Comment by danielnicollet | Hacker News Reader

Comment by danielnicollet | Hacker News Reader

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You can "challenge" me all you want but that still doesn't justify you or others downvoting my comments ;-) And it's just not three downvotes because I was up 6 at some point.

I worked briefly in the pharmaceutical industry and it taught me a few things about the level of testing and knowledge labs have about the pills that you compare to coffee. There has been much more research about coffee (which I remind you I don't drink either because I know of its side-effects) than there has been about the neural enhancers you kids take. You want to believe it's OK. Go ahead but don't blame me for saying it makes no sense to me. And you are right, I am not willing to put much more time into going in details on this. Too busy and the topic is really so off the charts to me that I am pretty sure of myself here.

I have heard so much of the same non-sense pseudo-chemistry from all the people advocating for one drug or another for their wellbeing. The argumentative here really sound of addiction. So I challenge you to explain in bio-chemical terms why these drugs are as harmless as coffee. Good luck!

Are you even reading what I wrote? I explicitly said I didn't downvote you. In addition, you still refuse to actually go into any substantial points, and still resort to the meaningless 'nahnahnah I can't hear you' style of 'discussion' common amongst toddlers.

"the topic is really so off the charts to me that I am pretty sure of myself here". Seriously? Your argument is 'I have a strong opinion about it, so I'm right"? "The argumentative here really sound of addiction." And your basic retort is "what do you know, you're all junkies"? No wonder you feel you're being treated hostile here - all anti-intellectualism is, as it should.

I am absolutely not anti-intellectual - more like the contrary in fact. However, I don't see any intellectualism here.

As I said, point me to serious research that shows coffee and neural stimulants are just as harmless as each other and and I'll side with you. I don't have to provide you research that shows they are vastly different. It's just so freaking obvious.

I suggest you read this about Ritalin and you tell me if it reads like the description of coffee: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0000606 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methylphenidate

Finally, I am very familiar with these medications since I took several neural agents as a younger guy when experiencing epilepsy. I am not against them, I am just surprised about so much talk of self-medication and I think it's plain wrong for people to think this harmless. But this is free world, so why don't you just ignore me and keep popping instead of getting all flustered about my comments, if you are sure of yourself that is.

Oh I'm not flustered, a bit annoyed at best. This used to be a site where mostly bright people discussed in a mostly intelligent way, but lately I feel like it's being overrun by people like you who provide words to the database but no content, and that's a shame. (of course I'm doing so myself now, I'll justify that to myself by saying that it's buried so deep in an article way off the front page that it won't bother many people any more, but I fully recognize that that's cognitive dissonance too).

Anyway please stop the straw man 'that shows coffee and neural stimulants are just as harmless as each other'. That was never even a point of discussion, please pay attention. This started off with you stating "I have no difficulties seeing authenticity in what I do vs. the pill-popping programming regimen" and some other comments that basically declared some ethical difference between using coffee over chemical substances. Caffeine and other chemicals are not the same, they have different effect on the brain and different effects on the body, each chemical has. You claimed there was a moral chasm between caffeine and synthetic drug use, and afterward you refuse to either back down or defend the point, instead weaseling out with (by my count) 5 fallacies by now.

Finally I did not mention once taking any chemicals myself, on purpose since it's immaterial to the question at hand and discussions about me (or you, for that matter) are completely uninteresting. It seems like you find it hard to comprehend that people would take an abstract interest in something that is not immediately applicable in their world, or to hold opinions that are not directly relevant in that. But since you seem to think it's important, let me state for the record that I don't use any non-medical chemicals myself (save for the occasional caffeine).

hehe - just "a bit annoyed" but wasting hard drive space with this long and slightly insulting rant!? you either have lots of time on your hands or are really flustered. I agree, the discussion has lost all meaning at this point. going back to my startup now :)

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