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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   4756 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for November 5, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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2 separate questions in one.

  1. Have you ever considered getting an ADHD diagnosis? Mainly for easier access to Adderall? (Not all of us can get it in the streets). I've tried a similar drug recently and it was like a magic drug. I got 3 days worth of work done in half a day. I think I might actually have ADHD or some kind of disorder given how far above my baseline it got me. What's your overall opinion on the matter of taking drugs to be a better wage slave?
  2. Do you feel irrationally anxious about food waste? Even though individual food waste is probably a tiny fraction of all the waste that happens in a modern economy? The idea of food waste gives me the heeby jeeebies and this is most likely because I've been indoctrinated as much as a child. It just feels "wrong".

  1. No, I have zero impulse to do drugs for work. I would try Adderall in a recreational setting, but daily amphetamine use to crank out a higher volume of work holds no appeal to me.

  2. Absolutely and strongly. So much so that I find it baffling when I see people order things that they clearly didn't intend to actually eat very much of.

  1. No, for the same mor(m)onic reason I don't drink coffee or smoke. Perhaps I've not shown my true potential by avoiding it, but letting extraneous substances take my "baseline" performance hostage doesn't feel like a good bargain.

  2. Global food waste or household food waste? Household food waste is a sign of someone's low efficiency. My lived experience shows efficiency is not a budget that you can save for more important tasks, so high food waste is a relatively reliable indicator of a person's overall spending behavior.

As others have said, I feel stimulants take away some of my creativity or presence or ability to connect with the world and people around me in a genuine way.

They do make you better at very rational, ordered thinking and clearly outlined tasks. But you lose out on some ineffable characteristics. I worry that if I was on adderall all the time I might, for instance, keep grinding in a career that’s wrong for me rather than taking a step back and finding a line of work that suits me better.

In other words I think stimulants can lock your mindset into short term repetitive gains as opposed to better longer term gains.

Re 1, I'm mostly where @2rafa is on Adderall. I used it to get stuff done in college on occasion, and yeah it was wild. I also found that I enjoyed it quite a bit, which deterred me from really ever using it anymore or ever trying a stimulant recreational drug.

As I've gotten older, I similarly enjoy the feeling of caffeine buzz, somewhat more in quality (though not as intense of course) than alcohol. Sometimes I'll find myself taking extra caffeine drinks not because I'm tired or need to focus, but for the buzziness.

I constantly have to cycle down my caffeine tolerance, so that I can build it back up again. Possibly relatedly, I can fall asleep on caffeine quite easily, and sometimes if I'm already tired (fatigued or lacking in sleep), it knocks me the fuck out and I'll sleep sounder on a cup of coffee than not. This is supposedly a symptom of ADHD, so, who knows. (@self_made_human is that true or am I mistake?). I don't know how exactly to describe it, but it works both as a stimulant/nootropic and as a sleepy drug sometimes at the same time.

Finally, and this is probably 100% placebo, but am I the only person who feels like they can snap themselves into adderall-esque state (with out the fun / high feeling)? It doesn't last nearly as long and it's not as intense, but on Adderall, my brain was in a state of focus / flow that I remember quite distinctly, and can basically 'recall it' when necessary to focus.

Finally, and this is probably 100% placebo, but am I the only person who feels like they can snap themselves into adderall-esque state (with out the fun / high feeling)?

At least two! It's probably a somewhat different mechanism, but I can just ... do that. I generally find the attitude that 'I don't want to do X but will take a pill to make me more motivated' disturbing. You do have the capability to be motivated at X if you desired it, you're just in a weird state where you want it in some abstract or socialized sense but not deeply enough to actually do it.

2 is easy, just plain no.

For 1, I've actually tried "street" Adderall, and it doesn't do that for me. (they are actual pills with the normal drug manufacturer markings, so fairly certain they're legit and not some weird random shit). It makes me feel a stimulant buzz and tends to make my head a little spinny; I feel like I have a harder time concentrating on things. I presume this means I do not actually have ADHD. I actually do like it sometimes, but for when I've drunk a lot and am starting to feel sleepy but want to stay up for a few more hours. In that case, it has less of the head-spinny effect and just makes me feel not tired anymore, also it wears off cleanly at a predictable time. I only use it like that once in a while, so I don't mind the higher prices of "street" pills. If I actually wanted to use it all the time, or at least semi-regularly for concentration etc, I'd probably try and get a diagnosis to get it cheaper and more conveniently.

Effectiveness can decline over time and I found it killed my imagination to a substantial degree and made me even lazier when unmedicated, so I stopped using it (lisdexamfetamine). I also found it made me angrier or at least more short-tempered, but ymmv. That said, the drugs 100% do work, they are a cheat code to substantially higher conscientiousness.

Personally I think either Adderall and equivalents should be banned or they should be available without prescription to anyone over 16. The advantage gained is so huge you might eventually see that in certain careers almost everyone is on them. In a way, that would hurt the least conscientious people with the most 'real' ADHD symptoms the most, because they're now competing with neurotypical people who hop on stims anyway.

Also, I think there's something to what @yofuckreddit says, it feels a little rotten to take powerful stimulants just to become a superior wage slave so you can better compete with others who are also going through the same thought process re. adderall.

Yes to both.

I've been able to build whole applications in a single day on Adderall. I don't like using drugs to be a better "wage slave". I think my performance on ADHD medication is too good to be a reasonable expectation of an employer, while without them I'm performing below where I feel my true capabilities lie. It's frustrating.

My anxiety about food waste has been tempered over the years. After working in the restaurant industry you realize that any perceived reduced waste there is just hidden from you. I also realized that I do a far better job of saving and eating leftovers than almost any other millennial I know. It's a fallacy to eat food to not waste it, the cost of ingested calories is non-zero and higher than just letting it rot in a landfill in some cases.

I don't like using drugs to be a better "wage slave".

The archetypical example of labour performed solely for the benefit of the master could be consider the ancient Egyptian Pyramids[1]. Only Pharaoh and the elite could be buried in them, the average Egyptian gaining nothing. But today it is tourists, who are not exceptionally wealthy (except in historical comparison) who enjoy the awesome sight of something so grand and millenia old.

By improving your job performance, unless you are writing code for dating apps for millionaires, you helping the masses. So if you are a slave, you are to the masses, which are likewise slaves to you.

[1] I know the workers weren't slaves. Also while enslaved people picking cotton did make some American slaveowners rich, it allowed clothe and products made from it to be cheaper for the masses.

Have you ever considered getting an ADHD diagnosis?

Why yes I have, if only because I actually have ADHD. If I didn't, I'd probably still find a way to get some, and it's frankly astonishing to me that despite how much academic pressure and intense competition there is in India, more students aren't on them. ADHD is practically unknown to the average person.

I think I might actually have ADHD or some kind of disorder given how far above my baseline it got me.

Not much evidence of ADHD by itself, the drugs are powerful and work on both the neurotypical and ADHD alike, and I am lukewarm on claims that it makes a qualitative or quantitative difference for the latter. In my particular case, it takes me from someone who can't read a textbook unless their life depends on it (or I have an exam in a few days) to someone who can grudgingly study for anywhere from 2-6 hours a day, averaging maybe 2 hours of genuine maximal effort. I think it takes me from a literal 2%ile score to something around 50% on conscientiousness, which is a massive difference, outright life changing.

What's your overall opinion on the matter of taking drugs to be a better wage slave?

If it helps you get on the grind, fuck everything else and go for it. Be careful not to use excessive doses, moderate use in amount while spacing it out to delay tolerance.

Do you feel irrationally anxious about food waste? Even though individual food waste is probably a tiny fraction of all the waste that happens in a modern economy? The idea of food waste gives me the heeby jeeebies and this is most likely because I've been indoctrinated as much as a child. It just feels "wrong".

Yes, I always clean my plate where possible, even if I'm past comfortably full, but I try to pack it away or save it as leftovers if the remaining quantity warrants it.

I've definitely considered if I have ADHD, or something like that. But I worry about it I have to take Adderall to function. I already feel like I got hooked on anti depressants to the point that I can't live without them: back in like 2008, I didn't take them, and then I started taking them just to try them, and now I need them or else I feel unbearable dread and guilt. Psychiatrists say that isn't likely that I got hooked, and it's more likely that my depression is worse now then it was in 2008, but I don't really believe them.

Now if I started taking something else that majorly alters my state of mind, it doesn't seem like it's something I want to do. I do wonder if I'd be more effective at work, but is that really worth the risk of being hooked on a potentially dangerous drug?

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