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

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.
  - snikeris 2y ago
    Possessing the GG variant of COMT rs4680 gene might explain this. Conversely, AA types might get overstimulated and irritable.
    - Sammi 2y ago
      This makes me so tempted to get one of those whole genome tests. I had issues with anxiety from age 20 to 38. I was a regular drinker of coffee between the age 20 to 38. About a month after quitting I was finally able to yawn properly like I remember I was able to when I was young. Coffee overstimulates me I figure.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
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/

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.
- snikeris 2y ago
  Possessing the GG variant of COMT rs4680 gene might explain this. Conversely, AA types might get overstimulated and irritable.
  - Sammi 2y ago
    This makes me so tempted to get one of those whole genome tests. I had issues with anxiety from age 20 to 38. I was a regular drinker of coffee between the age 20 to 38. About a month after quitting I was finally able to yawn properly like I remember I was able to when I was young. Coffee overstimulates me I figure.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]

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/