Nutt found that alcohol _the most harmful drug_ -- even more harmful than meth, crack and heroin-- far more harmful than ecstasy, marijuana, magic musrooms, LSD, etc.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2010/11/drugs_caus...
in general, using drugs isn't illegal. using drugs and not being wealthy enough to insulate yourself from the consequences of that choice is what is illegal
Your last sentence is exactly right. Neither of them will ever face legal action. But this is no different than most other things in the US (and elsewhere, usually to a lesser extent): law-enforcement-related outcomes react strongly to the presence of wealth.
I think that a key part of this discussion is making the distinction between saying which drugs are illegal and whether drugs should be illegal at all.
Alcohol is particuarly interesting. It was a crucial part of pre-modern society in creating clean drinking water and even for nutrition in the case of beer. Not only that but alcohol, as opposed to LSD for example, can be taken in doses that range from completely benign to powerfully intoxicating.
Defining what drugs should be illegal, how to punish the crime, and all the other details around it are more difficult to navigate.
I think the reason you find alcohol so interesting because of the Iron Law of Prohibition(2): 'The iron law of prohibition is a term coined by Richard Cowan in 1986 which posits that as law enforcement becomes more intense, the potency of prohibited substances increases. Cowan put it this way: "the harder the enforcement, the harder the drugs."'
I'm reading the Kalevala (The National Epic of the Finns), and there is a lot of talk about brewing "table beer". I didn't know the term, so I had to look it up: beer of 1-2% alcohol, suitable for drinking during meals.
I think the reason you find such a range of "responses" to alcohol is not the drug itself, but because of the fact that it's legal, and therefore not subject to the Iron Law of Prohibition, you can buy it in a variety of strengths-- from beer to wine to liquor. It's not the drug per se, but its manufacture.
But, if you're going to go through the trouble of breaking the law to sell or buy and use illegal drugs, you might as well make it "worthwhile". That's why you could not find beer or wine during Prohibition, but you could get hold of high-content whiskey and vodka, even white lighting, moonshine, etc.
Likewise, contraband drugs have from from morphine to heroin to even more powerful manufactured opioids. If you're going to risk buying a sheet of LSD, get a dose of 70 micrograms, instead of 20.
Meanwhile, in silicon valley and other places, there is a new trend of microdosing(3): taking sub-threshold doses of "hallucinogens" to the point that _you're not even hallucinating-- but you do experience the "side effects" of increased alertness, awareness, creativity, memory, and problem solving. So there are doses of LSD, mushrooms, etc you can take that are not very powerful at all. It all depends on how they are manufactured and sold, just like alcohol.
Even now in South American countries, the most popular form of "cocaine" is coca leaves-- which, by contrast, are actually very healthy, and the first response to potentially deadly altitude sickness when pills aren't available.
I would suspect that if drugs were legalized, you would find a lot more forms with a lot less power.
1. http://leslefts.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-great-medieval-wate...
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_prohibition
3. http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertglatter/2015/11/27/lsd-mic...
A classic example is the observation that the average orange sold in New York City is of significantly higher quality that the average orange sold in Florida.
On the face of it, this sounds silly - NYC doesn't grow oranges and Florida has lots of excellent orange trees, yet what happens is that given the high costs to ship fresh fruit, it makes sense (from a marginal cost perspective) to send mostly above-average fruit to NYC because the people in NYC who are already paying a much higher amount than the people in Florida for the same orange likely won't care very much about an extra five or ten cents to get the better orange while the people in Florida could see the extra five or ten cents as a 100% increase in the price of a good.
As an anecdote, I once had the opportunity to sample coca tea - not the kind with the cocaine removed that's legal to sell in the US, but the real stuff. The magnitude of the effect was similar to a strong cup of coffee or energy drink, but the feeling was a little different. It was pleasant, and I would do it again if it was readily available.
I don't know how I'd obtain it in the US or Europe, but I'm quite certain I could obtain refined cocaine if I wanted that.
I am wondering if you have ever taken LSD or heard of the term micro-dosing? At any rate, I disagree that LSD cannot be taken in benign doses.
This is false. For example, people microdose LSD for a more clear headed, caffeine-like stimulant effect. People microdose psilocybin to treat migraines. DXM, one of the most powerful dissociative psychedelics that exists, is sold over-the-counter in convenience stores to treat coughs. Research before your talk.
I would say that's accurate.
I think perhaps you have no idea what you're talking about. The available range of doses for most psychedelics are "microdosing" (about the same taking any nootropic, including strong coffee) to far in excess of safe levels of alcohol. (I met someone once who claimed to have (accidentally) snorted a line of LSD crystals. She was fine, but said it took a couple of days)
> Defining what drugs should be illegal....
I think the better question to start with is why drugs should be illegal. Then you can see whether (and when) a drug matches that description, and proceed accordingly.
Ironically, the "Schedule" system lays out pretty good categories, they just apply the rubrics unreasonably and with Catch-22's.
And if you agree to that, would you agree that the current policies based on racism and political goals would benefit from reform or do you think we should continue supporting them and the intentions behind them?
Deciding the criteria ultimately cannot be anything but an ideological policy decision. Deciding which specific drugs meet that criteria may be a scientific questions (if the criteria is such that that is the appropriate method of determining it.)
Do you see the possibility for a scientific process which would help define criteria?
At root, criteria are a value proposition, not a fact proposition. Science answers (or, predicts answers to) fact propositions, not value propositions.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/danielfisher/2013/12/12/study-fi...
Without data, any opinion of this subject is bound to be based entirely on society's collective opinion or individual anecdotes. Within those limits, I'd argue that "people that enjoy that shit" are actually more reliable.
I believe the partition made by the the post you're replying to gets pretty close to my anecdotal reality. I'm somewhat convinced that heroin/crack/meth are addictive and that alone will always scare me off. Whereas LSD/mushrooms/ecstasy have almost no potential for addiction.
And, yes, having experienced them tends to make you run around telling people that it's part of the human experience – much like I'd tell people that they'd miss something essential if they never got slightly drunk on white wine watching the sunset on a beach.
edit: I may be looking at a different study (I can't read that economist link). I'm referring to "Development of a rational scale to assess the harm of drugs," though I do see another study "Drug harms in the UK: a multi-criteria decision analysis" that corroborates his post.