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Comment by bilekas | Hacker News Reader

> Unfortunately people perform better when they have nicotine.

This is the first time I've ever heard someone bring this argument. Ignoring the health risks involved with nicotine, the 'performance boost' is negligible. It's less than caffeine.

> but we are way too quick to dismiss the possibility that nicotine itself may have been a civilization booster.

There are nicotine gums and patches available, and a very good reason you don't see people who don't smoke using them, because the idea of using nicotine as a performance enhancer is crazy.

A silly question, but why not just distribute cocaine or Adderall without prescription if you're concerned about performance? Where do you draw the line ?

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It’s that crazy… I’m a masters degree student who has used nicotine in the form of low-dose patches and oral pouches as a cognitive enhancer for many years. Never felt compelled to use nicotine outside of focused work at the library and I also maintain a high level of cardiovascular fitness.

That's really interesting actually, I've never heard of this. What gave you the idea of using nicotine in the first place ? Do you also use caffeine etc ?

> [...] because the idea of using nicotine as a performance enhancer is crazy.

It's not [0]

[0] https://gwern.net/nootropic/nootropics#nicotine

> A silly question, but why not just distribute cocaine or Adderall without prescription if you're concerned about performance? Where do you draw the line ?

In certain parts of society that is what happens, including fun places like the European Parliament.

If you were to test YC applicants for Adderall (illicit or otherwise) I wouldn't be at all surprised if it were over half of them, and if you would be surprised you're naive.

I understand that it's ongoing and I'm by no means naïve, I'm no stranger to Adderall myself but what is being suggested is to have these substances as freely available as nicotine is today. I'm not suggesting to ban nicotine but I don't think it should be considered some kind of measurable performance improvement.

That said, I really don't know, it just doesn't seem right with me but I'm happy to be proven wrong and I see another interesting comment of someone who does use patches. So it's interesting, and strange to me.

There was a pretty good NPR piece some time back by a reporter who was quitting smoking. The reporter went on a pretty deep dive of this popular quitting-smoking self-help company that was based on some dude’s book, the gist of which was that everything about nicotine making you feel good and perform better is bullshit and the trouble with is entirely a mindset thing, and an irrational craving for something that only makes you feel worse, in fact.

The piece entertains this and struggles with it for a while, before turning to experts on the biochemistry of nicotine.

TL;DR: “omg, lol, of course it makes you feel awesome and enhances performance on mental tasks in particular, here’s a list of the exact ways it affects your body to 100% for-sure do those things, that’s part of why it’s so incredibly difficult to quit for many people”

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