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Nootropics – The Facts About “Smart Drugs”

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Re: Nootropics – The Facts About “Smart Drugs”

#151

Post by adrianN »

kamaal wrote: post #149
tokenadult wrote: post #50

The article begins with "It’s a lengthy read, but don’t let the wall of text dissuade you." That's scary right there. Anyone who is scared off by this short, popular fluff piece needs a lot of help in reading (or is not a native speaker of English). To learn to read a piece like this thoughtfully and critically mostly takes practice in reading, not the latest "smart drug." I've been hearing people tout smart drugs fo…

Inevitable question: Why hasn't evolution already enabled a natural way of getting to this? And since it hasn't why should we assume we are ready for it now?

It could be as simple as an energy tradeoff. Our brains already consume a significant fraction of our daily calories, having them work harder might not improve our reproduction results sufficiently to balance the increased risk of starvation.

Re: Nootropics – The Facts About “Smart Drugs”

#152

Post by robbiep »

Pongo_the_Great wrote: post #119
tokenadult wrote: post #50

The article begins with "It’s a lengthy read, but don’t let the wall of text dissuade you." That's scary right there. Anyone who is scared off by this short, popular fluff piece needs a lot of help in reading (or is not a native speaker of English). To learn to read a piece like this thoughtfully and critically mostly takes practice in reading, not the latest "smart drug." I've been hearing people tout smart drugs fo…

Nooptroics work, otherwise they'd not have FDA [insert whatever system you're under] approval. A quick glance at the crap fluff piece above shows that many of them are simple supplements [i.e. distilled stuff from a normal diet], but some are real pharmaceutical drugs . Obviously, we immediately cull anything that is available from a normal diet, and ask the questions of the others. As such, your entire argument is i…

You state that Nootropics work, or else they wouldn't be available/approved. However drugs that would generally be considered psychoactive aren't approved as nootropics, they are approved as part of the food and beverage industry/anti depressant/anti-narcolepsy/anti-ADD aids (Modafinil, Adderall, nicotine, caffeine). Their use as nootropics is secondary to their licensed use and their current popularity is, I believe, mostly to the technological sophistication of society, with a quest for constant improvement and productivity metrics.

>|They're designed for a purpose. They must be efficacious for that purpose.

Why? That is fallacious. They aren't designed for the purpose they are touted for, and as you correctly point out later, the article that these comments all relate to primarily refer to supplements rather than drugs per se .

>| Where do you think heroin came from?

What are you talking about? The military had nothing to do with Heroin.

Now, I use caffeine, nicotine and modafinil regularly. But that does not legitimise all drugs/supplements that have had the label 'nootropic' added to them by passionate advocates for human mental advancement and improvement, and the comment that is currently the first post in this thread I believe correctly points out what is required in order to establish evidence around the efficacy of these drugs.

We should not be too rapid in our praise of miracle cures and treatments, history shows that most of them are a load of shit.

ps. try asterisks for italics

Re: Nootropics – The Facts About “Smart Drugs”

#153

Post by Tooluka »

matznerd wrote: post #82
Tooluka wrote: post #33

> No one talks about this stuff! Yeah, right. Probably in some other internet. You can't find a site today where there they weren't discussed at least once. Personally I won't take them without prescription from a doctor. Yes, downsides are pretty obscure and rare but the same are benefits. Based on reviews they are not some magic pills like in Limitless. Closer to placebo actually.

They are not some magic drug like Limitless, but they are closer to that than to placebos. Do you not notice a difference in your mental and physical state when you take caffeine? Caffeine is a Nootropic and it works, but Caffeine is just the tip of the iceberg.

For me caffeine is also closer to a placebo (I do know that it works, just weakly and randomly for different people). The major positive effect of it I think is drinking 100-200ml of hot drink. I feel the same after drinking coffee or any tea or some cacao mix by nestle. Drinking water a lot is very helpful for human brain, especially in cold and arid offices where we mostly sit without moving.

Re: Nootropics – The Facts About “Smart Drugs”

#154

Post by [deleted] »

matznerd wrote: post #82
Tooluka wrote: post #33

> No one talks about this stuff! Yeah, right. Probably in some other internet. You can't find a site today where there they weren't discussed at least once. Personally I won't take them without prescription from a doctor. Yes, downsides are pretty obscure and rare but the same are benefits. Based on reviews they are not some magic pills like in Limitless. Closer to placebo actually.

They are not some magic drug like Limitless, but they are closer to that than to placebos. Do you not notice a difference in your mental and physical state when you take caffeine? Caffeine is a Nootropic and it works, but Caffeine is just the tip of the iceberg.

[deleted]

Re: Nootropics – The Facts About “Smart Drugs”

#155

Post by Pongo_the_Great »

robbiep wrote: post #152
Pongo_the_Great wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nooptroics work, otherwise they'd not have FDA [insert whatever system you're under] approval. A quick glance at the crap fluff piece above shows that many of them are simple supplements [i.e. distilled stuff from a normal diet], but some are real pharmaceutical drugs . Obviously, we immediately cull anything that is available from a normal diet, and ask the questions of the others. As such, your entire argument is i…

You state that Nootropics work, or else they wouldn't be available/approved. However drugs that would generally be considered psychoactive aren't approved as nootropics, they are approved as part of the food and beverage industry/anti depressant/anti-narcolepsy/anti-ADD aids (Modafinil, Adderall, nicotine, caffeine). Their use as nootropics is secondary to their licensed use and their current popularity is, I believe…

Thankyou! I presume this will bold*

Of course, I was referring to the inverted U effect earlier ~ given we guess that HN is full of highly intelligent people, they'll not see as much benefit as others. However, the USA currently has a glut of anxiety / depression based disorders, and I suspect that HN has statistically more "introverts" than many other places on the web. i.e. I guess that social anxiety will be higher here than say, "Jock McGee's NFL Tavern" forum.

I'll attempt to only use PubMed links in respect of people not having to tunnel through paywalls:

Anxiolytic effects of aniracetam in three different mouse models of anxiety and the underlying mechanism. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11412837?dopt=Abstract&#3...

Antidepressant activity of memory-enhancing drugs in the reduction of submissive behavior model. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11959085?dopt=Abstract&#3...

Free but via paywalled garden

Piracetam: A Review of Pharmacological Properties and Clinical Uses http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1527-3458.2005....

Modulating effect of the nootropic drug, piracetam on stress- and subsequent morphine-induced prolactin secretion in male rats http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1476-5381.1996....

There's plenty of evidence that these drugs might be very useful for exactly the social induced psychological issues that plague modern society.

Re: Nootropics – The Facts About “Smart Drugs”

#156

Post by strlen »

kamaal wrote: post #149
tokenadult wrote: post #50

The article begins with "It’s a lengthy read, but don’t let the wall of text dissuade you." That's scary right there. Anyone who is scared off by this short, popular fluff piece needs a lot of help in reading (or is not a native speaker of English). To learn to read a piece like this thoughtfully and critically mostly takes practice in reading, not the latest "smart drug." I've been hearing people tout smart drugs fo…

Inevitable question: Why hasn't evolution already enabled a natural way of getting to this? And since it hasn't why should we assume we are ready for it now?

Well, to an extent it has: there's archeological evidence that human intelligence has risen from ~40,000 AD to ~10,000 (see "Before The Dawn"). It's just that additional intelligence (beyond what we have now) doesn't seem to confer any further evolutionary advantage.

Re: Nootropics – The Facts About “Smart Drugs”

#157

Post by knowledgesale »

kamaal wrote: post #149
tokenadult wrote: post #50

The article begins with "It’s a lengthy read, but don’t let the wall of text dissuade you." That's scary right there. Anyone who is scared off by this short, popular fluff piece needs a lot of help in reading (or is not a native speaker of English). To learn to read a piece like this thoughtfully and critically mostly takes practice in reading, not the latest "smart drug." I've been hearing people tout smart drugs fo…

Inevitable question: Why hasn't evolution already enabled a natural way of getting to this? And since it hasn't why should we assume we are ready for it now?

Why are majority of undergraduate students in Asia myopic? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myopia#Epidemiology
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