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Comment by bjourne | Hacker News Reader

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Probably around the same time as "a little bit of wine is actually good for you".

You will note that this study is very specific with its claims : 21-30, male, (only?) addicted / high potency.

Which is a surprise to me, as I thought that it was already "known" (while they say it's a first specifically for schizophrenia(!?)), and without these 3 specifics.

As soon as it's legalized.

Cannabis might be bad for your health, but the most significant consequences of cannabis use are getting arrested and losing your job.

As long as that's a risk, and as long as people use health concerns as an excuse to take away other people's freedom, we can't have an honest conversation about it.

I saw a comedy clip recently:

> Pot doesn't make me paranoid, pot being illegal makes me paranoid

this joke isn't accurate though. its just a meme. getting way to high can you paranoid in other ways. which i guess is like schizophrenia. ime if your the type thats constantly scared of the police itll just turn into other paranoias. "are they talking about me" "why are they looking at me" etc..

Idk, but I remember the bogus argument that legalizing weed will reduce how many people use it by removing the "forbidden fruit" appeal.

Did you see the article on HN a few days ago about how legal marijuana purchases in the US fell from 2021 to 2022? There was a fair bit of debate around why exactly that was but I personally do think that what you mentioned is a part of it.

edit: here's the comments section https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35788120

Article says "In addition to the persisting illicit market and plummeting wholesale prices, extreme delays in local licensing have been cited as a cause for the decline." The article is also about revenue only, so I dunno.

The hypothetical comparison like a decade ago was the number of users before legalization vs the number of users after. Every study I can find showed a sharp increase in usage in states that legalized it. If usage actually fell in '22, I doubt it came anywhere close to reversing the trend since legalization.

Probobly never

Can we say nicotine has nothing to do with mental illness? Because the mentally ill really like their cigs!

Strangely enough the research shows that nicotine has a positive affect on treating schizophrenia symptoms.

Tobacco can be a very good medicine. Smoking cigarettes is obviously harmful, but they can have a very good effect on mood.

In the Peruvian Amazon, tobacco is considered to be a medicine. They use a stronger type of tobacco called "mapacho" which is pure, no additives. A regular brand cigarette contain about 10% additives (mainly sugars but also a lot of chemicals no one has ever heard of).

And since mapacho is so strong you can get the effects without even inhaling the smoke, which is healthier for the lungs.

Mapachos are used to clean out bad energies and keep bad spirits away.

Here's a Scott Alexander post that looks at the link between nicotine and Schizophrenia. The research seems to indicate the nicotine reduces the incidence of schizophrenia, rather than smoking triggering schizophrenia. Smokers are less likely to develop schizophrenia, and mentally ill people probably end up smoking because it helps their symptoms

https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/01/11/schizophrenia-no-smoki...

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