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Comment by hukep | Hacker News Reader

I don't like the concept of word 'doping'. It is just the word which represents a chemical substance to stimulate body for a better performance. There is however such a hate in using this word. In the past even caffeine in the coffee was considered to be a doping. It is not nowadays Everybody should be allowed to use any chemical substance for himself as he wish. He should be responsible for his own action. If he destroys his health, he should pay for it not the society. There are also people who lives on revealing the 'doping sinners'. It is such a waste of money. People cmmon create something reasonable. Don't waste your time looking for a 'doping' to accuse others for taking it! I take a 'doping' so what?

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What if amphetamines (or some other stimulants) were to become a thing in the IT industry and that workers had no other choice to take some to meet standard performance or be unemployed? All for the benefit of the employers?

That's pretty much what's going on for professional athletes... now, I wouldn't like being forced to take some drugs to be able to make a living. And if we say it's ok to do it for professional sports, how long until someone says it should be ok in other fields?

> What if amphetamines (or some other stimulants) were to become a thing in the IT industry and that workers had no other choice to take some to meet standard performance or be unemployed?

That has pretty much happened already, for median skilled workers in IT. We call it coffee.

> All for the benefit of the employers?

And society. Sports and jobs are different.

There are such things as `professional league'.

I was making a distinction between sport and economic activity; rather than the strict definition of a job.

A sport is zero-sum. Economic activity is normally positive-sum.

> And society. Sports and jobs are different.

How does society benefit from it?

How does society benefit from products/services and innovation/invention? Really!

> How does society benefit from products/services and innovation/invention? Really!

Amphetamines allow for short term gains in productivity for individuals and possibly companies. The products/services/innovations/inventions will be realized regardless of these short term effects. As much as Silicon Valley likes the myth of the lone (drug fueled) rockstar developer, please don't be deluded to think this has any semblance of relevance in reality.

> Amphetamines allow for short term gains in productivity for individuals and possibly companies.

Your premise is incorrect! It depends on the dosage. Low dose amphetamines can be neuroprotective. Even meth!

People also take a combination of drugs to stave off tolerance. Memantine, for example.

> As much as Silicon Valley likes the myth of the lone (drug fueled) rockstar developer, please don't be deluded to think this has any semblance of relevance in reality.

I'm not making reference to that.

Increased productivity is good for living standards—ceteris paribus. I've given two examples of how amphetamines may be used profitably in the longterm (which increases productivity). And because of what I've said in the first sentence, it follows living standards will be improved.

> What if amphetamines (or some other stimulants) were to become a thing in the IT industry and that workers had no other choice to take some to meet standard performance or be unemployed? All for the benefit of the employers?

There is a culture of amphetamine use in the IT industry. I haven't seen articles on it in a while, but I thought it relatively accepted that a lot of people who go find ADHD diagnoses don't actually have the disorder, and are just looking for a dextroamphetamine scrip.

We are talking professional competition here, the result of your logic is that anyone who wanted to compete professionaly would have to subject themselves (and their health) to doping.

I don't want to see such a future, where young athletes have no choice but to put their health at severe risk in order to be competitive.

And of course should doping be allowed as you suggest, and naturally everyone would have to use it in order to be competitive, we would see continued escalation in the amount/strength of doping used, since else you would not get a competitive advantage.

In short I can't understand your reasoning.

If we prevent doping we should prevent genetic differences since they are not fair and unjust.

Fairness wasn't the reason present by gillianseed, so I don't see how your post is relevant. The idea is to avoid incentivizing a destructive practice; unless there is some way of changing your genetic code, the same doesn't apply.

Why is "I don't want to see X" considered a valid argument?

Are you kidding me ?

The argument is what follows that statement, how about we discuss that ?

The problem is that if health-destroying "performance enhancers" start to be seen as "acceptable" in sports, most performers will feel obligated to take them if they want to continue their careers, even if they'd normally wouldn't want to do that.

It's kind of how if everyone is allowed to cheat to pass an exam, the ones that don't want to cheat (even if the exam is so hard that they could fail) would be seen as fools (and arguably would be fools for taking the chance to lose the exam by not cheating).

Perfect analogy.

>It's kind of how if everyone is allowed to cheat to pass an exam, the ones that don't want to cheat (even if the exam is so hard that they could fail) would be seen as fools (and arguably would be fools for taking the chance to lose the exam by not cheating).

This might be less true in any field that the exam (or knowledge tested, even) is useful after the fact. Athletes who win due to doping generally have "a career" in chatshows, commentary, etc (Armstrong shows that this can happen even when caught). Alternatively, you have the folk who cheat at exams for certifications and pad resumes with paper-thin experience. It might be foolish to take the time with the learning process, but the end-result is quite different.

I wouldn't want to compete against people who are prepared to destroy their health to win.

Then you're not going to be able to compete. Basically all professional sports require someone to push themselves beyond regular human limits, and give up future health to get there even without drugs.

I'm interested to know if this is really true.

I don't think non-contact sports require someone to sacrifice health, except for wearing out their body...

And I'm not convinced they wear out their body more than manual laborers.

And there is definitely a qualitative difference between a 16 year old working hard as a teenager to make it as a professional athlete, and perhaps wearing out their body by the end of their career as a professional athlete (say, 30 years old on average), compared to a 16 year old using substances that would count as "doping" to most people.

To put it plainly:

A 16 year old boy who shows promise as a professional athlete can work hard, realize that they're not cut out for the big leagues after college (22 years old), and go on with their life with basically no ill effects aside from the chance of a major injury sustained during their sport.

Whereas a 16 year old boy who shows promise as a professional athlete, works hard, and also dopes for 6 years until he's 22, and then realizes he's not cut out for the big leagues, has probably irreparably damaged his health.

> I don't think non-contact sports require someone to sacrifice health, except for wearing out their body...

That still fits within the bounds of "sacrificing health"

Then they are not going to win very long anyway.

You're already competing against people who are prepared to destroy their health to win - the people who work 80+ hours per week.

If we don't outlaw over-working then I don't see a reason to outlaw the drugs.

Athletes would kill themselves very quickly. Have you ever heard of Goldman dilemma?: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldman%27s_dilemma

Also the 50% of athletes willing to do anything would make it unfair for athletes that wish to perform naturally, always creating a divide in tested vs untested events. Money talks and sponsorship would likely be limited for any non tested version.

> Everybody should be allowed to use any chemical substance for himself as he wish. He should be responsible for his own action.

I fully agree. He should then further demonstrate this responsibility by choosing not to compete in competitions that explicitly forbid this kind of enhancement.

Why should I expect to be free to do what I want and expect to be allowed to compete against people who agree to abide to certain restrictions?

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