Skeptics Stack Exchange
Skeptics Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [recreational-drugs]

Use this tag for questions about the use or properties of "recreational" drugs such as marijuana, heroin, cocaine or LSD.

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Is smoking weed bad for your health?

Some people believe that smoking marijuana (without any tobacco) is harmful to your health and may cause problems. Examples of things I've heard weed supposedly causes: All the health problems of tobacco (cancer, strokes, etc) You get addicted to…
smzs
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Did 20% of US soldiers in Vietnam use heroin, 95% of whom quit afterwards?

The following claims were made around 04:50 of this TED talk by Johann Hari: 20 percent of all American troops were using loads of heroin, and if you look at the news reports from the time, they were really worried, because they thought, my God,…
d-b
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Do blacks in the US get arrested more often for drug usage despite using drugs at the same rate as whites?

Kyle Kulinski of Secular Talk says in this YouTube video that The studies show that as well. Blacks and whites use drugs at the same rate but black people get arrested way more often for it. Is it true that the proportions of black and white drug…
Sakib Arifin
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Is LSD more harmful than alcohol?

Having read this Guardian article it seems LSD is a much less harmful drug (both to the user and to others) than alcohol. I live in the UK, where alcohol is legal to buy from age 18 (and to drink from even younger), but LSD is a class A drug - the…
fredley
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Did the CIA sell drugs in the US?

According to Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Gary Webb in his controversial article series The Dark Alliance For the better part of a decade, a San Francisco Bay Area drug ring sold tons of cocaine to the Crips and Bloods street gangs of…
Mark Rogers
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Does decriminalizing drug use lead to less drug use?

While listening to the RSA talk Addiction: What to Do When Everything Else has Failed I'm reminded of an article in the Times from 2009 about Portugal's decriminalization of drugs. The Cato paper reports that between 2001 and 2006 in Portugal,…
Kit Sunde
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Is Adrenochrome an addictive drug only obtained by drinking blood?

One of the core beliefs of QAnon is that some people are addicted to adrenochrome that can only be obtained by drinking the blood of frightened victims. Sean Morgan, author of a QAnon FAQ, talks about Adrenochrome, but admits there is no hard…
Oddthinking
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Does normal paper currency contain enough narcotics residue to attract a drug-sniffing dog?

It seems pretty well established that paper currency (e.g. in the US) is commonly contaminated with trace amounts of cocaine or other illegal narcotics. (See Snopes for instance, though I'm happy to have this assumption challenged.) Is this…
Nate Eldredge
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Does oxygen get you high enough to keep you calm during a plane crash?

Does oxygen get you high? If so, is the effect strong enough to keep the average person placid during a plane crash? From the movie Fight Club: Tyler Durden: [pointing at an emergency instruction manual on a plane] You know why they put oxygen …
going
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Did over 1000 people in the US die of cannabis overdose in 2021?

According to the National Safety Council, in 2021 in the US, 1159 people died of cannabis overdose, of which 1130 of the deaths were preventable: Is this true? I'm skeptical because the drug enforcement agency says on its Marijuana/Cannabis…
DavePhD
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Do methamphetamines give more pleasure than other human experiences?

This WatchData infographic video lists some of the worlds most pleasurable things ranked by how many dopamine units they produce At the top of the list, methamphetamines with 1250 dopamine units, ranking higher than falling In love and winning The…
user2638180
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Does a pair of trainers (shoes) hanging on a telephone wire mean the house nearby is a crack den?

I've been told this many times (in the UK). It's even mentioned in a wikipedia article: Some also say that shoes hanging from the wires advertise a local crack house where crack cocaine is used and sold Is there any evidence that this is true?…
user14708
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Has LSD 'been widely used in hospitals for the treatment of mental disorders'?

Operation Moneybags is a video purporting to be a documentary covering medical experiments on British troops, The film has an opening card (27 seconds in) stating: This film was made during the course of an experiment to test the possible effects…
tuskiomi
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Did Coca-Cola contain cocaine?

Is it true Coca-Cola once contained cocaine? To what extent and how similar was this to the street drug cocaine? Until 1903, the world-famous soft drink contained a significant dose of cocaine. livescience.com
Mark Price
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Is cannabis a gateway drug?

gate·way drug noun A habit-forming drug that, while not itself addictive, may lead to the use of other addictive drugs Is there any evidence to suggest that people who try cannabis are more likely to try other drugs?
MSpeed
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