HN Reader

As a long time marijuana user, these pro weed articles always crack me up. Sure it has some limited legitimate medical usages for pain or other applications. Vast majority of users are just addicts in denial, myself included for the longest time. Anthropologists in the future will be studying the effects of drastically increased marijuana consumption on society for decades in the future. I do wonder when the general populace will wake up to the propaganda, for example, how it’s clearly a gateway drug and clearly addictive on some level.

Let me counter this with all of my anecdata: I don't know a single pothead that improved compared to who they were (mentally especially, including cognitive function) compared to when I knew them before they started smoking pot. I'm sure they exist, I have not met them in person yet.

However other research shows a concerning association between long-term, heavy cannabis use and an increased risk of dementia, including Alzheimer's disease. [1]

[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27886010/

Interesting article, but immediately ran into one of my pet peeves:

> The work is published in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.

"Alcohol and drugs" is like saying "beef and meat".

Looks like I picked a bad day to give up cannabis.

What is the point of having a study published in a journal when no one can read it? Creds?

It has no cred to me unless I can read it. Appeal to authority is the opposite of science.

Anyway, sounds like induction, it might be probabilistically true, but they don't have the theory to prove it. (Popper ruined me)

Was it a controlled study or just correlation?

Big brained olds love this one weird trick.

Weed is expensive. But not terribly addictive. Another words, a luxury product, but people will not usually forego necessities to get it like more addictive drugs.

I don't think there is any controversy there is at least a weak link between intelligence and access to luxury goods.

In other news, occasional cigar smokers have slightly lower cancer rates. It aint the cigars...

--------------------------------------------

Edit: those talking about price being cheap in US: the data is from UK biobank. Unclear to me if that's actually UK citizens, but prices in UK are significantly higher than those quoting legal weed state prices. It appears those downvoting / rebutting are attempting to strong-arm a US centric view into foreign sourced data.

  Using data from the UK Biobank, which includes health information from over 500,000 adults, associations between cannabis use, regional brain volume, and cognition in participants aged 40–70 years (mean age = 54.5) were evaluated.

Is this causation or correlation?

Cannabis usage is linked to self-reported better cognitive function. But some new studies suggest it's not wise to do technical interviews while baked. Nobody can explain this paradox.

this is not a good study. it says that most cannabis use occured when young, and they then measure brains and cognitive test performance when older

this feels like reading tea leaves

There actually is a plausible mechanism here: various cannabinoids are anti-inflammatory and reduce excitotoxicity in the brain.

On the margin, this should reduce the risk of some brain diseases as you get older.

However as much as I love loud there are obvious downsides to daily use

Dude, but what about like, correlation versus causation, man?

They don't call it "dope" because it makes you smarter