Posts by Russell Brown
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Hard News: Before Lust, in reply to Jeremy Andrew,
I remember that book - I recall being mildly hypochondrialised by the VD section. Ironic given my utter lack of any opportunity to contract one.
I have a copy and I know what you mean. Eeew.
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Hard News: Before Lust, in reply to Ben Austin,
Will this talk be available via podcast?
Now you mention it, yes. Radio NZ will be recording them for broadcast. It's possible they might baulk at the stronger parts, though :-)
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Howard Marks weighs in :
These findings are likely to be mistakenly adopted by those who advocate continuing the prohibition of cannabis as a justification of their position. But assuming that such correlations are true, it is obviously important that cannabis use takes place within a framework where age limits may be imposed. I have been a dedicated supporter of the relegalising of cannabis since the mid-1960s. Neither I, nor any of the various pro-legalisation organisations with which I have been associated, have ever advocated that legalisation should not be accompanied by age limits and other controls. Age limits for a large number of activities are well entrenched and accepted by society, and tend to lie between the ages of 16 to 18.
But there are no age limits in a black market. Neither is there any other form of control. Prohibition is not control, and should not be equated as such. It is the abrogation of control leading to the unregulated peddling of adulterated substances outside the reach of the law. Apart from not beginning to achieve its aims, prohibition makes drugs artificially expensive and spawns an avalanche of acquisitive criminal behaviour.
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Hard News: Leaf and Tips, in reply to mark taslov,
(Richard)? Some people are more susceptible to psychosis. How are we as a society prepared to help them?
A strong social sanction on providing cannabis to young teenagers would help a lot.
It’s actually this kind of social prohibition that has helped turn around the meth boom. The P-pipe became a very uncool thing.
Then, under any kind of reformed cannabis law, it should still be an offence to provide it to under-18s. And there should be prosecutions if necessary.
You’d also hope it could become practical for people with genetic vulnerability to be identified and and warned of their particular risk.
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Up Front: Choice, Bro, in reply to Keir Leslie,
Winston’s stance on this is super scummy.
What a jerk. Easily the low point of the debate.
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Up Front: Choice, Bro, in reply to Emma Hart,
It was a hugely clever speech.
I was a fine speech. And not just for its intelligent framing of marriage equality in conservative terms (I was thinking of Craig for most of it). At one point she gulped with emotion. She meant it and it showed.
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Hard News: Leaf and Tips, in reply to Rich of Observationz,
That was proved by finding mechanisms of causation to confirm the epidemiological results. You can demonstrate experimentally that cigarette smoke is mutagenic, etc.
In the case of the link between adolescent cannabis use and adult psychosis, the Dunedin researchers identified a genetic predisposition in 2005 :
The team found that in New Zealanders with two copies of the "normal" version of COMT, smoking cannabis had little effect on their mental health. In people with one normal and one "bad" form of the gene, smoking cannabis slightly increased their risk of psychosis.
But for people with two copies of the bad gene, cannabis spelled trouble: smoking the drug as a teenager increased their likelihood of developing psychosis by a factor of 10.
This year, researchers at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland reported that they had shown physical changes in the brain related to COMT and adolescent cannabis use .
I presume this is the sort of thing you're calling for.
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Hard News: Leaf and Tips, in reply to Rich of Observationz,
Another point is that there are two problems with correlating IQ against drug use:
- there is substantial dispute as to the validity of the very concept of IQ
- there is a cause/effect ambiguity.Sure. But this comes on top of similar findings in the same study with respect to mental illness later in life. It’s becoming clear that the long-term risks of frequent cannabis use for people under (about) 18 are substantially greater than those for adults.
Perhaps the same people who use cannabis at a young age also take up life paths that militate against maintaining ‘IQ’ as they age (manual rather than knowledge work, less stimulating environments, etc). There’s also the known cultural bias in IQ testing.
The authors say they've done their best to correct for factors like those.
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Up Front: Choice, Bro, in reply to Lucy Stewart,
Brownlee voted for. I am genuinely staggered. Someone pointed out the age demographics of his electorate, maybe?
Perhaps, whatever his failings, he's actually not a social conservative. The only time I've met him was when he sat next to me on a plane. We discussed a New Yorker story we'd both read.