is smoking weed bad? (1 Viewer)

[+Po1ntDeXt3r+]

I sell my anus on the streets anyway..

if thats the case u might want some of the akyl nitrates

 

[Atonofrash]

noone said that it was?..... they use it as a risk factor for youth at risk.

alcohol is one too... cos it increases risky behaviour after alcohol consumption..

yes they are. people are saying that weed is bad because it's a gateway drug and makes people try harder drugs.

correlation between trying weed and trying harder drugs is not the same as trying weed CAUSING you to take harder drugs.

weed being a gateway drug isn't proven.

 

[stazi]

exactly, that's why 'any brain altering substance is wrong' is a bad statement.

Yes, even if you start limiting it:

'Marijuana = bad, because all brain altering substances = bad': food isn't bad.
'Marijuana = bad, because all brain altering substances not necessary to be alive (e.g. food, exercise) = bad': Anti-depressants can help people cope with depression
'Marijuana = bad, because all non-medical, non-essential brain altering substances = bad': what about caffeine, that's not illegal, but it's not necessarily 'bad'
'Marijuana = bad, because all non-medial, illegal, non-essential brain altering substances = bad': what about substances that are illegal here, such as that stimulant that you can chew that has very low dependency in the short term and creates a similar buzz to caffeine. That's not worse than caffeine.

etc.

 

[boris]

yes they are. people are saying that weed is bad because it's a gateway drug and makes people try harder drugs.

correlation between trying weed and trying harder drugs is not the same as trying weed CAUSING you to take harder drugs.

weed being a gateway drug isn't proven.

Young people who smoke marijuana are two to five times more likely to move on to harder drugs. That is the formal opinion of researchers, who published their conclusions from a recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

I would say that the positive correlation between marijuana and harder drug use is a little too strong to ignore.

 

[Graney]

correlation does not imply causation.

 

[boris]

correlation does not imply causation.

Actually it does imply causation, it just doesn't prove causation.

I think to ignore the correlation is pretty retarded, in my opinion.

 

[Atonofrash]

I would say that the positive correlation between marijuana and harder drug use is a little too strong to ignore.

correlation DOES NOT mean causation.

more likely there is something else that contributes to people who take weed also taking harder drugs. and that is that they are the kind of people who want to take mind altering substances.

if you are going to use correlation then (i'm going back to it) you should say that alcohol causes people to take cocaine.

people eating more icecream at tthe beach is highly correlated with more shark attacks. Does this mean that if you stop people eating icecream there will be more shark attacks? No, because it is a third factor, ie hot weather, that is actually the causation of both of the variables.

 

[Atonofrash]

yeah, correlation IS interesting and important. but you just can't extrapolate causation from it.

and that is what people are trying to do when they say that weed makes people take herion because there's a correlation.

 

[+Po1ntDeXt3r+]

yes they are. people are saying that weed is bad because it's a gateway drug and makes people try harder drugs.

correlation between trying weed and trying harder drugs is not the same as trying weed CAUSING you to take harder drugs.

weed being a gateway drug isn't proven.

actually there lies an interesting question... was marijuana rates this high in the 1800s and 1900s.. or pre-1950s when ppl started to use it more.....
not a strong case but causation can be implied.. but there are lots of factors there

in countries where marijuana is a class A drug tho.. lik up with heroin.. there is a lower rate of 'harder' drug uptake.. its not like 100% but its wat we have

 

[Atonofrash]

actually there lies an interesting question... was marijuana rates this high in the 1800s and 1900s.. or pre-1950s when ppl started to use it more.....
not a strong case but causation can be implied.. but there are lots of factors there

what?

 

[stazi]

lol exactly.

i think a more relevant beach example is saying that people who wear wetsuits are more likely to be attacked by sharks if you find that 80% of the people attacked by sharks are wearing wetsuits.

However, it is also possible that despite this correlation, the actual cause of this phenomenon is that people who wear wetsuits are more likely to be bodyboarders/surfers, who are in turn more likely to go out deeper into the ocean, where there are more likely to be sharks.

 

[+Po1ntDeXt3r+]

the problem is proving causality with marijuana.. its not lik u can get 13 yrs olds to take it.. or a placebo....

lol its psychological as well..

 

[stazi]

actually there lies an interesting question... was marijuana rates this high in the 1800s and 1900s.. or pre-1950s when ppl started to use it more.....
not a strong case but causation can be implied.. but there are lots of factors there

in countries where marijuana is a class A drug tho.. lik up with heroin.. there is a lower rate of 'harder' drug uptake.. its not like 100% but its wat we have

lol in english?

i understood the second part though. It's entirely likely that countries where weed is a class A drug, people are more likely to abstain from drugs overall. For example, in Singapore there's practically no hard drug use or marijuana use. This is because people don't want to go to jail or be executed, rather than because people don't have weed to try, and thus don't go on to harder drugs.

 

[Graney]

"ASSOCIATION DOES NOT IMPLY CAUSATION

An association between an explanatory variable x and a response variable y, even if it is very strong, is not by itself good evidence that changes in x actually cause changes in y."

Moore, DS and McCabe, GP 2006, 'Introduction to the practice of statistics', Chapter 2, p. 160

 

[lil lelu]

lol exactly.

i think a more relevant beach example is saying that people who wear wetsuits are more likely to be attacked by sharks if you find that 80% of the people attacked by sharks are wearing wetsuits.

However, it is also possible that despite this correlation, the actual cause of this phenomenon is that people who wear wetsuits are more likely to be bodyboarders/surfers, who are in turn more likely to go out deeper into the ocean, where there are more likely to be sharks.

and that they surf at times when sharks feed, dawn and dusk.

 

[Atonofrash]

the problem is proving causality with marijuana.. its not lik u can get 13 yrs olds to take it.. or a placebo....

lol its psychological as well..

exactly. so stop trying to mislead people by saying that there is evidence of causation when there's only studies on correlation

 

[Graney]

actually there lies an interesting question... was marijuana rates this high in the 1800s and 1900s.. or pre-1950s when ppl started to use it more.....

Based on the hypothesis "marijuana causes increased rates of mental illness", you would expect significantly higher rates of schiophrenia post 1960's, when marijuana use become widespread. Interestingly there has been no such rise.

 

[stazi]

For some reason I thought that the 'marijuana = gateway drug' argument is something only parents said to kids to scare them. It's just not a sound argument, unless you classify alcohol as the true gateway drug.

Based on the hypothesis "marijuana causes increased rates of mental illness", you would expect significantly higher rates of schiophrenia post 1960's, when marijuana use become widespread. Interestingly there has been no such rise.

actually, there may be a higher rate, but that's due to the refinement (loosening) of the classification criteria for many mental illnesses

 

[+Po1ntDeXt3r+]

exactly. so stop trying to mislead people by saying that there is evidence of causation when there's only studies on correlation

lol no its just not level one evidence.. its lik level 2 and 3
btw.. noone has ever proved that parachutes worked to level 1 evidence either so..

oh well i have to go to hospital.

 

[+Po1ntDeXt3r+]

Based on the hypothesis "marijuana causes increased rates of mental illness", you would expect significantly higher rates of schiophrenia post 1960's, when marijuana use become widespread. Interestingly there has been no such rise.

:O there are too many problems and too little clinical wealth from doing a retrospective study like that..

also technically that study cant be done...