Posted on 05/27/2019 6:36:09 PM PDT by Mount Athos
About one in five Canadian adolescents uses cannabis and its recent legalization across the country warrants investigation into the consequence of this use on the developing brain.
Cannabis use was linked to impairments in working memory and inhibitory control, which is required for self-control. Cannabis use was also linked to deficits in memory recall and perceptual reasoning. Alcohol use was not linked to impairments in these cognitive functions, suggesting cannabis could have more long-term effects than alcohol.
Adolescent exposure to THC induces changes in specific a region of the brain called the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and in a brain circuit, the mesolimbic pathway, that closely resemble the abnormalities observed in schizophrenia. Furthermore, adolescent THC exposure also caused affective and cognitive abnormalities including deficits in social interactions, memory processing and anxiety regulation.
(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...
In neither of your replies do you explain how you expect “good” science to be done if no government funding is provided.
There is no evidence that the government controls the results of scientific inquiry. Scientists who get funding from the government—including almost everyone that I know—do the experiments and record the results. And the results don’t change because of the source of the funding. Believing that an experiment or study will have different results if they are funded by government vs. by some other means (which you did not specify) is like believing that a man literally becomes a woman if he just says he is. Reality cannot be altered by beliefs.
In other words, the fMRI studies that show alterations in brain structures don’t produce one set of images if the machine is purchased and operated with government funds versus with other funds. The machine works the same either way.
Next time you need medical care, thank government funded scientists and physicians for the fact that we have medical treatments.
So according to you there’s no science without gov funding?
The greatest scientists throughout history were usually god-fearing and self supported with altruistic views - simply wanting to think God’s thoughts on creation and nature.
The highly acclaimed ‘scientists’ of the past 100-150 years now show a decline in god-fearing and altruistic views and their results are all over the map whether something the FDA controls is good for you or bad for you.
And what good is more and more medical tech, drugs, procedures when gov involvement in most everything drives up costs exorbitantly. Doesn’t really benefit folks when it’s another ponzi scheme to take more and more of our hard-earned money. If you can’t afford it then where’s the benefit?
Case in point my last trip to the doc kept insisting to treat my high blood pressure - no idea that there are natural ways to reduce it just take the cheap med - that happens to be derived from the venom of a pit viper! No thanks, the 3rd most common way to die naturally in USA is properly prescribed meds. Now who has become the snake ‘oil’ salesman?!
Oh but it happens. We are not that naive. I smoked under age. All of my friends were underage. Children smoking and yes it is a gateway drug.
And they wouldn’t want their patients to know. Any of them in drug treatment programs. Fox watching the henhouse.
Is it?
So tell me when did you start shooting heroin?
I was close. Very close. I believe that I wouldn’t have graduated from high school if had continued another year. My friend and drug dealer, a very smart promising person, ended up in a “drug induced coma” and it was 12 years before he came to his senses. He lost 12 plus years of his life. Critical years. Life left him behind. Drugs destroyed his life and he never recovered.
That’s a fine story and all, but it misses the point.
You used it, but it didn’t take you through the gateway.
Why not?
You resisted its power.
How?
No, not a fine story. A tragedy.
But that is the 65,000 dollar question.
Maybe because I saw what it had done to my friend. Drugs and doing drugs had a stigma that might have helped to resist. Something that is lost these days.
I started using when I was underage and continued into my later teens. So, children will have access to it and all of the other nasty stuff.
I was a healthy and exercised a lot and realized that drugs would hurt my health.
I had a pretty good family life with people who were willing to support me in all of my foolishness. They may have suspected but didn’t know for sure. I remember watching Happy Days with my family while I was stoned. That was towards the end of my stint.
I had pretty good grades which allowed me to pull out of the nosedive and graduate when I finally decided to right myself.
My friend didn’t have a good home life so maybe that made the difference.
What was the turning point? Probably moving on and away from the drug scene. College (ironically) might have made the difference too — a life goal that consumed all of my free time and spare cash. It gave me enough time to mature beyond the perpetual immaturity that drugs encourage.
I was lucky.
On the other hand, my brother had a longer road to recovery than I. That is another story.
Let me shine the light of insight on the subject.
There are no gateway drugs.
What there is is gateway personalities.
You don’t have one, which is great. But there are people who, your friend apparently having one, and myself as well.
And yes, I suspect that homelife early on, as well as other factors in early life, plays a roll in the forging of such personalities.
But in every case, it is the individual person´s battle with their own dark side to win or lose, and sometimes a loss results in the ultimate price being paid.
The evidence is mounting that there is not a pre-existing condition
More claims from you with no supporting evidence supplied. Dog bites man.
the evidence is readily available to anyone who can do a keyword search in the PubMed database. [...] From 2003 until the present, over 20,000 articles have been published.
So every one of those 20,000 articles says there is not a pre-existing condition? Or by your personal daffynition, does sifting through 20,000 articles mean "readily available"?
you are so quick to dismiss the growing body of experimental evidence that shows pretty definitely that marijuana use is not benign.
I've never claimed it's benign and have stated the opposite; shame on you for such low tactics.
I challenged your implication that a mechanism observed directly in rats does not apply to human biology,
Actually, you haven't said anything to anyone on this thread about that subject. Your mind's fabrication of self-serving memories explains a lot.
it was clear that you are still trying to promote that marijuana is benign.
I do not claim benignity by pointing out that the posted article says it is not known whether adolescent cannabis use causes behavioral changes related to reward and motivation. Your desperate attempts to smear me speak volumes about your position.
Here is my prediction. Once people realize that pot, and the other drugs waiting in the wings to be legalized (RE: magic mushrooms, etc.), is harmful, the lawyers will line up like sharks in bloody water ready to bite. The states who once favored legalized pot and reaped the windfall in taxes, will turn on the producers and everyone else involved and demand that it be litigated so that they can get their cut of the blood pie.
After, all “we were lied to for years” by people like you and we were told for years that pot was not harmful and some even suggested that it was helpful and one point they even called it medicinal. I guess it is safe to promote drugs on a blog but be very careful if you do it publically.
I'd gird my loins for the eventuality, if I were you.
Right, because that's exactly what's happened with the legal harmful drug alcohol.
“After you ingest or inhale enough to alter your mood [usually for the better] you should stop but if you don’t your body simply flushes it out. “
Part about “flushing it out” isn’t true. Level in blood and tissue (mostly fat) keeps increasing. Marijuana excretion is much delayed compared to many other substances.
“After you ingest or inhale enough to alter your mood [usually for the better] you should stop but if you don’t your body simply flushes it out. “
Part about “flushing it out” isn’t true. Level in blood and tissue (mostly fat) keeps increasing. Marijuana excretion is much delayed compared to many other substances.
I’ve not lied, and I never said it wasn’t harmful.
The bluster You hear is your own.
Part about “flushing it out” isn’t true. Level in blood and tissue (mostly fat) keeps increasing.
The blood THC keeps increasing even after one stops ingesting? I call BS.
Work on your comprehension, dude.
(If you don’t stop...)
That makes a lot of sense. Lol. Stupid!
Oh, and legalizing pot will not increase the chance that kids will gain access to it. /sarc. Denver just approved magic mushrooms!
Next up, meth, crack, coke, heroin. Pot is indeed a gateway drug for mushrooms. What it did was eliminate the fear of drugs.
Here is the truth about libertarianism. Libertarians always preach to us about how they should be able to do whatever they want to their own bodies.
I will add and it is often not emphasized nor mentioned — as long as it doesn’t affect anyone else. This is important: there is always a consequence for “anyone else.”
There is a clear connection to the health of people using and once addicted, the addicted person becomes a liability to society.
Whether it is the cost of rehab or general health issues, some severe, or them simply not pulling their own weight, that society and the general public end up paying for. It is a form of welfare.
The solution here would be refuse treatment to people using because “they did it to themselves.” They were simply expressing their rights as a pure libertarian. Being rhetorical here.
And then there are the kids. Yes, kids are more likely to be exposed to drugs if their parents are using AND, an important point here, drugs no longer have the stigma that they once had. And pot is the cool thing to do after all it is “medicinal.”
Heck, some people are even claiming that it cures cancer. There is good evidence that it causes cancer. Something that we will learn in a few years when more people smoke it. Not withstanding, the changes to the brain chemistry.
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