4 ms·

These studies are correlations that ignore complex interactions. Something pushed that guy to smoke and same something also makes him likely to do other things

These studies are correlations that ignore complex interactions. Something pushed that guy to smoke and same something also makes him likely to do other things culminating in earlier death. Another guy smokes all his life and lives into 90s with no issues because there was no "something". Another guy dies of suicide in his 30s because of loneliness because he did not have the excuse of cigarette to connect with people

armada651 2y ago
Are you arguing that people who smoke are simply predisposed to behaviours that cause lung cancer regardless of whether they smoke?
- frederikdss 2y ago
  No, he’s not arguing about causation but about correlation. Confounding variables. For example, where I live cigarette use seems related with social class (being more prevalent with the poorer part of our population). That can correlate with living and working conditions, which can impact everything else
- sellmesoap 2y ago
  From the recent time I was on a construction site: all the carpenters and drywallers etc all went for smoke breaks all the time, use of protective gear was infrequent. This was only one site I saw others with better habits.
- throwaway290 2y ago
  Smoking seems to cause lung cancer in some people but we don't know what would happen to those people if they didn't smoke. It's likely in some people smoking happens with other habits that would cause one issue or another but in other people it's not that. The studies that try to generalize smoking to life expectancy seem questionable.
chithanh 2y ago
Smokers have higher suicide risk than non-smokers. It has been known for decades that smokers have a "smoker personality" which differs from non-smokers. In recent years some evidence emerged that smoking is the cause of this rather than vice versa. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/07/140715141355.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/07/140715141355.h...
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- throwaway290 2y ago
  Yes but I am not sure you appreciate the point about cause and effect I made
  - chithanh 2y ago
    ? The second part of my reply was about cause and effect.
    - throwaway290 2y ago
      My reading comprehension. Oops. There are some good points regarding policy, like if there are anti smoking policies then suicide risk is lower. I think there are two kinds: chill balanced smokers and smokers who think it is bad for them and use it to show slow suicide. So I am not surprised smoker suicide rates are higher. Anti smoking policies reducing suicide is interesting. could be preventing a mild suicide from starting helps it not graduate to more serious. Mental health decline after starting smoking != mental health decline from nicotine, I bet it is real and big part of it is nicotine but doing daily and visibly something much of society frowns upon probably "helps". And also just knowing that you are killing yourself, if you are that kind of smoker Them saying that drugs can cause depression is basically saying nothing (basically same as "not using drugs can cause depression"). It's confusing that Serbia beats almost everyone by amount of smokers, it is the most smoke filled place I visited but it is not even in the top in https://www.wcrf.org/preventing-cancer/cancer-statistics/lung-cancer-statistics/ https://www.wcrf.org/preventing-cancer/cancer-statistics/lun......
irjustin 2y ago
> These studies are correlations that ignore complex interactions. Yes they have to. There's no way to do it otherwise and get any meaningful data. You have to get `n` to be very large.

armada651 2y ago

Are you arguing that people who smoke are simply predisposed to behaviours that cause lung cancer regardless of whether they smoke?

frederikdss 2y ago
No, he’s not arguing about causation but about correlation. Confounding variables. For example, where I live cigarette use seems related with social class (being more prevalent with the poorer part of our population). That can correlate with living and working conditions, which can impact everything else
sellmesoap 2y ago
From the recent time I was on a construction site: all the carpenters and drywallers etc all went for smoke breaks all the time, use of protective gear was infrequent. This was only one site I saw others with better habits.
throwaway290 2y ago
Smoking seems to cause lung cancer in some people but we don't know what would happen to those people if they didn't smoke. It's likely in some people smoking happens with other habits that would cause one issue or another but in other people it's not that. The studies that try to generalize smoking to life expectancy seem questionable.

chithanh 2y ago

Smokers have higher suicide risk than non-smokers. It has been known for decades that smokers have a "smoker personality" which differs from non-smokers. In recent years some evidence emerged that smoking is the cause of this rather than vice versa. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/07/140715141355.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/07/140715141355.h...

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
throwaway290 2y ago
Yes but I am not sure you appreciate the point about cause and effect I made
- chithanh 2y ago
  ? The second part of my reply was about cause and effect.
  - throwaway290 2y ago
    My reading comprehension. Oops. There are some good points regarding policy, like if there are anti smoking policies then suicide risk is lower. I think there are two kinds: chill balanced smokers and smokers who think it is bad for them and use it to show slow suicide. So I am not surprised smoker suicide rates are higher. Anti smoking policies reducing suicide is interesting. could be preventing a mild suicide from starting helps it not graduate to more serious. Mental health decline after starting smoking != mental health decline from nicotine, I bet it is real and big part of it is nicotine but doing daily and visibly something much of society frowns upon probably "helps". And also just knowing that you are killing yourself, if you are that kind of smoker Them saying that drugs can cause depression is basically saying nothing (basically same as "not using drugs can cause depression"). It's confusing that Serbia beats almost everyone by amount of smokers, it is the most smoke filled place I visited but it is not even in the top in https://www.wcrf.org/preventing-cancer/cancer-statistics/lung-cancer-statistics/ https://www.wcrf.org/preventing-cancer/cancer-statistics/lun......

irjustin 2y ago

> These studies are correlations that ignore complex interactions. Yes they have to. There's no way to do it otherwise and get any meaningful data. You have to get `n` to be very large.