No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation • Hacker News Board

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#491

Post by josefresco » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:39 PM UTC

allturtles wrote: post #389

kstrauser wrote: post #159

Although I live in a place where weed is legal, I don’t use it. I enjoy the occasional glass of a nice scotch, though, and I love a good stout or porter beer. This is where it gets a little strange for me: by every metric I can think of, I’d be better off replacing alcohol with weed. There seem to be fewer negative effects, it’s not a source of empty calories, and looks like a better recreational drug in every way. A…

Setting aside tradition/ritual, which I don't think should count for nothing, I can think of many objective metrics on which alcohol is superior: - Flavor - Fills the stomach (can be a disadvantage too, but is advantageous in some situations, e.g. while waiting for dinner to be served at a party) - Doesn't consume itself (i.e you can set down a drink and come back to it 30 minutes later) - Easy to consume a small amo…

> Flavor

I vape flower cannabis, flavor is a key component of this process.

> Fills the stomach

Cannabis stimulates my appetite. This is welcome and paired with a glass of wine (on an empty stomach) before dinner makes the experience amazing!

> Doesn't consume itself

My vape shuts off with inactivity - it doesn't "consume itself. Neither would a "bowl" of cannabis. Even a "joint" would stop burning if you put it down.

> Easy to consume a small amount without substantially altering your mental state.

This is one of the major advantages of consuming cannabis via the vaping/smoking vs. edibles (also alcohol). The effects are felt in seconds which allows you to eaasily regulate dosage. Edibles and alcohol can easily be overconsumed because of the delay involved in stomach/liver process.

> No fire/burn risk

My vape is electric, the risk of fire would be similar to using any of my other electronic devices with heat, such as a wax melt device etc.

> Doesn't generate smoke/odor, which is unpleasant for other people and gets in your clothes/furniture

While the vape does create an odor, it's short lived and doesn't smell like smoked cannabis.

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#492

Post by hydrok9 » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:39 PM UTC

2Gkashmiri wrote: post #350

antoniuschan99 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could it be that it’s the result of prohibition? Because the Temperance Movement advocated a few of the things you mentioned. Ken Burns has a great doc on Prohibition!

from my small understanding of "prohibition" it was like thry tried to enforce it by way of brute muscle and people found ingenious ways to fool the system. what would the result have been if they had worked on educating people and building a society wide consensus about its ill effects.

Well, they did educate people, alcoholism was a huge problem in the US at the time and men who became alcoholics often abused their families and could not provide for them, leaving them destitute. AFAIK, these issues did change for the better as alcoholism rates were lower after Prohibition than before, and less hard spirits were consumed. But building a society-wide consensus in the US confirming teetotalism? Outside of the highly religious communities, it's just impossible.

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#493

Post by alar44 » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:40 PM UTC

mritchie712 wrote: post #463

devoutsalsa wrote: post #178

"I knew a man who gave up smoking, drinking, sex and rich food. He was healthy right up to the time he killed himself." - Johnny Carson

One of those things is not like the others. I don't think sex is linked to many bad health outcomes.

The point is that they are considered vices. Sex, drugs, rock and roll etc. It's a joke, lighten up.

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#494

Post by tsol » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:41 PM UTC

endisneigh wrote: post #42

Of course it isn’t. Drink water. Unfortunately some people believe they can’t enjoy themselves without alcohol. It’s curious: - babies have fun without drinking - kids have fun without drinking - some teens have fun without drinking Then at some point some people, as adults, feel like they have to drink to enjoy themselves? I wonder what happened. Edit: explicitly clarifying that I’m only talking about some people he…

I believe it's really just cultural. If you spend time with people who don't drink, they often have just as fun a time as drinkers. Humans have been around for a while and if we couldn't have fun once in a while we'd be long extinct. I think people overestimate the necessity of social lubricants. This probably goes hand in hand with the greater culture as well-- at least in America I think it's seen as more necessary because socially its seen as weird to behave really friendly with strangers unless you're imbibed.

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#495

Post by clsec » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:41 PM UTC

caeril wrote: post #162

mmastrac wrote: post #11

Alcohol is one of the worst "drugs" on a personal/societal harm scale - if we're going to tolerate this at large, we should probably consider legalizing everything else that's less harmful to at least be consistent. While we're at it, let's de-stigmatize the abuse of substances and treat it like a real mental health issue.

Counterpoint: alcohol is one of the best drugs on the planet for anyone on the spectrum of introversion to crippling social anxiety. In all my (many) years, I have found no better path to becoming socially acceptable (even likable) to neurotypicals/extroverts than 3-4 shots of vodka. This is an unfortunate, but very real fact for many of us. I've heard good things about Phenibut, but (1) it's very difficult to obtain…

Speaking from experience, as an older guy with crippling social anxiety and 30+ yrs of alcohol use/abuse, I can say that it superficially helps with social anxiety. However, it does not get to the root cause(s) of said anxiety. Professional help is needed to find and work on fixing those. The side effects, physical and psychological, of regular alcohol consumption are far worse than living with social anxiety. I also think it's unhealthy to try to fix one's psychological issues with drugs/medications without also looking at and trying to fix the reasons for their use in the first place.

Also, I now have to undergo quite a few yearly medical tests to keep an eye on my body after years of self medicating for my extreme social anxiety.

FWIW, I don't say these things as a teetotaler. I believe in harm reduction.

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#496

Post by criddell » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:41 PM UTC

kstrauser wrote: post #414

allturtles wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Setting aside tradition/ritual, which I don't think should count for nothing, I can think of many objective metrics on which alcohol is superior: - Flavor - Fills the stomach (can be a disadvantage too, but is advantageous in some situations, e.g. while waiting for dinner to be served at a party) - Doesn't consume itself (i.e you can set down a drink and come back to it 30 minutes later) - Easy to consume a small amo…

There are lots of ways to consume weed that don’t have those drawbacks. There’s a dispensary around the block from me, and even though I don’t use it, I went in to look around to see what our new neighborhood shop looked like. They had a wide selection of edible candies, vape pens, and even drinks. It looks like it’d be very easy to get a consistent dose without burning anything. I know how much alcohol I can drink t…

Alcohol is pretty versatile. Not every use of it is for intoxication. For example, nobody is getting a buzz from deglazing a sauce pan with red wine.

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#497

Post by mywittyname » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:42 PM UTC

zabzonk wrote: post #320

mywittyname wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With beer, this was because the brewer needed to boil the water used in order to kill off any microbes which would compete with the yeast, or it would go "off". It's a very important step for brewing beer. Then the beer would be stored in barrels/casks to help reduce the chance of introducing further microbes, plus the use of preservatives like hops to help keep it longer. With wine, people generally mashed the grape…

> With beer, this was because the brewer needed to boil the water No, they didn't - you do not need (or should) boil the water. If you did boil it, you would then need to let it cool down before adding the yeast. Home-brew kits suggest using a fairly small amount of hot water to disolve the malt extract, and to get it up to fermentation temperature. Beer is safer to drink because the yeast out-competes pathogens, and…

I once toured a microbrewery which produces beers the same way they did in colonial times. This involved pumping the water up ~20 feet into a copper kettle situated above an elevated brick furnace. The water was boiled, then gravity fed down canals via ladles to other kettles for mashing and lautering.

Now, this brewery was replicating 19th century American brewing, but these ideas probably came from Europe.

How else are they going to get water to a specific temperature before the invention of thermometers?

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#498

Post by lm28469 » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:43 PM UTC

mmastrac wrote: post #11

Alcohol is one of the worst "drugs" on a personal/societal harm scale - if we're going to tolerate this at large, we should probably consider legalizing everything else that's less harmful to at least be consistent. While we're at it, let's de-stigmatize the abuse of substances and treat it like a real mental health issue.

> Alcohol is one of the worst "drugs" on a personal/societal harm scale

Addiction is, not alcohol in itself. I haven't been anywhere close to drunk in a decade. I still enjoy a glass of whisky or a cold beer here and there.

People who have problem with alcohol would have problems with "less harmful" (weed I assume?) drugs too, it's a personality trait. I've seen the damage of weed in my friends, it's just as bad as alcohol tbh. I never understood the "it's bad so let's legalise other bad things"

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#499

Post by pasabagi » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:43 PM UTC

allturtles wrote: post #474

AlwaysRock wrote: post #448

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a pretty odd comparison. Some amount of food/caloric intake is healthy or required. Too much is bad. Some amount of water intake is healthy or required. Too much is bad. No amount of arsenic intake is healthy or required. Any is bad. No amount of alcohol intake is healthy or required. Any is bad. Too much of many things is bad. Any amount of some things is bad. Safe may be an odd term for it but alcohols impa…

Arsenic is in all kinds of foods, if you made the claim "no amount of arsenic consumption is safe", you would be arguing that basically everyone's diet is unsafe. What does that even mean? To take the claim "no amount of alcohol consumption is safe" seriously would mean you shouldn't eat bread, which contains a small amount of alcohol.

What about: 'No amount of smoke inhalation is safe for the lungs'?

Obviously, if you live in a city, you're going to find yourself inhaling smoke from time to time, but it's still the case that it should be avoided. It's not extreme to think of alcohol as 'always negative' but also to accept it's a common and basically unavoidable toxin.

Re: No amount of alcohol is good for the heart, says World Heart Federation

#500

Post by irthomasthomas » Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 5:43 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #263

tharne wrote: post #4

Don't worry, in 5-10 years it will be good for you again. I still remember being lectured in school on the food pyramid and the importance of getting your 8-10 servings of grains a day.

The first time I started to wake up to government one-size-fits-all health policies was back in my 8th grade health class when we were being taught about the food pyramid, and this one kid asked the teacher why hamburgers are considered junk food when they pretty much fit into the model food pyramid. I remember the teacher being stumped and uttered out a barely comprehensible response after an awkward moment. At firs…

That's because the food pyramid is owned by the USDA, which represents American farming.