short term, at the cost of reduced quality of sleep. The question is, does caffeine "clearly enhance" cognitive functions long-term.
- pcai 2y ago
  Actually caffeine is a well known and widely studied performance enhancing drug, for example in endurance sports
- mensetmanusman 2y ago
  If you haven’t done long-haul driving, you might think caffeine doesn’t enhance any function.
- boringg 2y ago
  "cost of reduced quality of sleep" - very dependent on dosage and timing.
m0llusk 2y ago
It is not clear that a boost to speed is always an enhancement. Really deep expression and learning often involves slowing down.
pengaru 2y ago
relevant: https://xkcd.com/323/ https://xkcd.com/323/

nikanj 2y ago

People do joke about being dangerous without their morning coffee, but I have yet to see a coffee addict breaking into vehicles to score their morning fix. Also I have never had to worry someone is going to mug my loved ones to get some quick cash for a double-double. And have you ever heard of someone who skips important appointments because they stayed out getting high on caffeine instead Pretending caffeine is as detrimental to our society as e.g. fentanyl is prime intellectual dishonesty.

lolinder 2y ago
> Pretending caffeine is as detrimental to our society as e.g. fentanyl is prime intellectual dishonesty. These are your words, not OP's. OP isn't claiming that caffeine is as bad as any other drug. They're claiming that it, like other drugs, is likely to have negative health effects that outweigh positive ones and that it's interesting that it gets a special place in our culture while other drugs get banned and shunned. Nothing in that claim says that caffeine is as bad as the worst illegal drugs.
- anthony_d 2y ago
  > They're claiming that it, like other drugs, is likely to have negative health effects that outweigh positive ones That alone is a strong and unsupported statement. Drugs frequently involve tradeoffs, but saying the negative out weighs the positive is not the same thing.
amanaplanacanal 2y ago
Only drugs that have artificially high prices caused by having no legal source lead to addicts committing crime to find their habit. Caffeine and alcohol are cheap and easily available.
- gunapologist99 2y ago
  With all due respect, I wouldn't commit any crimes if caffeine was suddenly illegal. I'd have headaches for a few days and that'd be it.

kkielhofner 2y ago

> highly profitable substance Yes and no. I've been a fan of caffeine pills for years. They are very cheap, readily available (portable), and most importantly to me offer completely consistent dosing. With caffeine pills I'm able to ensure I stay below the FDA recommended maximum daily intake of 400 mg (worst case). Another fun bonus - when a physician asks you what your caffeine intake is and you respond in milligrams they look at you funny. Otherwise I completely agree with you. Every time I'm at an airport, etc I marvel at how many caffeine addicts are standing in line at Starbucks for however long ready to drop $10 (or whatever it costs) for a beverage with a completely unknown and highly variable dose of what is fundamentally a drug. Doubly so for variations that have other negative things like adulterations and calories. Caffeine is a drug and should be treated as such. If you were taking any other drug (over the counter or RX) would anyone tolerate "today it's 100 mg, tomorrow it's 400 mg"?

snikeris 2y ago
You’re missing out on the phytochemicals that contribute to the positive effects of drinking tea or coffee. You’re getting all the bad (and good) of chronic caffeine stimulation, with none of the plant medicine benefits that tea and coffee drinkers receive.
silverpepsi 2y ago
>If you were taking any other drug (over the counter or RX) would anyone tolerate "today it's 100 mg, tomorrow it's 400 mg"? afaik melatonin. Not super happy about it but it is what it is, giving it up has a high cost too.
lostmsu 2y ago
> caffeine addicts are standing in line at Starbucks I believe Starbucks is selling sugar under the guise of caffeine.
NoPicklez 2y ago
If you buy caffeine pills as a stimulant, you are no better than those "addicts" at Starbucks at the airport. I like coffee because it's a warm beverage, it tastes nice and of course there is the added benefit of the caffeine in the morning. That's about it. There's no way I would be getting close to 400mg of caffeine and doing so by pills is something I marvel at. I would say the majority of people drinking a normal cup of coffee (standard latte) a couple of times a day aren't getting anywhere near 400mg of caffeine. One shot of espresso is lucky to have 80mg of caffeine in it.

ericmcer 2y ago

This really hit home when I started swapping caffeine out for Adderall on work days. Literal amphetamines have a more mild effect on me than a strong coffee.

theragra 2y ago
I agree, reasonable amphetamine dose is easier on me than too much tea and coffee.

smrtinsert 2y ago

Anecdotal: I gave up my caffeine when it got the point that I was consuming 3-4 cups a day to combat persistent sleep deprivation and I noticed my stomach no longer would cooperate with it. Immediately, I began having dreams again which I hadn't had in years and didn't notice when they disappeared. I had bad headaches that tapered off after about 2-3 months. I awake usually refreshed, and my sleep patterns are much more regular, my body no longer can deal with less than 7 hours of sleep and will complain to me if I try to get away with less. My experience was ultimately that caffeine kept me awake but not at my cognitive best. I think it only worked before because I was younger and I'm now middle-aged. My stomach, brain, and body are better without a doubt. I still have small glasses of tea every once in a while when I really miss a hot drink and a pick me up. Hope this helps anyone else considering.

audunw 2y ago

Spinach is also mildly detrimental to health. (Oxylates) Doesn’t mean you should think that it’s bad for you unless you have a problem with kidney stones. Both black coffee and tea have several well documented health benefits. Even caffeine in isolation can probably have benefits when used correctly.