I realize this is slightly off subject with this particular thread, but since I just spent over an hour replying to the other heroin thread and it was closed while I was replying and people missed a lot of points, I'm going to post it anyways, my appology to any moderators it offends. It's a good read and if you feel like it would be more appropriate moved to another forum, fine.
Timrare, while you have a marvelous understanding of the difference between functional and dysfunctional personalities as far as society is concerned, it appears either drugs weren't for you, you missed the point, or you conditioned by a program such as NA.
Your points are valid, but in some respects too generalized. I can relate to a lot of where you are coming from because at one point in my life I became so dysfunctional as a result of my drug use, it was an absolute neccessity to quit if I was going to be able to take care of myself. My 6 month delve into sobriety and relearning how to function was not only essential for survival purposes, but also taught many an uncountable amount of life lessons. But as you come off, you make it sound as if drug use ultimately causes the same negative effects after some undetermined amount of time in ALL people. It doesn't work that way. People are individuals. Yes, there absolutely without a doubt exist typical results. But as with everything in life, there are untypical results. And from what you've written, you seem to fail to understand that different personalities carry different concepts that play a significant role in how drugs will effect them, or even how they live and think in general with or without drugs. So I will respond to several of your points and theories, all which are good, but are not the ultimate right. As there is no ultimate right to almost any aspect of human life. Humans are far from perfect and if by chance we are perfect and have even begun to reach a pinacle of evolution, we are truly a pathetic species.
I realize some of these were aimed at Phreex, but I'm going to take the liberty to reply to them anyways:
You know as well as I do that every now and then you pause and think of whether or not drug use, overall, was a good idea.
Every drug user does this, of course. I do not think my drug use as a whole was a bad idea. Infact, far from it. I definantly believe there have been points in my life where I have overused drugs, and I definantly paid a high price for it. On the other hand, my drug use has given me countless grandiose experiences that far surpased even my over-active imagination. I have lived utopia, postulated extraordinary concepts, gained an uncanny understanding of human origins and evolution, and they have helped me in excelling in visual and audio forms of art. I've even started understanding how and why certain aspects of music affect the human psyche and cause physiological responses. Again, yes, I've paid many prices, some of them rather heavy, but all in all at this point in my life it's only been a trade off. And no, I am not so foolish or short-sighted to believe I may not look back several years from now and feel differently. But I'm more than content now with totality of the choices I've made concerning my recreational drug use. My personal happiness, so long as it maintains a minimal and indirect negative impact on others, is the second most important thing in my life. My drug use inadvertantly leads me to things that make me happy, and that's all that matters in the end as far as it's concerned.
Or maybe it is when you have a frustrating moment of Brain Damage Realization, where you can't do something that you used to be able to do, and you know it isn't just old age.
Yes, there are times when my brain stutters, when I get stuck in the middle of a sentence and when my short term memory fails me. But it does not significantly hinder my work, my recreational or my social functioning. And after all the other benefits I've attained from my drug use, it's simply inconsequential and not a problem.
1) Psychoactive drug use of causes brain damage.
The human brain has amazing abilities to rerout to work around problems and also to heal itself. There are few psychoactives out there that cause damage that can't be repaired so as to keep you from being mentally dysfunctional. As well, despite everything I've used and for as much as I've used, any symptoms of brain damage are completely minimal and I'm still more mentally efficient than half of the people I've ever met who've never recreationally used drugs.
2) Drugs cost money. If you are using drugs in any significant quantity, you are paying for them.
And you'd be surprised how much you spend over time. The worst part is that unless you approach them from an intellectual perspective and try to learn something from what is happening, you don't really gain anything but some pleasure.
Completely wrong. I gain experiences and insight, which in effect are usually pleasurable. Experiences are priceless and often far more meaningful than material things. Yes, there are essential material things and yes, it would be foolish to live completely minimal in order to have these experiences. But so long as I can afford my residency and still be saving money to provide for a decent future, then the only thing other material items would serve as would be as status symbols to impress others. I have little interest in impressing others with the exception of my girlfriend, my family and a few other friends.
Let's say I buy a nice watch for $1,000. It's going to make me feel REALLY good. Both at the time, and while I'm wearing it. People are going to think of me as a better person because of my watch (hey, it's true). I'm going to get to talk to people about my watch. People are going to say "I like your watch". I'm going to get up, go down to the shop, and talk to the shopkeep about the watch for 30 minutes before I buy it. I am going to further establish my identity (that identity vs. autonomy game we played in adolescence, and most ongoing drug users LOST...). I GAIN THINGS. And ultimately, the watch will probably bring me, over the next few years, more pleasure than an 30 grams of methamphetamince would have for the same price. Ultimately I'll end up selling the watch and gaining back a nominal amount of money, or giving it to a friend or relative of lower social class than I am, who will derive some pleasure from even a three year old watch! Isn't that a pleasent story?
The watch will not last as long as an experience that will last my entire life. Even if it did, a) I don't care about the people I will impress with it b) I doubt the watch will really entertain me for a long period of time. Infact it will be something I'll most likely want to replace or just completely lose interest in after a while.
I completely understand your point, but I don't have that kind of personality. And that aspect of my personality existed long before I ever recreationally used drugs. I've been like that as far back as I remember and it first manifested in simple things like enjoying walks in the woods and being in nature instead of caring about the shoes I wore to impress my classmates.
3) Drug use leads to addiction. Addiction is not a dichotomy. It is a process, it is... a force which acts on a person. It varies in strength. You can't "fight" an addiction.
This would be to assume I'm uncomfortable with being addicted to drugs. But that's not true in my case. It is no different than being addicted to any other leisurely pursuit or hobby. And no, you can't argue with me that it is absolutely dangerous. You're much less likely to die or be seriously injured being a Nascar fanatic and racing cars if something like that would be the interest you carried an equivellent addiction to as one example.
4) Being a drug user DECREASES your social standing in the vast majority of social circles.
I think of most social circles as being lowly for being too simplistic and worrying about living life as you're told to instead of spending time thinking. Therefore, I could care less what most others think.
This isn't to say I don't understand or care about the concept of legacies. But I want to create concepts that will better enable our species to see utopia. I will create art that will outlive me that will meet my goals and it will effect a few people. Hopefully they will propagate the ideas. That's far more important than what a bunch of idiots feel about me when I'm alive.
Depends on your usage patterns, of course, but, assuming you have done cocaine, meth, heroin, mdma, marijuana, and lsd, you have alienated yourself from the vast majority of people.
Until I reached 8th grade, I was alienated by the vast majority of my peers because I was intellectual, therefore a geek and I was also alienated because I cared more about the environment than I did about football. So nothing is new by later alienating myself by my drug use. Since I have experienced nothing but social alienation from most people during my life, I again do not care. Actually, when I first began using drugs, my circle of friends grew from no more people than I have fingers on both hands to having a phone list of over 100 people I communicated with on a regular basis. I later decided it was better having few friends.
And people CAN tell from looking at you.
Yes, I realize this. Sometimes I'm not completely comfortable with it, but I'm not too concerned as long as I do not develop circles under my eyes or appear to be aged beyond my years. The circles don't exist and I actually appear physically younger than my years. It's not a problem.
Of course, social standing is a vital part of success in this society.
But this society is slowly working to drive itself extinct by destroying it's own physical habitat and forgetting the meanings behind the concepts it lives by. So I don't want to be successful by this societies terms. This society is diseased. I'm more interested in helping to cure it.
Succes is the attainment of dreams, the pursuit of attractive members of the opposite sex (ultimately terminating in a long lasting marriage under which children are raised), the achievement of goals, and ending up in a higher SES than your parents were.
None of these things in my life have been affected by my low standing in most social circles.
You are a genetic pattern, your purpose is to find out if you are good enough to keep on. To keep on is to succeed. To have kids that are given a head-start. Etc.
Not so. Genetics are only secondary as to the purpose of human life. Most people are mistaken because they have this bizarre interpretation of humans being created in the image of God. They believe that this is a physical image. But God has no physical manifestation. God is a non-physical consciousness. What seperates us from other life is our advanced conscious. The evolution of the human race is not defined by it's physical form. It's defined by the further development of consciousness, social progress and technology. This is why part of the human existance is legacy. It's not about passing down physical traits, it's about passing down information. We do not simply have children and propagate our species, but we pass down with them information, which as long as some people survive and the information is passed down is what truly matters.
I could go more into this. I've been collecting notes and working on concepts and theories surrounding it for 7 years. I've recently begun writing a book about it. I'll spare all of you that are reading this.
However, we can study the drugs through limited usage over a short period of time in our lives... (age 15-25 for most people), come to terms with reality and accept ourselves... and then move on from that. That is what 60+% of people do. The ones that don't missed a vital part of life, and are narrow minded and naive for the rest of it as a result. The ones that do, and move on, eventually meet with success.
This I do agree with for the most part. Some people are able to be successful while continuing their drug use their entire lives, but most people are not. Continuing is not something I have any interest in doing. I give my drug life another 2 years, tops. I look at is as a stage in my life that when I stop will give me amazing reflections and be a personal gain. This goes back to experience being important. At the same time I feel it's neccessary to recoup any lost functioning in order to eventually raise children and maintain a healthy lifelong relationship with my wife.
And kind of realize, that the pleasure which comes from drugs, really is only amazing to you... impressive... because you lack pleasure in other areas of your life.
You're right, I do lack pleasure in the mundane. I want something greater that in one way can be attained by shifting my conscious understandings with drugs.
In any event, that's not the point. Brain damage from opiates is usually a result of an overdose. Subject's blood doesn't have enough oxygen, lack of oxygen causes brain cells to die. Any time you use heroin your breathing is somewhat suppressed, anytime your breathing is suppressed you are risking lack of oxygen in the brain...
As I understand, heroin slows down your entire CNS, therefore less energy is being used which in turn means your brain needs less oxygen. If you're not overdosing, it should not be a problem. Considering people get things like colds which cause your nose to develop thick mucous membrane that interfere with your breathing for weeks at a time anyways, a few hours on heroin is nothing. And one of the other amazing things about heroin is that for whatever reason assuming you are able to keep yourself otherwise healthy, you're actually less likely to get a cold.
Pleasure is a state, but it isn't what you and other drug users are making of it. Too much of a dependence on pleasure is a problem with the mind.
Believe it or not, if you try hard enough, you can find a career that you actually enjoy and basically be pleasured all the time. It's kind of rare and I haven't figured out how to do it yet, but I'm sure I'll be a rock star writing heavily electronic music one day. Any ways, it just depends on what you find pleasurable and how much you partake as to whether it's good or bad in an overall perspective.
Most psychedelic drugs cause whacked out activity patterns in specific parts of the brain, it's self evident that these aren't good for those parts.
I think there are a lot of variables into how psychedelics effect the brain. With the exception of MDMA like substances which obviously cause lasting physical damage, I think the only real risk with other drugs such as psilocybe or LSD would be the psychological aspects. This isn't to say all the changes are neccessarily bad. Virtually every society, even conservative ones that now condemn drug use owe their foundations to drug users, particularly users of psychedelic drugs. There are some qualities of them which are a key to unlocking parts of the subconscious mind and can contribute to helping one realize greater ideas and concepts. Plus there are several archeotypes associated with psychedelic drugs such as images of dieties, jaguars, heiroglyphics, etc. I feel strongly that there is something important to the fact that in certain situations people from all walks of life hallucinate the same things. Even people that would have never known about these things so they would not have had some sort of subconscious idea brought to conscious thought. Also things like telepathy and the ability to see into the future have been reported over and over with high doses of psychedelics. I personally believe that these mystical 6th senses that some people also experience naturally are nothing more than an abnormal level of naturally occuring chemicals in the brain. This also explains "the oneness" with the universe that people often describe on psychedelics.
But at the same time, don't take me as advocating psychedelic drug use as an essential part of the human existance. It may be, but I know that psychedelics can often cause more harm than good in people, so I don't take that position.
And there is damage from DXM and inhalants, and nitrous oxide, and... ketamine... that is well established
You can easily use nitrous oxide without causing any more damage than holding your breath for a few seconds.
If you inhale several balloon fulls at once or use it regularly, yeah, you're going to have a little damage. It'd be rare that the damage would be significant, and it is beyond simple to avoid.
I mean, it's really a general trend... using the brain's receptors in ways they wasn't meant to be used isn't good for them.
I wouldn't go as far as saying that's absolute.
Abnormal brain states, activity patterns, are bad for you... they cause "shit" to float around in the brain for too long... etc
Meditation is usually considered good for you. Altered states of consciousness which effect all of the things you described above are not in themselves bad or harmful. It's dependant on how you get there and in some cases there is little evidence to suggest that even some drug related ones are harmful.
There has even been one study (that I read, anyways) about the effects of ayahuasca on South American natives that suggested the use may have possibly even caused their brains to function better than what would be considered an average normal in humans. (don't ask me where I found the study either.. hours of web searching).
I don't see why heroin would be the "wonder drug" the one drug out there which doesn't fuck with your brain...
Because it's almost an exact clone of existing chemicals in the brain and the brain does not respond to it any differently.
What your brain does do after regular use is develop a tolerance because of overstimulation. This isn't to say there is physical damage to the brain, though. It's simply your body adapting to chemical signals.
There is one thing, however, that I will agree with you although you have not directly addressed it. I do read on this board a lot about heroin not being unhealthy. As far as IV use is concerned, that's really unrealistic. If you frequently inject it into your veins, there are inevitable going to be some unavoidable health issues. Heroin itself may not cause damage, but using it inadvertantly will.
It's not a logical leap of faith to realize that putting a chemical in the brain which was never intended to be there, whose presence evolution was unable to account for and protect us from, in fairly large quantities, isn't helping.
Again, your brain does not interpret heroin as being unnatural. But I'm not going to say that regular use would be a good thing beyond the addiction issue.
