if modafinil were legal, it would become expected, and everything would be harder to match the increased ability of humans to be productive.
I tend to agree that this is a silly argument, especially given that it can be applied to coffee as much as to modafinil, so we better ban coffee, lest those allergic to it be at a disadvantage.
Or indeed to any technology. You may think you are better off using a combine harvester instead of a sickle, but actually it just shifts the expectation of how much grain you need to produce.
Yvain says in his posts’ comments that coffee doesn’t work, as tolerance builds up. This seems disputed.
But why not ban coffee? Because, like alcohol, it’s now too ingrained in our culture. But if it wasn’t—preventing headaches, irritability, concentration troubles, and the expectation that everyone can pull all-nighters? Fuck yes.
So, the world would be a better place if people like me (who drink butter-coffee everyday) had to give up their favorite health food or risk jail time? Consider me skeptical.
Coffee may not work to generate more virtual hours of productive time in the long run but that doesn’t mean that it’s use in time shifting sleep requirements etc isn’t still of net benefit.
I’ve been thinking about qat a lot these past few days, so I’ll tap out of the Far mode discussion. Just this: my problem with coffee is that people are often given too much work, which they require coffee and similar stimulants to accomplish. (Witness: programmers’ love for soda; project deadlines at university.) Qat doesn’t seem to have that problem.
It does have another problem: if you don’t want coffee, it’s usually socially acceptable to drink another hot beverage (though if you don’t want tea either you’re kinda screwed), whereas qat lacks an alternative.
Given the third world’s fondness for tobacco (eg. apparently China is now the largest and growing tobacco market in the world), isn’t chewing tobacco an alternative?
So legalizing modafinil (with corresponding reduction of stigma) leads directly to you having to work four hours more every day, gain an extra item on your budget (modafinil: $1000-$3000/year), get four hours less sleep (admittedly without restfulness cost, but still unpleasant especially for a lucid dreaming hobbyist like myself), plus suffer any unknown side effects of the drug that might turn up. And for all this, you get the chance to earn money that the economy immediately siphons off and throws away on more positional goods.
There is a number of fallacies in the above paragraphs, unusually many for a smart person like Yvain, so I assume that his “60% serious” disclaimer was missing a minus sign.
There is a number of fallacies in the above paragraphs, unusually many for a smart person like Yvain, so I assume that his “60% serious” disclaimer was missing a minus sign.
More generally, while very interesting, I find much of what he writes on his blog substantially less logically sound (but also more light-hearted, which I enjoy) than what he writes on LW, to the point that I constantly have to remind myself they’re the same person because I can hardly alieve that. (His writings on raikoh.net are somewhere in between.)
I apologize for accusing you of not reading the post.
I think your sarcastic coffee analogy is not quite apt. Yvain is advocating the status quo, which is more like “There is a ban on coffee from which me and people like me are exempt.”
Yeah, and that kind of people would still use coffee if it were a Schedule IV substance. And I can see no obvious reason why we are in an optimum, where restricting more or fewer stimulants would both be net negatives. (EDIT Actually, before even finishing to read the post, I thought ‘wow—if what he says about medical students etc. is right, we might want to restrict caffeine! I know I want to become stronger rather than my competition to become weaker, but I don’t know if that applies to others, so...’.)
I have not tried to write a mathematical model (should be reasonably easy), but my intuition tells me that the status quo is an unstable equilibrium. It will likely slide toward more universal acceptance, followed by either legalization or enforced prohibition (like with LSD).
I tend to agree that this is a silly argument, especially given that it can be applied to coffee as much as to modafinil, so we better ban coffee, lest those allergic to it be at a disadvantage.
Or indeed to any technology. You may think you are better off using a combine harvester instead of a sickle, but actually it just shifts the expectation of how much grain you need to produce.
Yvain says in his posts’ comments that coffee doesn’t work, as tolerance builds up. This seems disputed.
But why not ban coffee? Because, like alcohol, it’s now too ingrained in our culture. But if it wasn’t—preventing headaches, irritability, concentration troubles, and the expectation that everyone can pull all-nighters? Fuck yes.
So, the world would be a better place if people like me (who drink butter-coffee everyday) had to give up their favorite health food or risk jail time? Consider me skeptical.
Does it not work with decaf?
Coffee may not work to generate more virtual hours of productive time in the long run but that doesn’t mean that it’s use in time shifting sleep requirements etc isn’t still of net benefit.
Coffee may be too Near to discuss; I suggest a different even-older expensive teeth-staining addictive stimulant plant popular in social gatherings.
I’ve been thinking about qat a lot these past few days, so I’ll tap out of the Far mode discussion. Just this: my problem with coffee is that people are often given too much work, which they require coffee and similar stimulants to accomplish. (Witness: programmers’ love for soda; project deadlines at university.) Qat doesn’t seem to have that problem.
It does have another problem: if you don’t want coffee, it’s usually socially acceptable to drink another hot beverage (though if you don’t want tea either you’re kinda screwed), whereas qat lacks an alternative.
Given the third world’s fondness for tobacco (eg. apparently China is now the largest and growing tobacco market in the world), isn’t chewing tobacco an alternative?
You should read the post first.
I have, before replying to the OP.
There is a number of fallacies in the above paragraphs, unusually many for a smart person like Yvain, so I assume that his “60% serious” disclaimer was missing a minus sign.
More generally, while very interesting, I find much of what he writes on his blog substantially less logically sound (but also more light-hearted, which I enjoy) than what he writes on LW, to the point that I constantly have to remind myself they’re the same person because I can hardly alieve that. (His writings on raikoh.net are somewhere in between.)
I apologize for accusing you of not reading the post.
I think your sarcastic coffee analogy is not quite apt. Yvain is advocating the status quo, which is more like “There is a ban on coffee from which me and people like me are exempt.”
Yeah, and that kind of people would still use coffee if it were a Schedule IV substance. And I can see no obvious reason why we are in an optimum, where restricting more or fewer stimulants would both be net negatives. (EDIT Actually, before even finishing to read the post, I thought ‘wow—if what he says about medical students etc. is right, we might want to restrict caffeine! I know I want to become stronger rather than my competition to become weaker, but I don’t know if that applies to others, so...’.)
I have not tried to write a mathematical model (should be reasonably easy), but my intuition tells me that the status quo is an unstable equilibrium. It will likely slide toward more universal acceptance, followed by either legalization or enforced prohibition (like with LSD).
Probably, but that may take decades to happen.