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U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

hhs.gov

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Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#191

Post by chrisdhoover »

DoofusOfDeath wrote: post #173
liability wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Demanding that people give the federal disclaimer every time they discuss the matter is tedious and pointless (since of course you already know it...)

> Demanding that people give the federal disclaimer every time they discuss the matter is tedious and pointless (since of course you already know it...) It seems to me that saying "pot is legal in MA" is precisely as incorrect as saying "pot is illegal in MA". They're both half-truths. I believe there's rhetorical and political power, however, in repeating an untruth without anybody challenging it. HN is intended to…

Its a silly thing to get worked up over although important in a few instances. The pot industry has limited access to banking and you have states like Kansas going after Colorado for enabling drug traffiking

Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#192

Post by Medicalidiot »

THC (Tetrahydrocannabinol) activates cannabinol receptors in one's brain whenever they smoke cannabis. These receptors are responsible to stimulating hunger (why you get munchies) but they also stimulate something called long term depression, which is the process by which your brain forgets memories. The effects take years to decades for anything significant enough to precipitate.

Now, I'm not against smoking cannabis just like I'm not against drinking alcohol. I'm for people understanding the risk factors and being fully informed before they make a decision.

Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#193

Post by ksaj »

meiraleal wrote: post #188

I smoke heavily for 10 years and if I could say something about the cognitive changes, it was for better. I learnt two foreign languages, more programming languages that I can count with one hand and got out of depression by means of self-awareness and meditation after a joint. Weed+Youtube surely is harmful, but so it is only Youtube (with less fun).

You didn't say anything about your age, which would be important given that the article is about the developing brain. It's already pretty understood that the negative impact is significantly less in the adult brain.

The majority of people I went to HS with that were potheads are in exactly the types of jobs and whatnot that the Surgeon General suggests is most likely. Of course there are a lot of outliers. Nobody said this was 100%. The musicians are still pumping out great music. The artists are still doing artistic things.

Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#195

Post by peteradio »

mrpigeonpants wrote: post #76

For me, teenage recreational cannabis use helped to cure another severe disease I was struggling with. Unfortunately, since I've gotten older I've had to slow down a bit. Since then, there's been a gradual progression to the point where my Dorkinson's has almost fully returned.

Unfortunately Dorkinson's comes for us all.

Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#196

Post by AnthonBerg »

buttcoinslol wrote: post #145
bregma wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately the fallacy of correlation-is-causation muddies the water here. Does self-medication cause incipient psychoses to fully manifest, or do those with incipient psychoses resort to self-medication in early stages in seeking to treat their symptoms? Fortunately, it's still illegal to even study these things in America so we can comfortably resort to what we have faith in without the scourge of proof. This go…

I personally think it's the latter. There are estimates that 60-90% of schizophrenics smoke cigarettes, which is 2-3x the normal smoking rate. I think schizophrenics are more likely to smoke marijuana around the time the disease begins to manifest. It's a lot easier to look at your child/brother/uncle/whatever and say "weed did this to him, it's all weed's fault" vs "the disease presented concurrent with a time perio…

Cannabis gives me manic and schizophrenic symptoms. I feel emotions I don’t have names for. I don’t get these symptoms without. This is a strong psychedelic with a very long binding time deep inside our neurobiology.

Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#197

Post by mpalczewski »

mpalczewski wrote: post #168
weberc2 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm for decriminalization and legalization but at the core we need funding for long term studies to better understand marijuana's effects. This is sort of the inverse of the anti-GMO position: "we should ban GMOs until we understand them". I wonder if there are many legalize-weed / ban-GMO folks, and how they would defend their position?

GMO's are potentially dangerous to introduce into the environment. Lot's of shoddy science by Monsanto around them. They don't stand the test of time and aren't necessary. When introducing new potentially dangerous things into the world, the burden of proof is to prove them safe. This is hard to do. Weed has been around forever. Your use doesn't affect me(unless you are driving).

Ha, literally the only person to directly answer the question. downvoted.

Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#198

Post by dragonwriter »

umvi wrote: post #109
dragonwriter wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However, the point is moot because legalizing marijuana increases it's overall availability, image, and appeal Availability, sure; legalization is a product of image and appeal already reaching the level of legal recreational drugs, and there's no reason it would raise it beyond them. Might even reduce the forbidden fruit appeal to minors (but maybe not, because it still be forbidden for them.) > All it would take…

> legalization is a product of image and appeal already reaching the level of legal recreational drugs, and there's no reason it would raise it beyond them Sure there's a reason. The reason is that legalization opens the way for marketing. Marijuana companies will want to continuously increase its appeal and image via advertising, just like the alcohol industry aggressively does. We've already started seeing medical…

> Marijuana companies will want to continuously increase its appeal and image

Yes and like other legal recreational drugs it can and certainly will be taxed, with taxes used for addressing problem use including propaganda designed specifically to reduce the drugs image and appeal.

Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#199

Post by apl002 »

mdorazio wrote: post #172
apl002 wrote: post #166

Ive smoked for about 15 years now. Started heavy through highschool and college and after college usually just a rip before bedtime. I cant say I've experienced anything negative. No issues focusing or memory problems, or dealing with stress/anxiety. I've quit for months at a time cold turkey with no issues. I'll probably never fully quit but I am doing it less just cause I worry about the effects on my lungs more th…

Anecdote like this is bad for two reasons: 1) How do you know you wouldn't have done better had you not smoked starting in high school? You can't go back in time and A/B test yourself 2) Your personal physiology may be fine with marijuana use, but that's not a guarantee that the same applies to everyone else. I'm sure plenty of HN readers (myself included) knew people in high school who did suffer from marijuana-rela…

I totally agree with you. In my comment I wasn't trying to say the article was false, just my own experiences weren't negative. Some of my closest friends that I smoked all day with in HS never went to college and work in lower wage/service industry jobs.

Also to be fair, I was an awful student. However i was always the type that if I didn't want to do something, nothing could get me to do it. Yet when I want to do something, I tend to have pretty positive results. I still think I would have been a terrible student even if I didn't smoke weed. Who knows!

Re: U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use and the Developing Brain

#200

Post by pubgforme »

Smoking weed for me, at least in my early years (16-18, I'm 29 now) yielded a ton of anxiety. At the time I didn't know, but I would get full-blown anxiety attacks when I'd smoke weed.

I've since heard that it depends on the strain, sativa vs indica. Indica == 'in da couch'; anxiety attacks. Sativa is supposed to be a more mellow high.

While I don't smoke often now, I do on occasion. I've found that I tend to get anxiety in the beginning, but I've learned to sort of brush it off/ignore it and enjoy my trip.

Food for thought.

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