Coffee helped the Union in the Civil War | Hacker News Reader

Coffee helped the Union in the Civil War

smithsonianmag.com

178 pointsbookofjoe193 comments

When I was in high school, I always had major anxiety issues. I realized later in life that it was my excessive amount of caffeine I was ingesting on a daily basis.

I mostly cut all forms of caffeine completely out of my diet since January. As as long as I get 6 hours of sleep or more, I find that I can focus better, I have energy throughout the whole day, and the sleep I do get feels like I'm more rested.

Even if I got the same hours of sleep every night, I had a hard time getting up in the morning with caffeine in my daily diet.

Get ready for some mood swings and anger issues, unless you still drink tea or other caffeine sources.

nobody cold quit caffeine after drinking if since highschool.

my first attempt lasted 3mo, the second one 6mo. every I've settled in coffee only in the early morning. ... worst part is the headaches when your addicted brain crave it.

> nobody cold quit caffeine after drinking if since highschool.

That's your experience, not a fact.

I cold quit last year after drinking energy drinks since college (right before I quit I was multiple redeyes a day). Yes there are withdrawal symptoms but, through force of will, it is doable.

This narrative is seen way too often. “Here is how a drug affected me so get ready for it to affect you the same way.” Gets really tiring if you browse drug forums.

A physician told me that, while caffeine abstinence effects are real, they go away fast relative to other addictive substances.

"Fast" in my case turned out to be 2-4 days for the main physical symptoms such as headaches.

So yeah, not a very long time as these things go.

Yep, I could only cold-quit cigarettes. Soft-quitting never worked for me. Had to hard-stop and never take one again. Every time I felt the craving - 5 pushups!

Doing "Hard No" is easier for some people than "Do Less".

Many people successfully reduce or eliminate their caffeine intake with the right strategies and mindset.

It so hard for me to give up caffeine completely

One data point. In my 30s, quitting coffee led quite quickly to nasty headaches. Retrying in my 60s, no such headaches.

> quitting coffee led quite quickly to nasty headaches

That's caffeine withdrawal. That goes away after awhile, but it depends on how heavy an addict you were.

It is a very compelling article and nice to read about the Liberian farmer entreprenuer, but the South also had tea, tobacco, and yaupon (black drink) which are all stimulants.

As the article states, it wasn't just stimulant qualities, it was also for morale. Imagine having no choice but to drink tea after decades of very rapid cultural absorption of coffee by every person.

Wouldn't the lack of tobacco have similar effects on Union soldiers' morale?

I'm curious now.

The Union had some tobacco production -- 50 million pounds compared to 225 for the Confederacy. Was that enough for morale?

Also, it looks like cigarettes weren't popular until after the Civil War. What would the morale hit be like for Civil War era pipe/cigar smokers running short, versus the meltdowns experienced by cigarette smokers?

Indeed, I live in Wisconsin, and we were a tobacco growing state at one time. You still see old tobacco drying barns here and there. The folklore is that we grew the cheap stuff that was mixed with the nice stuff from further south, but during war time, it might have been a different set of priorities.

Actually, I wonder how much of the tobacco crop was for domestic consumption anyway -- it looks like 40 million pounds was going to the UK per year; that implies that a good portion of the 225 million pounds the South produced wasn't being withheld from the North.

So I'm guessing the North had plenty of tobacco for domestic consumption.

Mass market factory produced cigarettes came later in America. They were first mass produced in France around 1845, a guy in Mexico made first rolling machine. Here they were first sold for factory workers to have a quick smoke during breaks. Before that was cigars and more commonly pipes. There may have been hand rolled ones but the explosion of use happened after their manufacture was consolidated and mechanized. Also when they got taxed and had to carry tax markings. Cigars were hand rolled in dirty conditions until in NYC the industry was consolidated in the name of public health (big business grab).

https://www.historyextra.com/period/modern/a-brief-history-o... When were cigarettes first mass-produced? In 1881, James Bonsack invented a machine that could produce 120,000 cigarettes a day. He joined forces with Washington Duke’s son and in their first year they produced 10 million cigarettes – more than they could sell.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cigarette

For a short while but surely reduced access to smoking would improve performance in the medium term? Both are obviously possibilities and it would be good to know if anyone had an answer.

You can smoke all day and be stimulated around the clock. Try drinking coffee all day every 30 minutes and you’d be bent over on the latreen after your tenth cup by noon.

"You can smoke all day and be stimulated around the clock."

.. and find out that you have trouble breathing after minimal exertion. I gave up fags after 30 odd years (20 or so a day), six years ago.

I could drink coffee every 30 mins and no I won't be hitting the bog. I can quite happily drink "really shite" coffee - that awful desiccated stuff, but I go for 1/2 teaspoon of it and no milk.

I start my day off with decent coffee at home and at weekends (bean to cup) - that's 85% Aribica and 15% Robusta, for me. Thank you Genoa! We gave you cricket and football, you gave us coffee as the good Lord intended it.

Yes, but the union soldiers could not have been smoking for 30 years, because they were on average 25 years old. You probably won't notice a major effect until you've been smoking for decades.

It's not that simple and sadly: "probably" doesn't always work out the way you want it to. For every Dot Cotton puffing away into her 90s, there is someone who dies in their 20s.

Fairly recently: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-56801794 yes, the girl suffered from diagnosed severe asthma. The Coroner gave air pollution as the cause of death. Who knows what would have happened if she was a smoker, but I think we can make an educated guess.

My mum suffered from severe asthma (and hay fever) - enough to have to go to hospital on many occasions. However she never lived in an environment like that girl nor did she really smoke. Oh apart from three years in London and that was back when lead was in petrol. Hmmm.

Anecdotes are not data but I do recommend you avoid fags. Relying on the usual "my gran smoked woodbines until she was 105 and tripped over her old man" is not a particularly clever life choice.

With hindsight I bothered to notice loads of effects that I had glossed over for years.

On average, you are still not going to see the effects of smoking for many years to decades. You might get some exceptions but almost all cases it will take many years of pretty heavy smoking.

I smoked. In the end the best way to stop for me was to take up cycling because I found them fundamentally incompatible. My chest didn’t like it. This was in my 20’s and I was riding 2-6 hours a day.

Endorphins from exercise is a pretty good alternative for smoking.

Interestingly enough, some (not most) of the faster runners when I was in the US Army were heavy smokers.

A couple good cigs used to make me crap when I smoked. A coffee and a smoke was a sure fire thing, we used to have ashtrays by the toilet. I know this sounds gross and younger folks wouldn’t understand but … it was gosh darn amazing . = a great time

I think depends on how much physical exertion the soldiers needed in that day. Athletes don’t smoke (in general). Soldiers who need to march and fight with no vehicles might well be better off not smoking, when the going gets really tough.

I’m open to morale being more important, but doubt it’ll be settled from our rando internet person opinions. If someone has historical info that would be more useful. Maybe recent special ops people have a good view, as they are right on the edge of human performance under life and death pressure, and might well smoke.

Sounds like a way to rile up a bunch of angry troops.

"Hey fellas, if you want your cigarettes, you just gotta get through those guys over there - they have tons of tobacco."

But is the evidence sufficient to refute the null hypothesis, that coffee had no effect on the American civil war? Since the 19th century is behind us, randomized controlled trials is of course impossible, but there may be other evidence. Did Union regiments low on coffee supply fight worse than those with enough coffee?

Afaik, while coffee has been drunk for thousands of years, there is zero evidence of long-term cognitive benefits of coffee.

Idk about cognitive benefits (seems hard enough to measure that it doesn't even matter), but physiological benefits are well-documented.

I don't understand what this has to do with the topic at hand, though. Presumably coffee was used as a mild stimulant and a large morale booster, not some nootropic bullshit

Caffeine is a very interesting drug that makes capitalism and just daily work bearable. It's interesting that this went all the way to 1800s for the US.

After reading Your Mind on Plants [1], I decided to do an experiment, and stop any caffeine intake for ~3 months. After ~1 month, I felt "normal". Only when you cannot rely on a drug, a clutch, you realize how many pressures you face every day. One might have a deadline, something doesn't work, some part of work is boring... Maybe you just slept badly. Coffee fixes all of those.

Nothing is free though, and soon, you'll discover your sleep is not the best pretty much every day of the week. That, in turn, forces you to consume more caffeine, and thus the addiction cycle begins.

Interestingly, after being 3 months caffeine free, I succumbed to the pressure and started drinking some amount of caffeine again (work needs to be done, caffeine makes it easier to concentrate -> it's really difficult to say no).

I would encourage everyone to examine their relationship with this particular drug. It's insane to me that the population in 1800s was already so addicted to the drug that the lack "plugs" threaten to lose the civil war.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/This-Your-Plants-Michael-Pollan/dp/05...

I went on a similar caffeine experimentation journey, and eventually settled on one (1) cup of coffee in the morning, followed by usually plain water for the rest of the day. I appreciate the boost to "get a task started" willpower that the caffeine provides, and by limiting my intake, it's mostly flushed out of my system by the time I'm ready to sleep. For my body, this balance seems to work well: I sleep deeply, dream vividly, and am occasionally woken by nightmares. (always wasps.) Usual stuff.

Ideally I'd avoid caffeine entirely, but when I tried to sustain this (for over a year) I felt lethargic and fatigued more often than not. From a willpower perspective, it was far too easy to go, "I'm too tired to start this task right now, I'll put it off." Some of that is mental, I realize, but the quick fix won. I have stuff to do and I don't want to spend months in misery trying to force a major lifestyle change when the coffee is right there.

What I *cannot* do anymore is drink caffeine (in any form) all day long, like I used to when I was younger. I have no idea how I slept at all. I'm partly convinced I mostly did not, and in hindsight it explains a lot of weird sleep consistency issues I was constantly struggling with.

Same journey for me, sadly I don't think drinking coffee consistently is the perfect answer. No matter what amount I drink it either becomes too little (because I adapt) or too much (Far worse sleep, somewhat depressive, can't work out or jog anymore because of heart fluttering, only truly feel good for ~4-5h per day, then worse all day). I think the only theoretical way to consistently get value out of coffee is to drink it during the work week and then force myself to withdraw on the weekend so my body always has a fresh response to it. The reason why I don't like this either is because I obviously lose two entire days of my life to feeling pretty bad per week and you still eventually start drinking more because it's inevitable. Now what I remember seeing over the years is that whenever somebody would mention that they don't drink coffee and that person is still a high performer then they always seemed to be really into fitness and sports. Maybe this is the only way, using physical exercise as a stimulant instead of coffee.

Caffeine is great for working out. I have a coffee before running or lifting weights. It's also usually included into lots fitness oriented supplements.

If you feel tired and lethargic without coffee than to me that is a bigger problem to solve. I find the view on coffee here so strange. If I don't drink coffee I still get up and go for a run, I can still do everything just the same. My performance at work is the same. I drink it because I enjoy the taste and that's where it ends.

> I drink it because I enjoy the taste and that's where it ends.

Coffee is a very bitter drink. I don't know you of course, but my guess is that what you like more is the dopamine caffeine releases in your brain, which you've now associated with the taste. You can try and experiment with good decaf coffee to see if it is actually the taste that you like.

A strange sentiment. Do you think in general people can’t like ‘bitter’ flavors?

Bitterness is very loosely defined in general - we know what ‘sweet’ and ‘salt’ are; bitterness is sometimes associated with some sort of acidity, but a lot of people seem to just describe things that have strong flavor but lack sweetness as ‘bitter’. Lemon, chocolate, kale, and red wine are all sometimes described as ‘bitter’ and they have virtually no common flavor compounds.

It’s definitely possible to like the taste of coffee. My evidence for this is that when I drink coffee that tastes bad, I don’t like it as much.

Acidity causes things to taste sour, not bitter. Bitterness is associated with alkaloids (many alkaloids are poisonous, so the fact we have taste-buds for bitterness is an advantage).

I experience lemons as both sweet and sour, but certainly not bitter.

[Edit] Perhaps the peel is bitter; the white pulp is certainly bitter.

Some acids are bitter, e.g. in hops https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00253-021-11329-4 and in bile https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-023-04971-3.

If you like coffee, dark chocolate, grapefruit, kale, arugula, etc., you might just love bitter flavors.

Many people cut their coffee with milk and sugar to complement the bitterness. But then they typically enjoy the resulting flavor, too.

I've known plenty of people who loved caffeine but not coffee. They drink soft drinks or take caffeine pills.

Believe people when they say they like the flavor of coffee.

I drink decaf in the afternoon. Otherwise I'll have an Americano with a little bit of milk at least twice a day. I'll happily drink espresso and filter coffee though.

Personally I don't find well made coffee bitter at all.

Coffee isn't inherently bitter, but overextracted coffee is bitter. If you ever have the chance to try a well-extracted specialty drip coffee I encourage you to try it, it's quite an eye-opening experience as to what black coffee can taste like!

Twenty or thirty years ago (the time flies!) the Starbucks closest to me in downtown Seattle obtained a very limited amount of Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee. They sold beans and brewed it for day or two before running out. It was the smoothest, most flavorful coffee I've ever had.

Coffee isn’t all that bitter if it’s a decent cup of coffee. I love coffee but mostly drink decaf and also like 90+% dark chocolate. What makes you think people don’t like bitter things?

A lot of people such as Mormons manage to bear capitalism just fine without caffeine. I like to have a little coffee most days but let's not exaggerate it's necessity.

Underrated comment.

Perhaps Mormons have in their belief system a strong motivating stimulant? I am trying to avoid use of the word drug here as it is pejorative. Perhaps, Coffee is just what we need to overcome the ennui and pointless of modern existence and a set of religious (or cultural) beliefs helps us do the same.

This would also imply that Caffeine consumption is lower in societies that are religious and have strong belief systems - religious or cultural, which can be tested!

I agree with Razib Khan, who calls organized religion a form of “social technology.”

I’d venture that Mormons (and SDAs, with which I’m more familiar) have more close knit (Caucasian) communities for generations that support each other and have elevated their collective socioeconomic status. So perhaps they’re less likely to be bottom-level corporate drones, code moneys or Amazon warehouse workers.

Existence is no more pointless in the modern (or postmodern) era than at any previous time. Some people need to get over themselves with this "ennui" nonsense.

Marx wrote this just prior to the Civil War. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

Really ironic thing to say about the Civil War, which was to a great degree a holy war: https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/05/21/how-abraha...

The Republican coalition of religious conservatives and business has its origins in the Civil War, where northern industry joined forces with fundamentalist Christians who opposed slavery. A quarter of all union soldiers were immigrants, mostly poor German immigrants. Iowa sent more volunteers (per capita) to fight for the union than any other state. What motivated all those people to fight and die in a war between British people? They had no personal stake in the war—they didn’t have industry powered by southern resources like cotton, nor were any battles fought anywhere near their homes. For them, fighting for the union was about vindicating a religious opposition to slavery.

It was the confederates that portrayed themselves as being on the side of “science” against religious “zealots.” https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/cornersto.... To make sense of that, put yourself in 1861. That was more than a century before we had the technology to determine that humans are genetically all the same. If you were someone who looked at the world—what people had built in Africa and what they had built in Europe—and said “these people are all the same,” that was a statement of faith.

> That was more than a century before we had the technology to determine that humans are genetically all the same.

What a comically false thing to say.

Did we have the technology in the mid 1800s to understand that humans were all the same? Imagine you came from London to Virginia in 1700 and saw American Indians living as hunter gatherers. What empirical basis would you have to say they were the same as Europeans?

The only humans who are "genetically all the same" are pairs of identical twins.

In addition to what the other commenter said, the Indians in 1700 Virginia weren't hunter-gatherers. They had farms, money, laws, and government. To the extent that the colonizing English didn't think of them as "the same," well, they felt the same way about the Irish, who are also European.

I mean, to the extent you can have “laws” and “government” without written language, maybe you could say that. The English, meanwhile, had steam engines, buildings nearly 500 feet tall, guns, cities with half a million people, street lighting, and indoor plumbing.

You can have those things without written language; they weren't hunter-gatherers. I don't know what building you're talking about, but as far as I know the Brits didn't have any building nearly that tall in 1700. The Brits didn't have a steam engine in 1700. The Brits recognized, in 1700, that the Indians were people just as much as themselves. This argument of yours projects onto the past an opinion that nobody actually held.

> as far as I know the Brits didn't have any building nearly that tall in 1700

I assume that reference was to Lincoln Cathedral, the tallest spire of which is indeed 520 feet tall.

> This argument of yours projects onto the past an opinion that nobody actually held.

Agreed.

The modern Republican Party has a large contingent of rebadged Dixiecrats.

As for Iowa, there had never been slavery in what we think of as the Midwest--north of the Ohio River and of Missouri. However, the Dred Scott decision put it into question whether the states could maintain that status. I imagine that to have been a motivator for Midwesterners who did not wish to compete with slave labor.

Really ironic thing to say about religion given how deeply Christian Marxism is (or how Marxist Christianity, specifically, is). We're all equal ~~under God~~, sharing is caring, a camel can go through the eye of a needle more easily than a rich man can ~~get into Heaven~~ stay out of a gulag... :D

It is a common misconception that Mormons are not allowed to consume caffeine, the limitation is actually on "hot drinks," which is interpreted as having meant tea and coffee specifically in the time it was written down. They still drink soda and other heated drinks such as wassel, hot chocolate, and postum (a morning coffee substitute most folks find absolutely disgusting).

(we live near a de facto Mormon college and pester our neighbors, who are largely Mormon professors, about such things)

all the mormons I know are tee-totalers and drink only water or uncaffeinated drinks.

Most of them seem to drink soda here; in fact, we have a Mormon-owned soda shop in town that a lot of the school-age Mormon kids seem to hang out at! I've been told it's often a regional thing, that they're less "Mormon-y" (their term, not mine) if there's a community of them in the area. I suppose it's probably like any other group, and they feel less like outsiders.

Kinda interesting being somewhat immersed in what's effectively a conservative subculture that's supposed to not shun folks who aren't part of it. We have some weird conversations.

Swig, right? We had one of those open here and the line was ridiculous for months. Not my jam, but always blocking access to my coffee shop.

This one's called Straws.

Didn't know wassel was big with the Mormons. Wassel is delicious! Denton, TX has a wassel fest every year; that's how I got introduced to it.

Seems to be, at least with some of the families around here! A bunch of them also get together and do caroling around the holidays, so maybe it's related to that?

My understanding is that it changed in 2012 - the church released a statement then saying that the prohibition only applied to coffee and tea. Before that, it was ambiguous but customarily interpreted to apply to all caffeinated drinks.

As a (anec?)data point, I had a Mormon friend growing up and they drank caffeine-free Coke for this reason.

It seems many things have officially changed-but-always-been-that-way :P Everyone's got old-timey atlas prints of central America instead of upstate NY now.

My Mormon friend in college was an avid consumer of Monster Zero.

I was 100% caffeine free for a year and a half while keeping a demanding full time job. That eventually ended when COVID lockdowns started (it's unclear even to me what the relationship between the two was; maybe my subconscious used it as an inspector excuse to go back)

Caffeine doesn't seem to affect my sleep until I get to absurd amounts like 10 cups in a day, which some times it does happen.

Currently I love the drug and intend to keep using it.

I think this is really understated. After developing a facial twitch and realizing I was consuming more than 1000 mg of caffeine a day, I switched to decaf once the particular project was over. No one told me it's physically addictive and has withdrawal symptoms! It's the only thing that would keep me functional and able to drive on with a project though.

My wife and I switched to decaf about 6 months ago and we are pretty happy with it. Generally sleeping better and I can have 2-3 cups throughout my morning without going off the rails.

Oh I can drink a quart or two of regular coffee and still sleep like a rock, not get the jitters, etc. Pretty much my mom's entire side of the family is like that. Switching to decaf got rid of the facial twitch, but even after two months (in between projects) I was basically completely ineffective at even personal projects. I told the doctor about it and it's apparently likely I have adult ADHD.

When I just want to feel the pleasant aroma of coffee at night, I drink decaf

Our local coffee roaster stocks decaf of their most popular roasts/blends, and they taste pretty much exactly the same, which is great!

Yeah I used to just drink coffee or energy drinks all day. Now I'm sticking to one in the morning and a less caffeinated drink in the afternoon and my days are going a lot better.

Why do you go from extremely high intake to decaf, or do you mean to not go back to using caffeine for your next project? For me a 200mg tablet in the morning works well, more doesn't give me more benefits and by bedtime a lot or most has gone.

I had no idea there was withdrawal, and I have no psychological addiction to it, so I just switched to decaf not thinking anything of it, other than that I'd probably be more tired for a while.

> It's the only thing that would keep me functional and able to drive on with a project though.

Don't you think that part of this could be stress? Also potentially dehydration. I have had eye twitches a couple times during long road trips where I drank Red Bull or Monster to keep focused, and was not drinking enough water. But I have never had twitching from caffeine under normal circumstances, since I usually drink 2 parts water for every part caffeinated drink (lots of bathroom breaks).

Probably not, I drink a lot of water, especially during hot weather -- I walk to work and back twice a day no matter the weather.

For what it's worth, I've found that muscular twitches are always a symptom of magnesium deficiency, which caffeine does exacerbate.

Since I adore coffee and don't intend to stop drinking it, I supplement with magnesium drops in the water I drink large amounts of all day. This has completely prevented tics and twitches, and greatly reduces jaw tension as well.

I did this too. After I got through the withdrawal, I basically found myself sitting at my desk and waiting to die.

Like, cause of tiredness, or not being able to focus, or sheer boredom? Which one, or something else?

Nothing seemed very important. I had no motivation to work on anything. I was also in grad school at the time, which certainly contributed.

I stopped caffeine. It sucked for a week, and I’d taken a week off because I knew it would be hell. And it was.

But after a week I felt free.

I barely consume caffeine anymore, like if I’m with friends at a cafe or something. Otherwise I don’t make tea or coffee at home unless I have guests who want some.

Some results I’ve noticed is that I literally don’t give a shit anymore about any pressures. I’ll just #dealwithit and it’s fine.

I also sleep way better and I am able to utilize the full waking day (I wake up at 6am and I sleep at 10pm).

One thing that’s strange is that it seems caffeine no longer has much effect like it used to in the rare occasion I’ll have a coffee. I’m able to sleep just fine and I feel no burst of energy or anything. Just a warm drink so maybe it warms me up a bit when it’s cool.

Idk. 10/10 would recommend quitting caffeine. My mind is way clearer (no brain fog from being groggy) and it runs like a diesel engine just pulls like a mfer all day.

Great analogy being like a diesel engine, keep it up

I did the same back in December...while I was undergoing sleep compression during my CBT for insomnia treatment. Withdrawal on hard mode!

What motivated me to do so was trying a single origin decaf that my local roaster had available and realizing that, yes, decaf coffee can taste like regular coffee! I literally decided to stop drinking caffeinated coffee after that first cup.

Things were rough for about a month but all good after that.

The nice thing about drinking decaf every day is that caffeine _really_ works when I do choose to use it. Super helpful while driving long distances.

> The nice thing about drinking decaf every day is that caffeine _really_ works when I do choose to use it.

And how.

Decaffeinated coffee’s main problem isn’t that it tastes bad, it’s that it goes stale incredibly quickly.

You’ll have to consume a steady amount of coffee each day if you want to finish your supply on time. Or purchase only small amounts.

I thought the main problem was that it's made with the same chemicals used to do dry cleaning.

That's one way of making it, but it's by no means the only way. Also, the reason why it tastes bad isn't because it's "same chemicals used to do dry cleaning", it's that the decaffination process changes the physical structure of the beans, making it easier to stale.

source for both claims: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYTSdlOdkn0&, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IszQ2JR3Olc

For me it’s not that clear cut. Caffeine is a motivating booster each day but if I stick to my rhythm, one in the morning and one at lunch, then it doesn’t affect my sleep at all. It’s only when I’m pressured to go beyond that I suffer

> For me it’s not that clear cut. Caffeine is a motivating booster each day but if I stick to my rhythm, one in the morning and one at lunch, then it doesn’t affect my sleep at all.

Same with me.

> It’s only when I’m pressured to go beyond that I suffer

What I discovered was that If I gradually increase my consumption, then it doesn't cause any issues. There was a point where I'd drink my 4 or 5th cup of coffee very close to bed time and still get a good night of sleep. But the key was to gradually build up to that point.

I drink 2 or 3 cups now (mainly because I can no longer consume coffee after large meals, and OMAD at night is no longer sustainable).

Exactly my experience. I have a big cup of cold brew in the morning and nothing the rest of the day. When my head hits the pillow at night I’m out and sleep without any interruption.

There was a point a long time ago where I wasn’t under control, and in an effort to rein it in I quit for two months. It was awful. I struggled to concentrate and felt no real benefit from being “clean”.

I decided to set limits and started up again. That blast of caffeine in the morning is all it takes to set my brain on the right path the rest of the day. My theory is that people who end up struggling with caffeine, do so because they equate more caffeine with being even more productive. If you treat it like you would a (enjoyable) medicine, you can have the best of all worlds.

I did the same, but then transitioned to 10 mins of vigorous exercise instead in the morning. I found that getting my heart rate up was a better stimulus

10 minutes of rowing is an excellent replacement for coffee for me, having quit coffee due to hypertension.

Yeah, I do love me some coffee, but it's amazing what just a couple push-ups will do. All of a sudden you have blood flow in the upper part of your body and you just feel "ready to go".

James Bond spent 5 minutes under a needle-sharp cold water shower before breakfast.

Pavel Durov (Telegram's CEO) does something similar but in a bathtub filled with 0 degrees water with ice added in it too.

Since it has now become fashionable to give up on coffee, it would be refreshing to hear anecdotes from "the other side" as well -- people who drink plenty of coffee, throughout the day, but do not suffer from significant negative side-effects (i.e., they continue to get good sleep, have low stress, etc.)

People want to find the secret to living with joy in their lives. Someone who “quits caffeine” has enough mindfulness to have noticed something wasn’t quite right in their life and they had the courage to try and change it. That mindset right there is the key to reducing stress. It’s not caffeine (unless you’re consuming a lot), it’s a perspective and framing thing. Daily coffee ritual can absolutely be a part of a routine that has been having negative affects on your state of mind, but it’s much more complex than “caffeine is a drug and it’s bad for you”.

I don't consider I drink _"plenty"_ of coffee throughout the day but I can't remember the last day I went without some form of caffeine. On average I take 1 cup in the morning with some milk and sometimes mate or black tea, both of which have caffeine as well, in the afternoon... plus Coke or other caffeinated drinks as well here and there.

Ok maybe it could be plenty for some people, but for me 4 cups a day would be plenty lol.

Maybe caffeine doesn't affect me much to this point and that's why I don't have any problem sleeping. I doze off 10' after putting my head on the pillow.

Now regarding stress... comparing myself to the people around me I'd say I have normal levels of it. But most of those people consume caffeine daily so it's hard to have an objective measure.

I'd like to carry out the experiment of going 15 days without caffeine to see if stress decreases though but it would be very hard considering how ingrained the substance is in our lives, even the social aspect. Mate for example is a drink which we usually share here in Argentina. You could maybe call it a ritual and a way of social bonding. And I like how it tastes too, of course. Add that to all the times you meet with people "for a coffee and chat", for example.

I drink around 3 or 4 cups (around 50 oz total) per day 7 days a week and I sleep well enough. I try to avoid drinking it after 7pm though. I don't drink alcohol more than a couple times per month, if that much.

If I skip a couple cups I will get a headache, it's very predictable.

this is me, I drink about a pot per day and sometimes drink caffeinated soda with food. only a small amount of half and half in the coffee. my sleep schedule is pretty routine, hardly ever stay up past 11:30 and wake up naturally with no alarm between 6:30 and 8 every morning.

it is noticeable if i don’t have a cup at least at some point during the day but there are plenty of days i don’t have as much or hardly at all. but i just like the warmth and how it tastes, the caffeine is a non factor if i decide to have a cup or not.

other things that are probably significant factors: low stress job at a small private company where i don’t really have hard deadlines or deliverables and WFH as much as i want; wife and pets but no kids; low stress otherwise is areas of my life

I don't know if it's a lot, but I drink 3 cups a day, with the last one usually around 6pm, and I don't have any trouble going to sleep around 10-11pm, usually fall asleep the second I put my head down(but then I never had any issues going to sleep).

Going to sleep is the easy part. The quality of your sleep is the thing :) The biggest problem is that you don't know how good/bad your sleep is, unless you make some changes to your lifestyle (e.g. starting or stopping with coffee).

I’ve quit caffeine for 3-4 months. Aside from a rough few days from quitting cold-turkey, there was zero discernible difference in my day to day life. I enjoy black coffee, and the drawbacks, compared to say, soda or alcohol consumption are minimal, so I started drinking it again because I missed it. And most decaf is too gross to drink black so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I don't drink a lot of the stuff, but I haven't quit.

I used to drink about a litre of brewed coffee a day, starting at 7AM and going on until 5PM. Eventually that fell away, without any decision on my part, and I now drink one mug a day (1/2 imperial pint), after getting up.

It doesn't seem to power me up or make me more alert; I think it actually makes me dozy, 2-3 hours after my morning joe. That is, I think I only notice the crash.

The parent comment's experience does not reflect my relationship with coffee at all.

I was diagnosed with ADHD as a kid, never medicated for it. Just regulated with diet and exercise, also probably self-medicated with caffeine and nicotine in college. Quit nicotine because of the very obvious health problems that come with it, I found it very easy to quit interestingly enough (thank God I quit before the Zyndemic).

But I have never felt that coffee comes with any negative side effects for me other than anxiety. It doesn't affect my sleep unless I drink it past 5 PM, and I've never felt like it "wakes me up", it just lets me enter a hyperfocus state a lot more easily. Other people describe their relationship with coffee that they wake up and feel groggy, so they take coffee to have a baseline. For me it has never been about waking up, it's just something that helps with focus.

I do get the jitters when drinking coffee especially since I eat my first meal very late in the day (12pm), so I switched to mate cocido, which is just mate in tea bags. The effect of even very strongly-brewed mate is far less pronounced than the effect of coffee, and I would even go so far as to say that whatever benefits I think I am getting from mate is probably just placebo.

For reference during college I probably consumed 3-4 cups of coffee a day, then as I started working I would consume 5-6 cups a day, black. Now I stop drinking coffee after I eat at noon, so I am down to 2-3 cups a day.

Also I think that brewing methods matter. Hot-brewed coffee causes less jitters and more focus. Cold-brewed coffee tastes better but it is easy to overshoot what feels like a "therapeutic dose" and actually end up making it harder to focus, as well as more jitters. It might be that I usually have hot coffee black, and I have cold brew with a bit of milk and simple syrup. The sugar or coldness might also make me colder or do something with my blood sugar, not sure.

I have idly wondered if I just don't absorb caffeine very well. Coffee and energy drinks neither pep me up nor keep me awake; I continue to drink them solely because I enjoy them.

The only consistent effect I've observed is that the first cup of the day jump starts things in the digestive department and brings on a trip to the bathroom with some haste, but I've suffered on and off with IBS-like symptoms over the years anyway—even before I started drinking coffee.

In my early and mid-twenties I'd drink 5-6 cups of black coffee a day at work. I noticed no ill effects or really any effects at all—no crashes, no jitters, but also no increased alertness or focus.

I now usually make myself one latte in the morning then an additional one or two black coffees through the day, but I can still drink a coffee right before bed with no noticeable effect on getting to sleep. I don't usually have any coffee at the weekend, because Saturday I take my machine apart for cleaning, and Sunday I'm typically out of the house at the times I would normally make one. If I go away on holiday somewhere I might go a full week without any coffee at all, again with no noticeable effect.

Unfortunately I can't honestly say I have good sleep, because even now (I'm 31) my natural sleep schedule still wants to be something like 3am-11am, but society doesn't tolerate that. I really hoped that would be something I'd grow out of, but I haven't. So I'm pretty much tired all the time whether I drink coffee or I don't.

Your experience sounds a lot like mine. I continue to drink coffee and tea regularly because I enjoy them. They don't keep me awake at all. They do sort of help rouse me from morning grogginess, but I wake up groggy whether or not I drink any caffeine because of digestive and immune issues. FWIW, I've been diagnosed with ADHD (although none of the medications I've tried have been a net benefit) which also makes cannabis an excellent pseudo-stimulant (apparently by slowing down my brain and allowing it to focus).

I drink 4-5 cups a day, although I always stop by noon.

No problems sleeping, and stress seems average for the job lol

I drink a lot of black tea (about 60mg of caffeine per cup) throughout the day. Between 6-8 bags. My last cup is usually around 8pm. I’m soundly asleep by midnight and get a lot of deep and REM sleep (as validated by my Apple Watch). I do have to mention that I don’t get very noticeable effects from caffeine, probably because according to a 23andme test, genetically caffeine doesn’t affect me as intensely as most people. I mostly drink the black tea because I love the taste of fruit flavored, unsweetened black tea.

I can drink a cup at 8 and fall asleep at 10. Sleep a full 8 hours with dreams and wake up refreshed. I can binge it for weeks and stop and not feel anything. The coffee eschewers on the internet seem to posit that people like me can’t exist but here I am, chiming in.

Me too. Coffee has no noticeable effect.

Alcohol is similar; many people seem to equate any level of consumption of — or even interest in — alcohol with alcoholism. I enjoy alcoholic drinks, mainly for the taste, but can’t imagine becoming dependent on it. I think it must be a genetic thing. ‘Giving up’ alcohol for me would be a net decrease in quality of life; for me there’s no temptation to abuse whatsoever.

Similar here. I drink 4-5 cups per day and notice no effect. When I travel, I usually go cold turkey for days and notice no difference. I'm actually a bit envious of people who get the "caffeine high."

I need coffee to catch up with my toddler’s energy. Just kidding.

I drink all black espresso first thing in the morning, with the highest or mid intensity. Drink one in the morning, one in the afternoon, a small amount in the evening. I still sleep very well at night.

Now I am almost 40 and in my country people always ask me why I look so young for my age. I always tell them, it’s just coffee. I don’t consume alcohol or smoke, it’s just caffeine. I’ve been on this caffeine binge since I was in high school.

I drink around a litre of black coffee a day now. It's the other way around for me: I sleep better (i.e. I feel better / less groggy the next morning) if I drink coffee at the evening. Sometimes I even drink coffee at 11pm. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Honestly, I'm not sure if coffee even helps to "stimulate" me at all. It certainly lowers the feeling of stress and helps me keep a clear train of thought, though, even if that may be placebo effect. And it's something else than water to drink.

I only cut back because I was pissing so often that it was distracting. Other than that I have no issues, I fall asleep in the two minutes my partner takes to brush her teeth.

I'm confused by the anti coffee crowd. By all accounts black coffee is a healthy drink with essentially no calories.

> Coffee fixes all of those.

The thing is, it only does for a few days. At least for me. Then the coffee isn't helping at all -- it's just keeping you at the same baseline you previously were at with coffee.

I used to drink coffee all the time at just a constant level. Then I just got tired of feeling "dependent" on something and weaned off over a couple of weeks. Which was fine when you don't do it cold turkey -- just a little less energy each day but easily manageable.

Now I still drink coffee sometimes but I use it as a temporary performance tool. I'll "start up again" on any particular day where I have a ton of meetings, where I didn't get enough sleep, where I have to do a lot of physical stuff, etc. Often this might be several days in a row, where I increase my coffee each day a little more relative to the previous day for the same effect.

But then as soon as the demands stop, I immediately taper off to zero again, usually taking 2-5 days to do so. Not really because I "don't want to be dependent", but because I want to make sure I can get the full effect of coffee again the next time I need it, whether that's in a week or a month or three months.

It's kind of weird that I'm always fully aware of exactly how much I'm "dosing" myself with coffee. I'm almost always either "tapering up", "tapering down", or just off of it completely.

But it's very effective as a tool that way. Way more effective than when I just drank the same amount every day, which I discovered was no different from not drinking any at all (after tapering off).

I stop consuming caffeine 2 days before a holiday and preemptively take acetaminophen for a day to prevent any headaches. Then no caffeine on the holiday. I sleep more, relax more and just generally more chilled. I sometimes try to stay off it a bit after the holiday but that rarely lasts long.

Just a question -- are you entirely sure your acetaminophen pill doesn't also contain caffeine?

Just since that's an extremely common combination, and I wasn't aware of acetaminophen on its own being able to counter the effects of a caffeine-withdrawal headache.

I'm fascinated if this actually works.

From wikipedia:

>Paracetamol relieves pain in both acute mild migraine and episodic tension headache.[21][22]

Is there a reason to believe that it doesn't work for caffeine withdraw induced headaches?

Because a caffeine headache is neither a migraine nor a tension headache.

And according to Wikipedia, paracetamol is mainly only useful for migraines. For tension headaches, you need the combination with caffeine and aspirin as well.

Caffeine constricts blood vessels, which is why it's useful against headaches. And why withdrawal causes headaches, because now you have more blood flowing than you've been used to.

like running a ship aground on the rocks of a riff,coffein provides a few waves that get you further inland before the wreck comes to an halt

I operate a bit like this too, after I noticed a friend requiring a whole pot of coffee to get through the day. In the morning if I'm desiring coffee I ask myself for the justification. Bad sleep on a random weekday is not sufficient. My most preferable time to drink it is after a very good sleep during a focus time block. And of course, it remains potent. I've been drinking coffee for about 5 years now, and my "dose" is still very little: one small cup that I usually don't even finish, and I'm good for the day.

I definitely need harder stimulants than coffee, like ADHD medicines to get by with soul sucking corporate work. Ideally it would be much stronger than ADHD medicine though.

People who smoke a lot of weed call this taking a "T break" (t for tolerance). I do the same (with coffee) if I know a period is coming up where I could use bit of a boost.

> Maybe you just slept badly. Coffee fixes all of those.

It doesn't fix sleeping badly for me anymore, at all. Perhaps it used to when I was younger, but after turning around 45, I increasingly found that the only fix for a poor night's sleep is a good night's sleep.

or perhaps poor nights of sleep just didn't affect me much back then.

> Caffeine is a very interesting drug that makes capitalism and just daily work bearable. It's interesting that this went all the way to 1800s for the US.

Michael Pollan's thesis is absurdly exaggerated. I've been on and off coffee for the past few years and it's not necessary to "make daily work bearable". His link between caffeine and capitalism is just silly.

Laborers in Somalia chew khat Soldiers crave their cigarettes. Office workers need their cup of coffee. You can, of course, say it’s just human nature to enjoy an altered state of consciousness. but when it becomes a habit like that, it’s really hard not to see it as a symptom of the slave mentality. The little window of freedom that you have in your otherwise unfree life.

Makes me think of billboards advertising cigarettes to taxi drivers. Trying to associate the break for a smoke with the feeling of freedom.

Or television commercials for coffee. Suggesting you can have a stressful day, but never run out of energy because you “enjoy the aroma“.

When I feel under pressure and have deadlines coming up, I definitely drink a lot more coffee. I do it because I feel like I cannot afford to take a nap. I pull that lever to make myself function. If my kids did that, I wouldn’t consider it healthy.

Not saying Pollan is right. But I wouldn’t call it a completely absurd point of view either.

> Caffeine is a very interesting drug that makes capitalism and just daily work bearable.

What is it about socialist work that makes it bearable?

Not OP but I think it must be the fear of the gulag.

read a book, internet friend. whatever you're trying to signal went out of fashion in the 50s

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs"

We actually hated that while living under communism. It meant there was never hope for better, no better future on the horizon. All while those judging “your needs” kept the lion share for themselves and their apparatchik friends.

under dictatorship all things are equal

Some are always more equal than others

The more I read anecdotes like this, the more im convinced there is not a homogenous response.

For me, too much caffeine can be a thing. But I can stop coffee fairly consequence free. I stick with it as I do like the taste, but the world moving heavily to arabica coffee may get me to stop. Not at all a fan of it.

To my point, I'm growing convinced we will someday find something like blood types for how it impacts you. Probably closer to the cilantro effect. But, same general ideas. Maybe even closer to catnip for cats?

I don’t think I’ve ever noticed any effect from coffee. And I drink two to three cups a day of quite strong (light roast, so much of the caffeine has been preserved) coffee because I like the taste and enjoy the ritual. If I miss it for a day, I don’t notice anything.

I also suspect ritual makes up far more response for things than folks ack.

I feel like a bit of a fool for not remembering this page has citations: https://www.23andme.com/topics/wellness/caffeine-consumption...

Will try and take a dive on some of those in the coming days.

Why are these threads always full of anti-coffee weirdos?

https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/hsph-in-the-news/is-coffee...

https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2023/02/coffee-ca...

Conversely wouldn’t the south have a near monopoly on nicotine (also a stimulant). I wonder what impact nicotine consumption - if any - had on the war.

the outcome was that tobacco kills, and the surgeon general lee agrees

That was only a national conclusion after the advent of modern cigarettes.

Cigars and pipes are more nuanced and far less harmful (especially because of the chemicals that aren't added, and the fact that you don't inhale)

Both Ulysses S Grant and Grover Cleveland were heavy consumers of cigars. Both ended up with oral cancer.

Hot smoke in general causes cancer. Wood smoke (from fireplace, bonfire, etc.) is more carcinogenic per unit than pure (non-cigarette) tobacco smoke. There's a stronger link between regular wood fireplace use and cancer than there is between moderate pipe/cigar use and cancer.

So moderate (not heavy like Grant) cigar and pipe smoking ought to be regarded as within the realm of acceptable risk, especially given the enjoyment and mental benefits that result.

But if we're going to discuss carcinogens, a lot of other things ought to be considered too. For example, why isn't alcohol, a known carcinogen, considered socially taboo compared to pipe smoking? Why are burning wood fireplaces considered "a nice touch" when the second-hand smoke from them is far more dangerous than that from an outdoor cigar user nearby?

"So moderate cigar and pipe smoking ought to be regarded as within the realm of acceptable risk"

I believe that you have the right to come to this personal conclusion, but I do not think it is true, as a general statement.

(also please be consciousness about where you smoke, other people might not share your enjoyment)

I'm curious - you believe wood fireplace use is an acceptable risk?

> (also please be consciousness about where you smoke, other people might not share your enjoyment)

Totally understood. I don't smoke much (less than once a week)... but when I do, it's almost always at home.

"I'm curious - you believe wood fireplace use is an acceptable risk?"

Personally I believe that the benefits of a wood fireplace and the benefits of moderately smoking tobacco mixed with cannabis outweigh the downsides - for me. But I do not believe my personal choices are the right ones in general.

(also woodfire .. there are quite different types)

I agree with your line on personal conclusions. I think it is fair to come to a personal conclusion on acceptable risk, given the balance between risk and personal enjoyment, but I do not necessarily think that it is equally fair to come to this same conclusion for others.

No, there is no safe amount of cigar consumption.

“Consistent data from all identified cohort and case-control studies indicate a significantly elevated risk for oral and pharyngeal cancer associated with cigar use, with evidence of a dose-dependent relation. Coupled with biologic mechanisms that likely are very similar to those involved in cigarette-related carcinogenesis, the available evidence strongly supports the conclusion that cigar use is a cause of cancer of the oral cavity and pharynx.”

This is one of many negative health effects from cigar consumption, including overall mortality, cardiovascular disease, lung, bladder, and head/neck cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and periodontal disease risk. You can evaluate your own risk, but tobacco consumption seems like there is no “safe” amount of consumption according to broad literature reviews.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK586217/

"Medically safe" and "acceptable risk" are very different terms with different meanings.

The medical establishment also says there's no safe amount of alcohol use, but that doesn't stop people from (rightly, I believe) enjoying a beer or glass of wine every now and then.

The medical establishment's obsession with harm/risk reduction to the extreme is hazardous to human flourishing, in my opinion. We all have to come to terms with our eventual death to make the most of the life we have. I think the medical establishment is more motivated by insurance policy profits than by a desire to promote human flourishing.

Joy and friendship and enjoyment and gratitude (etc.) are far better for our well-being than minimization of harm.

I'm not trying to convince you or anyone else to never smoke cigars. I just think that it is fair to make the point that cigars are not necessarily entirely safe, even if the relative risk for lung cancer is less than for cigarettes. I didn't even necessarily even make this point, as with my previous comment, I simply made two separate statements, and you came to a possibly implied conclusion yourself.

Regardless of the safety of cigars, I fail to see the logic behind how the idea that the relative risk of wood smoke compared to cigar smoke is supposed to convince anyone that cigar smoke should seem safe, considering that wood fires are no longer commonly used to heat homes in the developed world. Indoor smoke from heating and cooking has been well-established as a carcinogenic risk, but people not using wood to heat nor using smoke-point inducing temperatures when cooking, do not regularly expose themselves to these risks.

Also, I never claimed that alcohol did not increase carcinogenic risk. I make no position on that. However, given the proposition that alcohol is a carcinogen, then as cigars use is not mutually exclusive to alcohol use, and as smoking cigars incurs some carcinogenic risk, then for users of cigars and alcohol, cigar use would be an additive risk along with the risk incurred by alcohol use.

> I fail to see the logic behind how the idea that the relative risk of wood smoke compared to cigar smoke is supposed to convince anyone that cigar smoke should seem safe

It's not so much a logical argument as an emotional one (though it is a true statement). So much of the public opposition to tobacco is emotional, not logical. So that's where at least some of the discussion needs to happen. Sometimes the best way to put something in the proper perspective is to make a comparison to a more familiar thing.

I grew up believing tobacco use was one of the worst possible sins against God, and that lighting wood in the fireplace was a relaxing, enjoyable thing to do. So at least for me, the argument was helpful to put things into perspective.

Ulysses Grant was pretty much a machine that consumed cigars and emitted union victories.

Whiskey was also one of the inputs.

He didn’t drink much while in charge of troops engaged in battle, then he’d go on massive binges where he got silly drunk. So, sort of?

Fun article! Particularly enjoyed the anecdotal evidence from individual soldier's writing.

Studying the civil war is really interesting and I wish schools did a better job of it. There is so much material from letters people wrote at the time that is just fascinating to read.

Reminds me of a recent story of how speed kept the germans advancing for days on end in WWII, in the blitzkrieg.

"How Methamphetamine Became a Key Part of Nazi Military Strategy" https://time.com/5752114/nazi-military-drugs/

Still in use by the US Air Force. Although it's amphetamine / modafinil instead of meth. I'm always curious if they train while medicated, which seems kind of necessary considering how it modifies decision making behavior.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_and_no-go_pills

Edit: Actually looks like amphetamine isn’t approved anymore.

Modafinil doesn't really affect decision making ? Being exhausted is probably way bigger impact, even under Modafinil.

Well, per [1], it increases dopamine, norepinephrine, serotonin, and other chemicals in the brain. It is highly unlikely that it has no effect on one's decision making (esp. when you take it when you are _not_ very tired). It's more likely that you don't notice the effects, but the effects would likely be measurable.

It's the same with caffeine. I'd wager a guess that most people don't think it influences their decision making... And yet it seems it does (e.g. [2]).

[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/...

[2] https://www.freethink.com/health/does-caffeine-harm-your-dec...

I remember reading a study on modafinil that found people on modafinil for a couple days when giving directions where apt to be irritable and not throwing in identifying details.

so a modafinil user "Go three blocks that way, turn left, go two blocks turn left again, turn right immediately"

non-modafinil user "Go that way until you see the Circle-K, turn left, then it's two blocks where you have to turn left again, the street name is something like Majors way, and then the first time you can turn after that you turn right - there's a large drawing of a man drinking coffee on the side of the building"

on edit: unfortunately no idea where I read this but that was a big let-down for me as it implied there was perhaps no such thing as a free ride. Bummer.

Modafinil increases my risk-taking behavior much more than amphetamine does, though otherwise has much lower physical side effects than amphetamine. Took me awhile to realize I was being incredibly flirty due to modafinil. It was typically well-received and it took me a long time to realize that it was modifying my behavior. But once I knew what to look for I saw the modifications across wide parts of my life including work and personal goals. Generally made me take on more ambitious goals.

Eventually I suffered some traumatic events and modafinil started causing anxiety, especially when mixed with caffeine, and I found vyvanse was better after that for managing my ADHD without quite as much paralyzing anxiety.

Everyone’s brain reacts very differently to each stimulant. On the very rare occasion that I take cocaine I usually just fall asleep and enjoy a hard nap! I don’t experience about 90% of the effects my friends report from it.

Caffeine keeps me awake all night long even if I have just half of a cup of coffee any time after 11AM, and increases my anxiety to the point where it’s very difficult to be productive.

Dextroamphetamine and Vyvanse both affect work productivity similarly for me but dextroamphetamine shuts down my social interaction, whereas Vyvanse increases it. This is particularly strange because they “should” be the exact same active drug once the Vyvanse is metabolized. Biology is still very much being discovered and there is a lot that we just don’t know yet.

Very much underestimate the impact of exhaustion. If I recall correctly, I read a study that driving after a long day of work was many times more dangerous than driving over the legal limit for alcohol. Kind of puts both into perspective

Modafinil has been the go to pill for the Air Force for quite some time. I don't know about nowadays, but in the mid 00s they handed it out like candy in the war zones. Same with Ambien. (source: I was there)

Here are the current details:

- "Go pills" are either dextroamphetamine (Similar to adderall), or modafinil. They are not used for normal day-to-day training. They are used reasonably heavily on deployments and international flights, to keep you sharp in these situations (Sudden combat after a long uneventful air patrol, or just fighting drowsiness while crossing the ocean and needing to mid-air refuel for the 5th time etc.)

No-go pills (eg ambien) are also common on deployments, mainly to deal with shift changes, or dealing with sunlight affecting the circadian rythm.

Use is up to the individual. I found that Dex has a severe impact on my sleep, even when taking 14+ hour prior. It is a very effective mental performance enhancer and obliterates exhaustion IMO, if you don't develop a tolerance. Ie, if you have available when flying, and take only when needed.

Rule of thumb: Always fly with dex available, but only take when needed. Never have ambien anywhere in the cockpit, or you risk mixing them up.

> They are not used for normal day-to-day training.

That makes sense, but you probably should do some training with them, so first use is not in a dangerous situation.

Correct - called "ground testing"

The animated show "Archer" (action/comedy TV series) season 9 episode 7 had this as a plot point. From the IMDB trivia section:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7576240/trivia/

"Pervitin was one of the first commercially available formulations of methamphetamine hydrochloride (salts); it also contained large doses of caffeine. It was used by Nazi soldiers, sometimes along with cocaine, to help them remain alert on night patrols, long marches and also to help increase aggression and stamina during battle. Pervitin was heavily used by Stuka (a German fighter plane) pilots to help keep them alert on long patrol flights, hence the nickname "Stuka tablets". By 1940 the German Army had started greatly reducing the number of tablets each solider was allowed to have due to the severe side effects. While the drug was in their system, it had the benefit of causing decreased fear and increased strength, stamina, aggression and gave them a high resistance to pain. However, after the drug wore off, soldiers often took several days to recover. They suffered from a form of amphetamine "hangover" and were pretty much useless for the next few days because they acted more like zombies than soldiers; this was mainly because of the long duration of methamphetamine's effects which would cause soldiers to be awake for a few days straight, so it would take several days for the body to recover. Pervitin use also was responsible for Nazi soldiers becoming too aggressive and attacking fellow soldiers and superior officers. It also caused some to commit war crimes by killing civilians and raping women and young girls as amphetamines often greatly increase libido and decrease inhibitions."

This podcast talks about Nazi drug use:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3_3aUKfLoI

One of the takeaways is that meth works ok during fast blitz campaigns like Poland or France where you want to get the whole thing over in a few weeks at most. But it works horribly in a long attritional fight like the eastern front where soldiers start suffering from the cognitive and physical consequences while still in the field fighting.

Another good book is _Blitzed_.

A bit about it:

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/09/books/high-on-hitler-and-...

John Billings Hardtack and Coffee is a detailed account of camp life during the war. Here’s the section discussing rations and (obviously) coffee:

https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/72532/pg72532-images.ht...

I went to a civil war reenactment as a kid where there were food samples from the era available to try. Who knows how accurate they were, but given how passionate folks can be about that history I imagine a lot of work went into the food. I remember eating hardtack and a couple other things that, at least to my young palette, tasted ok. Of course the hardtack I tried surely had fewer weevils and maggots than most did during the actual war.

Interesting article, but I wish they would give some numbers. I couldn't find good sources, but it sounds like the total volume of Liberian imports peaked at less than 0.1% of total coffee imports. So the Liberian coffee was an interesting footnote but not important for the actual supply of coffee.

They touch on the political affinities between the Union and Liberia but no so much the Confederacy and Brazil. I wonder if something similar was going on? Brazil still had slavery at that time. After the Confederates lost I recall learning that some slave-owning farmers moved down to Brazil to continue their slavery-driven farming practices. They only had 20 years though because slavery was banned in Brazil in the 1880s.

No doubt Brazil and the Confederacy would have liked to trade, as there was a strong tie between them as you guessed from the slavery issue. After the war, a number of Confederates (some illegally with their enslaved people) moved to Brazil, where their descendants are known as "Confederados" [1]. However, during the war the Union blockaded Southern ports and few trade items (including coffee) got through.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederados

The traditional ratio is that one pound of coffee is 50 cups. So they drank about 5 cups per day. Though if the coffee came green, it might have been a little lower

There’s a short and fun book called Blitzed about “PED” use in WWII. Covering German pharmaceutical industry’s monopoly over certain stimulants, Hitler’s unlikely doctor who shot him up with everything under the sun, and the ultimate consequences for everyone involved (addiction, exhaustion, insanity).

Meth specifically is believed to be one of the contributing factor in the early success of the German army. Interestingly, I believe the same was used by the Japanese to encourage suicidal attacks, since, it turns out, it's easier to carry one when you're high as a kite.

The union didn't caffeinate their way to victory, the southern men went off to distant battlefields and the morally bankrupted northern generals like (((Sherman))) (who traded letters with his wife wherein they exchanged hopes of driving southerners right into the sea) he led armies to farms and towns populated only by the women and children left behind.

They fire-bombed entire cities "Stop there! Leave this building standing so they see a town once stood here." An actual quote.

This was a war meticulously overseen by Honest Abe himself. No wonder Hillary Clinton likened herself to him for being two-faced: One for public consumption, and one for Satan.

Do you see this tactic of deliberately targeting civilians, children, and infrastructure being employed anywhere else in the world right now?

I never thought of Caffeine as the Pervitin of the civil war… or pervitin as the caffeine of WWII

Well, yeah, when you're hella sleep deprived, of course not having a stimulant readily available is a problem.

Sounds like anything to eat or drink would have helped.

The know how and ability to manufacture condensed milk is another famous example from the civil war.

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