NationStates Jolt Archive

“Ministers and doctors should consider making the drugs available without prescription and for non-medical use, said John Harris, director of the Institute for Science, Ethics and Innovation at the University of Manchester.
The drugs, which include Ritalin, more commonly prescribed for attention deficit problems, could help students achieve better grades he said.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/4061055/Students-should-be-given-smart-drugs-to-get-better-exam-results.html

He’s suggesting to take Provigil

This is so sick… Maybe there’s a short term advantage, but it’s too soon to predict what will happen on the long term.
The brain is a very sophisticated device, I don’t think we should mess with it. Ritalin by instance can cause permanent brain damage. Provigil is something as Ritalin.

I’m also wondering why professors and stuff want to make people smarter.

Smarter doesn’t mean better, we are smart enough. Being smart is overrated. It’s not important for many things. It doesn’t make you rich, you will not have sex with the nicest wo(men) on a permanent base, it doesn’t make you healtier or happy.

I don't quite agree with the sentiment that being smart is overrated. But I do agree it's not a good idea to pump people full of drugs in the hopes of making them smarter. At least not until there are long term studies that show it is safe and works long term.

Mess with people's mind, not their brain!

It's not worth poisoning yourself so you can get better at cross word puzzles. The west has a lot of its priorities screwed up. I suspect this is because bullying was eliminated from schools.

, you will not have sex with the nicest wo(men) on a permanent base, it doesn’t make you healtier or happy.

If you could drug yourself to have sex with the wimminz, would it be wrong...? Hmmmm.

The drugs, which include Ritalin, more commonly prescribed for attention deficit problems, could help students achieve better grades he said.”[/I]

...so that grading can be adjusted and students that don't take Mentats get a D.

...so that grading can be adjusted and students that don't take Mentats get a D.
The only time I ever took mentats was when I needed to disarm that nuclear bomb but I wasn't skilled enough in demolitions.

AAAH the third part.

Haven't you played the first two?

You need Mentat drugs to get the VC citizenship the legal way.

AAAH the third part.

Haven't you played the first two?

You need Mentat drugs to get the VC citizenship the legal way.

I feel happy that I know what everyone is talking about but also, ever so slightly sad.

The only problem here I see is that it messes with a body's natural equilibrium which has its own host of undesirable consequences. The sentiment that being smarter is not better is silly. In and of itself, increased intelligence is definitely more desirable, we are certainly not "smart enough already."

The only problem here I see is that it messes with a body's natural equilibrium which has its own host of undesirable consequences. The sentiment that being smarter is not better is silly. In and of itself, increased intelligence is definitely more desirable, we are certainly not "smart enough already."

It is not silly.

Why should we be smarter?

I have fun in my life, I feel fine, I have some friends, I am good to most people and most people are good to me. I am smart enough to study an occupation I like and if I feel different I'm still smart enough to learn a new profession. I have enough spare time for doing things I like. I'm physical and mental sane, I don't take any hard drugs and I'm not addicted to something.

Probably I'm not that dumb, but I'm not a genius either. Would I feel better if I was a genius? I really doubt.

Smartness doesn't influence your happy level. And it isn't an indicator for materialistic success either. I know a few real dumb people who are rich and I know smart ones who live in poverty.

BTW, you can be smart and knowing nothing.

BTW, you can be smart and knowing nothing.

High INT Low WIS are known as absent minded professors.

The only problem here I see is that it messes with a body's natural equilibrium which has its own host of undesirable consequences. The sentiment that being smarter is not better is silly. In and of itself, increased intelligence is definitely more desirable, we are certainly not "smart enough already."

Well, to begin with, you cannot say that it is definitely making people 'smarter' - whatever that is. It is just making people better at school.

And very often people who are good at school are a danger to themselves and others, so we might be actually better off without so many of them. There is no evidence that if grades went up generally then the human condition would actually improve. None whatsoever.

And secondly, what hairless kitten said.

This seems like: a badly thought up plan, concocted by people who were very probably good at school but not really that smart, who also seem oblivious to the potential drawbacks..

I think it is the product of a severely distorted worldview.

NO... ADD drugs are not smart drugs, they are speed. plain and simple.
if you don't have ADD the benefits are temporary and are more connected with the ability to stay up and write a paper/study.

Amphetamine FTW.

Military servicemen, particularly pilots, occasionally soldiers take a number of drugs when the job requires that.

But institutionalized use of drugs to do homework and pass school tests, i.e. things that don't matter, is like... Well, I can't think of anything so dumb to liken it to, it's just stupid.

The side effects of Provigil are:

• Common
o Headache (34% vs 23%)
o Nausea (11% vs 3%)

• Less common
o Nervousness (7% vs 3%)
o Insomnia (5% vs 1%)
o Anxiety (5% vs 1%)
o Dizziness (5% vs 4%)

• Infrequent
o Chest pain (3% vs 1%)
o Hypertension (3% vs 1%)
o Tachycardia (2% vs 1%)
o Vasodilatation (2% vs 0%)
o Dry mouth (4% vs 2%)
o Paresthesia (2% vs 0%)
o Pharyngitis (4% vs 2%)
o Anorexia (4% vs 1%)

Nice! You are smarter, but you’re having a headache, feeling nervous and all the stuff. And if you’re really unlucky you’ll become an anorexia patient.

DOn't mess with your brains. That's my job. :)

NO... ADD drugs are not smart drugs, they are speed. plain and simple.
if you don't have ADD the benefits are temporary and are more connected with the ability to stay up and write a paper/study.

I have read once that they are rather similar to cocaine, no?

I have read once that they are rather similar to cocaine, no?

sort of closer to this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amphetamines

I believe that you have a right to do what the hell you want to with your body, even if it turns you into a nervous crack wreck. That said, I dont support institutional programs that encourage a certain type to obtain certain ends.

I believe that you have a right to do what the hell you want to with your body, even if it turns you into a nervous crack wreck. That said, I dont support institutional programs that encourage a certain type to obtain certain ends.

under the current system it needs to stay perscribed.

if you take a more free drug system it needs to be something that we allow people to use with a license after taking a course, on risk dangers and proper usage.

I believe that you have a right to do what the hell you want to with your body, even if it turns you into a nervous crack wreck. That said, I dont support institutional programs that encourage a certain type to obtain certain ends.

Well I think different. There are several species of humans who can't choose for themselves:

Children, retard ones, addicted drug users...

They are all not sane enough to make a good decision.

I feel fine with the current drug laws, but maybe they should put, in all countries, marihuana on the same level as tobacco.

under the current system it needs to stay perscribed.

if you take a more free drug system it needs to be something that we allow people to use with a license after taking a course, on risk dangers and proper usage.

Mm, proper education is always a must. It'd be very cool if I could go down to the pharmacist and get 250 mg of codiene if I wanted to relax. Very cool.

Well I think different. There are several species of humans who can't choose for themselves:

Children, retard ones, addicted drug users...

They are all not sane enough to make a good decision.

I feel fine with the current drug laws, but maybe they should put, in all countries, marihuana on the same level as tobacco.

And I feel fine with punching you in the face after reading that, it doesn't make it right.

Heroin is one that could use a little sense. I envision people living with it, as they do. People live with heroin addiction for thirty years. Of course, tainted drugs don't help no-one except dealers profits. I'd like to see a system where addicts see their GP, are put on a plan for living with it if they want, as long as they don't work with heavy machinery etc, and are able to go to the pharmacy to pick some up to keep them going, of course with plans in place for thoses that wish to quit completely. Putting them in prison for seven years doesn't help.

And I feel fine with punching you in the face after reading that, it doesn't make it right.

Heroin is one that could use a little sense. I envision people living with it, as they do. People live with heroin addiction for thirty years. Of course, tainted drugs don't help no-one except dealers profits. I'd like to see a system where addicts see their GP, are put on a plan for living with it if they want, as long as they don't work with heavy machinery etc, and are able to go to the pharmacy to pick some up to keep them going, of course with plans in place for thoses that wish to quit completely. Putting them in prison for seven years doesn't help.

I believe that in the entire world, most hard drugs are not allowed. There's a reason for, no?

It's not worth poisoning yourself so you can get better at cross word puzzles. The west has a lot of its priorities screwed up. I suspect this is because bullying was eliminated from schools.

Yes...bullying has been eliminated from schools...right...:rolleyes:

I believe that in the entire world, most hard drugs are not allowed. There's a reason for, no?

A reason, yes, a decent reason? Not one good enough to lock someone up for several years.

EDIT: BBC backs me up with the Swiss doing this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7755664.stm

A reason, yes, a decent reason? Not one good enough to lock someone up for several years.

EDIT: BBC backs me up with the Swiss doing this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7755664.stm

Nobody says that drug users shouldn't be treated more humane.
IMHO, it's not wise to destroy their life with lengthy jail time.

But that's something different as making hard drugs legal for all.

Beside, I believe that the Swiss are counting the most drug users (per inhabitant) of Europe...

How about instead we develop better drugs that don't have the nasty side effects of these ones and use those for cognitive enhancement?

Seriously, though, it's kind of ridiculous to advocate kids should take drugs to get better grades. The purpose of education is not and never has been good grades, and the moment it does switch to making good grades instead of learning and retaining material is the moment the system becomes fundamentally and irreparably broken...no drugs will save it by that point. If anything, mass consumption of those drugs should mean significantly harder classes, with the goal of completely erasing any of the paper performance gains in favor of making students tackle more challenging material at a faster pace. A student who doesn't put in the effort should do poorly no matter what drugs they take, and classes should be adjusted as a result to accommodate that possibility.

If we're going to enhance people, let's at least use their enhanced abilities to achieve more, not just to adjust the letters and numbers on a transcript to something they might like.

I don't quite agree with the sentiment that being smart is overrated.
It seems smartness is horribly overrated among those people who think they belong into group of smart people.

People don't have to be smart to be good people, and oft smartness can be in the way of being a good person.

The only time I ever took mentats was when I needed to disarm that nuclear bomb but I wasn't skilled enough in demolitions.
FO3 = Yay, let's make a post-apoc world teeming with nukes! :rolleyes:

edit:
On topic, how about we give those drugs for free for those people who need it the most? That is people in Israel, Palestine and developing countries - like Zimbabwe.

It seems they need all the brains they can muster...

E-gad, Viagra for the brain? Have to think hard before making that freely available...

People don't have to be smart to be good people, and oft smartness can be in the way of being a good person.
Not really, having a focus on being more intelligent than everyone could get in the way.

Zimbabwe.
Can we classify food as a drug?

That, or give the drugs out to the military and political leaders in Zimbabwe.

If the average person needs drugs to do reasonably well in secondary level education then either your standards are too high or your quality of education is too low. Or maybe both!

Yes...bullying has been eliminated from schools...right...:rolleyes:

Obviously since nasty little swotty types can survive to adulthood and go on to propose this sort of thing, it has been more or less eliminated.

E-gad, Viagra for the brain? Have to think hard before making that freely available...
I see what you did thar.

Obviously since nasty little swotty types can survive to adulthood and go on to propose this sort of thing, it has been more or less eliminated.

Your logic is impaired.

I'd take performance-enhancing drugs if my boss asked me to, under the condition that it was free, along with any downers I might need afterward. Why not? As long as you're not firing people who don't comply, it should be fine. It's what goes on with coffee already.

It is not silly.

Why should we be smarter?

I have fun in my life, I feel fine, I have some friends, I am good to most people and most people are good to me. I am smart enough to study an occupation I like and if I feel different I'm still smart enough to learn a new profession. I have enough spare time for doing things I like. I'm physical and mental sane, I don't take any hard drugs and I'm not addicted to something.

Probably I'm not that dumb, but I'm not a genius either. Would I feel better if I was a genius? I really doubt.

Smartness doesn't influence your happy level. And it isn't an indicator for materialistic success either. I know a few real dumb people who are rich and I know smart ones who live in poverty.

BTW, you can be smart and knowing nothing.

Well, to begin with, you cannot say that it is definitely making people 'smarter' - whatever that is. It is just making people better at school.

And very often people who are good at school are a danger to themselves and others, so we might be actually better off without so many of them. There is no evidence that if grades went up generally then the human condition would actually improve. None whatsoever.

And secondly, what hairless kitten said.

This seems like: a badly thought up plan, concocted by people who were very probably good at school but not really that smart, who also seem oblivious to the potential drawbacks..

I think it is the product of a severely distorted worldview.

I'm apparently being misunderstood so I must have either been unclear in my post or people just didn't read it very thoroughly, so my apologies. I am not saying that this specific plan is great. I am saying that, all else being equal, increased intelligence is better.

Now, generally that isn't how things work, all else is rarely, in fact, equal. Is increased intelligence (well, in this case it's increased focus, which is completely different) worth a trade-off in terms of emotional stability, physical health or just the monetary cost? I don't know, it really depends on the context, imo.

What I meant to call silly was the notion that, in and of itself, increased intelligence is not a good thing. Intelligence, to me, means a lot of things. Being intelligent is not simply memorization, though that goes a long way to develop intellect, but analytic and predictive capacity, as well. More of this is always good.

Nobody says that drug users shouldn't be treated more humane.
IMHO, it's not wise to destroy their life with lengthy jail time.

But that's something different as making hard drugs legal for all.

Beside, I believe that the Swiss are counting the most drug users (per inhabitant) of Europe...

Which is what I took exception with when you said you were fine with current drug laws.

Hard drugs for all? I never said that.

Indeed they are, which is why they've put in place a program for treating it, and why use of heroin is in decline, at least according to the BBC.

certainly more people, most people, need to exercise their brains a lot more often.
the idea that some chemical can replace doing so, seems to me like another failure to.

on the other hand, people with regenerative brain diseases do need, we all need, for the development of effective therapies to reverse this problem.

i do have a certain blind faith, that if people thought smarter, we'd be living in a better world.

I disgree that intelligence doesn't make you happier, I think that that depends upon the person.

It's not worth poisoning yourself so you can get better at cross word puzzles. The west has a lot of its priorities screwed up. I suspect this is because bullying was eliminated from schools.

Bullying eliminated from schools? Seriously, when did this happen and why weren't my school's bullies informed?

Fuck it. Let's just dump a few tonnes of Ritalin into our water supply and see what happens

Fuck it. Let's just dump a few tonnes of Ritalin into our water supply and see what happens

It's been working with Flouride.

Fuck it. Let's just dump a few tonnes of Ritalin into our water supply and see what happens

better yet, how about something to (statistically) lower human fertility across the board without bias or exception?

(salt peter's been suggested, but the problem is fertility, not lebido.)

The government doesn't like too smart people.

If we were all smart, nobody would vote or pay taxes.

The government doesn't like too smart people.

If we were all smart, nobody would vote or pay taxes.

If we were smart everyone would vote and they would only not pay taxes if a large portion of the population didn't, no one would want to be the first one to get bitch slapped for it.

if we were all smart, the only government, or for that matter, social organization in any sense, would be voluntary coordinators of infrastructure hobbyists. likewise no one would be so inconsiderate of anyone or anything else for laws or their enforcement to be necessary either.

it goes without saying there wouldn't need to be symbolic value or keep out signs either.

and fences would only be used to corral livestock.

and there certainly wouldn't be mass production of, nor mass demand for, oil or coal either, nor dependence on combustion for anything other then cooking and keeping warm.

personal vehicles, where they existed, and that wouldn't be in cities or densely populated areas, would be propelled by stored energy or other clean methods, as would the public vehicles, mostly guideway based and built to however modest proportions necessary, to be practical in all but the VERY lowest of population density places.

and they wouldn't want to bring large families into this world, unless and until, underpopulation became a real threat, which would take it falling to maybe a hundredth of where it is now. somewhere around a 20th might be a nice stable and sustainable optimum. i mean in the same range as it was between 1750 and 1917.

there wouldn't need to be building codes and there flat out would not be closed borders, well borders at all in today's sense.

if we were all smart, the only government, or for that matter, social organization in any sense, would be voluntary coordinators of infrastructure hobbyists. likewise no one would be so inconsiderate of anyone or anything else for laws or their enforcement to be necessary either.

it goes without saying there wouldn't need to be symbolic value or keep out signs either.

and fences would only be used to corral livestock.

and there certainly wouldn't be mass production of, nor mass demand for, oil or coal either, nor dependence on combustion for anything other then cooking and keeping warm.

personal vehicles, where they existed, and that wouldn't be in cities or densely populated areas, would be propelled by stored energy or other clean methods, as would the public vehicles, mostly guideway based and built to however modest proportions necessary, to be practical in all but the VERY lowest of population density places.

and they wouldn't want to bring large families into this world, unless and until, underpopulation became a real threat, which would take it falling to maybe a hundredth of where it is now. somewhere around a 20th might be a nice stable and sustainable optimum. i mean in the same range as it was between 1750 and 1917.

there wouldn't need to be building codes and there flat out would not be closed borders, well borders at all in today's sense.

*wipes tear from eye*

if we were all smart, the only government, or for that matter, social organization in any sense, would be voluntary coordinators of infrastructure hobbyists. likewise no one would be so inconsiderate of anyone or anything else for laws or their enforcement to be necessary either.

it goes without saying there wouldn't need to be symbolic value or keep out signs either.

and fences would only be used to corral livestock.

and there certainly wouldn't be mass production of, nor mass demand for, oil or coal either, nor dependence on combustion for anything other then cooking and keeping warm.

personal vehicles, where they existed, and that wouldn't be in cities or densely populated areas, would be propelled by stored energy or other clean methods, as would the public vehicles, mostly guideway based and built to however modest proportions necessary, to be practical in all but the VERY lowest of population density places.

and they wouldn't want to bring large families into this world, unless and until, underpopulation became a real threat, which would take it falling to maybe a hundredth of where it is now. somewhere around a 20th might be a nice stable and sustainable optimum. i mean in the same range as it was between 1750 and 1917.

there wouldn't need to be building codes and there flat out would not be closed borders, well borders at all in today's sense.

You seem to be assuming that if people were smart they'd be nice to each other rather than continuing to be selfish bastards and pushing their own needs at the expense of others. Assumption dubious.