A society that runs on stimulants is badly broken

A society that runs on stimulants is badly broken(currentaffairs.org)

49 points by pmg101 11 days ago | 26 comments

jollyllama 11 days ago |

Hasn't it been that way for at least a few hundred years? I'm surprised the article didn't mention the OG stimulant, tobacco.

theokrueger 11 days ago | |

coffee houses (previously a threat to the monarchy) would buckle at their knees in front of the dose in caffiene pills or energy drinks

even tobacco has turned to vaping to deliver more nicotine quicker

homer456 11 days ago | |

Sometimes I wonder if coffee is responsible for modernity.

mapontosevenths 11 days ago | | |

It literally is. Technologists are all the degenerate intellectual children of Voltaire - who famously drank 40-50 cups of coffee per day.

ahartmetz 9 days ago | | |

Probably, by replacing alcohol in places where people gathered during daytime.

BiraIgnacio 11 days ago | |

Perhaps since the beginning of what we came to call society.

nitwit005 11 days ago | | |

Even animals will do things like get drunk on fermented fruit. Humans just figured out how to get a regular supply.

hoppp 11 days ago | | |

The romans had society. No tobacco or coffee

throwitaway222 11 days ago |

I was on a prescribed stimulant for 6 months. It was nice for work, but it ended up with too many side effects that kind of mess with ones head. It tends to "simplify" complex decision making processes and not just for code but for life decisions.

suburban_strike 11 days ago | |

> It tends to "simplify" complex decision making processes and not just for code but for life decisions.

Improving executive function is literally the point of prescription stimulants.

Rather than endless spirals about whether you should do ___, it just makes everything sound like a great idea to you...for better or for worse.

Cocaine has the same effect, only amplified.

copperx 11 days ago | |

Simplifying decisions can be a positive outcome, just to add balance to your comment.

throwitaway222 11 days ago | | |

And I don't disagree!

deepc4life 11 days ago |

I don't know how we do it. I am much more clearheaded without coffee or anything of the sorts.

RevEng 11 days ago | |

There's a fine line, as with alcohol. A single cup of tea might feel refreshing. A monster energy drink is going to feel like a fight or flight response. Some people are also more sensitive than others and some are addicted more really than others.

deepc4life 9 days ago | | |

I guess I am a little bias here too - if my caffeine intake goes near 200 mg for the day then I get shaky. I have a friend who can toe the line at 700-800 mg! Which I read the other day that is the 'danger zone'.

hoppp 11 days ago | |

Its an addiction, just like a lot of things.

deepc4life 9 days ago | | |

So the article should be about how we are an addicted society to accurately capture the essence. You can be addicted to anything - good or bad or indifferent. And that's definitely the culture...

ElijahLynn 11 days ago |

I hypothesize that most of the stimulant use is actually due to poor sleep hygiene and jacked circadian rhythms, because of electricity and lighting on-demand.

And trauma, of course.

Barrin92 11 days ago |

I do find the economics / work narrative relatively unconvincing. For one workload in the developed world has fallen by about 40-50% over the last 100 years. Consuming stimulants is as popular among call it the 'lazy bum class' (no offense, I grew up in a deadbeat town) as it is among strivers. Coffee goes back five thousand years, Nicotine as far as recorded history, that is 10k+ years.

They've always had recreational or even ritual use, and the health fads against stimulants and cleansing crazes usually come from the work-obsessed than anyone else. So I don't think that we run on stimulants, I'm pretty sure we'd do them regardless.

MichaelRo 10 days ago |

>> There’s a generational split in those numbers; among the under-35 crowd, it’s 60 percent. The older demographic still prefers coffee, and 66 percent of Americans drink that every day, too.

But, but! Isn't coffee consumption supposed to provide health benefits too? Like "reduced risks of type 2 diabetes, heart disease, liver conditions, and overall mortality".

Seems odd to lump coffee into the same bucket with energy drinks.

card_zero 11 days ago |

> brutal labor conditions in Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar, and Indonesia, where more and more workers are turning to amphetamines to “work without stopping.”

...

> All of this adds up to one thing: a form of hyper-capitalist imperialism

Does this just not happen, then, in communist Vietnam or Laos?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Russian_drugs