Post: #51

Post: #52

(02-16-2014 09:25 PM)LeonsGreenWifeBeater Wrote:  

(02-16-2014 08:17 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  kapitaw, these testosterone studies (which are in any case inconclusive and contradictory) only serve to obscure the issue.

There is no need to rely on specific "studies" that look at a very particular and noisy measurement of the intractably complex human endocrine system, when we know from everyday observation that, while there are exceptions to this, habitual pot smokers have the tendency to become sluggish, lazy and passive as time goes on.

Yeah ignore the science and focus on what you perceive to be true...cant see any fault in that logic...

I love it when people who often have no understanding of any kind of science trot out the all-purpose scarecrow phrase "the science" to justify the idea that any "peer-reviewed study" no matter how ill-designed, inconclusive, or outright irrelevant, is necessarily a better basis on which to form conclusions about a subject than the totality of human experience about that subject.

There is no such thing as "the science". There are different sciences, developed to very different levels of quantification and predictive power. Overestimating the applicability of a weakly developed and under-quantified scientific field -- let alone of a single, limited, and inconclusive "study" -- can be as or more dangerous as ignoring the valid conclusions of a mature and powerful one.

If I'm going to design and build a bridge, I will rely on the conclusions of harshly quantified mechanics and materials science to determine whether or not the bridge will hold, not on my personal impressions on that subject (even though the latter might still add some value). But if I want to evaluate something as intractably complex as the effects of a prolonged administration of a psychoactive drug on such elusive but no less real phenomena as morale, motivation and joie-de-vivre in no longer very young men, I would be a fool and a simpleton to rely on the outputs of a small number of measurements of this or that specific indicator in one or two studies, as opposed to the totality of human experience and observation on the subject at hand.

Post: #53

   

Post: #54

Howard stern?

Post: #55

(02-17-2014 12:10 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  

(02-16-2014 09:25 PM)LeonsGreenWifeBeater Wrote:  

(02-16-2014 08:17 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  kapitaw, these testosterone studies (which are in any case inconclusive and contradictory) only serve to obscure the issue.

There is no need to rely on specific "studies" that look at a very particular and noisy measurement of the intractably complex human endocrine system, when we know from everyday observation that, while there are exceptions to this, habitual pot smokers have the tendency to become sluggish, lazy and passive as time goes on.

Yeah ignore the science and focus on what you perceive to be true...cant see any fault in that logic...

I love it when people who often have no understanding of any kind of science trot out the all-purpose scarecrow phrase "the science" to justify the idea that any "peer-reviewed study" no matter how ill-designed, inconclusive, or outright irrelevant, is necessarily a better basis on which to form conclusions about a subject than the totality of human experience about that subject.

There is no such thing as "the science". There are different sciences, developed to very different levels of quantification and predictive power. Overestimating the applicability of a weakly developed and under-quantified scientific field -- let alone of a single, limited, and inconclusive "study" -- can be as or more dangerous as ignoring the valid conclusions of a mature and powerful one.

If I'm going to design and build a bridge, I will rely on the conclusions of harshly quantified mechanics and materials science to determine whether or not the bridge will hold, not on my personal impressions on that subject (even though the latter might still add some value). But if I want to evaluate something as intractably complex as the effects of a prolonged administration of a psychoactive drug on such elusive but no less real phenomena as morale, motivation and joie-de-vivre in no longer very young men, I would be a fool and a simpleton to rely on the outputs of a small number of measurements of this or that specific indicator in one or two studies, as opposed to the totality of human experience and observation on the subject at hand.

I agree with you that scientific studies aren't very conclusive and you can find a study to corroborate whatever side of an argument you may be on. However, in this case I'd place more weight in a couple of studies that went through the scientific method and found no link between testosterone and marijuana than opinions on the internet that stoners are pussies. I linked those studies because reading this thread was the first time I've ever heard a claim of a relation between marijuana use and testosterone levels. I was curious for my own health so I looked into it, and I'm going to believe the lack of scientific evidence over the perfect example of bro-science going on in this thread.

I was really only challenging the link between testosterone levels and marijuana use, not motivation or laziness or anything like that. That's something that would be very hard to provide scientific evidence for on either side of the argument. I do think it's important to challenge your own anecdotal evidence though. There is a rampant stereotype of the lazy stoner who just sits on the couch and eats munchies. I believe this is what conservative America and people anti-marijuana want people to believe marijuana does to people. There are countless media representations of people smoking pot and they're all uniformly negative (think the picture Ali linked above).

I agree that marijuana can make people sluggish, lazy, and passive as time goes on. Yet so can alcohol, television, food, marriage, the workforce, etc. My argument is that these people you see burning out and being negatively affected by marijuana over the years already have the character traits of laziness. They would find a way to be lazy even if they weren't smoking weed.

Also, anecdotal evidence can't be relied upon because people have different experiences. I'm sure there are many people who have experienced lazy stoners but I believe most people's perceptions are clouded by the media representations of marijuana. I've seen lazy stoners and I've also seen functional, successful stoners, which is something that you'll never seen on television or in movies. Blindly stating that weed makes you lazy and sluggish is akin to saying all PUA's are creepers living in their mom's basements wearing eyeliner and fuzzy hats. It's just media stereotypes that have been accepted as a norm.

Post: #56

It's all about your priorities man.

I haven't smoked weed in like a month because I am looking for jobs/internships so that I can make the money. Because with da money I can buy better clothes.

But seriously, make sure you got the important things done first before doing weed.

Source: I'm a talking gold medal!

Post: #57

Well I smoked. I'm starting over tomorrow. I was off today and end up day drinking and really wanted t smoke and gave in.

Post: #58

(02-17-2014 12:10 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  

(02-16-2014 09:25 PM)LeonsGreenWifeBeater Wrote:  

(02-16-2014 08:17 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  kapitaw, these testosterone studies (which are in any case inconclusive and contradictory) only serve to obscure the issue.

There is no need to rely on specific "studies" that look at a very particular and noisy measurement of the intractably complex human endocrine system, when we know from everyday observation that, while there are exceptions to this, habitual pot smokers have the tendency to become sluggish, lazy and passive as time goes on.

Yeah ignore the science and focus on what you perceive to be true...cant see any fault in that logic...

I love it when people who often have no understanding of any kind of science trot out the all-purpose scarecrow phrase "the science" to justify the idea that any "peer-reviewed study" no matter how ill-designed, inconclusive, or outright irrelevant, is necessarily a better basis on which to form conclusions about a subject than the totality of human experience about that subject.

There is no such thing as "the science". There are different sciences, developed to very different levels of quantification and predictive power. Overestimating the applicability of a weakly developed and under-quantified scientific field -- let alone of a single, limited, and inconclusive "study" -- can be as or more dangerous as ignoring the valid conclusions of a mature and powerful one.

If I'm going to design and build a bridge, I will rely on the conclusions of harshly quantified mechanics and materials science to determine whether or not the bridge will hold, not on my personal impressions on that subject (even though the latter might still add some value). But if I want to evaluate something as intractably complex as the effects of a prolonged administration of a psychoactive drug on such elusive but no less real phenomena as morale, motivation and joie-de-vivre in no longer very young men, I would be a fool and a simpleton to rely on the outputs of a small number of measurements of this or that specific indicator in one or two studies, as opposed to the totality of human experience and observation on the subject at hand.

Here's a recap

Dude asks:
"Does MJ make your T go down?"

Another guy says:
"Here's a study that says no."

You say:
"Ill just trust my own judgement."

Which is far more ridiculous that blindly trusting a study. For a variety of reasons.

1) You are around people who aren't high and act "normal" This of course the makes the data you are drawing on very polluted.

2) You can't "see" T levels...Of course high T will be correlated with happier, more aggressive men and the reverse is probably true also, but still you cant actually see what you're claiming to be a good judge of.

3) These loser burnout types that we are all talking about...Well how did they behave "before" they started smoking weed? If a weakling starts smoking weed, can we really blame the weed when the dudes still weak twenty years later?

Post: #59

(02-16-2014 02:34 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  

(02-16-2014 01:17 AM)frenchie Wrote:  For the record, I smoke everyday. I also hit the gym daily, pay my bills, go to work, and complete tasks like any other adult.

Doesn't affect my ability to do life tasks or complete goals. I'm more dominant when I'm blazed to the point of intimidation. I'm better sober simply because I put more energy into being nice.

frenchie, you're a young guy (around 25 I'd guess) so you may be able to get away with it for now, but I'd watch it over time -- you always want to quit while you're ahead with this sort of thing.

One of the main ways your body and brain change as you get a little bit older (even late 20s and 30s) is that it gets harder to flush out the effects of a repeated insult such as the long-term administration of a drug. You can feel just as well in every way in your 30s and 40s as you do in your 20s if you keep your shit clean -- but you can also start taking damage of both obvious and less obvious kinds if you keep jamming your brain with a psychoactive drug like pot day in day out.

Again, don't want to be a buzzkill here -- but you want to enjoy your life and your body to the utmost for a long time to come, so watch it and don't hesitate to set the pot aside if you feel the least sign of a problem, anything like sluggishness, lower libido, less interest in life, and so on. No matter what, if you're still doing it regularly past your late 20s you're trying your luck.

Good advice. I know older folks that were old school hippies who have no retired. They've been on the ganja for decades and managed to lead their lives just fine. Even then though, all this stuff affects everyone differently.

I'm probably going to take a month off sometime and see what it does. The last time I took a detox was about a month and a half. Honestly, I was miserable and started drinking more. I wouldn't be surprised if now things are different since I work out a lot more. I'll report back.

Post: #60

As far as my experience goes the reactions can be totally different. I know some guys who smoke that stuff every day and who are totally fine and I know other guys who smoke it a few times and walk around like zombies. It all depends on how you can handle it.

Post: #61

(02-18-2014 12:25 AM)LeonsGreenWifeBeater Wrote:  Here's a recap

Dude asks:
"Does MJ make your T go down?"

Another guy says:
"Here's a study that says no."

You say:
"Ill just trust my own judgement."

Which is far more ridiculous that blindly trusting a study. For a variety of reasons.

1) You are around people who aren't high and act "normal" This of course the makes the data you are drawing on very polluted.

2) You can't "see" T levels...Of course high T will be correlated with happier, more aggressive men and the reverse is probably true also, but still you cant actually see what you're claiming to be a good judge of.

3) These loser burnout types that we are all talking about...Well how did they behave "before" they started smoking weed? If a weakling starts smoking weed, can we really blame the weed when the dudes still weak twenty years later?

Nope. You're missing the point.

"Testosterone levels" are a distraction. Do you really believe that there is a single magical measurement of any one quantity such as that of serum testosterone levels which can summarize the effects of a drug on a human being? Or that the measurement of this quantity, just because it's a quantified measurement published in a "peer reviewed journal", is supposed to replace the conclusions of the totality of human observational experience on this subject -- not just my personal experience and observations, though even that would indeed be vastly
more valuable than any single study -- but the experience of other guys on this forum, and everyone else who has ever commented on this?

You're acting as if this one quantity -- serum testosterone levels -- is some sort of sufficient description of a man's state. No need to look at the guy, observe how he acts, ask him how he feels, or report on any of 1000 other indicators -- just measure his serum test and there's your answer. While there are some questions that can be pretty much completely answered by measuring a single indicator, the effect of a psychoactive drug on the human being is very definitely not one of those questions.

Now it so happens that I actually know something about the likely mechanism -- or at least one of the main mechanisms -- of the adverse impact of marijuana usage on men. The active ingredient in marijuana (THC) strongly inhibits the binding of DHT (the main metabolite of testosterone) to the androgen receptor, thereby blocking its action:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6249575

Quote:Endocrinology. 1980 Sep;107(3):848-50.
Marihuana inhibits dihydrotestosterone binding to the androgen receptor.
Purohit V, Ahluwahlia BS, Vigersky RA.
Abstract

Marihuana and its constitutents delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol (delta 9-THC) and cannabinol (CBN) were tested for their ability to interact with the androgen receptor in rat prostate cytosol. Smoked marihuana condensate, delta 9-THC, and CBN inhibit specific binding of dihydrotestosterone (DHT) to the androgen receptor with a dissociatin constant of the inhibitors (Li) of 2.1-5.8 X 10(-7)M. in addition, other metabolites of delta 9-THC were also androgen antagonists. This data suggests that the anti-androgenic effects associated with marihuana use results, at least in part, from inhibition of androgen action at the receptor level.

In other words, while marijuana may not directly lower test levels, it strongly inhibits the downstream action of its main metabolite, so the result is essentially the same (or actually worse, because it is easier for the body to regulate raw serum levels over time than to counteract this inhibitive effect).

Now that I've shown you what "the science" actually is on this subject, let me restate the main point. Although these results are clear and probably explain much of the effect, they are still far less important than what we see in everyday life. If I didn't know the science on the subject, but I knew only that potheads and stoners tend to get lazy, sluggish and dull over time, and that countless other people have observed the same thing -- my conclusions would not change in the slightest; I would just say that while the mechanism of action is unknown, the effects are obvious, and that's that. And conversely, if I knew that everything in this paper was true, but neither I nor anyone else could ever detect the least observable impact of pot smoking on guys who have done it for years -- I would then say, yeah it seems to inhibit the binding of DHT to the androgen receptor, but clearly there is something else that goes on to compensate for it because the end result is that it seems to have no effect.

Again, and for the final time: while "the science" in this case in fact happens to be understood at least to some extent, for a subject of such complexity, and given the general immature state of this science as a whole, this is mostly a distraction. There is more -- vastly more -- to learn from the totality of shared human observation on a subject such as this one, than there is from this or that peer-reviewed study.

Post: #62

I felt pretty alpha a couple nights ago when I was watching porn on my big screen, chilling on the couch with my girlfriend, she started riding my dick reverse cowgirl, while I was talking a fat rip of sour diesel off my double bubbler. It was very cool, I recommend all you guys try it.

Smoking weed can make you kind of passive while you are stoned, a lot of it depends on the person, the type of weed, the way they smoke it, and the circumstances. Smoke weed on your off time when you are just "chilling", times like when you watch a dvd on a week day night, at a concert when you want to enjoy the music, at the beach or on a lookout point with a dope view. Don't smoke it when you are about to spar at an MMA gym, before going out to spit game at a night club, or when you need to get a lot of shit down and make quick decisions.

There is a time and place for everything. I don't get the weed haters, sure it might not be your cup of tea, but quit trying to act like every person who tokes is some World of Warcraft basement dwelling 40 year old beta. Arnold was a frequent toker, as are a lot of "alpha" athletes, politicians, businessmen, criminals, and musicians, rappers, etc. If anyone watches "Real Sports on HBO" former professional football players were interviewed and it was said that roughly half the guys in the NFL smoke.

Post: #63

@ ognorcal, nobody is denying that smoking weed is enjoyable. You're probably more responsible than me. I'm talking about being constantly stoned and I'm trying to figure out if the cons outweigh the pros

Post: #64

Just be honest and ask yourself why are you taking it? There is nothing inherently bad about it, if you use it at time of leisure to unwind from the day, or to enhance an already pleasurable experience, I don't see a problem. If its used as a crutch or as an escape from reality tool, then you fucked up.

Post: #65

(02-19-2014 06:00 AM)FilipSRB Wrote:  Just be honest and ask yourself why are you taking it? There is nothing inherently bad about it, if you use it at time of leisure to unwind from the day, or to enhance an already pleasurable experience, I don't see a problem. If its used as a crutch or as an escape from reality tool, then you fucked up.

Nailed it. This is true about any "vice".

Post: #66

At least one third of NFL players smoke weed.

Post: #67

I'm sure that 1/3 of the NFL don't smoke during the season. I'm talking about constantly being stoned here.

Post: #68

JoyStick, I think you posted this thread because you already know that for you, the cons outweigh the pros. You're just trying to get your mind around what you need to do.

Nothing could possibly be less relevant here than discussing the supposed exploits of Arnold or NFL players. These are world class athletes whose physical lives are completely different from that of a normal guy; why would anyone even mention such freaks of nature in this context? They're of no use whatsoever in understanding how smoking pot day in day out affects the brain and body of a normal, no longer very young man.

Post: #69

Sidenote, most of my bangs in college came from bringing girls back to my place to "smoke". it should definitely be apart of any players arsenal.

Post: #70

Second that. Don't underestimate the power of weed as a social lubricant, and use it to your advantage.

Post: #71

It does make you passive, as in you feel more lethargic and static, even when you smoke sativa weed, which is the alert and high energy weed after you come down. The more you smoke you build up in your system, which makes you lose motivation. It's great every once in a while when you're with a fresh girl before sex, but there is a WEED HANGOVER. Use it sparingly and watch how much more energetic you feel. Truthfully, I smoked before and I would still get shit done, but one time I had my intuition tell me to stop it all together, just to reach my peak and my game and productivity skyrocketed.

Post: #72

At first, just a couple of hits are enough. But pretty soon you want or need a few more hits. Eventually that's not enough and it's now a whole joint.

It reaches a point where you expect each joint to take you higher, so you smoke even more. The evil devil weed now has you in its grip.

That's the point where you need to quit, or take a long break, and examine why you are getting high.

Post: #73

I lived many years in Boulder, Colorado. I knew many habitual users - daily, weekly, every other day-type users. My friends, in fact.

Virtually EVERY habitual user is self-medicating some other problem away. IF you go off and are tempted or feel a strong need to resume, there are lots and lots of safe and legally prescribed drugs to help with things like too much anxiety. These will all have fewer side-effects.

One might be using because of undiagnosed ADD/ADHD. If you use a lot of caffeinated products daily, you might need to address this more directly with amphetamines. It could change your life!

IF you have depressive episodes, then maybe bi-polar medications are indicated. This is similarly important.

But most likely, it's anxiety or depression you're self-medicating. In all these cases, there are more than one set of drugs to try with far fewer side-effects.

DO THIS, get equilibrated - and then try MJ, recreationally - socially. At a party. Months later. It may very well change your game, your life, and the pleasure-profile you can can achieve with it.