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When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

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Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#461

Post by flattone »

memebox3v wrote: post #415
LrnByTeach wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All high school weed smokers are not equal. There are many occasional smokers. For the sake of simplicity, let me put a number here. High schooler between 9th to 12 grade who smoke weed at least 10 times a week all four years will settle in LIFE below 50% of his potential (compared to how he would have done without weed)

I knew a guy at university who smoked everyday. And before he took exams or tests, he would do a bong hit to settle his nerves. He got a 1st in Chemistry. #anecdatasmackdown

+1 definitely know a few people who somehow (total mystery to me) their brains are on fire when using. Similarly have opposite examples... It just seems to work differently for differently people.

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#462

Post by _bz2r »

jeffdavis wrote: post #441
ocdtrekkie wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a huge opposer of legalization, because I've seen what pot has done to people I care about. I would point out that solution to the negatives of prohibition is not legalization, but decriminalization. The issue with legalization is that it removes the stigma with trying it, which means we get more users than otherwise. We can maintain the very correct statements that drugs are bad and that all possible care shoul…

Maybe we need ways other than the law to stigmatize bad behavior. The law is a blunt instrument. Churches might serve this purpose, but those are out of fashion now.

You don't need a church to express social disapproval.

There are lots of behaviors that are not illegal and not against religion that we still use social feedback to minimize.

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#463

Post by zchrykng »

simplify wrote: post #452
zchrykng wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same argument could be made for anything. Not paying your taxes is only illegal because there is a law that says you have to. You can't just define words to have whatever meaning you want. If you agree that they did something illegal then you can't call them innocent without lying. It isn't that hard, don't do illegal drugs if you don't want to be called a criminal. You can work to make them legal, but that doesn…

I'm not "defining words to have whatever meaning". I explicitly agreed with you on the technicality of innocent vs criminal ("Of course"), and brought the conversation back the actual point: Prihibition is dramatically worse because it imputes criminal charges onto people who are otherwise innocent. This is bad because these people are not a threat to society , yet with prohibition they lose their life to jailtime an…

I talking about the original comment I was responding to. You specifically said that it "imputes innocent people as criminals". This implies that they are innocent which they are not.

I never said that it shouldn't be legalized/decriminalized, I'm just objecting to the usage of "innocent" to describe these people.

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#464

Post by thedaemon »

nicoburns wrote: post #390
stouset wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only because fearmongering has scared people away from MSG. You can use it to improve the flavor of nutritious food, too. It’s conceptually no different than salt; junk food contains it, but that doesn’t mean you should avoid it in your own cooking.

This was more or less my point about MSG.

People are quick to down vote here.

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#465

Post by thedaemon »

nradov wrote: post #258
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not so sure. Many people get drunk every Friday or Saturday night for decades without developing alcoholism or ill effects on the rest of their life.

Even if you don't technically become an alcoholic, getting drunk once a week for decades will absolutely have ill effects on your body. This is medically inevitable.

It should also be a person's choice. I find this the main issue. Personal freedom. Many people choose to drive a car, which has one of the highest mortality rates. But people still drive. What's wrong with a drink or a smoke then, even if that person knows it's dangerous.

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#466

Post by kadendogthing »

thecatspaw wrote: post #356
kadendogthing wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where does marijuana suddenly not fall under the same characteristics as any other leisure activity? It's blatantly obvious some of the comments are speaking out of unbridled ignorance.

Well, if your definition of smoking marijuana is going outside, walking around, thinking about stuff or talking with friends, then yeah, it is also an alternative to boredom. But when you finished the joint, you will still have to do something. And after the active part of smoking is done, the "beeing high makes you more likely be okay with beeing bored" still applies. And I can promise you that I am not ignorant whe…

I don't understand what line you're drawing here, because I don't understand how this is different to say, listening to music.

I wouldn't consider music an "alternative to boredom" as its foremost characteristic or as a last resort to boredom. It's just a fun activity. Just like smoking marijuana is. It's too much of a mischaracterization of music, or pot, or any other leisure activity.

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#467

Post by int_19h »

narzu wrote: post #5
S0ckpupp3t wrote: post #4

A drug more benign than alcohol. Smoke too much, take a nap. Smoke too often, cut down and get sharp again. Drink too much, you get flu symptoms. Drink too much too often, you get a new liver, or die.

The fact that alcohol and tobacco are legal doesn't mean we should legalise all drugs that are somewhat healthier than alcohol and tobacco. I think we can do much better.

Sure, we can do much better. For example, how about we recognize that bodily autonomy is a fundamental human right, and that includes deciding what to put into said body?

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#468

Post by jhayward »

jwdunne wrote: post #454
framebit wrote: post #278

A therapist friend recently attended a conference where a big group of doctors and health professionals focused around adolescents presented on the link between pot and the development of psychosis and even schizophrenia in users under age 32 or something like that. I've definitely heard about this colloquially with people reacting very differently to the same strain ("we were all fine but she was just freaking out")…

A personal anecdote of mine. A friend has schizophrenia. There was a clear point of descent from smoking cannabis. He was 13 at the time - young for schizophrenia. He's now on clozapine, a powerful antipsychotic. Whenever his judgement fails him and he smokes pot, it's weeks to months before he has to spend some time in hospital. Otherwise, he could take other, heavier drugs to excess and not require urgent hospitali…

You've illustrated the problem in anecdata: Nothing in what you said indicates that cannabis causes his episodes.

It is just as likely, given the description, that the sequence that results in an episode includes the prompts that trigger him to medicate with cannabis.

This is why we can't use personal experience to make public policy.

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#469

Post by [deleted] »

mywittyname wrote: post #381
otakucode wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every study done, and likely to ever be done given ethical standards, attempting to link marijuana usage to mental illness shares the same fundamental problem which makes their results meaningless: It cannot account for self-selection. There is no way to know that those who would later be diagnosed with schizophrenia were not self medicating with marijuana, leading to the causation actually being backwards. And in th…

This same argument could be applied to many long-term medical studies: Maybe people with a pre-disposition to heart disease also hate exercising, so the link between heart disease is and lack of exercise is backwards. Yeah, that doesn't work. Ignoring the link between mental illness and marijuana use is ridiculous. A medical study doesn't need 100% confidence to be true. If we held all of medical science to that bar,…

[deleted]

Re: When Adolescents Give Up Pot, Their Cognition Quickly Improves

#470

Post by simplify »

zchrykng wrote: post #463
simplify wrote: post #452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not "defining words to have whatever meaning". I explicitly agreed with you on the technicality of innocent vs criminal ("Of course"), and brought the conversation back the actual point: Prihibition is dramatically worse because it imputes criminal charges onto people who are otherwise innocent. This is bad because these people are not a threat to society , yet with prohibition they lose their life to jailtime an…

I talking about the original comment I was responding to. You specifically said that it "imputes innocent people as criminals". This implies that they are innocent which they are not. I never said that it shouldn't be legalized/decriminalized, I'm just objecting to the usage of "innocent" to describe these people.

Ok, I hear you. But I think my usage is ok. The purpose of prohibition is to apply a criminal status to an otherwise non-criminal. And without that law they are innocent, no? Or how else should we describe the status of said citizens without the existance of prohibition?
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