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"But Rachel also has another hobby, one that makes her a bit different from the other moms in her Texas suburb—not that she talks about it with them. Once a month or so, after she and her husband put the kids to bed, Rachel texts her in-laws—who live just down the street—to make sure they’re home and available in the event of an emergency.

"And then, Rachel takes a generous dose of magic mushrooms, or sometimes MDMA, and—there’s really no other way to say this— spends the next several hours tripping balls."

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

What you're doing is colloquially known as "sealioning".

Science literally does not get much better than that. Plus the decades and decades of studies there are showing that smoke — in general — causes cancer.

Do you think it's the nicotine in cigarettes which is causing people to die? That that's why the mortality figures from cigarettes is so high? Or could it be that inhaling smoke is unhealthy?

You're demanding that I present to you where the chart I linked got their figures from, saying you absolutely refuse to believe there's any connection to increased mortality in any method of using cannabis — even the one where you INHALE SMOKE. How am I supposed to do that? I don't have access to their data. I have access to the same data that I presented to you. But if we want to pursue your query as to where these mortality figures might come from, well, obviously they're at least from the increased risk of cancer from smoking. I've said this several times but I suspect that if every single person that was involved in that study had actually used edibles instead of smoking, there would be much less mortality, if any.

So I don't understand what exactly you're protesting here. Because the most popular method (well, it might actually be edibles or vaping already in some places where it's legal) is smoking and smoking causes cancer. It feels like you're adamant that smoking cannabis magically makes smoking healthy. Which feels subpar compared to your normal rhetoric.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (2 children)

No. No I am not.

I am asking for where they got their mortality numbers.

It's clear you don't know and you're just guessing. I can only surmise because you want cannabis to be that deadly.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Hey man, I like cannabis too, but it is true that ignition based delivery systems(smoking) I think just generally cause cancer.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

That's not the issue. The issue is that their mortality numbers are suspect. How could they possibly know that all of those people died of lung cancer because they smoked cannabis? Especially when Cannabis is illegal in the UK where that chart is supposed to be from? I would like some actual evidence. So far, all the evidence I can find goes back to a pyschopharmacologist called David Nutt who seems to think cannabis is dangerous but won't show his sources either.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I'm guessing it's all estimated numbers from statistics. Personally, I'll always recommend dry herb vapes or just getting regular THC vapes from more reputable brands, or shit make your own vape liquid if you think you can do it on your own(although I hear this way can be risky).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

What statistics? Because I've looked and I can't find any.

I don't know why either your or the other person are just assuming this is true based on nothing at all.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

I'm guessing the claims of cannabis potentially giving some people cancer, come from the estimated population of cannabis smokers, which is probably going to be lower than the current population of tobacco smokers, and then finding out how many people died from smoking(ignition based delivery systems that are basically what's to blame for cancer), and then just extrapolating from those two points that there's probably gonna be some extremely regular smokers of cannabis who've gotten cancer. Of course cannabis being WAY less addictive than nicotine means that the average cannabis smoker in general is still unlikely to develop cancer when compared to the average tobacco smoker, but the very exposure to smoke just increases your chance of developinng cancer anyways when compared to somebody who doesn't smoke anything.

Like I think it's just common sense. The other guy may have made a more specific point that is wrong though, idk, I just skimmed the convo

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

That the thing. You're guessing.

This is not supposed to be about guessing.

They do not reveal the source of their numbers and any searching I do goes back to David Nutt, who does not explain where he got the data.

You both need to be more skeptical about this sort of thing. Even if cannabis can lead to lung cancer that doesn't mean this data is anywhere near accurate.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

What do you mean even if?

Smoke from burning that plant isn't somehow magic and different to all other smoke.

Inhaling smoke can lead to cancer.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Now you’re just evading the point.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I'm not evading anything. Your entire argument throughout this submission has ultimately whittled down to a disbelief that inhaling smoke can have adverse health effects and, yes, cause cancer.

Why say "if"? It's not "if" - it is a well-established fact of biology.

You may as well be saying "if the world really is a sphere", or "if climate change is real".

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Nope. My entire argument has been that their source for mortality figures is highly suspect.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Stop the sealioning.

Firstly, there's nothing suggest they're suspect.

And secondly, back to what I'm actually talking about, you're clearly trying to cast doubt on whether breathing in smoke is bad for you. There is no "if". Smoking does cause cancer.

And it may shock you to find out that cancer does indeed cause death (it's true, cancer really does cause death. I can give you sources on that if you like).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Firstly, there’s nothing suggest they’re suspect.

Apart from the fact that, as I said, they come from David Nutt, who won't say where he got the numbers from. Why that isn't an issue to you, I don't know.

you’re clearly trying to cast doubt on whether breathing in smoke is bad for you.

I am doing no such thing. If you're going to lie about what I am saying directly to me, this conversation is over.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Read the study.

You are doing such thing. You've repeatedly sidestepped it, and keep using language to cast doubt on it.

I want you to tell me right now that breathing in smoke, unequivocally, causes cancer, and therefore death.

Again, this is not a thing in doubt. It's not an "if". It's an established fact.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I have read the study. Both of you have told me to read the study. I did. I don't think either of you did or you would quote what supports the chart's claim that there is a significant mortality risk due to using cannabis.

The study simply does not show where this information comes from.

Don't tell me to read the study when you have not.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Does inhaling smoke cause cancer, yes or no?

Why are you evading this so much? Why do you seemingly not believe that inhaling smoke can cause cancer? It absolutely does.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Why are you evading this so much?

Now that is some irony. You've been evading my one claim this entire time: the mortality numbers are suspect, something I was saying before you even replied to me. No, I'm not going to move on to the lung cancer thing until my issue is addressed first. I'm not going to just drop what I was talking about initially and talk about what you want to talk about instead.

You also evaded what I literally just said- that you didn't read the study you told me to read.

Do you see yourself when you look in the mirror?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

The entire time? You've mentioned it to me once. You say the numbers are suspect. You're free to start your own peer-reviewed study to prove that. I await the findings.

Answer the damn question: does inhaling smoke cause cancer or not?

Why is this so difficult for you? What's with the evasion? It's a one word answer.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Now you're just lying. I mentioned it to you over and over again. What a silly thing to lie about. It's right there in the comments.

I also said this to you:

I am doing no such thing. If you’re going to lie about what I am saying directly to me, this conversation is over.

Which you have now done once again. So this conversation is over.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (2 children)

The lenghts you go to to avoid admitting you said/did something that might be considered silly.

That is the first reply you made. I then explained no-one is saying that cannabis is killing people — admittedly having forgot the mortality stat on the chart. The mortality stat doesn't mean cannabis is "killing" people.

Then you start your inane sealioning, which you continue up until yesterday, at which point you blame me and @[email protected] of "not reading the study" and it "not having sources", but you keep referring to Nutt's study, when it cites it sources, which you clearly haven't gone and read, which I've linked quite a few times now.

What I'm betting you did is read the cover of this link: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(10)61462-6/abstract saying "they don't say where their numbers are from". That's like reading the back-cover of a murder mystery and saying "it's dumb, they didn't even resolve the whole murder!"

If you actually log in and read the FULL TEXT, you will see the data.

They source several different studies for different citations. I've done the work for you and here's the most relevant ones.

https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=50ba3efb0204557af6b762141f94c9a68cb9e291

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Robert-Gable/publication/14984972_Toward_a_Comparative_Overview_of_Dependence_Potential_and_Acute_Toxicity_of_Psychoactive_Substances_Used_Nonmedically/links/557613d908aeb6d8c01aea8d/Toward-a-Comparative-Overview-of-Dependence-Potential-and-Acute-Toxicity-of-Psychoactive-Substances-Used-Nonmedically.pdf

They also explain just how they've weighed all the data:

During the decision conference participants assessed weights within each cluster of criteria. The criterion within a cluster judged to be associated with the largest swing weight was assigned an arbitrary score of 100. Then, each swing on the remaining criteria in the cluster was judged by the group compared with the 100 score, in terms of a ratio. For example, in the cluster of four criteria under the category physical harm to users, the swing weight for drug-related mortality was judged to be the largest difference of the four, so it was given a weight of 100. The group judged the next largest swing in harm to be in drug-specific mortality, which was 80% as great as for drug-related mortality, so it was given a weight of 80. Thus, the computer multiplied the scores for all the drugs on the drug-related mortality scale by 0·8, with the result that the weighted harm of heroin on this scale became 80 as compared with heroin’s score of 100 on drug-specific mortality. Next, the 100-weighted swings in each cluster were compared with each other, with the most harmful drug on the most harmful criterion to users compared with the most harmful drug on the most harmful criterion to others. The result of assessing these weights was that the units of harm on all scales were equated. A final normalisation preserved the ratios of all weights, but ensured that the weights on the criteria summed to 1·0. The weighting process enabled harm scores to be combined within any grouping simply by adding their weighted scores. Dodgson and colleagues3 provide further guidance on swing weighting. Scores and weights were input to the Hiview computer program, which calculated the weighted scores, provided displays of the results, and enabled sensitivity analyses to be done.

So no matter how much you want to sealion and pretend you weren't wrong and didn't say anything silly, I have offered you the data several times. And this all ignores the fact that you keep ADAMANTLY IGNORING a question I've put to you more than a dozen times; do you accept that a lot of cannabis use is SMOKING and that SMOKING causes increased mortality?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (2 children)

They have excited a desire for to the this conversation to end. At this point, your borderline harassing them. Please let it go.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

Fair enough.

Just really irks me when someone pretends like they "won" the debate while leaving.

"Don't play chess with a pigeon. They will just shit on the board and knock over pieces."

And it irks me because I really had faith in him, and now the blindly ignorant hypocrisy they've displayed here has basically ruined one of the biggest posters on Lemmy for me. Eh. Too bad.

Thanks for the warning instead of just banning, that's some good modding. I respect that.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

"I declare I have won the debate. Goodbye."

Nah. It's fair enough to call them out on their bullshit.

Leaving one comment is not harassment. And if they really feel harassed, the block function is always available.

All I wanted was a one word answer to whether smoking causes cancer/death. Apparently a dozen long-winded comments about stuff I was never talking about in the first place was easier.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Read the study. Then look at the references.

Why can't you accept that inhaling smoke causes cancer? Why are you evading this simple yes or no question so much? It doesn't take long to type out a yes or a no.

Come on mate, this isn't hard. Inhaling smoke causes cancer. You're sounding like a climate denier or antivaxxer when you're being this blatantly anti-science.

You literally asked how cannabis can kill, were given an answer (smoking is bad for you), then refused to accept it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You are denying that there's any evidence for mortality being increased from any way of using cannabis. That's the very strong implication you're giving off here.

You definitely didn't even browse the studies I linked.

I'm very disappointed. This is really hurting the respect I have for you.

A popular method of using cannabis is smoking. Do you disagree?

A very obvious consequence of smoking is an increased risk of mortality from an increased risk of cancer and cardiopulmonary disease. Do you disagree with this?

If you don't disagree with either, then you know where the figures came from, at least partly. I'm sure you can try to look them up for yourself if you have such a burning need to browse them in detail.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I am doing no such thing.

I am asking where they got their figures from. You have no idea. Telling me "do your own research" will not tell me where they got their figures from.

No matter how much you object to it, I'm not going to take a chart with no sources at face value.

No one should.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Fine, be childish. I'll do the work for you, so you can't even use your asinine sealioning to get out of this one.

https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/06/25/what-is-the-most-dangerous-drug

So that's the article I linked. It says:

That question is the subject of a report published today by the Global Commission on Drug Policy, an independent group of 26 former presidents and other bigwigs.

The study in question:

http://www.globalcommissionondrugs.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/2019Report_EN_web.pdf

Which says:

Mortality is defined as risk of lethal overdose (drug-specific), OR BY life shortened by factors other than overdose (drug-related)

This graph is based on the scientific modelling made by David Nutt et al. (Drug harms in the UK: a multicriteria decision analysis, The Lancet, https://doi.org/10.1016/S6-61462(10)6736-0140), and their assessment of the various harms of drugs used for recreational purposes in the UK, using multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA)

Huh. Other factors? No way we could know what mortality related factors there could be in using cannabis, seeing as the most popular method is burning it and inhaling the smoke? Geez. I wonder what we'll find, right?

Let's see. You just copy the link from there. Select it, and then you can use a handy keyboard shortcut, just press "CTRL+C" while you have something selected, and the computer copies it to memory! Oh, the URL seems corrupted because of the formatting of the PDF. Just select the title mentioned there and paste it (CTRL+V), and you'll find this: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21036393/ which has a functioning link: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(10)61462-6/abstract

All the data is there. Satisfied, or still gonna just stomp your foot and yell "no no no no smoking cannabis magically makes it healthy and thus there's zero increased mortality rate from anything related to cannabis, not even smoking and inhaling it"?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Cool. But I asked you the source of the mortality numbers. You still haven't given them to me.

This was literally in that PDF:

The UK government treats these as much more dangerous or desirable (from the consumer perspective) than those others already mentioned despite overwhelming evidence that psychedelics are very safe (almost no deaths) and are rarely abused. cannabis is also relatively safe having been a medicine in the UK until 1971

From what I can tell just searching for the word 'cannabis,' something you did not do, this information all comes from a psychopharmacologist called David Nutt who seems to have a particular hard-on for talking about the dangers of cannabis.

Without ever showing his sources on mortality.

I know you didn't read the entire report in the time it took you to reply, and neither did I. But it didn't take me long to find that, which puts the whole mortality number thing under suspicion.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

"whole mortality number thing under suspicion"

You're acting as if you're arguing this in good faith. That's not the case anymore, since you've ignored half a dozen replies in I point out that there are two facts which I'm sure you can not disagree with. 1. Smoking is one of — if not the — most popular ways of consuming cannabis. 2. Smoking anything is unhealthy and causes an increased risk of cancer.

There is a third fact as well. Namely that they clearly say "Mortality is defined as risk of lethal overdose (drug-specific), OR BY life shortened by factors other than overdose (drug-related)"

If I were to ask you to name anything risky in relation to the usage of cannabis (not the substance itself), would you be able to name anything, or would you just stand there like a teenager who discovered pot, claiming nothing related to cannabis can ever be harmful?

Just like with the crack v cocaine harm part of it, it's not due to the pharmacological properties of the substance that the chart is like that. Smoking is more addictive than other methods of use (sometimes in some studies even more so than shooting up, depending on the substance). It's also unhealthy.

You're treating this as some DARE propaganda. It's well researched data, and I'm pro drug legalisation, and I'm sure you won't argue the facts over smoke in your lungs being bad for you. So I genuinely don't understand what you think you're protesting here.

I don't think I've ever used this saying in such a suitable moment; you're barking up the wrong tree.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

None of that is the source for the mortality numbers either in that chart.

I'm not why you can't just admit you don't know the source. You don't. You simply don't.

Also, why are you even talking about cannabis overdoses now? Do you know the LD50 of THC?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

There's nothing that would satisfy your criteria for the "source". I've literally pasted the DOI number of the study that the numbers are from. You're sealioning, just like I said.

I'm quoting the study where the numbers are from, and I still haven't mentioned any "cannabis overdoses". It literally says “Mortality is defined as risk of lethal overdose (drug-specific), OR BY life shortened by factors other than overdose (drug-related)”

This means that the "mortality" bit of the chart isn't even implying that cannabis has directly caused someone's death. Not even remotely has anyone implied that, yet it's all you keep going on about, while ignoring the facts.

We know where the numbers are from. First off, we have the actual study, go ahead and read it. Secondly, (AND THIS IS THE PART YOU KEEP IGNORING), do you disagree with the following facts; first that smoking is a popular way of using cannabis and secondly that smoking causes cancer?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (11 children)

There’s nothing that would satisfy your criteria for the “source”.

Aside from an actual source of actual mortality numbers, which I asked for. And yes, I looked up the links you pasted, which you did not. None of them give the source either, other than Nutt.

All of this comes from this Nutt, who is apparently aptly named, because he's apparently just making shit up. And you just accept it for no apparent reason other than you want people to die from cannabis.

First off, we have the actual study, go ahead and read it.

I read your links. You clearly did not. In fact, you pasted them within minutes of my responses so you didn't even have time to. It's pretty silly to tell someone to read links you haven't read as if they prove your point.

do you disagree with the following facts; first that smoking is a popular way of using cannabis and secondly that smoking causes cancer?

We'll discuss this as soon as you acknowledge that there is no legitimate source for the death information in the chart you gave. It all comes from one guy who just doesn't like cannabis rather than any sort of actual medical information.

Edit: If you are going to lie and claim you read all of that, I think this part of the conversation where you didn't realize the chart had mortality information and told me to read the chart to see that there isn't any when there is shows quite clearly that you don't read the information you provide very carefully:

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I think this part of the conversation where you didn't realize the chart had mortality information and told me to read the chart to see that there isn't any

Well, when you revise history and change what you said originally it'll come across that way, yeah

As you can see in your own fucking picture there: you originally kept asking who cannabis was killing, which isn't on the chart mortality is, but that goes beyond direct killings, which has been their entire goddamn point

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Sorry... you think mortality from a drug is different from being killed by a drug? What?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You just pay 0 attention to what people clearly and concisely explain to you, dontcha squid?

Drug mortality is defined as any contributory cause-of-death that involved one or more of the following drugs:

And then it lists off shit like meth, coke, anti depressants, etc. as you can see, I've bolded the relevant part

You originally said "who got killed by weed", which is different entirely. Nobody has died of smoking weed (that I know of), people HAVE died because they were high (that's a mortality)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

So the mortality for cannabis doesn't apply to people who just use cannabis and it has no indication of what other drugs they might have used?

That is beyond useless information. That tells you absolutely nothing. Your chart is garbage.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

It is, yes.

Drug-specific mortality and drug-related mortality are two different things.

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