statistical difficulties

[miriam_e]

In a couple of places recently I've read the uncritical statement that caffeine and nicotine have some apparent protective effect against alzheimers. I find this difficult to believe. I have seen spurious statistical effects before and have to wonder if this is another. Did study control for the number of people killed by cigarettes and coffee? If people die earlier from cigarettes then a younger, intrinsically more resilient group will remain, who may well be less likely to get alzheimers, but not because nicotine protects; it would be simply that the cigarettes had already killed the most susceptible.

I know people are fond of saying that caffeine is safe, but I frankly don't believe it (to my shame I do drink caffeine). When I was a kid I embarked on an experiment with a friend at school to mutate fruit flies by feeding caffeine to them. Doesn't sound like a safe substance to me. Doesn't it strike anybody else as odd that caffeine producing plants are rendered fairly safe from pests. Why would that be do you suppose? Perhaps the insects are, in a sense, smarter than we are. I am almost willing to bet that some day in the future we will find that caffeine has been afflicting society with massive health problems that we have been studiously ignoring, just as we did for so long with cigarettes, and still do to some degree with alcohol.

Comments

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

That's unfortunate about your cousin. I guess she hasn't really found a compelling reason to stop. Complicating any argument against drug use is the fact that addictive drugs create their own need and thereby skew the user's value system in favor of continued use. It is a very difficult thing to disentangle it from your "normal" judgments because in a sense we don't have a normal way of thinking. We change from hour to hour and day to day. Something that I like early in the morning may irritate the hell out of me late at night. One day I'll love visiting the coast, and another day I'll wonder how anybody wanting to retain some shred of sanity could even consider spending any time there. One day I'll see a sunset that will leave me breathless with awe, and another I'll see a similar or even more stunning one that feels merely nice. Add drugs onto our shifting natures and it isn't so surprising that one day she'll see that it is ruining her life, then another she'll think, fuckit I need another hit no matter what. It is a pity.

My brother gave up cigarettes so many times that he once told me that he had given up giving up. But he did eventually kill the habit. How? He just decided to. He just never had that next cigarette. Afterwards he was pissed off that he'd spent so much time and effort trying and in the end he just did it because he had reason to.

I think I was never particularly interested in heroin in the first place, so stopping never presented a great problem. My values all lie in another direction. I've known all along that speed was the drug I'd have to be careful of, so I avoided it. I think I might have had difficulty getting off that if I'd been unwise enough to get involved. I don't know... I have a feeling that my ability to think clearly is too valuable for me to get addicted to that either.

[xxclovergrrlxx.livejournal.com]

oops. this is late, but i've been avoiding the internets as of late haha.

i really liked what you said about our shifting nature. it reminds me a lot of a buddhist concept called the 10 worlds. but since buddhism typically gives explanations/parables for what we do see in everyday life, it's not exactly interesting enough to provide an explanation... especially since you already seem to have a pretty firm grasp of the concept. i hadn't thought about applying it to drug use though.

i understand exactly what you mean about the drug thing. for example, i have heard that ecstasy is fantastic. one friend told me that the pleasure he received from ecstasy was a million times better than any sex he could ever have. i also like techno music a lot, but these two things frequently tend to go together. a friend of mine told me he enjoys techno music, but it always seems lacking whenever he's not on E so techno really just makes him want to do drugs. for this reason, he has found that he has to avoid clubs to avoid drugs. but for me, i've never opened that door so i am able to enjoy the experience just as it is and not constantly wish for something else. i have no doubt that i would probably enjoy E, i just don't ever want to go there. i'd rather just be happy with the situation as presented and not desire some completely harmful illegal chemical. i do believe that there is such a thing as having too much fun.

[miriam-e.livejournal.com]

heheh :) I haven't been using it much lately either. Been putting up with headaches for the last couple of days because I stopped drinking caffeine at long last. This time I won't take it up again.

The buddhist connection is interesting. Thanks for that. It stands to reason that it is one of the things they'd tend to see better than most. I have a lot of time for the thoughtfulness of buddhism.

Keeping away from something that you know you'd enjoy too much sounds weird on the surface of it, but I always remember some horrible experiments done decades ago, where some ghoulish experimenters inserted electrodes into what they thought might be the pleasure centers of rats' brains and let them press a lever to energise the electrode. (We humans can be such monsters!) The idea was that they were dosing themselves with pure pleasure. The poor damn rats ended up dying because they neglected to eat and drink, endlessly pressing the lever. That always stuck in my mind. But even more horrifying is that the experimenters were wrong; they weren't pleasure centers, but were to do with compulsion. So these poor little guys were trapped in an endless cycle of compulsive behavior. Nevertheless the concept of substituting fake pleasure for real pleasure is still a valid one. Real pleasure aims to make you better able to live (even if it doesn't always work out for the best). Fake pleasure is not related to life at all, and can much more easily easily get in the way of it.

[xxclovergrrlxx.livejournal.com]

that's pretty messed up about the rats. interesting though. yes, our society is very wrapped up in fake pleasures though, even aside from drugs. our materialistic yearnings, which many attribute to a 'pleasure', will eventually cause more misery. getting that camero you always wanted will only create more worry and attachment. be it just the natural unstoppable decay of the physical or an often inevitable scratch or accident. this is a very basic premise of buddhism. attachment makes real happiness unattainable.

regarding drug use though, i know many pot heads who need to be high each and every day to "feel normal", as they say. they say without pot, they are too stressed and don't feel right. but life is stressful! lol. they avoid actually dealing with life and it's problems by running to a drug which makes them feel that life is different. but avoiding reality is not helpful and just creates more stress when one is thrust back into it. it is very sad to me that some people's lives are this way. in buddhism, real happiness is attained by dedicating yourself to others and helping them find their happiness. self-centered happiness is too fleeting so the goal is to realize the connection between everyone and everything so that eventually, others happiness does become your own. most problems arise from the illusion that it is us vs. them and a need to establish your own superiority.

fyi, i'm not there yet, haha. but i try! i'm currently in the state where i still very much act on impulse, but i know enough to contemplate my actions afterward and try to do better in the future.

since you seem interested, i'll give you a small overview of the ten worlds. basically, the philosophy is that we live in an ever shifting state of 10 worlds/life states.

these are: hell, hunger, animality, anger, humanity/tranquility, rapture/heaven, learning, realization, bodhisattva, and buddha.

the first 6 are called the lower life states because any human beings can experience these without much effort. they do not help much for self improvement. on the other hand, the last 4 require effort and are considered positive life states. however, it is said that all of these exist within us simultaneously. buddha exists in hell, realization in anger, etc. so no matter what life state you are currently in, the potential for greater is still there. it is also said that even though they are referred to as the "lower 6", that does not mean that there is no good in the bad. going through "hell" is often needed to develop empathy for others experiencing the same situation. "anger" can be redirected toward an oppressive force for the betterment of society. even the fleeting emotion of "rapture/heaven" can give us a renewed sense of purpose at times.

this concept is also used to attribute to the shifting nature, like we were talking about before. i read one book that described it in this way:

imagine that there are two people driving up a mountain. storm clouds begin to form and a light rain develops.
the first person feels the mountain is menacing. the sky then begins to darken and even worse! now it's raining! he is depressed and feels on edge.
the second person, however, is thoroughly enjoying the scenery. the mountain is beautiful and majestic in his mind. he sees the birds flying and the interesting mountain animals. then it begins to rain and he notices the interesting cloud formations. he enjoys the sound of the light pitter patter of rain on the windows and feels at peace, happy to experience this moment.

these are two completely different interpretations of the same event. it is obvious that it is not the external forces causing these feelings, although we often attribute it to them. but rather, it is the external giving rise to the "feelings" already within us. it is actually our nature, something within us, that is shaping our view of the world. once you realize it is not the external, but the internal, then you realize that your emotions/feelings/interpretations are not out of your hands. this concept helped me a lot with my depression. i still become depressed, but i realize now that i am actually in control. i may not be able to affect everything that goes on in the world, but i can affect the way that it affects me.