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Does it matter?

Absolutely.

If there is no dose/response correlation, then there is little evidence of causation.

Without causation what do you have?

Yes, there is a positive correlation between smoking and a variety of health ailments, but so far no one has proven that x amount of smoking will produce y type of effects in humans.

IOW, some of you have to rely on falsehoods in order to further your agenda.

but so far no one has proven that x amount of smoking will produce y type of effects in human

You know, that would be some really useful info for once, if it was available.

I've smoked off and on since college. Lately, I've been doing more than I'd like - some weeks up to a pack a day.

Obviously, that's probably not good for me, although I really can't say I have experienced any negative side effects. I enjoy cigarettes and I am quite careful not to smoke where it would offend or bother non-smokers.

What I don't know, is how bad it is. There's not any information that I've found that helps put a certain level of smoking into perspective. Sure, the health industry's admonition that no smoking is best is an accurate, but nearly useless piece of information. Three packs a day for 30 years is almost definitely a serious health risk. How do you evaluate the risk of any level in between?

For example, is there some level of smoking that your body can "keep up with", purging the harmful substances as they're injested? No idea. If I were to cut back from one pack a day to half a pack a day, would that change my health risk? To what measure - by half, by a quarter, no change? No idea. Is it better/worse to smoke at a low level consistently, or binge ever weekend? No idea. How much do filtered vs non-filtered cigarettes change the equation, or do different brands have any effect? No idea. Are any of the above relevant? No idea.

It seems logical that there is a progressive increase in health risk, that varies by disease, based on the average number of cigarettes per day and the length of time at that level. Putting some concrete numbers on that risk would be a huge benefit to smokers. I have to believe that the data is there after all these years of studies.