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Comment by bowsamic | Hacker News Reader

Even if this is supposed to be a joke, I don't get the connection between physics and drugs that the joke implies

There's a few instances in science where ideas were borne after the researcher took drugs. A good example is PCR assay.

> Mullis has credited his use of LSD as integral to his development of PCR: "Would I have invented PCR if I hadn't taken LSD? I seriously doubt it. I could sit on a DNA molecule and watch the polymers go by. I learnt that partly on psychedelic drugs."[86]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymerase_chain_reaction#Hi...

Many more ideas in science have been discovered sober than on drugs. In fact I would probably say it's one of the disciplines with the least drug use in my own experience. That's why I'm confused about what the connection is. I'm a physicist and I know very few colleagues who take drugs.

EDIT: honestly, looking at the user's other comment doesn't fill me with confidence https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36756514

The point is that some ideas may never be discovered without the use of mind expanding drugs, and some notable discoveries in physics have come from the use of mind expanding drugs, and possibly more than in other disciplines, so there is a notable link, if even in jest, between physicists and mind expanding drug use.

Yes but you can say this about literally any idea in any field ever. Surely arts and music have a much stronger connection with drugs than physics? In fact, we are on Hacker News, so surely software development has a far stronger connection. I'm just failing to see how physics is in any way especially connected to drugs compared to pretty much any other human activity. In fact, it seems almost the bottom of the list to me

> Yes but you can say this about literally any idea in any field ever.

Great! That's why it's fun to say.

I do find the prospect of scientists using a bit more amusing than the average employee, however, as the public expects them to be holy.

In mathematics, there is a certain prestige in having a low Erdős number. Paul Erdős was famous for his (ab)use of amphetamines. The role which stimulants played in the sheer volume of papers he published over his life is up for debate.

"You shouldn't have mentioned the stuff about Benzedrine. It's not that you got it wrong. It's just that I don't want kids who are thinking about going into mathematics to think that they have to take drugs to succeed."

-Paul Erdős responding to the author of a 1987 Atlantic Monthly article profiling his work (as well as his use of benzedrine).

I don't know, man. The last time they tested my IQ, they wanted me to come back and take the test again, because I was "out of bounds" for the test they gave me. My parents refused, because none of us cared enough to spend another $800.

And I took a _lot_ of shrooms.

Unfortunately, I majored in Philosophy. So, I'll never find the right answer to life's great mysteries. I did get fairly good at pointing out the wrong ones, though.

IQ is totally irrelevant to this discussion

I agree 100%. I should have mentioned this in. My first post.

While I'm open to the idea that breakthroughs can come from unorthodox places, I don't think that Mullis is the best example. My highschool biology teacher had some negative opinions about the guy and claimed that it was an open secret that you do not invite him to speak at events, noble price not withstanding.

So, I looked him up. If anything my biology teacher was being polite.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kary_Mullis#Views_on_HIV/AIDS_...

https://alumni.berkeley.edu/california-magazine/winter-2019/...

EDIT: My opinion is that this is a case of a broken clock being right twice a day. The second article talks about his PCR breakthrough. It sounds like he was clever and lucky. But based on what else he seemed to have believed, I really don't think we should take his word on the LSD being the key.

I agree he's a terrible person but it is a good example of where drugs helped in discovery. The key point IMO is that he may not have discovered or invented PCR without drugs. But PCR would have been invented one way or another.

On a separate note, I find your main argument not at all helpful to the current thread. Terrible people can create and do amazing things. But it's still an a good example.

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