Do Recreational Drugs Help Programmers? 878
jfruh writes "Among the winners of last night's election: marijuana users. Voters in both Washington and Colorado approved referenda that legalized marijuana for recreational use, though the drug remains illegal under federal law. There's been a long-standing debate among programmers as to whether recreational drugs, including pot and hallucinagens like LSD, can actually help programmers code. Don't forget, there was a substantial overlap between the wave of computer professionals who came of age in the '60s and that era's counterculture." (There's even a good book on that topic.)
Caffine (Score:5, Insightful)
Absolutely.
Woot (Score:3, Informative)
First cup of coffee gets first post!
I can sleep (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Contradictory ... (Score:5, Insightful)
It is not contradictory in the least, he goes home, smokes, relaxes, and in that relaxed state he thinks about his job in a relaxed and creative state and he writes down the ideas and brings them to work.
What about that is contradictory?
If you do think it is contradictory do you have personal experience with being high?
Re:Contradictory ... (Score:4, Informative)
Today I learned that no one who experiences stress of any kind is happy, ever.
Thank god Slashdot has such good psychology credentials.
Re:Contradictory ... (Score:5, Informative)
The weed relieves the stress and makes him happy.
It really isn't that difficult to understand.
I have depression issues, I take anti-depressants, it is not contradictory that the end result is that I am not depressed.
Re:Contradictory ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Contradictory ... (Score:5, Insightful)
You can be a top contributor and still be stressed... dur. Most people drink a beer or a glass in the evenings to relax, what people have been saying this ENTIRE TIME is that puffing a spliff to achieve that effect is exactly the same.
Re:I can sleep (Score:4, Interesting)
Do the people you talk about also drink alcohol?
What you are describing is clinical depression.
I know with me a lot of the issues you mention went away when I quit drinking and got medication for bi-polar depression.
I still smoke pot and my psychiatrist is perfectly fine with me smoking pot, but alcohol is a strict no no.
Re:I can sleep (Score:5, Interesting)
No, if it were weed, it would be incomplete.
The pattern resembles caffeine more than weed.
There's a famous study that was done about the effects of drugs on the ability of spiders to spin webs.
Web-spinning resembles coding to a degree, both are engineering tasks, both have to be completed in a timely manner or the author starves.
What they found was caffeine made the spiders very productive, but rather sloppy. That sounds like Windows to a T.
Weed on the other hand made the spiders do very detailed, ornate work, but they seemed to have wandering minds, get bored and leave their webs unfinished. I don't know what OS that would correspond to.
LSD had the effect of the spiders becoming very parsimonious with their effort. Webs constructed by LSD-spiders are typically minimal but very elegant. This makes me believe that Unix was probably dreamed up by some acid-heads.
The study
http://www.trinity.edu/jdunn/spiderdrugs.htm [trinity.edu]
Re:Caffine (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Only if you use it rarely. If you use it regularly, your body will get used to it and usage will only get you to the same level as those who don't use it. And not using it will drop you below their level. But I think you can recover within a week or two if you stop using it.
Re:Caffine (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Caffine (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3)
Same experience here. 2-3 days of mild withdrawal symptoms whenever I temporarily quit caffeine! Of course I never really quit because I end up drinking it again at some point.
Re:The other side of the coin (Score:5, Funny)
I doubt your story based on that!
Re: (Score:3)
Re:The other side of the coin (Score:5, Interesting)
I almost never drink coffee or tea with caffeine. Not that I'm against them, I just don't like them, I prefer herbal teas. No Mtn Dew or Cola either.
The problem is when I do need some caffeine (Monday overflow or something) if I drink a small cup of regular coffee, I get all anxious and shaky, my pulse increases and overall I feel bad. So, if I didn't get enough sleep, coffee does not make me feel better.
This happens to me with weed... I generally have a better experience with it if I'm using it regularly. If I let my tolerance get too low it makes me uncomfortably anxious and paranoid. I've heard other people say this too.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
was anybody talking to you, faggot? if you value your health, you better shut the fuck up too.
Whatever it is that you are taking, you should probably back off of it a bit.
Re:Caffine (Score:5, Funny)
Dude, decaf.
Re:Caffine (Score:4, Insightful)
Caffeine does zip after about a week of (ab)using it. After that you just need it to be normal.
Re:Caffine (Score:4, Insightful)
It depends on the drug and on the programmer.
maybe (Score:5, Funny)
I will program something while not being high and see if it makes a difference, later though. So far I am still collecting data points.
Re:maybe (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:maybe (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think the idea is you code while high. I think the idea is that getting high last night affects the way your brain works today. Either because of simple stress relief or something more complicated. LSD in particular is known to have serious and long lasting effects on brain function, and not all of them negative. For example, a single dose of LSD can increase the chances of an alcoholic staying sober by a significant margin, significant enough that if it weren't for the stigma associated with it it would probably be part of standard rehab.
Re:maybe (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.trinity.edu/jdunn/spiderdrugs.htm [trinity.edu]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effect_of_psychoactive_drugs_on_animals [wikipedia.org] [
There's some evidence that humans shouldn't use marijuana if they are young and their brains are still developing: http://www.medicaldaily.com/articles/11417/20120809/marijuana-brain-damage-memory-learning-drug-habit-addiction.htm [medicaldaily.com]
Re:maybe (Score:5, Funny)
Here's a video of the drugged spiders
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1n15JxrBJ8 [youtube.com]
Re:maybe (Score:5, Interesting)
There's some evidence that humans shouldn't use marijuana if they are young and their brains are still developing:
I would be very surprised if there wasn't evidence, since it seems self-evident that any psychoactive drug is going to affect a developing brain in some way or another. Which is one of many reasons drug laws are stupid: It's easier for a kid to buy pot than for an adult. This is ass-backwards.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
> Don't believe the hype, and stop spreading misinformation.
> If you want to join the party come informed.
Um... you are falling into the same trap. Not all drugs are the same, they don't affect the same systems within the body/brain, they don't metabolize the same ways, they are not the same.
Alcohol hangovers are pretty complex and are due to various issues from dehydration to the effects of various metabolites of alcohol and what they do in your system (or what alcohols even, its long been noted that
Re:maybe (Score:5, Insightful)
As I've heard somebody say (my experience confirms it too): "People on drugs think they are creative and productive. Everyone else thinks they are on drugs." The same can be said about alcohol.
Re:maybe (Score:4, Funny)
I'll drink to that....err....wait...
Re: (Score:3)
too broad a statement, sounds like establishment FUD. what kind of drugs? you have proof anyone died young from MJ use? LSD use?
Re:maybe (Score:5, Insightful)
Although I was raised around drugs and I smoke pot on a regular basis I know for me that is not a good idea to get stoned at work, for two reasons.
1) I'm trying to get a job done, but I am impaired so I can't do my job well.
2) I'm trying to enjoy this high, but I am concentrating on getting my damn job done so I can't enjoy the high.
So for me it is a waste of time and a waste of weed to get high at work.
Re:maybe (Score:5, Interesting)
It sounds like that is based on very limited personal experience.
I have been smoking cannabis for more than 35 years and it is nothing but an enhancement to me (well... unless used excessively all day or something). To long time users, it's more like having a cup of coffee than an intoxicant. While it is and we have to be a bit discrete, we don't even think of it as an "illegal drug" when we use it either alone or in social settings, but then, this is Canada where we don't believe American propaganda.
Hippies didn't necessarily die young because of drugs (at least not marijuana and not likely LSD either). There are other common factors and lifestyle choices that come into play. I have friends in their 70's who still smoke cannabis several times a day, by the way.
Most all of the harm from cannabis comes from the drug laws, and extrajudicial mechanisms that serve only to ostracize people who defy those laws. For example it is absolutely disingenuous to test urine for cannabis and use the presence of non pharmacologically active metabolites that may persist for weeks or months, to discriminate against people for employment or any other purpose. Hair follicle testing is even more sinister. They are always testing for past use. Even blood tests, while more accurate, immediate and having the possibility to be quantitative, can detect it for up to 4 days.
Funny how the harm is directly related to society. In places where it's legal/ignored and tolerated, there is far less harm than in an authority driven place like America where the public is so brainwashed that they actively participate in the injustice. You've really got to see cannabis use without the stigmata, to understand this. It doesn't affect your family either, when it's tolerated. In fact it can be a "god send" (not my words) when chosen over alcohol abuse. When people aren't punished by society for it, they keep their jobs and/or businesses, they own homes, have families, raise bright kids who go on to higher education just like "normal" people etc.
The answer to the main question in the article "Do Recreational Drugs Help Programmers?" can only be that it depends on the individual, the drugs in question and the circumstances. It is my opinion that someone who doesn't use drugs would almost certainly be affected adversely if they suddenly got intoxicated or over stimulated and tried to code. Drugs don't affect all individuals the same, either. I know some people who just CAN'T use cannabis for example.
Re:maybe (Score:5, Funny)
Re:maybe (Score:4)
higher tolerance due to growing up in England.*
*Completely made up.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
That's as far as you got? I wrote an entire content management system while stoned.
It worked pretty well, only problem was that I could never remember how it worked for some reason.
Re:maybe (Score:5, Funny)
That's as far as you got? I wrote an entire content management system while stoned.
It worked pretty well, only problem was that I could never remember how it worked for some reason.
Oh, you're the bozo who coded Lotus Notes? At least there was a reason for it.
tht depends (Score:5, Funny)
Is the pot free as in beer or free as in speech
Spice (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I frequently relax at my computer with Sappho-related things.
If overlap is now causality... (Score:3)
then Cthulhu t-shirts and mugs and solstice carols are good for programming.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for legalizing drugs. And I don't like it one bit that my tax money goes into making victims of some harmless pot smokers.
But [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cum_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc]cum hoc ergo propter hoc[/url] is a fallacy for a reason.
Too distracting (Score:4, Funny)
*the cat seems to be know something...*
"Dude, did you see where I put that lighter?"
*Must get test routines done for code review tomorrow....*
*Woah.. how'd my browser get on Ebay buying troll dolls?*
"Dude, did you see where I put that lighter?"
inpaired thinking = bad coding (Score:5, Insightful)
I would expect code produced under the influence to have more bugs, less comments and generally be an unmaintainable mess.
Re:inpaired thinking = bad coding (Score:5, Funny)
I would expect code produced under the influence to have more bugs, less comments and generally be an unmaintainable mess.
Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion man.
Impossible to Say (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Impossible to Say (Score:4, Insightful)
Studies are being done [beckleyfoundation.org]. They seem to indicate that cannabis does have a positive influence on the subject's creative performance.
Re: (Score:3)
Those who do will of course say that it does and will provide anecdotal evidence (although I'm sure most of them have not actually performed any controlled tests to verify that claim). Most studies would indicate that drugs would not aid in many of the mental processes involved in programming, but that won't change anyone's mind, and I definitive statement can't be made until studies are done to specifically test this assertion.
Agreed, I'm comfortable enough with the understood process of "Addict rationalization" that 100% of the anecdotal evidence can be thrown out at face value. Until some start-up in Colorado offers to out-source brilliant programming to an army of potheads (with positive results) I am going to stick with the studies that are already out there.
I guess we'll see (Score:5, Funny)
Voters in both Washington and Colorado approved referenda that legalized marijuana for recreational use
Valve Corporation is an American video game development and digital distribution company based in Bellevue, Washington, United States.
If HL2:EP3 finally comes out, I guess we'll know what to thank.
Don't bother with the article (Score:4, Informative)
In case you were tempted to RTFA, don't. You have to click through two ad-laden pages, and there really isn't any more information than in the summary.
Real experience here. (Score:3, Informative)
THC... sometimes for certain people. It helps me focus, and some of the best code I've done has been while stoned.
LSD on the other hand... I can't even read the text on the screen and find it difficult just to play music on my computer. I think that after the fact it leaves one with a more holistic and empathic perspective on life, but it sure as hell can't help you at the time of being high - similarly with pretty much any other psychedelic drug (I have the term hallucinogen, because they don't really make you hallucinate, strictly speaking).
Not exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
But I would argue that the type of person who would try recreational drugs is also the type of person that might get into programming. Curious, risk taking and someone who doesn't want to be told what to do or fit into a mold? Yeah sounds about right.
Logical fallacy in assuming drugs help (Score:5, Interesting)
Drugs do things to your brain that make you realize certain things.
The fallacy is assuming that the only path to these realizations come through drugs.
(It's worth mentioning that drugs have numerous downsides as well.)
If you learn to meditate, or for those with aversion to religion to "think hard," you'll get everything you could from drugs.
This isn't an anti-drug argument; that's for someone else's thread. It's an argument against assuming drugs can give you something that can't get another way.
If the potential is within the mind, clearly it's the important element, not the drugs.
Re: (Score:3)
So does the Eastern mystical woo you're selling.
Re:Logical fallacy in assuming drugs help (Score:4, Interesting)
Meditiation is an excercise in two things... relaxation and focus (in that order). No "woo" required.
It's a pity that so many people believe that meditation is synomymous with "woo", though I understand why that is... because the techniques are usually described together with other "interesting ideas" (yeah, "woo" is actually an appropriate word here).
However, proper studies (do your own googling) do show that meditation is good for mental health and, in my experience, is good for training oneself to become calmer and more able to focus. (Like how excercise makes you fit, even when you're not excercising.) Very useful when making decisions and letting the mind think more freely.
If you want a good technique for meditation then I suggest using traditional Buddhist techniques (though you're welcome to ignore Buddhist beliefs). They're the hardest to master but the most effective. Many other types of "meditation" amount to daydreaming - pleasant, possibly relaxing, but not training focus.
And believe me, when you can really focus on a problem in your mind, the ideas begin to flow. No need for drugs to think imaginatively. But with the added bonus that clear, structured and critical thinking are maintained.
Re: (Score:3)
I agree with you in sentiment but wanted to point out that there is nothing inherently religious about meditation. A lot of religions have meditation as a component but a lot of religions also have specific clothing, chairs, tables, buildings and other trappings, but textiles and architecture aren't religious by nature either.
Is meditation religious? (Score:3)
I'm speaking more of its origins, but I'd like to clarify:
Meditation is a type of thought.
Thought is not necessarily religious.
Cassocks are types of clothing; altars are types of furni
Re:Logical fallacy in assuming drugs help (Score:5, Insightful)
I've done a lot of meditation (I am a chan Buddhist, live in a zen center*, and spend an awful lot of time sitting on a pillow, staring at the wall in addition to my other primary occupation of neurobiology and martial arts). I've done a smaller amount of recreational drugs (and not recently, but I'm not particularly against them).
I think the comparison between meditative states and those acchieved through drugs is overblown. Oh, there are some overlaps - both my own experience and the literature calls out the use of psilocybin in particular as creating lasting deeply significant insights, and there are certain plenty of examples of drug experiences that in some way mimic enlightenment experiences - but I think there's actually a lot more difference. That they're so often compared might be in part a legacy of the sixties.
Drugs are just a tool. They produce various effects, and can be used more or less (less explicitly including negative values here) usefully. As a society we've created some fairly arbitrary distinctions between drugs. I personally generally tend towards the "less is more" aesthetic... but I'm hardly an absolutist, and I think there's a lot of room for individual variation.
* Yes, I'm using the same word in two languages - the order I belong to is of Chinese origin, and I speak Chinese, and I live in a zen hall affiliated with a lineage of Japanese extraction.
Re: (Score:3)
If low-dose LSD helps you stay off alcoholism, for example, which is entirely possible
It's better than that, a single hit of LSD can seriously increase your chances of staying on the wagon for months. The fact that it isn't part of the treatment for alcoholism says more about our irrational war on drugs than it does about anything else.
No, but stoners THINK it does (Score:3, Insightful)
Had a stoner friend back in school who thought weed made him do everything better. In reality it made him do everything WORSE, but he was too stoned to realize it. Creative people think weed helps them, but it doesn't. That's just some horseshit they've convinced themselves of, as an excuse to smoke more weed.
It's like the old idea among Wall St. types that cocaine allowed them to work harder and longer. Yeah, it does...and also work a lot dumber. Read a quote once from an old-school SNL writer from the late-70's-early 80's who said "Cocaine gives you diarrhea of the mouth and constipation of the brain." Pretty much sums it up for most drugs.
Re:No, but stoners THINK it does (Score:5, Informative)
Your friend was doing it wrong. The intoxicant helps draw connections between things you wouldn't've necessarily thought to connect beforehand, gives you ideas, sends you off in an unexpected direction.
The work that derives from that initial idea, the actual making stuff of it, should be done sober.
short term gain (Score:5, Insightful)
You end up with a short term gain and long term problems. Anyone who tells you different has not reached the other end yet.
For example aderall lets you concentrate to a very effective degree. Until you start need to up the dose to get the same effect. Then you give up and are a wreck for it.
Cocaine makes you spazzy.
Codine sorts of things makes you relaxed and happy until you are full blown addicted to it.
Caffeine makes you a 'bit spazzy' but long term you keep having to up the dose to get the same effect. Then trying to quit = massive I am going to throw up my lungs headaches.
Weed makes you mellow. But eventually you get paranoid.
So yes you can 'hack' your body. But remember sometimes what you do can NOT be undone.
Don't forget, there was a substantial overlap between the wave of computer professionals who came of age in the '60s and that era's counterculture
And there was a non significant number that did not touch it. You are trying to justify a position with spurious thinking. This is usually the words of someone who is doing something they know is stupid yet want to justify it in some way. Just man up and say 'I am doing something stupid'.
Eh it all comes down to moderation (Score:5, Insightful)
As with anything, moderation is key. As I remember from my college days there are a few times where I got so out of it I was couched locked and did not want to do anything.
The typical drug war debate aside, I personally wouldn't toke up every time I had to program. I know how it affects me and sometimes being sober for work is a good thing. Just keep it simple and enjoy it as a treat when your work is done. Just like one would treat alcohol.
The body compensates to anything one throws at it to make up for the temporary gains. It's a zero sum gain sadly. Just enjoy it as a treat or treatment if you really need it for a disease/disability.
Dealing with Management (Score:5, Insightful)
Recreational drugs serve more as a device to cope with Management than they do for any other aspects of developing code.
No. (Score:3)
Sensationalism at its finest.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge's_law_of_headlines [wikipedia.org]
Obligatory xkcd (Score:4, Funny)
Hellz Yeah. (Score:5, Funny)
When I was on the Windows 8 UI development team, we all were taking Meth and PCP daily. And look at the wonderful and innovative design we came up with!
No (Score:5, Funny)
This is your code:
This is your code on drugs:
Any questions?
Re:No (Score:4, Funny)
And so you prove my point by failing to notice the bug. Lay off the drugs, man!
Re:No (Score:4, Funny)
I always thought that minified javascript was run through a minification program to do that, but it was actually being handwritten by Cheech & Chong.
Recreation vs Programming (Score:5, Interesting)
For my part, I obviously don't use illegal drugs at work and I'm doing fine. But I can see that most of the programmers, including me, using energy drinks, or shit load of coffee. It seems obvious to me that caffeine is a great drug for programming as much for most of other jobs and activities.
Sometimes at home however, I like to smoke a spliff, read some code on the Github which eventually results in coding my own projects after a while. I have never used any stronger stuff for programming, because it doesn't make much sense for me. While you can get some inspiration, programming is a very focused activity with little room for being dreamy, thus I would say that anything that is stronger than a lightly made joint would be counter-productive for coding.
I suggest, recreational drugs should belong to our recreational time. Many geeks I know has a huge problem with separating from the computer, at least a little recreational time should detach us from the matrix.
Depends on Strain of Pot (Score:5, Interesting)
Tricky question (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a fun topic to debate but the question is pretty fuzzy. "Recreational drugs" vary so widely in their effects that you can't really say anything about all of them at once. "Help" is also a subjective term that would need to be further defined to have any meaningful discussion.
I'll also put out there that anyone who hasn't done much of them is unqualified to answer.
Personally, and speaking very generally, ie. the way this question would typically be taken, I would say that they do not help. More specifically:
- Depressants such as pot and alcohol can help you think more creatively but tend to erode motivation and coding accuracy/efficiency.
- Hallucinogens (LSD, DMT, MDA, 2CB, shrooms etc) in normal doses also help creativity but will usually make interacting with the computer difficult or impossible. At very low doses (see LSD microdosing) there can be potential for augmenting sharpness of mind and attention.
- Most energetic stimulants (cocaine, meth, crystal, crack) make you too wired to sit still and focus on a task like programming. Way too little attention span.
- Speed is an exception to the above. With lower doses it can help keep you focused and awake almost indefinitely without being foggy. This the one drug I would say has the ability to help, even if it doesn't allow you to do anything you couldn't already with willpower and enough Jolt.
- MDMA (ecstasy) I consider a class on its own. Coming up with and talking about programming ideas could work very well but sitting in front of a computer doing a task that needs a clear head would definitely be problematic due to the mashy fogginess. Besides, why code when you could be hugging someone or dancing?
- I couldn't tell you about heroin but from what I've seen in movies it doesn't look like something you can code on at all!
FWIW I've been coding for about 30 years. Hope this helps :)
Maybe (Score:3, Interesting)
An anecdote: My athletic club used to participate in a state program to employ the mentally challenged. The guy who cleaned our locker room was slow. But he was a nice guy and proud to have a job that he could do, and do well. This level of pride motivated him to always do his best and, as a result, we had a fantastically clean locker room. After a while, the program was discontinued and he was replaced by (I suspect) a college student who needed some part time income. The locker room became a slimy mess and the attendant always had a bad attitude about the complaints.
So, I suppose if you have a job that involves repeated hour after hour of monotonous drudgery, knocking a few points off the old IQ might help. Pot smoking (a popular recreational drug) has been shown to impede the creation of short term memory. That might explain stoners' tolerance for doing repetitive work without complaint. It isn't so bad with long term memory, so learned skills are probably still available. Just don't count on converting much current experience (short term memory) into new learning.
Personally, if someone gives me a monotonous job, I figure its a candidate for automation. I figure out a way for the computer to do it (automated code generation from requirements documents, for example) and free up time for something challenging.
Re:What? (Score:5, Funny)
You forget how stunningly crap the spec and use cases you've been provided are?
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
In this case, probably non-conventional logic; computers don't operate the way human brains do, it takes a twisted head to program well. Especially if you're attempting to optimize a system using low level programming languages.
Of course, I've said before: Drug tests are mostly to attempt to filter out incompetent low level employees, trending a bit upwards when they're operating dangerous equipment. By the time you're a serious professional, I figure the general attitude is that they don't want to know, but secretly expect you to be able to handle your recreational drug use. IE the difference between a lawyer and a burger flipper is the Lawyer is expected to know how to handle his cocaine habit. IE as long as his performance doesn't degrade unacceptably, he's good.
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Drug tests are a dumb american war on drugs phenomenon. Nobody in Canada or the rest of the world takes them.
If you can't filter out incompetent employees without a cup of urine, you fail at HR 101.
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, all of our HR employees are stoned.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Creative programming and creative problem solving.
Musicians and artists for example do benefit from recreational marijuana use. Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys was quoted in Rolling Stone magazine as saying that marijuana helped him write Pet Sounds. Shakespeare, Carl Sagan, Paul McCartney .. the list goes on and on .. have all said that the use of cannabis had a profound positive experience on their creative process.
So it wouldn't be a stretch to assume that cannabis could also provide a mental "boost" to a
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Write something clever while doped. Read that when sobered up. At that point your only excuse will be that you obviously were off your rocker
That being said, I truly do believe that it helps relaxing while not at work. It will only help you directly at work when your job is to devour tons of pizza.
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
A stately pleasure-dome decree...
Re:What? (Score:5, Interesting)
How about: Write something whiled doped. Read that when sobered up. Pick out the good bits. Write it into a coherent story, edit, publish. I suspect that is much closer to the way most writers use drugs to increase creativity. Good writing is only 5% creative ideas, but that 5% can destroy an otherwise gifted author's career if it just won't show up to the party. The idea is that the sober brain has a lot of filters that stop 'stupid' thoughts making it up to the conscious level, getting doped relaxes those filters letting a lot of stupid stuff through. But like any piece of filtering software, sometimes there are false positives, and those false positives are more likely to be groundbreakingly creative ideas simply by their nature of being so close to the stupid line.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What? (Score:5, Informative)
Well ... it's a bit of a stretch ... but quoted from Scientific American and BBC news ...
In the current issue of the South African Journal of Science, Francis Thackeray of the Transvaal Museum in Pretoria and his colleagues document the presence of cocaine and myristic acid (a plant-derived hallucinogen) in clay-pipe fragments retrieved from the beloved bard's Stratford-Upon-Avon home. Their analysis also hints at the presence of marijuana residues.
Though the pipe cannot be definitively linked to Shakespeare himself, it is certain that it dates to the 17th century. This fact came as a surprise to the scientists; previously, the earliest known record of cocaine in Europe dated to only 200 years ago.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=shakespeare-on-drugs
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Creative programming and creative problem solving. Brian Wilson. Shakespeare, Carl Sagan, Paul McCartney...
Correlation is not causation. Maybe they were just creative people. Period.
Millions of non-creative pot smokers nationwide will back up this hypothesis.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Creative programming and creative problem solving. Brian Wilson. Shakespeare, Carl Sagan, Paul McCartney...
Correlation is not causation. Maybe they were just creative people. Period.
Millions of non-creative pot smokers nationwide will back up this hypothesis.
One easy thing to look at is how many of them were heavy drug users *before* achieving fame and success. Get back to me if you find a single one. It just so happens that large amounts of money, free time, and basically a "free pass" from law enforcement leads to, you guessed it, experimenting with drugs. What a shock. Plenty of non-creative hacks do lots of drugs, too, but confirmation bias must be something that gets harder to spot the more you smoke.
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Creative programming and creative problem solving.
Majority of coding work is not creative. Take an interactive form with 20 fields in WPF, for example - with data binding, with triggers, with validators.
I'm not even sure what coding is creative these days. Perhaps yet another scheduler for Linux? That certainly would be very creative. But even a driver for Linux is 99% slogging through the datasheets and through the sample code. For that you need clear mind, and not this [youtube.com].
By the time the tasks are allocated to coders the problems are already cut into bite-sized chunks - forms, interfaces, graphics, styles, database schema, etc. Real problem solving usually starts at a higher level, during system design. What does the customer really want here? What hardware and software should we select, and why? What are the risks? How much it will cost? How could the impossible task X be done at all? What is the plan B? Who is going to do this and that? But you'd better not be drugged out of your mind when you answer those questions.
Re: (Score:3)
Majority of coding work is not creative. Take an interactive form with 20 fields in WPF, for example - with data binding, with triggers, with validators.
I assume you aren't a recreational pot smoker. Different people, different strains, different results.. but in my anecdotal experience pot can be useful in routine tasks. For some it lets them focus (like Ritalin or adderall). I've tried coding drunk.. results were horrid. Weed? I can focus for longer periods of time, but also find it increases creativity. For some people it ruins concenrtation. We did an informal experiment with a dance game (similar to DDR). Played it sober, same level multiple times and
Re:What? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What? (Score:5, Funny)
Majority of coding work should be preemptive coding for scalability.
PHB: Listen, Bill, I have a small programming task for you. We need an application that pops a dialog up, asks for a number, and appends that number, as plain text, to a file. Could you put this together before lunch?
Bill: Hey, boss, this is a major undertaking. Since we want to ensure scalability of this application I need to make it so it accepts a form definition language, parses it, executes scripts in another language, and then spits it into a variable, programmable set of databases which could be plain text files as you want, or ODBC connections, or The Cloud. Of course we want strong crypto on all that, and biometric authentication at every step. My team of ten will probably do it within a year or two.
PHB: Bill, are you high?
Re: (Score:3)
On that basis, whatever you want to do outside of work should be your business as long as it doesn't have a negative effect on the hours and effort you put in for work. When I was in college I used to really enjoy go
Re:supremacy clause (Score:4, Interesting)
Sure, this isn't 'the end of it, but these kinds of events are symbolic of the direction the country is moving. A few states trying it out here and there, pretty soon Iowa will be doing it and then it will be all over.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:LSD and Unix (Score:5, Funny)
What about crack cocaine and Windows ME?
Re:You're asking the wrong question. (Score:4, Informative)
I have seen code produced by a drunk person before, it is ridiculous,
You might think you can, but you cannot code drunk.
Re:This Is Disgusting And Sick (Score:4, Interesting)
Warning: Psychedelics can cause fear, nervousness and delusions in those who do not use them.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
People like you are the reason why you have many co-workers who smoke pot every day but don't tell you about it.
Re:This Is Disgusting And Sick (Score:5, Insightful)
While I agree that you shouldn't mod GP down because of disagreeing...I do believe GP should be modded down. He uses inflammatory and trolling language.
"This Is Disgusting And Sick"? Filthy, vile, and destructive? Timothy is irresponsible and should be fired?
This is exactly the kind of language that stops thoughtful discussion, and should be discouraged accordingly by the mods.
Whatever your opinion is of recreational drugs, this animosity toward people minding their own business in the privacy of their own home is reminiscent of those who think violent video games caused the Columbine massacre and other real-world violence. It is a simple fact that humans generally consumes large amounts of chemicals that alter the way our mind and body work, and our society generally manages to do just fine. And just like some people will be violent psychopaths who just happen to be gamers, some people will self destruct who just happen to use recreational drugs.
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you're just not getting it right. code while high for creativity, debug while sober