The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal • Hacker News Board

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#21

Post by drakaal » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 2:57 AM UTC

bpeebles wrote: post #16

drakaal wrote: post #5

While Marijuana may have uses for medicine. As a recreational drug, I think the in ability to easily check when you consumed it, or to have a high as a result of just burning off fat. (it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories) Makes it harder to enforce responsible use than say alcohol. I don't think we want pilots, surgeons, or police doing their jobs while high, and si…

Do you have any links to actual studies that find you can get high by burning fat "even years later"? Everything I've read has said that some of the metabolites of THC can be stored in fat--and those are the actual compounds tested by "marijuana" tests, but THC itself isn't stored in the human body after the initial processing even if it is fat soluble itself. Lengths of high vary, but so do lengths of being drunk. A…

Years may have been a stretch. Looks like 7 days has been shown in a lab, and the CDC thinks weeks.

http://healthland.time.com/2013/09/17/one-toke-many-hits-exe...

http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00001143.htm

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#22

Post by BariumBlue » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 2:58 AM UTC

drakaal wrote: post #5

While Marijuana may have uses for medicine. As a recreational drug, I think the in ability to easily check when you consumed it, or to have a high as a result of just burning off fat. (it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories) Makes it harder to enforce responsible use than say alcohol. I don't think we want pilots, surgeons, or police doing their jobs while high, and si…

Remember, these are adults, not little kids. If I can't trust them to be professional and cautious of risks, I wouldn't bother with their services, and likely neither would their employer.

Personally, i think sleep deprivation is a much bigger issue for pilots and doctors than weed. Please, do leave careless speculation and personal vendettas by the door.

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#23

Post by iguana » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 2:58 AM UTC

drakaal wrote: post #5

While Marijuana may have uses for medicine. As a recreational drug, I think the in ability to easily check when you consumed it, or to have a high as a result of just burning off fat. (it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories) Makes it harder to enforce responsible use than say alcohol. I don't think we want pilots, surgeons, or police doing their jobs while high, and si…

This is completely ridiculous and written by someone with absolutely no experience with marijuana. The idea that you "could end up high years later" is laughable, and has absolutely no basis in scientific fact.

"A stoned Doctor might not smell of it, might not have any real outwards signs, and then could get the giggles when he nicked an artery."

Marijuana does not cause a significant impairment in regular users. Even if that were not the case, if a doctor chooses to be intoxicated when they are responsible for someone else's life, they are already making a terrible choice, regardless of the legality of the substance in question.

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#24

Post by cal2 » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 2:59 AM UTC

drakaal wrote: post #5

While Marijuana may have uses for medicine. As a recreational drug, I think the in ability to easily check when you consumed it, or to have a high as a result of just burning off fat. (it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories) Makes it harder to enforce responsible use than say alcohol. I don't think we want pilots, surgeons, or police doing their jobs while high, and si…

I'll preface by saying that I used to smoke a lot of weed, but I haven't in quite some time.

> it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories

Please cite this extensively. Many bioactive molecules are fat-soluble. Just because a substance is fat-soluble doesn't mean it can be stored indefinitely and readily metabolized.

> The real reason Pot is still illegal is that it is dangerous to those who aren't consuming it. A stoned Doctor might not smell of it, might not have any real outwards signs, and then could get the giggles when he nicked an artery.

I disagree with you 100% here. I can tell when someone is stoned, regardless of physical side-effects, changes in mentality or demeanor, etc.

Regardless, in my opinion, your argument crumbles if we clarify stoned to be under the influence of well-concealed alcohol, benzodiazepines, opiates, barbiturates, excessive stimulants, or, hell, maybe even ketamine, methaqualone, etc.

I (unfortunately, I suppose) have had experiences with pretty much every drug and RC under the sun, and I personally think it's very easy to detect when someone is under the influence of marijuana compared to any of the substances thereof (well, maybe except the dissociatives or excessive alcohol).

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#25

Post by hamiltonkibbe » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 2:59 AM UTC

drakaal wrote: post #7

hamiltonkibbe wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the fact that alcohol use is easily detected in a field-administered test all that keeps surgeons from doing surgery drunk?

No, but easily defined rules about how long between a drink and the surgery is. Just like pilots. You can drink and be a pilot, just not 8 hours before. How long you have a high varies wildly, and under stress old highs can come back. Edit: And if you think you can come up with a combination where you didn't die an hour after your drinks and are still drunk 8 hours later, here is a calculator http://touchcalc.com/cal…

Any source for the calculations that calculator uses? A quick search says alcohol can be detected in blood up to 12 hours[1].

How many doobies does it take to stay high for 8 hours?

[1] https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojp/181103.pdf

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#26

Post by hamiltonkibbe » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 3:01 AM UTC

ggfdsgsdfg wrote: post #18

drakaal wrote: post #5

While Marijuana may have uses for medicine. As a recreational drug, I think the in ability to easily check when you consumed it, or to have a high as a result of just burning off fat. (it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories) Makes it harder to enforce responsible use than say alcohol. I don't think we want pilots, surgeons, or police doing their jobs while high, and si…

You're going to have to post some citation on the whole "getting high from burning THC-laden fat" point. Just because it's fat soluble doesn't mean you can get high enough concentrations in your bloodstream from exercise alone to cause impairment, or even be noticeable.

[0] wild conjecture

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#27

Post by lotsofmangos » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 3:03 AM UTC

drakaal wrote: post #5

While Marijuana may have uses for medicine. As a recreational drug, I think the in ability to easily check when you consumed it, or to have a high as a result of just burning off fat. (it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories) Makes it harder to enforce responsible use than say alcohol. I don't think we want pilots, surgeons, or police doing their jobs while high, and si…

it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories

You are confusing pot with one of the presumed mechanisms for LSD flashbacks.

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#28

Post by adventured » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 3:08 AM UTC

justinator wrote: post #14

From TFA: > Prescription opioids, a line of pain-relieving > medications derived from the opium poppy or produced > synthetically, are the most dangerous drugs abused in > America, with more than 16,000 deaths annually linked to > opioid addiction and overdose. But, that's wrong. http://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/fact-sheets/alcohol-use.htm "There are approximately 88,000 deaths attributable to excessive alcohol use each ye…

And of course cigarettes are far more dangerous health wise than alcohol. With the cigarette being the drug delivery method, as an beverage is the delivery method for the alcohol.

http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/healt...

"More than 480,000 deaths annually (including deaths from secondhand smoke)"

"Life expectancy for smokers is at least 10 years shorter than for nonsmokers"

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#29

Post by Zigurd » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 3:11 AM UTC

drakaal wrote: post #5

While Marijuana may have uses for medicine. As a recreational drug, I think the in ability to easily check when you consumed it, or to have a high as a result of just burning off fat. (it is fat soluble, and you can end up high even years later if you burn enough calories) Makes it harder to enforce responsible use than say alcohol. I don't think we want pilots, surgeons, or police doing their jobs while high, and si…

Wow. I had no idea people believed stuff like this. Cannabis appears not to have a large negative effect on people in at least some elite performance situations, like musical performance and freestyle snowboarding. What's particularly hilarious is the debate of whether cannabis might be categorized as a performance enhancing drug.

Re: The Reason Pot Is Still Illegal

#30

Post by rayiner » Sat, Jul 12, 2014, 3:57 AM UTC

The reason pot is still illegal is because public opinion just shifted in favor of legalization last year, and the attitude among likely voters (skew older than the general population), probably is still against. See: http://www.people-press.org/2013/04/04/majority-now-supports...

The real reason isn't lobbyists. The real reason is soccer moms and dads and baby boomers, who vote in droves, who are convinced that pot will make their kids sit around and mastrubate all day. The ones that hold monthly anti-drug assemblies in school where they shriek "just say no!" at the top of their lungs.