REEFER MADNESS!!!!!!

[Vaud]

Yeah, I have no interest in having it out over this either.  RWHN: I appreciate your input, and I do not intend to be dismissive toward it.  I'll check out those links at the end; I truly skirted over them before.

[AFK]

I just think it is too simple to get hung up on this physiological vs. psychological angle.  Substance abuse and addiction is far more complicated than that, as are psychological addictions themselves.  And in the end, it is rather arbitrary given that the brain is a part of our biology, is it not? 

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I just think it is too simple to get hung up on this physiological vs. psychological angle.  Substance abuse and addiction is far more complicated than that, as are psychological addictions themselves.  And in the end, it is rather arbitrary given that the brain is a part of our biology, is it not? 

Addiction is addiction.  There's no sense differentiating between the two types.  Either you can walk away from it easily, or you can't.

On the other hand, if there's no reason to walk away from it, who cares?  If someone is happy smoking weed, and they aren't suffering ill effects that outweigh that happiness, let them have their fun.

Personally, I can't see the value in smoking weed, but then again, I am sure not to many people would see the value in what I consider to be fun activities.  To each his own.

Life's rough enough without imposing arbitrary prison sentences or even social stigma on someone for doing something that harms nobody else.

[ñͤͣ̄ͦ̌̑͗͊͛͂͗ ̸̨̨̣̺̼̣̜͙͈͕̮̊̈́̈͂͛̽͊ͭ̓͆ͅé ̰̓̓́ͯ́́͞]

The second link comes across as a group of professional nannies who make their money off treating addiction as wanting to protect their bread and butter rather than appealing to science. It also reinforces the idea that people shouldn't have access to medicine that the government hasn't given them permission to use, which is the kind of authoritarian bullshit that's destroyed this country. It's one thing to say drug companies can't market medicine without its approval. It's quite another to say people should be legally prevented from having access to cannabis they grow in their own yards (even if the voters approve it).

Umm, the ASAM criteria ARE based on science.  It is an evidence-based model that sets the standards for addiction treatment in the United States.  And that is precisely why they are against recognizing marijuana as a medicine in the same way other medicines are recognized.  Because of patient safety.  When the science definitively makes a case that leads to FDA approval, then ASAM will go along with it.  But patient safety is a vital part of their "bread and butter" and it would go against their code of ethics to condone it.

Emphasis added.

My main concern is how the science on marijuana is made nearly impossible to study in the US, shut down in the middle of clinical trials, or outright dismissed when the evidence clashes with official drug policy.

You say if the science proves marijuana is medically useful that policy will change, however I'm not sure you're aware of the obstacles in place to make sure that the evidence cannot be collected:

MAPS is currently the only organization working to demonstrate the safety and efficacy of botanical marijuana as a prescription medicine for specific medical uses to the satisfaction of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

MAPS' efforts to initiate medical marijuana research have been hindered by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) since its inception in 1986. NIDA's monopoly on the supply of marijuana for research and the DEA's refusal to allow researchers to grow their own has effectively paralyzed medical marijuana research, and for over ten years MAPS has been involved in legal struggles against the DEA to end this situation.

Source

If government agencies were truly interested in collecting scientific evidence about medical marijuana we would have enough by now to make informed decisions about its medical value and it's appropriate scheduling. As it stands, NIDA and the DEA have repeatedly put serious obstacles in the way of research. Why are they so aversive to the science on this, if as you claim, they are merely following the evidence in the interest of public safety?

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Net brings up a very valid and disturbing point.

The corruption of actual research in America is now enshrined in law.

[BabylonHoruv]

Well, the original version did mention "possible direct antitumor effect".  So even in the original there was no definitive statement that medical marijuana has that impact. 

I would wager that without definitive science, they perhaps erred on the side of caution and removed the passage.  Which I think is perfectly reasonable.  Especially when you are talking about an addictive substance.  Otherwise you may have people seeking the medication solely for the anti-tumor effect.  But I would also wager that lawyers were involved in altering the language, to protect themselves from any action from patients who used medical marijuana and didn't experience any improvements in tumors. 

I was under the impression that all available science points to marijuana NOT being physically addictive? (obviously, ANYTHING can be psychologically addictive)

not poking with a stick, just honestly curious whether you have something that contradicts that.

I will post it later when I have time, but people who use marijuana extensively and then try to quit do experience withdrawal symptoms.  Obviously, compared to heroin or other illicit drugs, they are a walk in the park, but they are still withdrawal symptoms, nonetheless. 

I was taught in drug education at my school that Pot has no withdrawal symptoms due to it staying in your system for so long.  So it's actually physically impossible to quit cold turkey because it doesn't all leave your system at once.

You're obviously more educated in that area than I am, but if it is possible to experience withdrawal that would kind of invalidate the biggest drawback to using pot (that it stays in your system for so long)

[BabylonHoruv]

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/drug-addiction/DS00183/DSECTION=symptoms

http://www.jointogether.org/blog/posts/2011/addiction-doctors-say-medical.html

ASAM argues that marijuana is problematic because it is addictive

http://www.whitehousedrugpolicy.gov/publications/pdf/Marijuana.pdf

Long-term marijuana users who are trying to stop using the drug report symptoms such as irritability, sleeplessness, decreased appetite, anxiety, and drug craving, all of which make it difficult to quit.21
21 Budney AJ, Vandrey RG, Hughes JR, Thostenson JD, Bursac Z. Comparison of cannabis and tobacco withdrawal:
Severity and contribution to relapse. J Subst Abuse Treat 35(4):362–368, 2008.

For starters.

That doesn't sound much worse than say, cigarettes. Nobody's smoking tobacco for medical reasons, though.
Also, why are people smoking medical marijuana? Wouldn't it make more sense to make marijuana pills or something? Much less damage to the lungs that way.

Tobacco is physically addictive.  I don't know the withdrawal symptoms but I know they are there. 

The symptoms RWHN listed sound, to me, like the symptoms of a mental addiction.  I know that if I don't get my time on the internet I get irritable, anxious, sleepy, and crave it,  those are all signs of a mental addiction certainly, but not a physical one.

[BabylonHoruv]

There are pills with THC, but there is more stuff in cannabis than THC. Unfortunately any cocktail of substances approximating cannabis would be almost impossible to get through the FDA.

Also, marijuana is cheap, pills are not.

Also, you say that smoking is bad for the lungs, but there isn't much evidence for this. Yes, smoke is hot and contains tar, but studies looking at long term cannabis smokers do not show an increased level of lung, throat, and mouth cancers. Also, tar isn't well defined. THC could count as a type of tar.

There are ways to consume marijuana that are more comfortable. There are vaporizers, which heat the cannabis up to less than 300 degrees C. It doesn't burn, but many of the active substances do make there way through. You could also make tea out of it. Arno Hazekamp wrote his PHD dissertation on the subject, it's available online (Cannabis; extracting the medicine.) 

marijuana can also be taken orally without making it into a pill.

Mixing all the cannibanoids in pot might be possible, but it would be extremely expensive to make in the lab, and strikes me as awfully silly when it can be made cheaply and easily, and in a more environmentally sound way by simply growing a plant.

[BabylonHoruv]

The Mayo Clinic source doesn't say what you want it to say. It says cannabis may be "psychologically addicting," which is different from being addictive in the sense we say heroin or cocaine is addictive. Anything is psychologically addicting if you like it enough. And the "use and dependence" section simply lists some of the temporary side-effects of use, not any long-term effects, not to mention it conflates "use" with "abuse" as if they were one and the same, which is an old, tired drug warrior tactic.

Psychological addictions can be very powerful and cause very real harm to an individual.  And as someone who works in the field, and who's worked with people who've been addicted to marijuana, I can attest to that.  Addiction is addiction.  If you are using a substance to an extent, that you cannot quit it because of the withdrawal symptoms, that is addiction.  Word games and pedantry don't change that fact. 

The second link comes across as a group of professional nannies who make their money off treating addiction as wanting to protect their bread and butter rather than appealing to science. It also reinforces the idea that people shouldn't have access to medicine that the government hasn't given them permission to use, which is the kind of authoritarian bullshit that's destroyed this country. It's one thing to say drug companies can't market medicine without its approval. It's quite another to say people should be legally prevented from having access to cannabis they grow in their own yards (even if the voters approve it).

Umm, the ASAM criteria ARE based on science.  It is an evidence-based model that sets the standards for addiction treatment in the United States.  And that is precisely why they are against recognizing marijuana as a medicine in the same way other medicines are recognized.  Because of patient safety.  When the science definitively makes a case that leads to FDA approval, then ASAM will go along with it.  But patient safety is a vital part of their "bread and butter" and it would go against their code of ethics to condone it. 

The third link is from the feds, which... I'm new here, so I'm just going to assume you're trolling and this is an application of Poe's Law based on that. Not to mention it lists symptoms of "abuse" that I can reproduce from going without chocolate for a week...

Yes, you are new, and that was a rather predictable response.  You will notice that in the quote I included the citation to the actual study linked to the quote.  So the "its the feds" copout doesn't quite hold up. 

Psychological addiction and physical addiction are substantially different however.

ANYTHING can be psychologically addictive if someone is bent to become addicted to that particular thing.

Sure it's easier to become addicted to weed than, say, hopscotch because wed is inherently more pleasurable.  On the other hand the rate of addiction to World of Warcraft is higher and I don't see anyone clamoring to make that illegal.

Carefully controlling a substance due to the fact that it causes physical dependence makes sense. Controlling it because people can become psychologicaly dependent on it, is, IMO extremely silly.

[BabylonHoruv]

In my experience, weed is about as addictive an Mountain Dew.*











I have a Mountain Dew problem.

Actually Mountain Dew is physically addictive because of the caffeine.  So it's more addictive than weed.  Caffeine withdrawal can cause severe hypertension and migraine headaches.

You can also die from a caffeine overdose, or suffer really nasty symptoms like vomiting and diohrea both at once while hallucinating.

[BabylonHoruv]

I think there may be a broader point to be made about whether or not the potential for psychological addiction should be basis for any decision about any substance's medicinal usefulness, but I'm also not sure there's much point to debating it here. My personal opinion is that while potential physical dependency SHOULD factor into a substance's schedule and frequency of prescription, the fact that psychological addiction can be caused by virtually anything in people predisposed to have that problem means that it should NOT factor into decisions on a substance's schedule and frequency of prescription.

TITCM

[BabylonHoruv]

RWHN: Thanks for the links, but I'm still not convinced that it is anything beyond psychological.

Are you reading ANYTHING he's typing in this thread, or just sticking to your script come hell or high water?

I think he's right in this case, but only really because the links RWHN gave aren't making any attempt to differentiate between physical and psychological addictions.

I can't really blame the site though, the APA insists that both kinds of addiction are things that only happen with chemical use, its only really when you look at the broad kinds of compulsive habits people form that there's any reason to consider the difference between addiction types.

Did everyone just skip over the part where I explained the difference between, say, pathological gambling and marijuana addiction? 

You claimed that gambling withdrawal is not as severe.  it doesn't say that anywhere in your sources.

Both are psychological addictions and the withdrawal symptoms are very similar.  The severity of the symptoms is going to vary with the severity of the addiction.

[BabylonHoruv]

It's been a tool box for months.

I've been enjoying reading the links that Telarus has been putting up concerning various benefits found by different studies. 

I think a weed thread is doomed to devolve into people shouting at RWHN periodically, but most likely it'll go back to being a collection of links after a while again.

[Telarus]

Thanks to RWHN for taking a few of the questions seriously and providing some good links and counterpoints. I'm not shouting at him, and I appreciate his take on the issue.

On the NIDA, DEA and FDA issue, I have to agree that it's quite disturbing.

The primary reason, often cited, for FDA non-approval is that "you cannot replicate a consistent dose".

Probably because there are thousands and thousands of different genetic strains. Combined with different nutrient and environmental factors, and you see the problem. Hell, if vitamin C was controlled like this, ORANGE TREES would be illegal, because who knows how much Vitamin C an individual orange has, you can't standardize that.

Ok, so on top of that, the government WON'T ALLOW you to grow your own, setup your own controlled conditions, manipulate environment and nutrients. Nope, you get the (historically very 'hempy' and uncertain quality) plants that they are required to grow (Oh, yeah, did you know that the federal government is required to grow cannabis?), which they distribute to the few remaining patients in the old NIDA program. Search for "Ed Rosenthal" and you'll find a lot of information on the quality of the weed that the government forces every one to do research with.

marijuana can also be taken orally without making it into a pill.

Mixing all the cannibanoids in pot might be possible, but it would be extremely expensive to make in the lab, and strikes me as awfully silly when it can be made cheaply and easily, and in a more environmentally sound way by simply growing a plant.

The public also doesn't know that Sativex, which has received FDA approval for "late stage trials", one step from ":marketing approval", is simply whole grown cannabis (grown in a hydroponic manipulated environment), and then rendered down with an oils extraction process, similar to the one you'd use when making brownies. The way they got FDA approval was to A) grow it in britian where they didn't have to deal with NIDA, B) separate the THC from the other cannabinoids during extraction, and then blend them back together (with a bit of food grade anti-freeze) to package into the aerosol dispenser at a specific THC:other ratio. "Guaranteeing" a "standardized dose", which really isn't (you have no idea what the ratios of secondary cannabinoids are).

Now, the smartest bio-science spag I know researching this is Dr. Melamede (the doctor who is organizing the research where I grabbed the pics of the Australian woman's skin cancer). This is what he says about the current state of research (~ 2004):

Harm reduction-the cannabis paradox, Robert Melamede

The Controversy
Cannabis use can be divided into three categories, recreational, medical, and religious. The latter will not be examined in this article. Some, including those who favor or oppose cannabis use, presume recreational and medical use are the same. On the one side, it is often claimed that any cannabis use is justified by some underlying medical need. On the other side, cannabis use is presumed to have no medical value, with the implication that those who use it are simply "getting stoned." While the former claim may be too extreme, the latter defies current scientific understanding of the biological functions of the endocannabinoids. While many people are reluctant to approve recreational cannabis use, it appears that most people support medical use. The United States Federal Government denies that there is any valid medical use for cannabis, while the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA) provides marijuana on a monthly basis to a few medical users through the compassionate Investigatory New Drug (IND) program of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Nevertheless, a number of states, through either legislative action or voter initiative, have approved the use of medical marijuana[3].

Current Federally Approved Medical Marijuana Uses
In order to better assess arguments for and against the medical use of marijuana, the scientific evidence for the health benefits of cannabis will be reviewed below. It should be noted that the federally supplied cannabis users have been receiving and using cannabis for 11 to 27 years with clinically demonstrated effectiveness in the treatment of glaucoma, chronic musculoskeletal pain, spasm and nausea, and spasticity of multiple sclerosis [4]. Furthermore, there is no evidence that these patients have suffered any negative side effects from their cannabis use.

The Endocannabinoid System
Cannabis preparations have been used medically for thousands of years for illnesses such as epilepsy, migraine headaches, childbirth, and menstrual symptoms. However, it is only relatively recently that the active components have been identified and their mechanisms of action have begun to be understood. While delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) was first synthesized by Mechoulam in 1967 [5], it was not until 1990 that the cannabinoid receptor was localized in the brain [6] and cloned [7]. Since then, discoveries in the field have proceeded at an ever-increasing pace. The discovery of cannabinoid receptors on cells naturally prompted the search for internal compounds (endogenous ligands) that would activate the receptors since it seemed unlikely that cannabis receptors had evolved so people could partake of cannabis. In 1992, anandamide was discovered [8]. This lipid metabolite was the first ligand of an ever-expanding class of molecules known as endocannabinoids (internal marijuana-like compounds) to be discovered. Endocannabinoid synthesis, degradation, transport, and receptors together form the endocannabinoid system.

The broad therapeutic potential that can result from correctly manipulating the endocannabinoid system is just beginning to be realized[9,10]. In fact, major pharmaceutical companies, and university researchers all around the world are now engaged in the cannabinoid-related research [11]. Their efforts focus on learning how the endocannabinoid system functions, and on how to manipulate it in order to increase or decrease its activity, depending on the illness or condition under consideration. GW Pharmaceuticals in Britain has been developing and testing a plant extract-based product line that is in clinical trials in Britain and Canada [12]. The results thus far have been positive to the extent that Bayer AG has entered into a 25-million-dollar distribution agreement for GW's product, Sativex which has recently been approved in Canada. In contrast, Sanofi Research has developed an antagonist that will inhibit the ability of endocannabinoids to stimulate hunger and thus potentially be useful for weight control.

Evolution of Endocannabinoids
The cannabinoid system appears to be quite ancient [13,14], with some of its components dating back about 600 million years to when the first multicellular organisms appeared. The beginnings of the modern cannabinoid system are found in mollusks [15] and hydra [16]. As evolution proceeded, the role that the cannabinoid system played in animal life continuously increased. It is now known that this system maintains homeostasis within and across the organizational scales of all animals. Within a cell, cannabinoids control basic metabolic processes such as glucose metabolism [17]. Cannabinoids regulate intercellular communication, especially in the immune [18] and nervous systems [19]. In general, cannabinoids modulate and coordinate tissues, organ and body systems (including the cardiovascular [20], digestive [16], endocrine [21], excretory [22,23], immune [18], musculo-skeletal [24], nervous [19], reproductive [25], and respiratory [26] systems). The effects of cannabinoids on consciousness are not well understood, but are well known, and underlie recreational cannabis use. These effects also have therapeutic possibilities [27].

Cannabinoids: Homeostatic Regulators
The homeostatic action of cannabinoids on so many physiological structures and processes is the basis for the hypothesis that the endocannabinoid system is nothing less than a naturally evolved harm reduction system. Endocannabinoids protect by fine-tuning and regulating dynamic biochemical steady states within the ranges required for healthy biological function. The endocannabinoid system itself appears to be up- or down-regulated as a function of need. As will be detailed later in this article, endocannabinoid levels naturally increase in the case of head injury and stroke [28], and the number of cannabinoid receptors increases in response to nerve injury and the associated pain [29]. In contrast, the number of cannabinoid receptors is reduced when tolerance to cannabinoids is induced [30].

Here's his list of medical issues where cannabis has been involved in scientific study (links to each study on his website):
http://www.uccs.edu/~rmelamed/Evolutionism/medical_uses_of_cannabinoid_2/

Aging

    CB1 Knockout Mice
    THC Toxicity

Autoimmune Diseases

    Arthritis
    Crohn's Disease
    Diabetes
    Multiple Sclerosis

Behavior

    Addictions
    Aggression

Cancer

    Breast Cancer
    Colorectal Cancer
    Glioma
    Lung Cancer
    Lymphoma

Cardiovascular Disease

    Artherosclerosis
    Myocardial Infarct

Gastrointestinal Disorders

    GERDS Gastro-intestinal Reflux Syndrome
    Ulcers

Musculo-Skeletal Disorders

    Osteopathic Manipulation
    Osteoporosis

Neurological Disorders

    ALS
    Alzheimer's Disease
    Epilepsy
    Huntington's Disease
    Tourette's

Mental Disorders

    Bipolar Disorder
    Depression
    Schizophrenia
    Stress and Anxiety

Pain

    Arthritic Pain
    Fibromyalgia
    Inflammatory and Neuropathic Pain
    Migraines
    Pain Processing

Reproductive System

    Critical Developmental Periods
    Milk
    Reproductive Revew
    Sperm
    Uterine Receptivity

Liver Disease

    Cerebral Disfunction Following Liver Failure

Respiratory System Disorders

    Asthma
    Broncoconstriction
    Influenza
    Vaporizer

Pheochromocytoma
Vision

    Glaucoma

Memory

    Short term memory

[East Coast Hustle]

that is probably the most interesting AND specifically detailed account I have read of the biological basis for medicinal marijuana use. Thanks!