Marijuana...

[jotabe]

Excuse me but... what was the question?

Seriously, capitalism (well, we are a capitalist country, more or less) doesn't really affect this. It's education. Changing people's mindset on the matter, giving more social prestige to Science and R+D.
There are many companies that have collapsed for lack of innovation, and companies that succeed because they innovate... still people don't believe yet that innovation matters.
People still love to say that scientist are ignorants, and rejoice when fakes and crook scientists are discovered (rejoice for the wrong reason, i mean).

[AnthonyByakko]

Excuse me but... what was the question?

The question was why Spain didn't have money.

Seriously, capitalism (well, we are a capitalist country, more or less) doesn't really affect this.

I beg to differ. Capitalism (or the lack thereof) directly affects the kind of wealth being created in any given nation. I have never lived in Spain, but I wouldn't call it "capitalist" - either in the common misconception of it, or in the true understanding of it.

It's education. Changing people's mindset on the matter, giving more social prestige to Science and R+D.

These are certainly aspects that could be changed to help allieviate the problem, but we'll touch on that in the next paragraph:

There are many companies that have collapsed for lack of innovation, and companies that succeed because they innovate... still people don't believe yet that innovation matters.

Innovation is the hallmark of capitalism - competition breeds innovation, and innovation breeds wealth - which in turn provides the funding necessary for thorough education and research

EDIT: I'm not saying that you're wrong. Merely that a freer market creates a freer society. This is not a discussion about socialism (which is what Spain is), but of capitalism (which is an economic, rather than social discipline.) I'm not saying your social policies are the problem (some people think I am sometimes) but rather your economic policies (and the economic policies of most countries, too.)

[luminousnerd]

Lol, Spain isn't socialism

But I think you're right, mostly. I don't pretend to know a whole lot about Spain, but really, capitalism motivates people to push further.

[AnthonyByakko]

I think of any highly-mixed economy as socialism. So our definitions may not be congruent. However, we agree that laissez-faire (capitalism) is not what they (or most countries, for that matter) actually have.

[luminousnerd]

I think of any highly-mixed economy as socialism. So our definitions may not be congruent. However, we agree that laissez-faire (capitalism) is not what they (or most countries, for that matter) actually have.

Well, yeah, no country has true socialism, no country has true capitalism. It's always a mix. I don't think any country really resembles what socialism is supposed to be about. Not that I've read about every little country or anything...just making a general statement and I'm prepared to be corrected if I'm wrong.

[jotabe]

I, instead, only identify socialism with planified economies. Spain has not a planified economy, though i'll say that maybe some sectors of it are highly regulated (mostly i am talking about the energy and building). Still, the philosophic bases of our economy lie in supply-demand, so i'd call it capitalist. Difference between regulation and socialization is that a regulated system will let the private initiative to control the market, but stablishing a frame for their operations. Of course this frame can be more or less rigid.
USA has a lot of regulation, too, though it is less rigid than Spain in most aspects (i will not say if i consider this to be good or not).

Btw, my "what was the question" was trying to quote that famous grafitti in an american university that said "Clinton is the answer", and then someone wrote below "and what was the question?".

Something that is true is that, for a long time (historically speaking, i mean), Spain lacked private initiative. So governments tried to favor it with protectionism (every country went through the protectionist stage). Still, while the rest of Europe started to enjoy democratic-parlamentarian democracies, Spain chained totalitarian governments which isolated us. In this situation, governments had to sustain the private initiative with rich subventions. I guess that old-school CEOs got too used to that, and they still expect the government to protect them, so they still can reap benefits despite their inefficiency.
As a piece of data, i can tell you that Spain is, within the western world, the country with the lowest productivity per worker... but still is one of the countries were workers spend more time at work.

[Eaquae Legit]

Just in case we have further dispute over marijuana research in the US, I logged onto one of my library's available journal archives, JSTOR. I selected the categories of Biological Sciences, Botany & Plant Sciences, Developmental and Cell Biology, Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, Health Policy, Health Science, and Psychology. A total of 134 peer-reviewed journals.

I searched for "cannabis OR marijuana," with the search restricted to only English, and only Articles.

There were 971 results. On the first page alone, there were four results from the American Journal of Nursing, two from the American Journal of Botany, one from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, and another four articles which explicitly studied the United States. Eight articles touched on the decriminalisation debate. Another 8 dealt with the chemistry/biology of marijuana

So really, if anything, it seems that the United States is a leader in the study of marijuana.

Moving along now.

[Bevis]

http://www.dailytribune.com/stories/010 ... t001.shtml

enjoy

[eriador]

This article from Salon.com gives a good overview of why Marijuana is illegal in the United States. It's a story of racism, greed, yellow journalism and corruption that may surprise you (it surprised me). Enjoy.

P.S. Digg readers, this is the article from the frontpage earlier today.

[jotabe]

This article from Salon.com gives a good overview of why Marijuana is illegal in the United States. It's a story of racism, greed, yellow journalism and corruption that may surprise you (it surprised me). Enjoy.

P.S. Digg readers, this is the article from the frontpage earlier today.

Oh look! it is in the Internet!
Then it MUST be true!

[luminousnerd]

Oh look! it is in the Internet!
Then it MUST be true!

He didn't say or imply that at all. The article backs itself up well.

[jotabe]

Yeah! very well backed, i might add!

[eriador]

It has a couple things going for it:
1. It's on Salon.com, which is well respected on the internet (and I mentioned that)
2. It supports itself well.

You might read it before criticizing it...

[jotabe]

Any cite to peer reviewed papers on specialized journals? Any cite to any History college text book? Any cite to anything serious at all?

[fawkes]

Have you looked at the bottom of the page? Those references look pretty legit to me.

[luminousnerd]

Any cite to peer reviewed papers on specialized journals? Any cite to any History college text book? Any cite to anything serious at all?

I think it's stupid that you automatically disregard anything that doesn't reference someone famous. I think it's perfectly okay to prove your opinion with your own words.

Maybe it's more convincing to you if they use citations. However, why should you automatically discard everything said simply because it came from someone's mouth and not from a famous book?

[eriador]

Have you looked at the bottom of the page? Those references look pretty legit to me.

They're from:
A Speech to the California Judges Association 1995 annual conference;
VIRGINIA LAW REVIEW. VOLUME 56 OCTOBER 1970 NUMBER 6;
the Editors of Consumer Reports Magazine;
The History of the Marihuana Tax Act of 1937 By David F. Musto, M.D.;
The Report of the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse;
The Marihuana Tax Act of 1937;
Marijuana - The First Twelve Thousand Years by Ernest L. Abel;

Yeah, totally disreputable sources. I think they all sound pretty legit to me. Just because they aren't "peer-reviewed" doesn't mean they're wrong; as a matter of fact, peer reviewed literature is no better than anything else (remember the South Korean human cloning thing a while back?).

[jotabe]

lolmedicinejournals

Nah, sorry, medicine journals aren't that bad. And the fact that as soon as it passes through the peer-review, other people will try to replicate your results give me enough confidence.

The authors of that web accuse the press of being yellow. Now that's the pot calling the kettle... yellow.

All conspiracy/creationist/paranormal books/articles have the same structure. They cite books, lots of books. When they cite actual work, they take it out of context. And they make sure they have PhDs and College proffessors amont the authors.
Well, it's all the same: conspiracists/creationists/paranormalists will never get me to take them seriously.

[eriador]

Okay, how about instead of saying that they might have been cited out of context, you look up the citations, look at the facts, and see how well the story holds up. I'm pretty sure that Salon.com will have had at least a brief fact-check to look for glaring errors, and I doubt that such a high-profile post (front page of Digg) would have been deeply wrong. However, you are right that I might be wrong. It would be nice if you would back up your assertions, instead of just insinuating. If people were taken out of context, show me.

As to the "pot calling the kettle yellow," I think that it's widely accepted that W.R. Hearst did practice "yellow journalism," it's not like that charge is unheard of or original.

And I still don't get why you are so convinced that this article is wrong about what it says. I know I can be this way, but I guess that I don't see any point in insisting that this article is unsupported.

EDIT: How about it everybody, what do you guys think of the story this article sets forth?

[luminousnerd]

I read it a while back, before I was a pwebber, and found it interesting that there was racism involved. I know quite a few reasons why the government would want it illegal, but I hadn't heard of that one. It certainly makes sense though.

Anyway, it's a great article, and I also don't see any reason for someone to make all of that up when there is plenty of well-documented, factual information to use against the drug war.

[eriador]

It was quite surprising to me. However, it makes just as much, if not more sense than a lot of what our government does.

[luminousnerd]

It was quite surprising to me. However, it makes just as much, if not more sense than a lot of what our government does.

You are so right.

[liquifiedrainbows]

Excuse me but... what was the question?

Seriously, capitalism (well, we are a capitalist country, more or less) doesn't really affect this. It's education. Changing people's mindset on the matter, giving more social prestige to Science and R+D.
There are many companies that have collapsed for lack of innovation, and companies that succeed because they innovate... still people don't believe yet that innovation matters.
People still love to say that scientist are ignorants, and rejoice when fakes and crook scientists are discovered (rejoice for the wrong reason, i mean).

Capitalism has everything to do with this. Why?

Marijuana has been proven to help alleviate pain ie get rid of headaches help with body aches etc. if they legalized it marijuana would cause tylenol sales to go down.

[Jebus]

You know, luminousnerd, awhile ago you made this comment:

I have seen the facts, and my opinions are always either informed or nonexistent.

And it struck me as odd, because it's plainly not true. But then everything made sense when I read this post:

I think it's stupid that you automatically disregard anything that doesn't reference someone famous. I think it's perfectly okay to prove your opinion with your own words.

Maybe it's more convincing to you if they use citations. However, why should you automatically discard everything said simply because it came from someone's mouth and not from a famous book?

If you don't understand the point of sourcing information or the fact that people have the ability to lie, twist the truth and make mistakes, then I'm not surprised that you're always so tragically wrong.

[eriador]

actually, luminousnerd, didn't you say in the marriage thread that you were "right" even though you didn't have any evidence? And then you said that -^. Crazy.

[Sibyl]

Marijuana has been proven to help alleviate pain ie get rid of headaches help with body aches etc. if they legalized it marijuana would cause tylenol sales to go down.

Surely you aren't serious! Tylenol, aspirin, many other painkillers, don't make you nonfunctional while they're alleviating pain!

Marijuana for recreational purposes, alleviating things where you probably aren't trying to function anyway like chemo nausea from cancer, glaucoma, are one thing.

Cooling down a headache or a joint pain is entirely something else.

[luminousnerd]

If you don't understand the point of sourcing information or the fact that people have the ability to lie, twist the truth and make mistakes, then I'm not surprised that you're always so tragically wrong.

I said it's OKAY, not that it's the only way to prove something, or even the best way. I completely understand the point of sourcing information, as I made very very very f****** clear. All I said was that it is okay to say something without sourcing information!

And opinions cannot be wrong! You're really starting to piss me off with that attitude! It's not healthy debate when you resort to attacking the person of your opponent.

[luminousnerd]

Surely you aren't serious! Tylenol, aspirin, many other painkillers, don't make you nonfunctional while they're alleviating pain!

Nor does marijuana. It only affects you, does not make you nonfunctional. Some studies have shown (though I won't be linking you to them because I only remember it, and if you don't believe me that's your own problem) that marijuana actually increases your productivity at things you enjoy doing, but decreases your productivity for things you dislike.

Marijuana for recreational purposes, alleviating things where you probably aren't trying to function anyway like chemo nausea from cancer, glaucoma, are one thing.

Cooling down a headache or a joint pain is entirely something else.

If you had ever tried it I suspect you would realize that you are dead wrong. I say this because you are not stating an opinion, and I do not say it to attack you. You are simply a victim of propaganda, and I am sorry for you.

[luminousnerd]

actually, luminousnerd, didn't you say in the marriage thread that you were "right" even though you didn't have any evidence? And then you said that -^. Crazy.

They are out of context.

If it is pure opinion, and it cannot be proved as fact one way or another, then my belief is always right. That doesn't mean the other person's isn't. But it's completely opinion, it all depends on your OWN beliefs, so you are always right.

[wigginboy]

actually, luminousnerd, didn't you say in the marriage thread that you were "right" even though you didn't have any evidence? And then you said that -^. Crazy.

They are out of context.

If it is pure opinion, and it cannot be proved as fact one way or another, then my belief is always right. That doesn't mean the other person's isn't. But it's completely opinion, it all depends on your OWN beliefs, so you are always right.

If it is pure opinion and cannot be proven, your belief is not automatically right . It might be what is right to you, which is perfectly fine, however, that does not make it right when looking at it from an objective point of view. If something cannot be proven, and neither can your argument, no one is right, except for the fact that until proven, nothing is fact. I am a human being: that is FACT, it has been ascertained by any who have met me, and all those who observe me; there are aliens on Jupiter: this is an untrue statement, but not just because I do not believe it. It is untrue because it has not and cannot as yet be proven. Beliefs are just that, a set of beliefs that you, the individual hold to be true. Beliefs can be anything, and they can be completely true to you, but when you are talking in the real world with real people, who have beliefs aside from your own, it is unwise to state your beliefs as fact. This is how holy wars start. One side states that their relgious ideology is true, and the other side refutes that claim, claiming that their doctrine is absolute fact. The involved parties get pissed at each other and wage war. Beliefs are ideas that you hold valuable to yourself. Facts are statements that have been proven through the scientific method, or other such process that is allowed to define something. Sorry for my slight derailment, i hope we can now get back to some serious marijuana discussion.

[luminousnerd]

Okay, great, what do you want me to say? I agree with what you said, but it doesn't contradict what I have said. There are things that are simply opinion matters. They cannot possibly be proved. Period. End of story.

Thus, if you want to look at them as automatically wrong, be my guest, but you're being a cynical a******. Not to mention a complete hypocrite, because it is 100% impossible for a human being to believe his/her own opinions are wrong (that would contradict the definition of opinion).

Regardless, what do you expect to come of this? What do you want me to do? Is this it?

Okay, I'm sorry, I was wrong, I'll never do it again, yada yada? I don't get what you're after here, by arguing completely non-related, unimportant, trivial bits of what I say, yet leaving alone the important parts that actually matter to the discussion.

On a lighter note

I think this is a pretty controversial topic. I would not presume to try to start a club myself, being a new and not a respected pwebber in general. But I think that there could be a marijuana debate/discussion club, with separate topics for each point of debate (IE, Medicinal, Personal, Drug Company Conspiracy, wasted drug war money, etc etc)

[Jebus]

luminousnerd, if I'm of the opinion that you're always wrong, and opinions can't be disproved (according to you), does that mean it's true?

I think this is a pretty controversial topic. I would not presume to try to start a club myself, being a new and not a respected pwebber in general. But I think that there could be a marijuana debate/discussion club, with separate topics for each point of debate (IE, Medicinal, Personal, Drug Company Conspiracy, wasted drug war money, etc etc)

Yea, we really do need a place where we can discuss marijuana.

[Sibyl]

Surely you aren't serious! Tylenol, aspirin, many other painkillers, don't make you nonfunctional while they're alleviating pain!

Nor does marijuana. It only affects you, does not make you nonfunctional. Some studies have shown (though I won't be linking you to them because I only remember it, and if you don't believe me that's your own problem) that marijuana actually increases your productivity at things you enjoy doing, but decreases your productivity for things you dislike.

Marijuana for recreational purposes, alleviating things where you probably aren't trying to function anyway like chemo nausea from cancer, glaucoma, are one thing.

Cooling down a headache or a joint pain is entirely something else.

If you had ever tried it I suspect you would realize that you are dead wrong. I say this because you are not stating an opinion, and I do not say it to attack you. You are simply a victim of propaganda, and I am sorry for you.

Sorry, Lumi, but I am speaking from personal experience, for several years, long before you were born, and on which the statute of limitations has long run out. I don't have a problem with not believing you. I quit when I got pregnant, which is how I know that it's not addictive, because while I quit marijuana easily, I was only able to cut way down on tobacco, and didn't try on caffeine, because I didn't realize that caffeine was a Bad Thing for pregnancy. I stayed quit when the baby was born, because I didn't want to be nonfunctional with a helpless person in the house whose life depended on my functionality (designated driver). (And if you think anyone really _likes_ changing any particular diaper, you are wrong! ) The baby is 32 years old now, and I never got around to going back to it, for many reasons depending on the year. I believe that it should be legal for recreational as well as medicinal purposes, but that people should use good sense when using it.

[Sibyl]

This article from Salon.com gives a good overview of why Marijuana is illegal in the United States. It's a story of racism, greed, yellow journalism and corruption that may surprise you (it surprised me). Enjoy.

P.S. Digg readers, this is the article from the frontpage earlier today.

Oh look! it is in the Internet!
Then it MUST be true!

To the best of my knowledge and belief, the Salon article is accurate.

[luminousnerd]

luminousnerd, if I'm of the opinion that you're always wrong, and opinions can't be disproved (according to you), does that mean it's true?

No, because it's not an opinon that can't be disproved. I can disprove it right now by saying: The sky appears blue.

Sorry, Lumi, but I am speaking from personal experience, for several years, long before you were born, and on which the statute of limitations has long run out. I don't have a problem with not believing you. I quit when I got pregnant, which is how I know that it's not addictive, because while I quit marijuana easily, I was only able to cut way down on tobacco, and didn't try on caffeine, because I didn't realize that caffeine was a Bad Thing for pregnancy. I stayed quit when the baby was born, because I didn't want to be nonfunctional with a helpless person in the house whose life depended on my functionality (designated driver). (And if you think anyone really _likes_ changing any particular diaper, you are wrong! Smile ) The baby is 32 years old now, and I never got around to going back to it, for many reasons depending on the year. I believe that it should be legal for recreational as well as medicinal purposes, but that people should use good sense when using it.

I'm confused here, I thought you were saying it did not have medicinal purposes? I agree with what you've said here.