Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. "Go read this book" ain't it.
“I don’t feel like reading a book” isn’t a counter argument. That’s just a tidbit about how your day is going
The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
21–30 of 280 posts
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. "Go read this book" ain't it.
'extraordinary claims' is laughable.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIA_involvement_in_Contra_coca...
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#23The insane thing for me is seeing how tightly meth purity correlated with the airing of Breaking Bad.
I was thinking the same thing, though I couldn't remember the timeline. Makes me wonder if there was something already in the zeitgeist, or if it was fueled by the obsession with purity in the series. I could totally see Breaking Bad causing chemists to want to up their game, or causing chemists to get clowned for having low purity.
[deleted]
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#24The insane thing for me is seeing how tightly meth purity correlated with the airing of Breaking Bad.
I was thinking the same thing, though I couldn't remember the timeline. Makes me wonder if there was something already in the zeitgeist, or if it was fueled by the obsession with purity in the series. I could totally see Breaking Bad causing chemists to want to up their game, or causing chemists to get clowned for having low purity.
yes, while the show probably popularized the idea of purity for meth, in general strict prohibition leads to increase in purity and potency. We've recently seen that with heroin/fentanyl. There is probably still no "fentanyl of meth", and thus so far only purity increase. Once a more potent, fentanyl-like, meth appears, it will probably similarly get into and displace a lot of classic meth trade.
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#25P2P stands for Peer-to-Peer.
Now I can't say that I led a P2P network anymore.
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#26The ephedrine (or pseudoephedrine) synthesis is a one step using phosphorus/iodine reduction directly to methamphetamine. It’s simple and clean in that only an acid base extraction is required, and only one set of NP solvents. All these others syntheses with multiple steps up the chances of weird toxic solvents or contaminants creeping in. I think it’s a contaminant issue that’s exacerbated by the drug use. The gover…
> I think it’s a contaminant issue that’s exacerbated by the drug use.
I think the various pieces of evidence presented in the article basically all point against this. Is there a reason you think the evidence in the article is flawed?
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#27Fantastic write up. I think the biggest takeaway for me is just how insanely ineffective banning pseudoephedrine over the counter was. Price went down, usage went up overdose went up, seizures went up, the production just changed quickly and there wasn’t even a blip. Billions of uses of bullshit decongestant products that didn’t work at all… and to get the good stuff you still need to buy it from behind the counter a…
Throwback to A Simple and Convenient Synthesis of Pseudoephedrine From N-Methylamphetamine [0] [1], a 2012 paper describing how to synthesize Sudafed from meth lol
[0] https://improbable.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Pseudoephe...
[1] https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/pseudephedrine-mad...
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
I was thinking the same thing, though I couldn't remember the timeline. Makes me wonder if there was something already in the zeitgeist, or if it was fueled by the obsession with purity in the series. I could totally see Breaking Bad causing chemists to want to up their game, or causing chemists to get clowned for having low purity.
yes, while the show probably popularized the idea of purity for meth, in general strict prohibition leads to increase in purity and potency. We've recently seen that with heroin/fentanyl. There is probably still no "fentanyl of meth", and thus so far only purity increase. Once a more potent, fentanyl-like, meth appears, it will probably similarly get into and displace a lot of classic meth trade.
What? Prohibition historically showed the exact opposite.
I suspect higher purity & potency of street drugs has much more to do with more sophisticated operators operating outside of the US than strict prohibition. Same with fentanyl.
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#29The article was doing so well until the conclusion.
> Does this rule out the idea of contaminants? No. Even if it’s 97% pure d-meth, there could be something very nasty lurking in that last 3%. But I don’t see the need for such an explanation. We know there are many more heavy users, so there’s no need to go beyond the idea that quantity has a quality all its own.
It's fine if the author finds it an uninteresting problem because the probable answer is staring us in the face, but still, he only has a plausible hypothesis.
If Sam Quinones is correct in that there is a fundamental difference in meth then and now that is causing major issues for addicts, it would certainly be in society's interest to figure that out and rectify it.
Re: The main thing about P2P meth is that there's so much of it (2021)
#30>..What evidence is there that these have a chemical difference? 3 lines later.. >.. The Drug Enforcement Agency tests the meth they seize to see how it was made. quick answer!
Right? One suspects that "knowing how it was made" implies "understanding contaminants to look for."