[HN Gopher] A Survey of Programmers' Cannabis Usage, Perception,...
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A Survey of Programmers' Cannabis Usage, Perception, and Motivation
Author : say_it_as_it_is
Score : 146 points
Date : 2021-12-23 16:57 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (arxiv.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (arxiv.org)
| beiller wrote:
| Smoking helps me through the "grindy" parts of programming, like
| you have a set goal in front of you with many small tasks and the
| way they all fit together can be held in your mind in one go.
| When it comes to idea deadlock, like no architecture is a good
| fit and you just need to choose the best of the bad paths,
| cannabis can hinder me greatly. I work on many side projects with
| a toke or two.
| rpmisms wrote:
| Coding while really high is difficult. Coding while a little
| buzzed is a wonderful experience. It's almost like an artificial
| flow state.
| GrumpyNl wrote:
| I experience it the same way.
| Datagenerator wrote:
| Maybe it's CBD and almost no THC that enables being
| productive and creative
| rpmisms wrote:
| Maybe? CBD does next to nothing for me. A small amount of
| THC enables really deep focus for me. I'd describe it as
| allowing me to follow every thought that passes and
| deliberately investigate it.
| extr wrote:
| Just read the abstract but seems to make sense. Weed (in a
| low/moderate dose) is great every once and awhile if you're
| trying to brainstorm or think holistically about how something
| should work. Sometimes if you have to work on something really
| boring it allows you to see it in a new light and appreciate
| interesting the aspects of the task. But if you're actually
| trying to get work done, good luck remembering what loop
| iteration you're on!
|
| Despite the above, personally I have a hard time justifying
| getting "high on the clock" as ethical even if it makes me more
| productive in some things. Though it feels like having a little
| puff on a wide-open, set-aside Friday afternoon isn't too much
| different than having a drink in that situation, something I'm
| occasionally guilty of. IDK. What do people here think?
| colechristensen wrote:
| Do you think drinking caffeine is similarly unethical, why or
| why not?
| extr wrote:
| No, definitely not. In a strict sense, because it is not a
| federally scheduled drug and I didn't make any agreement with
| my employer not to use it on the clock.
|
| The same argument applies to alcohol, but I've noticed that
| cultural expectations around drinking are a lot different. A
| "business lunch" with a beer is no big deal in many (most?)
| industries. But I've never been at a business lunch where
| everyone passed around a joint!
| SOLAR_FIELDS wrote:
| Depends on culture of course. When I worked in Sweden a
| beer with lunch was considered pretty anathema.
| ModernMech wrote:
| > because it is not a federally scheduled drug
|
| Is it your view that cannabis is a federally scheduled drug
| for ethical reasons? Or is your view that it's always
| ethical to follow laws as written? I guess what I'm getting
| at is that to me there doesn't seem to be any good ethical
| reason for cannabis to be a federally scheduled drug in the
| first place. In fact, given the devastation the war on
| drugs has caused, it's my opinion that it's unethical for
| cannabis to be a federally scheduled drug.
| Karsteski wrote:
| Do you consider getting a high off of caffeine to be unethical?
| Assuming some people find weed to be a performance enhancer,
| why is that different?
| extr wrote:
| Well for myself, most of the time when I start working
| somewhere I sign agreements stating I won't be using
| drugs/alcohol on the clock. So even though I may feel it's
| personally okay and the agreement is silly, I would still be
| violating it.
|
| Perhaps I could approach my employer and explain actually
| getting high makes me more productive, but I have never had
| the courage to start such a conversation :)
| e0a74c wrote:
| I don't know you but if you're like most people, you've
| probably violated other (non-drug related) clauses in your
| contract already. Ever watched a YouTube video during work
| hours? (assuming you don't work for Google/YouTube) Ever
| took a personal phone call during work? Ever been late? I
| get the feeling that it's not just a matter of avoiding a
| breach of contract in your case although you phrased it
| that way.
| nickysielicki wrote:
| Because the right side of the caffeine Ballmer peak is less
| steep.
| [deleted]
| stef25 wrote:
| Used to smoke daily for 20+ years. Nobody should kid themselves
| that pot makes you "stupid", for lack of a better term.
|
| Also puts me in a really bad mood the next day - short tempered,
| even aggressive.
|
| On rare occasions it does help with brainstorming, looking at
| things differently. But mostly it's good for forgetting about
| your day and just going to bed.
| mrtksn wrote:
| I thought that cannabis enhances the imagination, boosts the
| creativity and induces out of the box thinking up until I was
| late to a party. When I arrived, I was sober when everyone else
| was high and I couldn't bear the stupidity of those normally
| intelligent people. That's when I stop using the substance.
|
| I'm more inclined to believe that Ballmer Peak[0] is a real thing
| and I do get productive, motivated and creative when I'm slightly
| drunk.
|
| Back in the university, one night when I was lonely and bored I
| just got enough drunk to code a Facebook app that will give
| invitations to invite-only shopping startup using my referral. By
| the time the sunlight hit me, I was finished reverse engineering
| their invite system, write a code that will generate the invite,
| design the UI where people will request the invite, write the
| copy that promotes it, integrate all that into Facebook app(at
| that time FB was cool), post it to the social media. Not the
| biggest engineering or creative challenge but I was first at it.
|
| When I woke up, my app was all over the social media, the founder
| had me added as a friend and invited me to their office. Lifted
| my max invitations limit and I made quite substantial(for a
| student)referral bonus and kept spending it for years to come.
|
| https://xkcd.com/323/
| __float wrote:
| I can imagine it's a super different experience to be (probably
| very) high at a party, and to be a little stoned while working
| alone on a programming task. (Compare someone who's had 1 beer,
| and someone at a party doing shots in the kitchen :p)
|
| There's also the possibility that different people are affected
| differently, and maybe you just prefer alcohol to marijuana
| -\\_(tsu)_/-
| mrtksn wrote:
| It could be, it's just that I'm yet to see someone fun and
| intelligent when Iim sober and they are high on
| cannabis(those who are high think that they are, of course).
| Slightly drunk people tend to be fun and maybe not exactly
| more intelligent than the sober but they tend to go out of
| their comfort zone which enables them to entertain ideas that
| they normally wouldn't do.
|
| There are many stories about how people invent things when
| slightly drunk at the bar and write it down on a napkin.
| ModernMech wrote:
| > yet to see someone fun and intelligent when Iim sober and
| they are high on cannabis
|
| I've gotta ask: how do you know you haven't yet? Not
| everyone who is high loves to announce it to the world.
| mrtksn wrote:
| You can usually tell from the smell
| SauciestGNU wrote:
| That was more true prior to legalization. Now with
| edibles and cartridges and vaporizers you might never
| know if the person you're talking to is zooted to Mars or
| not.
| mrtksn wrote:
| It's not right to assume that it's legalised everywhere.
| ModernMech wrote:
| Even if it's not legalized everywhere, I can 100%
| guarantee you that edibles and vapes are available for
| purchase in your local community. There isn't even a
| question about that.
| 2-718-281-828 wrote:
| > Such cannabis usage, however, is in conflict with anti-drug
| poli- cies currently enacted for many software engineering jobs:
| 29% of our sample reported they had taken a drug test for a
| programming- related job, a hiring practice that may limit
| developer application pools.
|
| What? 29% ... seriously? That's outrageous.
| sophacles wrote:
| A really really large number of programmers work for places
| like government contrators, banks, and insurance companies -
| the types of places that have blanket drug policies for all
| employees. There's probably a lot more companies that have such
| policies but they aren't enforced (unless something bad happens
| requiring it) because insurance gives discounts for having the
| policy, but thye will lose employees if they start enforcing it
| in a serious way.
| sheepybloke wrote:
| I've had to take one for a job because it was a government
| contractor position. I wonder if that's related to why the
| response is higher?
| 2-718-281-828 wrote:
| that would be the only reason coming to my mind but then that
| sample would be quite biased. I never heard of that being a
| thing ever for dev positions.
| Overtonwindow wrote:
| I work in government, and I smoke just about every day, all day.
| From a lifetime of trauma and PTSD, depression, and anxiety,
| _NOTHING_ has been able to hold a candle next to the mental
| relief I get from just a little marijuana. It's not for everyone,
| and although I've abstained many times, for me, it's been a
| lifesaver.
| crate_barre wrote:
| I can't see how you can do anything other than micro-dose
| cannabis (small hits or low dosage edibles). You just get too
| high to be productive.
|
| But I'm very interested to see if low dosages help.
| capnorange wrote:
| for me, cannabis is only useful for sleep and sometimes blank
| canvas thinking.
| beepbooptheory wrote:
| This is maybe pendantic but there are different types of
| productivity. If I really need to get one thing done, it does
| no favors to be stoned. But if you just want to learn,
| experiment, explore, I find it extremely useful in keeping
| myself patient and receptive.
|
| I learn languages in very much sober place, but learning linux
| I can be stoned, and maybe it helps?
|
| Also if your in this space at all, you just need to modify
| Hemingway's advice: commit stoned, but rebase sober!
| crate_barre wrote:
| That's quite true. I've sat through a couple
| lectures/learning tutorials with some wine and managed fine
| (was more fun).
|
| Taking the edge off is a strategy that works well in
| moderation since often procrastination is a phenomenon where
| fear and anxiety can be inhibiting.
|
| Stigma is one of the reasons experimentation has such a bad
| rap.
| jstahrowaway wrote:
| That depends. A lot of people who say you "just get too high"
| often have a super low tolerance, and they are smoking enough
| to get shit faced. If you smoke frequently and only do a puff,
| trust me, not everybody gets as high as you do with your one
| edible a month. I work at a top tech company smoking before
| work, it really only relaxes me at this point, however I smoked
| weed since 14.
| crate_barre wrote:
| I will certainly confess my tolerance sucks, but we are
| effectively talking about the same end result. To get a
| useful _high_ , we need just the right functional amount of
| buzz. The quantity is obviously different for everyone, but
| the goal is the same.
| nemosaltat wrote:
| Anecdotally, I've found that when I'm stumped on a section of
| code, a micro dose, coupled with working on something else,
| _can_ speed my normal process of "walking away from a problem
| for a bit." But yeah, exceeding a small amount just makes me
| code slower.
|
| edit: originally omitted "something else"
| ASinclair wrote:
| I've had the same experience. It forces me out of that
| obsessive debugging loop and gets me thinking about something
| else for a while. Though I'm sure there are plenty of other
| activities that could accomplish the same thing.
| laluser wrote:
| > 29% of our sample reported they had taken a drug test for a
| programming-related job
|
| Wow, That seems so high. I don't know anyone in my circle of
| friends who was drug tested. Although, we are all on the west
| coast.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| I took one for both of my corporate jobs, and that was over
| thirty years ago.
|
| Not new.
| conductr wrote:
| That's a pretty old sample. The war on drugs was full
| throttle 30 years ago. Boomers were the millennials and the
| greatest generation had all the real power. Their straight
| laced policies were on everything.
|
| These days it's 50/50 for me. Depending on how conservative
| the corp culture is. But I work in finance and could
| literally embezzle their money. I'm actually surprised when i
| don't get drug tested.
| ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
| The funny thing is, I worked for a defense contractor for
| my first job, and looked like Cousin Itt. They never drug
| tested me.
| computershit wrote:
| It is extremely common for more enterprisey jobs, or anything
| dealing with finance or gov. I wouldn't expect many smaller
| orgs or startups on the west coast to test very much.
|
| Most regular smokers I know just use fake piss to get around
| it.
| tra3 wrote:
| I can't even focus/code after 1 beer. I can't imagine what
| cannabis would do.
| GrumpyNl wrote:
| Totally different substance.
| tra3 wrote:
| Agreed. I can't anything cognitively difficult when I am any
| kind of intoxicated.
| lambic wrote:
| In my twenties I did some of my best work after a few beers, as
| long as you define "best work" as "innovative code that works
| well but is mostly incomprehensible when you come back to it 6
| months later"
| tra3 wrote:
| This is a normal occurrence for me when I'm sober too :D
| bl4ckm0r3 wrote:
| Always enjoyed but in small amounts and weak power. If it's only
| coding i can definitely see good impact on my performance but
| having meetings really really bring out the worst side (boredom)
| of meetings. Small joint with a bit of hash and coffee is the
| breakfast of the champions!
| sporedro wrote:
| For me it really depends on how much I smoke and what the task
| is. If I'm trying to learn new tech and implement something new
| I'm weed dosnt help. If it's coding in a language I already know
| beyond the absolute basics and I smoke a reasonable amount it
| actual makes me feel more engaged. Of course 10 bong rips or
| something wouldn't be good, but a certain amount is great once in
| a while. As for alchahol after about 1 beer I lose all motivation
| to do anything and think clearly.
| ok_dad wrote:
| I used to vape full spectrum THC+CBD cartridges and other forms
| of "vape juice" ("sugar", "oil", etc. are in that category) and
| consume THC+CBD edibles all day long, every day (except when I
| had to drive somewhere, I would stop for 4-6 hours or more prior
| to the trip), for about 2-3 (maybe 4?) years when I was in a
| legal state, but then I had to move to a non-legal state and
| since I have a kid it's no longer possible for me to use any weed
| (don't want to lose him to the system). I miss it so much, I was
| so much less stressed and calm with weed, and I was much more
| focused on work and I slept better. Now, I basically have to take
| shitty OTC sleep drugs and drink a pot (haha) of coffee a day in
| order to survive, and I yell way too much at my kid and get too
| angry at work. I wish we could just legalize it everywhere (fat
| chance of that happening) and make it like tobacco and alcohol,
| both of which are way worse for you than a daily weed habit.
| rajin444 wrote:
| That's weird - I had to go off weed during a highly stressful
| period of my life. It temporarily made me forget about how
| stressful things were but then it all came crashing back after
| it wore off. I didn't have time to process the stress sober.
|
| I've heard it's very useful for extremely traumatic or
| temporarily stressful incidents but I found the opposite for
| chronic stress.
| ok_dad wrote:
| I'm an anxious person and it helped me a lot. I think it
| really depends on the individual because my wife just gets
| more stressed and anxious on weed, but for me it's a miracle
| drug. In any case, I'm okay sober but I would love to at
| least have weed occasionally during large levels of stress. I
| would never be one of those people who suggest weed is great
| for everyone, just like alcohol is okay for some folks but
| for others the negatives are greater than the positives. If
| government would get out of the way and let us all decide
| what we prefer, and allow us get high quality drugs from a
| reliable and tested source, then I think each person would be
| better served by that than the government being our mommy and
| daddy.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| I've vaped marijuana every night to sleep for the past 3 years or
| so... beats the pants off of any other insomnia med I've tried
| and it certainly takes the edge off of pandemic stress.
|
| As a weird side-effect it occasionally makes me want to work
| more, because an idea will hit me as I'm high. 50% of the time
| it's actually a really good idea. The effects on creativity are
| so apparent, I never would have guessed before trying it.
|
| I'm very diligent with not partaking during normal working hours
| though, my worst nightmare is having to debug something time-
| sensitive while high... it absolutely does not seem like a good
| time.
| honkycat wrote:
| I love smoking weed. I smoke pretty much every day. Just a little
| bit, a puff on the vape pen to get my groove going after work. I
| find it USELESS for problem solving or productivity, but hey: I
| don't need to be productive 24 hours a day. I just want something
| to take the edge off while I play a strategy game or fart around
| on a game prototype.
|
| I NEVER do it during work or when I have to drive.
|
| I started smoking weed when I was 16. I remember it was New Years
| day and the cool older kids from the nearby city took a liking to
| me and offered to smoke with me. We all got high, and it was
| extremely fun. Still friends with those people today. They all
| did quite well for themselves.
|
| It was my rebellion growing up in a small town where there wasn't
| really much to rebel against. I had good parents and a good
| family. Little did I know my dad was also toking...
|
| Then I went from my small town to the big city for college, and
| life got really hard. I didn't have the money to pay for weed
| anymore, and my mental health wasn't great due to all of the
| stress of college and work, so I stopped for around 6 years.
|
| Then, about 3 years ago, I moved to a state where it as legal,
| and the first thing I did was buy some weed just to have the fun
| experience of purchasing it legally. And I smoked it. And I
| discovered something!
|
| It wasn't just youthful rebellion, or following along with the
| cool kids, or anything like that. I actually really enjoy the
| feeling of being high! It makes me feel calm and relaxed.
|
| And that is a good thing! Doing drugs is amoral[0]. There is this
| puritanical vein through US society that altering your state of
| mind, and making yourself feel good is a BAD thing. It even
| extends to coffee and caffeine sometimes.
|
| But altering your state of mind is not inherently wrong! Clearly,
| it can sometimes be used as a crutch for avoiding other pain in
| your life. I am sure we have all seen it. But the same can be
| said of video games, and television, and even exercise when
| overdone. If it doesn't have any other effect on your life, doing
| a drug is fine.
|
| - 0: Legal, not funding drug lords. I avoid illegal drugs for
| this reason.
| stareblinkstare wrote:
| > not funding drug lords. I avoid illegal drugs for this
| reason.
|
| I hate to break it to you...
|
| [Edit: it's best if I expand this comment. The people who
| currently sell "legal" weed whitewashed illegal operations and
| coordinated it with lawmakers to put them at the top. Chinese,
| oddly enough, play a big part at this, since we're on an anti-
| China bend right now it might be useful to know. This whole
| legal drug thing... no, it doesn't exist. Anyone thinking
| otherwise needs to get a wake up call. You're supporting
| massive drug lords that wear suits and work alongside law
| enforcement.]
| mahogany wrote:
| Can you expand on this a bit more? I've never heard about
| this. Are you saying when I go down to my local dispensary
| that it's owned by China? Or that the local bud is not
| actually local?
| FPGAhacker wrote:
| It all depends. I knew a grower in Oregon. They got into
| growing to provide for chronic pain sufferers (frequently
| fibromyalgia) since it is more difficult to get
| prescription pain medication in the US than marijuana.
| stareblinkstare wrote:
| A large portion of the grow ops are owned by Chinese
| groups. This is "common knowledge" in circles where people
| want to grow weed as a business, at scale, and scope out
| their competitors. This is their competition. The small
| local growers are not a competition anymore than your mom
| and pop business is competition to Amazon.
|
| People find this surprising, but they've never stopped to
| ask themselves where did all that weed and infrastructure
| to grow it suddenly spring up from the moment it was
| legalized.
| say_it_as_it_is wrote:
| What are your thoughts on TikTok having more web traffic
| in 2021 than Google or Facebook?
| seabrookmx wrote:
| This is an incredibly ignorant, racist, presumably US-centric
| comment.
|
| Lots of areas (like here in Canada) have well regulated,
| legal Cannabis businesses. The product even goes through
| thorough testing procedures [1]. As far as I can tell, it's a
| very similar setup to alcohol related businesses.
|
| I would love to see a source on this supposed Chinese
| involvement. This sounds like some early 1900's opium den
| stereotyping to me.
|
| [1]: https://news.gov.bc.ca/releases/2021PSSG0050-001115
| davidandgoliath wrote:
| [citation needed]
| z3c0 wrote:
| Very apt username, as that's what I've found myself doing
| towards your comment.
|
| Do you have more information on this nefarious China-
| sponsored drug supply-chain?
| mythrwy wrote:
| There was a pretty high profile case in New Mexico of
| Chinese growers setting up shop on the Navajo reservation.
| It was a big operation too.
|
| (you can probably search for better articles, here is one I
| just found)
|
| https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-56835897
| stareblinkstare wrote:
| Thanks for this but I wouldn't bother. HN knows better
| than us "ignorant, racist, presumably US-centric"
| commenters.
| say_it_as_it_is wrote:
| You can silence skeptics by sharing information. Not
| sharing leaves doubt.
| kadoban wrote:
| You seem to be defining "drug lord" to be including even
| those that legally grow weed, then using that naming to say
| they're bad?
| honkycat wrote:
| And the people who work at the farms are exploited pretty
| terribly as well.
|
| Same with the meat packers, the fruit pickers. Same with the
| people working in all of the factories and shipping plants
| and driving the trucks. The invisible labor we are all
| surrounded by every day that touches literally everything I
| can see right now, aside from the tree outside my window.
|
| And all of the money I spend inevitably trickles upwards to
| people who are going to use it to do things I consider evil
| like destroying our natural world for profit.
|
| But! That is not a problem I am going to solve over-night. I
| can try and tailor my consumption to products that I vet and
| are hopefully more ethically sourced than alternatives. Even
| doing this is of questionable utility.
|
| "No ethical consumption under capitalism" and all that.
| beiller wrote:
| In Canada it's not so much how that works especially Ontario
| where I am at. Yes some illegal sales got rolled up into the
| legal market, but very little. It's very strict to be legit
| here. All the illegal money for rolled up into real estate
| instead looks like. :)
| x1ph0z wrote:
| I hate to break it to you, but OP could be in Canada, where
| weed is legal and has developed grow ops where cannabis grown
| and sold locally...
| [deleted]
| stevenjgarner wrote:
| I would proffer that the recruitment bias for this survey renders
| its results dangerous. I would proffer further that programmers
| at large do no use cannabis and the "true" conclusion for such a
| study might well be the exact opposite of the authors.
|
| The recuitment basis for the survey is not random and is only
| amongst a very small subset of candidates the authors considered
| "ethically permitted" (specifically from GitHub, the University
| of Michigan and social media). So probably few enterprise
| programmers and few non-US participants, etc.. In other words not
| the majority of programmers.
|
| "We now present indirect evidence that our participants, while
| not a random sample, are similar in many ways to previous random
| samples or studies. A true random sample would not have been
| ethically permitted, but we gain confidence in our results'
| generalizability by contextualizing participants' gender, age,
| and employment. ... our study population by recruitment pool
| (e.g., how they were contacted to participate in this study)...
| from GitHub ... from the university ... and social media" - page
| 4, https://arxiv.org/pdf/2112.09365.pdf
|
| A more meaningful lead-in survey would have been to ask
| programmers from all sources if they are subject to any form of
| drug-testing.
|
| Perhaps they should have selected a less clickbaity title for
| their study:
|
| A Survey of [Ethically Permitted USA] Programmers' Cannabis
| Usage, Perception, and Motivation
| pipthepixie wrote:
| What about common nootropics people take to get into 'programmer
| flow', like nicotine, lions mane, choline, caffeine, theanine,
| etc
|
| Surely they're more effective than cannabis, which typically
| makes everything feel great, but in a sober frame of mind, and on
| hindsight, seem trivial and over-hyped when sober.
|
| I've tried various nootropic 'blends' (stacks) over the years and
| they've all been great. Cannabis has its uses, like experiencing
| the various vibes and feel of a new city for the first time, or
| making a snowman when it's snowing, but it's not some panacea
| that makes you super-productive.
|
| Not saying nootropics are a panacea either. You have to have the
| base multiplier before using nootropics, and already be in a flow
| state before getting any leverage from them. They don't
| automatically make you more productive or creative.
| pvarangot wrote:
| I read there's some research on Lion's mane, and there's a lot
| about caffeine and theanine but none of this are magic
| productivity pills. Like it's not that the concentration and
| productivity effects are obvious and reproducible among all
| humans. Caffeine has the "keep you awake thing" that cocaine
| also has and it's pretty reproducible but in most studies I've
| read about caffeine and L-theanine the flowy non-jittery
| productive state or any cognitive enhancement are spotty.
|
| I think the other problem with cannabis as a workday desk-job
| productivity enhancement substance that you are not mentioning
| is its interaction with other drugs and the unpredictable and
| really deep tolerance buildup. Like giving an average someone a
| curve of how much they need to smoke to get the same "effect"
| among weeks or months is probably really hard.
| abacadaba wrote:
| after seeing some fresh lion's mane at [fancy supermarket]
| for the first time, I'm convinced it's reputation is just
| because it looks and feels soft and squishy like a brain.
|
| still take some of course, yolo
| bostonsre wrote:
| Yea, I'm useless on weed and feel slower for a day or two
| afterwards but have had luck with nootropics. Just a warning
| about nicotine tho, it works well for me but it is addictive
| and I feel dumber for a couple days after stopping. Nicotine
| and substances like adrafinil almost feel like overclocking my
| brain.
| nothrowaways wrote:
| > "... 35% of our sample has tried programming while using
| cannabis, and 18% currently do so at least once a month..."
|
| Selection bias.
| Sebb767 wrote:
| Is it? It seems like you're comparing your anecdotal evidence
| against their (at least somewhat) scientific survey, which
| makes it more likely that you experience selection bias.
| throwawaygh wrote:
| Is "programmer" a coherent group?
|
| How much does a Senior Engineer doing something like writing
| kernel code have in common with a fresh high school grad writing
| on something like a single threaded ASP/PHP codebase for an
| internal tool that has fewer than 100 daily users?
|
| I've done both of those jobs, and they both involve the same set
| of general tasks (requirements, brainstorming, coding). But in
| actuality they have almost nothing in common. The fact that both
| involve writing code is mostly a red herring.
|
| More to the point: is a convenience sample taken by a university
| research group representative of the profession?
|
| I'm generally suspicious of Emperical SE research that doesn't
| either:
|
| 1. focus on _specific_ sub-populations of the programming
| profession, or else
|
| 2. make an extremely strong case that their research questions
| are highly likely to generalize across all research labor.
|
| (edit: changed wording because many folks made the worst-possible
| interpretations of my original comment.)
| nickysielicki wrote:
| > Is "programmer" a coherent group?
|
| Well, it's a profession, so yes.
|
| > They have almost nothing in common.
|
| They both write code all day. Professionally.
|
| I'm sorry for the snark. You might be able to make a case that
| this study doesn't take income into account but that's not the
| comment you're making here.
| 8note wrote:
| Programmer isn't a profession though.
|
| It's missing things like licensing groups to limit the supply
| of labour. Similarly, while some programmers are highly
| educated, plenty are self taught or started working after a
| couple weeks of boot camp.
| nickysielicki wrote:
| What?!
|
| What word would you prefer to use to refer to the group of
| people who get paid to program?
| throwawaygh wrote:
| You're taking this extremely personally. My comment is about
| a scientific paper, not about you.
|
| _> Well, it 's a profession, so yes._
|
| I meant from a scientific perspective. I.e., here's the
| point: "can we lump all programmers together, randomly
| sample, do a correlational study or survey, and draw
| conclusions about the underlying population?"
|
| I assert that such studies will generally fail to replicate
| and will mostly tell you about the properties of a skewed
| convenience sample.
|
| _> They both write code all day. Professionally._
|
| You could say the same thing about people who work in
| hospitals. Or people who work in offices. What's the
| difference between a novelist and a listicle author? They
| both write all day, professionally.
|
| Heck, what's the difference between a journalist and a
| lawyer? Again, they both write natural language all day.
| Professionally.
|
| And sometimes you can do studies that generalize. But,
| generally speaking, an empirical study about what makes
| novelists productive won't necessarily tell you how to make
| legal clerks more productive.
|
| It's not income. In fact, I didn't even mention the salary of
| the senior engineer in my hypothetical! $FANCY_CO was
| supposed to be a sign-post for difficult problems and/or
| complex politics, not compensation. (The $10/hr web dev does
| sign-post the complexity of the work, and wasn't meant as a
| hyperbole... I started my career making $10/hr doing PHP dev
| for local businesses. It was really easy work. Requirements
| were simple, code was trivial, and there was never more than
| 1 counter-party. The job was low-paying for a reason.)
|
| It's the type of work. I've done a lot of programming, of
| lots of varieties at nearly all pay scales. Here are some
| buckets:
|
| There's a lot of programming that is easy and mechanical (at
| all payscales). There's a lot of programming that is
| extremely complex and requires intense symbolic/mathematical
| reasoning.
|
| There's a lot of programming where the code is simple but you
| need to think long and hard about some complex technical
| topic separate from the code.
|
| There's a lot of programming that is extremely social and
| requires an incredible amount of intentional interaction with
| customers or internal stakeholders.
|
| These are the same job in the same sense that all medical
| professions are the same job or all people who write natural
| language all day have the same job.
|
| There is a strong relationship between pay and the degree to
| which an inebriating drug would impair your ability to
| perform well. But it's of course not a perfect correlation.
| Some highly paid people do trivial work. Some low paid people
| do complex work.
| gumby wrote:
| I think there's a fundamental complexity and skills-required
| difference between someone writing kernel code or microcode
| and someone writing a generic CRUD app.
| haswell wrote:
| Most devs at "$FANCY_CO" aren't writing kernel code or
| microcode either.
|
| There is merit to the idea that different developers focus
| on different kinds of problems, but the positioning of the
| parent comment - that this variance is due to the
| size/prestige of the org - is incorrect.
| nickysielicki wrote:
| Yeah but do salaries represent that? The biggest mistake
| I've made in the past 10 years of my life is choosing to
| focus on low level instead of just chasing the latest and
| greatest react/rails stuff. Fresh grads with experience
| only in Java at $FANCY_CO outearn me by a factor of 2.5
| because they get on the web/app track.
|
| Meanwhile over in embedded I'm writing highly performant
| const-correct modern asio C++ applications requiring custom
| kernel drivers.
|
| Parent comment had the nerve to imply that I'm not even a
| true programmer. None of this shit makes any sense anymore,
| I can't wait for the bubble to pop.
| throwawaygh wrote:
| _> Parent comment had the nerve to imply that I 'm not
| even a true programmer._
|
| That wasn't my intention.
|
| _> Fresh grads with experience only in Java at $FANCY_CO
| outearn me by a factor of 2.5 because they get on the web
| /app track._
|
| 1. In fact, my example of "less complex job" was "web
| dev".
|
| 2. Most fresh grads doing web dev make $55K or so. The
| $FANCY_CO engineers are an outlier. And, FWIW, within
| those companies, the low-level C++ people tend to make a
| lot more than the fresh grad web dev people.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| There are hot companies in need of embedded programmers.
| Plenty of auto companies, both self-driving and not, it's
| a big space. Ditto for IoT, which has gone from an
| enthusiast's hobby to a mainstream category over the past
| five years. Representing these spaces, Rivian and Samsara
| both went public in the past two months, respectively.
| Nearly every FAANG makes consumer electronics, and at
| least a couple are into cars.
| haswell wrote:
| I've also done both of those jobs, and they have quite a bit in
| common. The scale of the problems to be solved may be
| different, and that naturally results in some differences
| between the roles, but the fundamentals are all the same.
|
| It's unclear what kind of point you're trying to make and how
| it had any bearing on the cannabis angle.
| throwawaygh wrote:
| _> but the fundamentals are all the same._
|
| Sure. Also, any job that requires writing English all day has
| some cross-cutting fundamentals.
|
| I'm making a general point about empirical software
| engineering research: "does the question that's being asked
| get at the fundamentals that are shared between all
| programmers, or do we need to be more careful about
| specifying what we mean when we say 'programmer'?"
|
| _> It's unclear what kind of point you're trying to make and
| how it had any bearing on the cannabis angle._
|
| I could probably do the "$local_shop web dev job" high all
| day. Not probably. I definitely could write straight-forward
| iPhone apps or Django web apps all day long while high as a
| kite. No problem.
|
| I definitely couldn't do other programming jobs high all day
| -- either because I need to spend a ton of time in careful
| conversation with other people, or because the technical
| problems require sobriety, or more usually a combination of
| both.
|
| Apparently the basic observation that some programming is
| easier than other programming is divisive here. That's fine
| for an HN comment thread. But I'd love to see a paper that
| goes something like "here are some buckets of programming
| jobs. Let's try to replicate a bunch of empirical SE studies
| with samples selected from each of these buckets and see what
| happens."
| haswell wrote:
| I don't think there's any question that some kinds of
| programming is harder than others. The only thing that
| seems to be divisive is automatically assuming that the
| size or prestige of the org is what drives the complexity
| of the work.
|
| It's easy to find easy programming work in big shops, and
| not uncommon to find hard work in small shops.
|
| As I said in my previous comment, there is absolutely a
| difference between different kinds of work.
| jMyles wrote:
| Since we're all sharing our anecdotes...
|
| I'm in a someowhat rare position of wanting to consume (and
| particularly smoke) more cannabis, especially during the work
| day, but I refrain because of the "anxiety" or "paranoia" it
| causes.
|
| I use quotes because these phenomena aren't precisely anxiety or
| paranoia, and after-the-fact, I'm almost always thankful for the
| reflection that they provide.
|
| Has anybody found a way to increase intake and keep it regular
| over the long-term amidst these pain points?
| ranprieur wrote:
| I use cannabis for creativity and motivation, in both writing
| fiction and playing piano. I can't prove that it gives me better
| ideas, but looking back from a state of sobriety, I believe that
| it does, and certainly I've been more productive high than I ever
| was sober.
|
| The catch is that I take frequent breaks. My current rule is, for
| every session, I have to go one calendar day without using it at
| all. This also keeps my tolerance low, so I only use about a gram
| a month.
| Slavebot00 wrote:
| This should be in the "Any excuse to get loaded.", department.
| [deleted]
| BXLE_1-1-BitIs1 wrote:
| Looking at the jerk off code in some highly revered and critical
| software, it wouldn't surprise me if the writers were on LSD or
| meth.
| [deleted]
| throwaway599281 wrote:
| > Furthermore, this cannabis usage is primarily motivated by a
| perceived enhancement to certain software development skills
| (such as brainstorming or getting into a programming zone) rather
| than medicinal reasons
|
| How can anyone who has tried it remotely believe this nonsense?
| MissionInfl wrote:
| It's possible to have different reactions to the same drug :)
|
| As someone that is a heavy longtime user and recently diagnosed
| ADHD (there is a deep relationship between cannabis/substances
| and ADHD), I did find during the pandemic that smoking cannabis
| prior to writing software made it feel more productive. Given I
| couldn't prove that I was really more productive, and there are
| other costs, I decided against using it at least for my full
| time job. This is all to say, YMMV with cannabis or any
| psychoactive substance.
| torbTurret wrote:
| "Feel more productive" - just like all the drunk drivers who
| swear, "I actually drive better drunk!"
| MissionInfl wrote:
| Comparing "unfocused without cannabis" to "focused with
| cannabis" is a no brainer: I am definitely more productive
| with cannabis if it gets my butt in the chair and fingers
| typing on the keyboard. Comparing "focused without
| cannabis" to "focused with cannabis" is a different story,
| likely favoring the former as you are implying, but I think
| it is a bit less certain than driving drunk which is always
| dangerous.
| __float wrote:
| Also ADHD here. I find smoking a little helps significantly
| with turning off the distractions of Slack, email, reading
| interesting docs that cross my path. It's much easier to sit
| down, crank out a coding task, or jump into a deep debugging
| session.
|
| Not something I do often (or even occasionally), but I
| definitely don't think it's nonsense.
| Eldt wrote:
| Undiagnosed but suspected ADHD here. With a bit of THC and
| some electronic music I can bang code out for hours
| completely in the zone. It's like I build a great mental
| model on what I'm working on and become very immersed in
| it. I can't do it too often as managers need their meetings
| and updates but it's the most "zen" I ever feel.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| In my experience, being in any alternative state of mind,
| whether from caffeine or moderate amounts of alcohol, or
| even something not substance related- after working out,
| after a good night's sleep, after a bad night's sleep
| (the sweet spot is four hours), there is a _sensation_ of
| productivity benefit, but I hesitate to claim there is
| actually productivity in every case. I think these
| altered states of mind help make it _emotionally_ easier
| to cope with whatever the underlying cause is- possibly
| ADHD, possibly some variety of anxiety- and thus make it
| feel easier to work or engage in other difficult tasks.
| But _cognitively_? That 's a whole different story.
| [deleted]
| pxc wrote:
| Different people work differently. I don't have the spare
| working memory necessary to be very productive on cannabis,
| except with respect to very menial tasks. But in college I knew
| people who studied for our calculus and physics exams stoned
| and did quite well.
|
| I'd be skeptical of a programmer who claimed cannabis made them
| more productive, especially at high doses, but if I could see
| that their work were consistent and good, I might believe them.
| mediocregopher wrote:
| This has basically been my experience with it... the actual act
| of typing out code goes slower, but my ideas are more fluid and
| I'm able to "see" the whole picture more clearly. I think the
| slowness is more to do with having more ideas and noticing more
| details and possibilities than otherwise, so I have to spend
| more time sorting through all that.
| pvarangot wrote:
| I don't think it's nonsense, and it doesn't "work" the same way
| on everyones brain, that's like the whole reason psychiatry is
| a thing and research like this makes sense. If cannabis helps
| 10% of the population get into their "programming zone" all
| power to their nonsensical selves.
|
| Thinking "this drug makes me useless hence it should make the
| rest of the world also useless and any claims to the contrary
| are nonsense" it not only a blatant abuse of incomplete
| induction, but also kinda rude as it can make some people feel
| othered out just because of how their brain chemistry works.
| pietrovismara wrote:
| I tried and can confirm it works exactly like that for me.
| mwattsun wrote:
| Absolutely, but I understand ymmv. I live in California where
| it's legal, so I decided to try it again. What I found is
| related to another article on HN right now: Step Away from
| Stack Overflow (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29659938)
|
| _Sometimes I get lost in the programming equivalent of
| throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. After some time
| with no progress in figuring out what sticks, it's time to step
| away from that approach._
|
| I don't smoke daily. I use it as a tool because I found it
| helps me when I am semi-manic and just trying to get something
| to work. I step away from the keyboard and spend time thinking
| about how to architect my code so that it is easier to write
| and understand. I'm sure other people do that without smoking,
| but it's been a big help for me to do that more often.
| systemvoltage wrote:
| I've tried weed, got addicted to it in college and have seen
| many people do the same. It made me lazy, completely
| unmotivated and unproductive. All I did was watch Anime and eat
| unhealthy foods.
|
| Contrary to the notion that you can think about great ideas and
| brainstorming - it's amazing when you're high. Write down those
| ideas and think about them when sober - I quickly realized how
| foolish they were.
|
| Concentration and programming is so far from my experience (and
| others that I know), I absolutely cannot believe this study.
| Couldn't even stay motivated to go take a shower. There has to
| be a study that matches my experience. What's going on?
| officeplant wrote:
| Sounds like my experience but I was using it at the time to
| cope with depression and anxiety about graduating from
| college amid the late 2000's financial crisis and other
| stresses you deal with as a lonely young adult.
|
| But I also never really stopped smoking and learned to use it
| to cope with a multitude of things like migraines and
| sleeplessness.
|
| In the end it often comes down to the person and their
| reactions to a substance more than the substance itself. I
| can smoke and melt on the couch or I can smoke and go for a
| long walk and decompress.
| j4hdufd8 wrote:
| > I absolutely cannot believe this study
|
| What do you not believe about the study? Did you read the
| study?
|
| > In this paper, we presented results of the first empirical
| study of cannabis's prevalence, perceptions, and usage
| motivations in programming environments
|
| I don't think this study says "weed makes you better" or
| anything like that.
| frank_nitti wrote:
| Thanks for calling out one of the many people responding
| without reading the material, not even the abstract
| apparently. HN users are typically better about this than
| other platforms, but this topic seems to be especially
| triggering for people who have had some negative life
| experience related to weed.
| weerd wrote:
| In my experience, lazy people who already love eating and
| watching TV will double down on this behavior when using
| cannabis. It can make you feel comfortable and OK with
| things, and also triggers the appetite. So instead of
| becoming satiated/bored with your activities and moving to
| something else, you remain in place.
|
| Others who are not as thrilled with consuming food and media
| to begin with will have different cannabis experiences.
| You'll probably find them exercising, making art/music, or
| creating software like mentioned in the article.
|
| I'm sorry if this offends you, but your statement might say
| more about you as a person than about the effects of
| cannabis.
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| I think your experience probably mimics most experience but
| years of hanging around people who smoked a lot showed me
| that it really does affect everyone differently.
|
| I hear people talk about it like it's a miracle drug for pain
| management, but for me it makes pain worse. I spend the
| entire time focused on every pain in my body.
|
| I knew a guy who concentrated on problems and coded better
| when he was stoned. Another who was an amazing chess player
| and _had_ to smoke before he could play. Others who mixed
| records and played music while high and it enhanced their
| abilities. I tried to DJ techno once while high and it was a
| horrible trainwreck, and I can 't focus more than 30 seconds
| at a time. I wrote a paper in university while high and it
| was the worst crap I ever wrote. Others swear by it.
|
| Many of my friends were super social and enjoyed going out
| and doing things. It always made me paranoid, overly self-
| critical, and I spent the whole time taking myself apart and
| feeling sad.
|
| So I didn't smoke it for almost 20 years. I tried it again
| recently now that it's legal here. Basically the same
| experience, even with "low THC, high CBD" strains.
|
| It really comes down to YMMV. And yes, I saw many people with
| the same experience as you, including a close relative.
| Unproductive, unmotivated, and low concentration, and
| chronic.
| sophacles wrote:
| I program high often. It's resulted in good code and bad code
| at proportions roughly equal to sober programming. The
| difference is generally in _which_ code is good in each case.
|
| Tricky memory stuff, trying to deal with complex order of
| operations (threads, race conditions, etc) tends to go way
| better sober.
|
| House keeping like light refactors (im in rust these days so
| stuff like: oh that should be a result not an option, or using
| matches instead of ifs, genericize this struct), boiler plate
| stuff and cleaning up logs/error handling tends to go better
| when I'm high.
|
| But there are exceptions to both trends and I've done good deep
| work high and done plenty of good housekeeping sober. And of
| course since it's coding, i've (re)done plenty of bad work in
| both states too.
|
| Sad to know my experience is just nonsense. I guess I need to
| get in touch with the CFO and let him know the profit from the
| product I wrote is just a pipe dream.
| jermaustin1 wrote:
| Anyone who has tried it and doesn't use it, might experience it
| different than people who use it every day. I've known new
| users who couldn't walk straight after a bowl, and "pro" users
| who smoke 2+ grams a day and just keep on trucking. It comes
| down to tolerances, and probably also your mind adjusting to
| how it interprets the world under the influence of marijuana
| which is a mild psychedelic.
|
| Also going to add that the time-dilation effect of marijuana
| will definitely make you feel less productive but you will
| realize only 1/3 of the time you thought passed has passed. I'm
| sure this might play into some of the findings.
| ModernMech wrote:
| Remember cannabis has a range of effects, so there is no
| singular "it" to be tried. You can try one strain of cannabis
| and it will knock you out. No problem solving happening there.
| Then you can try another strain and your mind is flooded with
| ideas. Both are called "cannabis" but it's not the same drug
| really.
| bicx wrote:
| This has definitely been my experience. If you take an Indica
| gummy, you're most likely going to want to just lay on the
| couch and take a nap. On the other hand, I've had hybrids and
| sativas that will really lock me in on what I'm doing. I
| don't know if I could say I was more productive, but I
| definitely felt more focused.
| pm90 wrote:
| YMMV. I've found that it helps to turn off distractions and let
| my brain get in the right state to play with the problem, to
| look at it from different angles... basically brainstorming.
|
| It's pretty well known that marijuana helps to boost
| creativity; just look at all the music (and media in general)
| that's been created by musicians high on pot.
|
| Arguably, it's effects have not been studied as well as regular
| drugs so perhaps that's needed to make more objective
| statements about its effects.
| whalesalad wrote:
| Eliminating chronic pain can have the net result of improving
| concentration and intelligence from baseline.
|
| I have absolutely had profoundly productive days while using
| THC. It's not black and white. Like any tool, it needs to be
| used responsibly.
| rbanffy wrote:
| I think a lot of the overengineering is driven by amphetamines
| and self medication instead. I'd expect a system designed under
| Cannabis to be very simple and flexible.
| ArtWomb wrote:
| Somewhat related, but a recent Senate hearing cited the lack of a
| national standard regarding cannabis impaired driving. They voted
| to investigate further. Results may be counter-intuitive ;)
|
| Interesting there is so little research into the actual *effects*
| on humans. You get better data from Leafly reviews!
| pxc wrote:
| > Interesting there is so little research into the actual
| _effects_ on humans. You get better data from Leafly reviews!
|
| I imagine that this will always be true, because what you want
| to know about the effects is inherently qualitative and
| subjective, and that kind of research gets relatively little
| attention and funding.
| mabbo wrote:
| Many years ago, before we legalized it generally, an
| acquaintance of my father fought a fun court case related to
| this.
|
| https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/pot-smoking-motorist-not-guil...
|
| From everything I've read about him, the guy was a hell of a
| character and maybe some of his misfortune was self-inflicted,
| but he did fight some important court cases around marijuana
| laws.
| gumby wrote:
| Because the DEA and the "War" on Drugs opposed any research.
|
| Just as congress prohibited the government from maintaining
| statistics on gun violence almost 20 years ago.
|
| If you don't like what might be learned, don't let anyone look.
|
| (I don't like smoking pot, or really any mind altering
| substances, but other peoples' use is none of my business and I
| think it is worth a study).
| darepublic wrote:
| for me weed is definitely an impediment to coding, even more so
| than alcohol
| assbuttbuttass wrote:
| I always find it is more difficult to program while under the
| influence, I tend to make more typos and small mistakes.
|
| Doesn't stop me though.
| awestley wrote:
| This is the most realistic answer here.
| irthomasthomas wrote:
| This seems like a good place to drop a cool tip I learned
| recently. You can cure a weed overdose (the whitey) quickly with
| black pepper. Sniff it for instant relief, or swallow some whole
| corns. You can pop a few peppercorns pre-emptively too before you
| indulge. No more paranoia or anxiety.
| neveradmitmyid wrote:
| I've been a heavy, 1 oz. of Indica a week smoker for decades,
| while being an extremely productive lead and principal software
| engineer on dozens of highly visible tech products. I am part of
| a heavy smoking, high tech collective of startup and career
| research individuals from companies people use everyday. I start
| my day with a combination of THC and caffeine, which folds into a
| deep work and research focus lasting the entire day. Over time,
| fellow high tech heavy smokers have identified one another,
| forming a moderately secret heavy smokers network that support
| one another in non-legal places, sometimes meet at big
| conventions, or we realize a number of us are at an airport at
| the same time and all meet in the smoker's den.
| ok_coo wrote:
| The hippie speedball makes me ultra-productive, but
| unfortunately employers (well, mine) are probably not cool with
| me being high on Zoom calls. :/
|
| I just wanted to chime in and say that, for some people,
| THC+caffeine in the right settings can give you a nice hyper-
| focus. I wish I could use the combo more often.
| 3a2d29 wrote:
| Just out of curiosity, why THC + caffeine? I am a regular
| coffee drinker, but never smoked at the same time.
|
| Is it the caffeine gives you focus, but the THC removes the
| jitters and antsy-ness that goes along with it?
| crate_barre wrote:
| These people are heavy smokers that probably developed a
| functional habit (they sort of need the hit to feel
| normal).
|
| You won't magically get the benefits being espoused, if
| that's what you're thinking.
| w0de0 wrote:
| Of course you're right - but drugs usually do deliver the
| benefits espoused (if often at a Faustian price). Your
| two statements are a shade oxymoronic.
|
| Addictive habits form suddenly, but not immediately.
| Every drug requires a period of optional, regular, and
| increasing use before dependency develops. (Some, like
| nicotine, can have rapid dependency onset. Others take 6
| or more months of intermittent use before withdrawal
| threatens).
|
| This non-dependent yet regular use is usually driven by
| genuine (subjective) benefit to the user - euphoria or
| focus, amnesia or nescience, etc.
|
| This is the essence of the word "drug": if inactive we
| say supplement, snake oil, homeopathic, etc.
|
| Pharmacology _is_ somewhat magic - absurdly improbable in
| a way reality, and human endeavor, often is (see: organ
| transplants, the bioengineered mutant grass known as
| maize/corn).
| 0xdeadb00f wrote:
| Very much this. If you're looking at it from a pure
| productivity standpoint and want to try it out, and
| aren't a regular toker - don't - because you'll just get
| really baked. :P
| centizen wrote:
| I've always assumed it to be that the caffeine keeps the
| user more energetic and alert than they would be otherwise.
| ok_coo wrote:
| The key part is you can't get too high. You just need a
| little bit, along with some good coffee. Unless if you're a
| heavy smoker and then you probably already know what you're
| doing.
|
| I don't think this works for everyone but THC can help me
| focus in small amounts. The coffee (caffeine) is just there
| to keep you energized and going. I will also drink lots of
| water along with it. For me, caffeine actually makes me
| less focuses and more prone to anxiety, so it's for more of
| an energy kick.
|
| Further down the this thread, there's mention of making you
| "dumber." Yes, that can happen if you take too much. I have
| messed up trying this method before on a weekend and wasn't
| able to figure out my own code so I just relaxed for a bit
| and came back later.
|
| I like to say it's akin to some sort of alchemy. Need to
| find the right mixture for you and environment to work in.
| throwanem wrote:
| The caffeine gives you focus and the energy to counteract
| whatever lassitude comes with the cannabis, and the
| cannabis provides easier access to flow state and the
| tendency for thoughts to wander in what can often be
| unexpectedly productive directions.
|
| Or so I assume, at any rate, based on knowledge of each
| drug's action in isolation. I had a heavy cannabis habit
| back ages ago, and kicking it cold was really one of the
| best decisions I've ever made - of all else in my
| recollection, the only thing comparable in terms of
| immediate cognitive and emotional improvement has been
| beginning APAP treatment for obstructive sleep apnea. Given
| that I'd be very wary of self-reports of the benefits of
| heavy cannabis use - after all, I thought for a long time
| it was helping _me_ , too! - but I suppose I can see why
| folks who do choose to indulge might choose also to pair
| cannabis with coffee.
| odonnellryan wrote:
| I haven't ever been high during work hours, but I have tried
| to program while high. I tunnel vision too hard to get things
| done. I find it impossible to debug or think about broad
| solutions. I also am under the suspicion that I'm dumber when
| high.
| criticaltinker wrote:
| Wow an ounce per week is such a heavy intake, have you noticed
| any negative impacts for example to your lungs or teeth?
|
| Do you prefer smoking over edibles because of the instant rush
| versus a slow ramp up?
| GordonS wrote:
| Have you considered d switching to vaping? It's so much more
| efficient that you'd likely only use 1/2 oz, or maybe even 1/3
| oz.
| gime_tree_fiddy wrote:
| The efficiency, the dosage limitation and convenience is
| amazing, and its been a a few months when I smoked a joint.
| But I still find the joint to be better experience, not sure
| why, maybe the trace amounts of CBD.
| MisterTea wrote:
| smoking always trumps dry vape, oil, wax, and edibles. I've
| found joints to be the easiest but least efficient way to
| smoke (its hard to charge a smoker with paraphernalia for
| having papers if you also carry a bag of tobacco). bowls
| are better but have to be cleaned. bongs and bubblers are
| top dog but they are bulky and even harder to clean than
| bowls.
| stackedinserter wrote:
| Show your LinkedIn profile.
| itronitron wrote:
| I can't tell whether the parent comment was written as parody
| or while the author was high.
| dave_sid wrote:
| Sounds more like an idea you have for a movie than reality
| [deleted]
| chris_hk wrote:
| pvarangot wrote:
| Do you also smoke tobacco or vape nicotine juice?
|
| Maybe you know me, you can check my profile, I've been in the
| "in" side of like... three? or maybe four? of this super-secret
| techie psychedelic ultra select clubs even involving VPs of
| unicorns and directors of tech companies and most of the heavy
| indica smokers also smoke nicotine like, a lot. Weed and
| tobacco are a very different thing as just smoking weed, on
| some cultures that smoke weed heavily like Rastas that's the
| more common method, like in a spliff or a blunt.
|
| If you don't vape nicotine can I out of curiosity ask about
| your other super-secret habits? Because in my super secret
| extracurricular experience in this circles multiple time per
| year LSD trips and occasional cocaine binges are not unusual
| and both LSD and cocaine probably effect glutamate receptors in
| ways that I theorize help with the brain fog or fatigue that
| for some people regular weed use causes.
| TrippinTraveler wrote:
| Sounds like a cool group, where do you meet? :-) Need the
| deets. Also I am a Sativa man myself, but caffeine indeed,
| gotta stack those chemicals.
| TrippinTraveler wrote:
| Anecdotal but I'm a "programmer" at BigTech(tm) and smoke all day
| every day, and at this point I can't tell if it helps me or
| hinders me, but when you smoke all the time, most of these
| stories you are hearing about in the comments don't happen. At
| this point in my life, it's just a little "pick me up". It's by
| no means a micro dose as I probably smoke a gram or 2 a day. But
| when you live high it's a different kind of beast. I'll probably
| stop one day, but at the moment I don't see a reason to. Maybe it
| helps, maybe it doesn't, but I like being high and at this point
| I am addicted for sure anyway.
| kerneloftruth wrote:
| Interesting. That describes me for the past 20 years. But, I am
| going to turn 60 next year, and have decided that age 60-90
| (God willing) will be different than age 30-60. Key in that is
| that I have returned to my original weed habits prior to age
| 30: none until evening time. So far, I'm _really_ liking the
| change. I still like weed, but I'm not allowing it (or
| anything) to have that much importance to me, and minimizing
| false 'dependencies' feels very refreshing.
| criticaltinker wrote:
| Yeah the body quickly develops a tolerance when cannabis is
| used chronically. In stoner culture people talk about taking
| "T" breaks for this reason. Other people switch strains to try
| mitigating the effect.
|
| Smoking a gram or two would be enough to get a newbie high as
| hell for the entire day. For chronic users it's more like a cup
| of coffee that wakes you up for the day. And in that respect,
| many chronic stoners are forever chasing that feeling of the
| first time they got high. You can feel that way again, just
| take a break!
| TrippinTraveler wrote:
| Haha ya I haven't taken a T break in years, but you are right
| that when I did and I finally smoked again, it was like
| remembering why I smoke in the first place. I am at a point
| in my life where I have kinda stopped trying to have self
| control in this regard and just made it part of my life. I'm
| 36 now and had never smoked weed until a trip to Amsterdam
| when I was 25. I get something from smoking, but it's muted
| for sure now-a-days with my tolerance, and I need to smoke
| the strong stuff.
| frank_nitti wrote:
| Personally, I much prefer the feeling of a THC high when I
| _have_ a high tolerance. Been a daily smoker for 15+ years
| (with occasional breaks for other reasons) and one single
| toke still works wonders, and I never take more than a single
| puff in a session.
|
| Smoking some potent bud after a long break can be unpleasant,
| like taking big cup of coffee having no tolerance to
| caffeine. More likely to experience the negatives like
| anxiety, paranoia and confusion. The only upsides of low THC
| tolerance are some more intense spells of nonsensical
| laughter and things like "munchies" which were novel and fun
| things as a kid experimenting with a group of friends.
|
| But that is quite different from what I enjoy most about MJ
| as an adult, which is more akin to adult enjoyment of
| caffeine. A morning cup of black coffee feels great _because_
| I have a tolerance, not despite it.
| MisterTea wrote:
| > Maybe it helps, maybe it doesn't, but I like being high and
| at this point I am addicted for sure anyway.
|
| I smoked occasionally since my 20's and by occasionally i mean
| 3-4 times a year if even. then around 35 I started smoking on
| my own and it went from a puff or two at 9pm to help sleep to
| 3-4 j's a day. Like you I cant tell if it does anything any
| more. Likely I'm just giving myself lung cancer. And I too
| enjoy being intoxicated. my family is full of addiction so it
| figures.
|
| Bottom line is YMMV and be careful with self medicating.
| veidelis wrote:
| It's just lovely to hear how honest you are about your
| "situation". I enjoy smoking occasionally. I would say that
| sometimes I dismiss my thoughts too quickly when I'm sober, and
| rarely engage in thought process about particular details too
| intensively when I'm a bit off the ground. Otherwise it's great
| no matter what's being done, just need to be active.
| TrippinTraveler wrote:
| Thanks, hopefully I am being honest with myself. I think weed
| can be very different for different people. Also it's not
| really mentioned here but Sativa and Indica strains also can
| make a difference as well as the THC % and method of
| consumption. I vape half a bowl from my Pax 3, I am in Canada
| so it's legal and we have THC % labels, I typically go for
| 25%+ which is not the "cheap stuff". I'd say if someone
| smoked my stuff with me at 9 AM, who doesn't normally smoke,
| it would probably knock them out for a few hours. But for me,
| it's like booting up in the morning. Nobody has ever
| mentioned or asked if I am high because I am more "normal"
| high than sober. Although I haven't been "sober" (clean for
| 4+ weeks) in many years, so I admit I have slightly lost
| perspective. It also has other effects on my life, such as my
| total loss of recalling my dreams, although I can tell they
| still occur, I just can't recall them at all.
| shaky wrote:
| You sound very much like me. Totally happy with my usage,
| and a chronic user that smokes 2-3 times per day reaching
| about a gram. It helps with empathy, it helps with creative
| flow, it helps with many things, but there are downsides of
| course. From August to December I took a break and it was
| immensely useful for perspective and for resetting my
| brain. My dreams were extremely vivid and rich, and going
| back to smoking was like rediscovering pot when I was 16. T
| breaks are indeed the key as GP pointed out.
| criticaltinker wrote:
| Not going to bed stoned should be a recommended best
| practice in my opinion, especially given all the research
| supporting the fact that sleep is impaired by Cannabis much
| the same way as alcohol.
|
| So many people claim that Cannabis helps them sleep but the
| science just doesn't support that idea.
| cik2e wrote:
| It takes weeks after I stop smoking weed for me to start
| remembering my dreams again. I don't doubt that there are
| other effects on sleep from acute smoking around bed
| time. But for me, the loss of REM sleep is definitely
| mainly a function of cannabanoid tolerance.
|
| After many years of on and off heavy smoking, I would say
| that the best best practice is actually not smoking weed
| every day. I think there are some amazing benefits to
| weed, but for me they all but disappear with enough
| tolerance.
| GoodJokes wrote:
| Citations? From what I know cannabis can give you really
| good "deep sleep." Which is just as good as REM sleep.
| netizen-936824 wrote:
| I definitely agree that cannabinoids mess the sleep
| processes, but without cannabinoids at night (even during
| periods when I'm not adapted to them) I wake up easily 6+
| times during the night just to urinate. Its a horrible
| experience that's easily solved with cannabinoids, but
| there are likely other solutions to whatever is actually
| causing the problem. I do stop or slow my water intake a
| while before bed but this doesn't seem to matter.
|
| Also it should be noted that this is not the primary
| reason for my cannabinoid use.
| gime_tree_fiddy wrote:
| Yeah, I've gone for 1-2 months long period of everyday, to cold
| turkey and haven't found much issues(even when going cold
| turkey, like no jonesing).
|
| How do you define being addicted to it, what is your benchmark?
| netizen-936824 wrote:
| The general benchmark for an addiction is whether or not the
| substance use interferes or causes issues in other parts of
| your life. Like continuing tobuse in the face of damaging
| side effects or damaging effects on one's interpersonal
| relationships.
| netizen-936824 wrote:
| I'm in a similar situation where I use cannabinoids basically
| 24/7. But for me I don't like inhalation anymore because it
| spikes the blood concentration too far and too fast for my
| liking. Edibles not only provide a more consistent and long
| lasting effect, but also saves money if you make your own from
| the flower you would have smoked. Part of this is because a
| similar inhaled dose compare to eaten, the eaten dose will last
| longer and be slightly more efficacious due to first pass
| metabolism.
| [deleted]
| marcodiego wrote:
| Well, and sometimes just maybe. When people feel like that and...
| but it is not always. Just a feeling that sometimes and just not
| always. But people do get the feel, and it is not the same thing
| but not always too. And it is great and good. /s
| coffeeyesplease wrote:
| I'm a programmer (cto these days) and a skateboarder (kind of
| c'os age is not just a a number) and I've always been in awe of
| people who smoke weed and are able to engage in either activity
| and yet I do have friends capable of such. This is not a lie :-)
| I've seen it with my own eyes. What amazes me is how good they
| are at it. If, by contrast, I did same I would end up hurt or
| fired :-)
| educaysean wrote:
| For me weed is not really something that actively aids in
| problem-solving or brainstorming, but rather acts as more of a
| motivation booster. When it's 11pm and I have a handful of less-
| demanding tasks to slog through, that's where I've found weed to
| be a lot of help. It helps make otherwise routine tasks more
| engaging. It even gives me sufficient motivation to actively
| refactor and improve parts of codebase that I might've otherwise
| ignored or ticketed away in the backlog.
| MissionInfl wrote:
| Sorry if you have heard this before but you may have ADHD or
| something similar. I found myself in a similar pattern of using
| cannabis to motivate myself to do the more boring tasks that
| inevitably come up being a full time software engineer and
| after several months of therapy was diagnosed with ADHD.
|
| FWIW, I find that if I have a boring task and attempt to use
| cannabis to power through it, half of the time I complete the
| task with vigor and then other half of the time I do literally
| anything else. So my story is as similar to yours as those
| saying that cannabis leads them to be anything but productive.
| datavirtue wrote:
| I tried getting help for ADHD years ago but found it very
| difficult to get help for an adult that is high functioning.
| I'm pretty sure I have it but all the diagnostics focus on
| young children. The office where I had evaluations was loaded
| with whacked out kids. They just don't see it as a problem
| compared to those kids and the diagnosis is heavily focused
| on childhood behavior and excludes adults. The doctor, who I
| struggled to find, was really disorganized and lost my case
| file and forgot about me after several visits. Total joke.
|
| I have to keep self medicating I guess.
| uberduper wrote:
| Talk to your primary care physician. Let them know you're
| struggling to focus and it's impacting your ability to
| function at work. Get a referral to a counselor and do a
| telemed appointment. Answer the handful of questions
| (truthfully). It's not like there's a series of tests for
| ADHD. It's just behaviors that are common to people with
| it.
| MissionInfl wrote:
| Telemedicine is great for avoiding those whacked out kids.
| I was able to find a great therapist (who I have never met
| in real life) through a mental health startup made
| available to me by my employer.
| encoderer wrote:
| Yes same for me. It makes it easy to push through tedious tasks
| with a little enjoyment.
| awestroke wrote:
| Why are you working at 11pm?
| dylan604 wrote:
| Why do you care, and why is it important to the conversation?
| People work different hours. Some people choose to work those
| hours.
| awestroke wrote:
| Because I was curious. Why do you care that I care?
| dylan604 wrote:
| I read it as accusational for working at an odd hour /
| after hour, so I was asking to see if that accusational
| tone was implied or just read into it by the reader. Why
| do you care why I care?
| ses1984 wrote:
| During the day I just kind of loaf around, answer questions
| on slack, practice music, work out, etc.
|
| Late at night is the only time I can get any deep work done.
| anchpop wrote:
| Wow, I'm the exact same way. I basically never get anything
| done before 12 but I'm perfectly happy working until 10pm.
| I wish I could work earlier because it really disrupts my
| family life.
| LouisSayers wrote:
| Why not block out a couple hours during the day where
| people can't interrupt? This was brought up many times in
| my last workplace and we found that we could cancel lots of
| meetings and magically the days became much more free.
|
| I also never put slack on my phone, and use the snooze
| functionality.
|
| Usually you can make the time if you really want to.
| ses1984 wrote:
| Why would I do this? What I'm doing works for me.
| pm90 wrote:
| I am so glad to read this because I am just the same. Day
| time seems like there's just too much other things to do,
| night time it's quiet and dark and it feels cozy to sit at
| my desk, uninterrupted by slack messages or meetings and
| get long stretches of focus time.
| indiantinker wrote:
| I am double glad to read this. I am pretty much the same.
| I just cannot work when other people are around. I tend
| to end up helping them on some of their tasks and do my
| work when they all have left. The problem is that doing
| so gets work done , but you get a bit burny and your, if
| any, social life suffers.
|
| I have since then, done the following, found a special
| zone/cabin and started to make a list when I go to this
| cabin. This has helped on tasks that I like to do (like
| designing and programming) but I still have to slog
| through other tasks (making presentations and writing
| pointless documents) in the late evenings.
|
| The guide that helped me was this :
| https://adhdatwork.add.org/adhd-accommodation-guide/
| doovd wrote:
| FWIW, liking to work at night is s very popular thing.
| technophiliac wrote:
| We are legion...
| xzel wrote:
| 11 pm - 2/3 am is the best time for me to get work done.
| Most people are asleep. News, slack/discord and emails
| aren't coming in. Hopefully the small tasks were already
| done earlier in the day, and the only thing left to do is
| focus. My only worry with this is that its just a cover for
| my procrastination.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| Wow, thanks for this viewpoint. It's cool how weed can have
| such opposite effects for different users. For me (and
| apparently for tons of other weed smokers given the "And then I
| got high" song), it is 180 the opposite - weed makes me
| completely useless.
| Stevvo wrote:
| A personal anecdote; I don't find Cannabis useful for difficult
| problem solving, but for more repetitive tasks like writing unit
| tests it's a fun way to pass the time.
| cmrdporcupine wrote:
| Yeah the only uses I've ever found for cannabis was: doing the
| dishes and going to sleep.
| flatiron wrote:
| I got my three kids desks for christmas. Put them down to bed for
| the night and smoke a little weed. I was shocked how I couldn't
| follow ikea desk instructions. Got frustrated and decided to try
| again sober. I was super shocked the next day how easy it was to
| follow when sober.
| 0xdeadb00f wrote:
| Sometimes smoking completely makes me suck at programming. I
| can't get my thoughts into the text editor as code. Other times
| I work just as well as I would have sober.
|
| Most of the time getting high is a good way to get ideas for
| what personal project to work on next.
| conductr wrote:
| I've experienced this. Generally following ikea step by step
| style directions is just boring af when high and my mind
| wonders. But if I put that same energy towards something more
| creative I can really lock in. Although, sometimes my brilliant
| creative ideas are complete garbage when seen through sober
| eyes.
| gwbas1c wrote:
| You could also be... _Tired_.
|
| I can't do much of anything that requires concentration once I
| put my three kids to bed. The nights that my wife is out give
| me a lot of sympathy for single parents.
|
| (But I will admit that there are times that I've had to just
| wait until the effects wear off.)
| z3c0 wrote:
| That was the obvious explanation to me as well. A task was
| hard in the evening, before sleep, and easy in the morning,
| after sleep...
|
| Must be the drugs.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| Drugs significantly alter cognitive processes and perceptions.
| I know that reads like a _duh_ comment because that 's
| literally why people take them, but it's amazing how frequently
| drugs users forget that the drugs alter their perceptions of
| how the drug is impacting their lives.
|
| I've fortunately only had a few of my friends succumb to
| addictions, but it was surreal to watch them remain convinced
| that the drugs (including alcohol) were actually helping their
| performance, relationships, and productivity while everyone
| around them could clearly see that the opposite was happening.
|
| One of the most striking examples is benzodiazepine abuse.
| Benzos famously mislead users into a false sense of sobriety
| even when they may be so inebriated that they struggle to
| accomplish basic tasks.
|
| Within the tech scene, I've also noticed this with LSD
| microdosing. The few people I know who (openly) tried it were
| convinced they were smarter and more productive while
| microdosing, but it was objectively clear to everyone else that
| they were thinking more slowly, generally more confused, making
| more mistakes, and so on. The difference is that the drug
| convinced them that everything they accomplished was a
| wonderful achievement that made them happy, which led them to
| perceptions that they were accomplishing more on those days.
|
| I see similar trends in acquaintances with excessive marijuana
| habits: A general belief that the drug is helping them do more
| of the things they want to do, but they're clearly doing very
| little on the days they smoke. Obvious from the outside, hard
| to see from the inside when your perceptions are being bent to
| extremes.
| shawnz wrote:
| Anecdotally, I was a daily cannabis smoker for many years,
| had to quit about 5 months ago and have noticed persistently
| decreased focus and productivity since then.
| thewarrior wrote:
| I think that people thinking that mind altering substances
| cannot be a useful tool should keep an open mind about it and
| let those people who are getting real results out of it keep
| doing their thing. And yes these people do exist. They are
| not going to be too open about it because of how taboo it is.
|
| It's well known that many of the greatest rock bands, highly
| productive mathematicians like Paul Erdos and comedians like
| George Carlin found great benefits in the disciplined use of
| mind altering substances. Not the addictive side which he
| regretted but the occasional one as a creative boost. Steve
| Jobs swore that it changed him. Not that it was perfect but
| he himself claimed it played a pivotal role in shaping him
| into the unique person that he was.
|
| There are peer reviewed studies that show that psychedelics
| are among the most effective tools for treating depression.
| ADHD medication is prescribed quite often today and it's a
| game changer for many people.
|
| This is not without its dangers so proceed with caution and
| have other people in your life to check on you often. But
| let's not deny the enormous power.
|
| Why should some stimulants like caffeine or alcohol be
| permitted for responsible use while others have to be kept
| away ? Many of them are less addictive than either.
|
| And besides far beyond any argument about utility it's also
| one about aesthetics and spirituality. It's an entire new
| dimension to the human experience.
|
| If you don't have a good track record of practicing
| moderation then stay away.
| vlovich123 wrote:
| That may be the case but we should also be careful to not
| assume that people under the influence are able to
| accurately evaluate its impact on their performance. Nor
| should we extrapolate on the general impact based on the
| experiences of some. Not everyone smoking that jazz cabbage
| is a Steve Jobs. And there's no guarantee that the change
| it has is good for that person (eg triggering some latent
| susceptibility to schizophrenia as we know LSD can do from
| the MK Ultra experiments)
| noah_buddy wrote:
| Paul Erdos took uppers, specifically Ritalin and caffeine,
| IIRC. Carlin was pretty vocal about the majorly negative
| impacts of drug abuse on his life and even went to rehab.
|
| Prior discussion on Erdos,
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2497420
| frank_nitti wrote:
| Carlin made a very clear exception for marijuana for his
| creative work.
|
| https://youtu.be/nCGGWeD_EJk?t=6m50s
|
| I understand the comment thread you are responding to is
| lumping many psychoactive substances together, but the
| authors of the posted study were careful to distinguish
| this.
| thewarrior wrote:
| Yes exactly.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| > highly productive mathematicians like Paul Erdos
|
| I think Paul Erdos' stimulant usage has been blown out of
| proportion. According to his biography, he took "10 to 20
| milligrams of Benzedrine or Ritalin" ( https://archive.nyti
| mes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/first/h/ho... ) which is,
| believe it or not, lower than a lot of people's commonly
| prescribed ADHD doses today. Erdos also published a lot of
| his best works before taking up non-caffeine stimulants, so
| it wasn't exactly the driving force behind his
| productivity.
|
| Anyone using Erdos to justify an excessive or non-
| prescribed/non-medical stimulant habit has misunderstood
| the history.
|
| > Steve Jobs swore that it changed him.
|
| Steve Jobs was also famously terrible to everyone around
| him and died prematurely because he firmly believed he
| could cure pancreatic cancer with an all-fruit diet. Which
| of his properties are we to ascribe to the mind-altering
| drugs and which are we to overlook?
|
| Again, using Steve Jobs to justify drug consumption (or
| anything, really) is missing the point that he was a unique
| person.
| thewarrior wrote:
| " Colleagues worried that Erdos might have become
| addicted. In 1979, he accepted a $500 bet from his friend
| Ronald Graham. Graham challenged Erdos to abstain from
| speed for 30 days. Erdos met the challenge, but his
| output sank dramatically. Erdos felt the progress of
| mathematics had been held up by a stupid wager. In an
| article by Paul Hoffman published in November 1987,
| Atlantic Monthly profiled Erdos and discussed his
| Benzedrine habit. Erdos liked the article, "...except for
| one thing...You shouldn't have mentioned the stuff about
| Benzedrine. It's not that you got it wrong. It's just
| that I don't want kids who are thinking about going into
| mathematics to think that they have to take drugs to
| succeed."
|
| The truth is far more nuanced. Like I said no one will
| openly admit to this as it sets a risky example for
| others.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I'm sure any addicted person would perform very poorly
| when undergoing 30 days of withdrawal. I know when I
| withdraw from caffeine, the next few days are hopelessly
| unproductive.
| thewarrior wrote:
| Sure but what if I decided to ban you from using caffeine
| and throw you in jail because it's addictive ?
| Apocryphon wrote:
| Jobs also took acid because he was in the generation
| where it was commonplace. Gates also did it, too.
|
| https://finance.yahoo.com/news/bill-gates-once-coyly-
| defende...
| thewarrior wrote:
| And that generation was a powerhouse of business,
| innovation and culture. Counter culture laid the
| foundation for what we now call Silicon Valley.
| WalterBright wrote:
| Yeah, but that doesn't mean they were high when they were
| working.
| twangist wrote:
| Yeah, but they were when thinking about what to work on.
| thewarrior wrote:
| Well actually
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_the_Dormouse_Said
| TigeriusKirk wrote:
| My experience with LSD in my 20s was about as far from
| "micro" dosing as you can get. With that in mind, I found
| that while I did have some truly profound experiences, most
| often it was more along the lines of wasting time having fun.
| And things that seemed really deep while tripping were
| obviously and unambiguously superficial afterwards.
|
| From various experimentations over the years, the only drugs
| that make a real positive difference in my cognitive function
| are caffeine (in large doses) and alcohol (in small to
| moderate doses).
| alpenbazi wrote:
| same. complex logical thinking is quite hard. but feeling is
| great. listening high to classical sound sometimes opens the
| story, the memory or the feelings the creator wanted to
| transport. for example.
|
| so, a day in remote-meetings can be quite nice high, a complex
| migration hardly..
|
| EURdit: could we pair our experiences with our "handed"-style?
| i'm strongly lefthanded. i have a theory, with left handeds the
| possibility is higher to the "logical stuff does not work
| anymore" component than for righthandeds
| agency wrote:
| I'm a daily consumer (and right handed FWIW) and while I can
| usually focus on decently complex tasks unless I'm really
| stoned I definitely notice an effect on like
| abstract/symbolic reasoning type stuff. I notice it with
| video games especially. I was playing a lot of Factorio
| earlier this year and there's some stuff great to do high,
| like drive around and clear area to expand your base, but
| other stuff like planning/designing blueprints is too much. I
| think anything where you've kind of decided what you're going
| to do and just need to go execute on it is nice but when
| you're doing stuff that's requiring active logical decision-
| making it's tough.
| ineptech wrote:
| On a similar note, I see a clear difference in Baba Is
| You[0] where sober me can follow longer chains of
| reasoning, but high me can think of more unexpected
| approaches.
|
| 0: Very good logic game on steam:
| https://store.steampowered.com/app/736260/Baba_Is_You/
| [deleted]
| Eldt wrote:
| I'm a prolific consumer of THC and have done considerable
| professional and personal work to a good quality under the
| influence. I suspect tolerance and dosage can lead to a
| variety of experiences.
| zelon88 wrote:
| For me I find that pot reduces background noise in my mind
| that would otherwise prevent me from becoming extremely
| focused.
|
| When I'm high I can follow the instructions so hard that I
| won't notice a person standing next to me addressing me by
| name.
| pengaru wrote:
| I am super shocked by your apparent ignorance of such well-
| known effects from the drugs you're using. Especially at such a
| late stage in life, having _multiple_ kids under your purview.
|
| Maybe I'll just assume you were high when you wrote that
| comment.
| flatiron wrote:
| It was my first time trying to build furniture while high.
| Not currently high.
| ineptech wrote:
| From my experience and some of the comments, it seems like a
| common thread is that weed is good for "clean the garage" tasks
| - not cognitively challenging but tedious, something you'd like
| to be distracted from - and not good for reading and retaining
| new information.
|
| In programming terms, I think it's great for refactoring, or
| let's say working through a bunch of corner cases on some weird
| business data you have to parse, and terrible for learning a
| new framework or implementing something new you where you need
| to read several articles about something and combine them into
| a coherent plan.
| vlovich123 wrote:
| Hard disagree, at least for me. I've tried doing lots of
| different programming tasks and they all take longer. Now it
| might not be as annoying to do the refactor but it takes more
| time since I lose track or get distracted. Not sure about the
| quality of the code either since it's hard to measure
| objectively when you're making mistakes in the moment.
|
| Maybe creative technical problem solving it has a benefit.
| However, from listening to interviews from successful
| comedians, there are many that express that worry about not
| being funny off weed, and it rarely if ever works out that
| way so I'm the "it likely has no to mild negative effect" on
| most (but not necessarily all) creative problem solving
| ineptech wrote:
| I'm not surprised, I think it's just extremely subjective.
| I mean, I find it extremely hard to focus on a programming
| task if there's music playing, but I know people who listen
| to music all day while they work.
| datavirtue wrote:
| I can't even begin to program under the influence of
| alcohol. Almost brain dead in that regard.
| frank_nitti wrote:
| Generally agree with this, with one specific addition:
|
| Spend some sober hours wrapping my head around some new
| concept (e.g. programming pattern/paradigm or theory topic)
| or just reading a large codebase for the first time. At a
| certain point, my brain is just "done". Then a small toke of
| some good weed with the intention of checking out and
| relaxing. More often than not, the effect is the opposite:
| the complex material i had spent the previous hours analyzing
| starts to piece itself together in new ways and my energy and
| interest in the task is restored to 100%.
|
| While it may not be the right time to hammer out a complete
| implementation, it has often assisted in that crucial step of
| "getting it". This happened for me often with topics that
| require a new perspective e.g. vector calculus and functional
| programming patterns
|
| Edit: for reference, I am a heavy user (typically on 2+
| doses/day), with occasional long breaks of weeks/months. I
| believe "tolerance" plays the dominant role in programmers'
| experience with this. After a month long break, there is NO
| way I'm able or interested to work with complex systems of
| any sort when under the influence.
| datavirtue wrote:
| This fits mwith my experience. When my tasks are defined and
| are left only to implement I can plow through a lot of work.
|
| If I have to develop (or much worse, alter) abstractions that
| make use of generics and OOP I do not feel productive at all.
| I get very confused, easily. (Though I often power through it
| just fine)
|
| I do not smoke during business hours while working on client
| systems however, that does not sound appealing at all.
|
| I have used cannabis extensively on personal projects for
| inspiration and to make easy but mundane programming tasks
| interesting for motivation. Refctoring is very boring
| sometimes, and getting high can keep you focused on how nice
| it will be to complete it and get to the end result. I often
| am able to uncover a bit of fun in the refactoring process
| after smoking.
|
| My personal projects benefit from a pattern of: program for
| an hour or two (completely engrossed), short video game
| battle or two, smoke up a bit, program...repeat. I can chew
| through a tremendous amount of work in a five hours (measured
| by git commits and the complexity within those commits) that
| would easily take me weeks in a corporate setting. The
| pattern or rythum triggers "flow" consistently.
| ineptech wrote:
| This is interesting, I wish it were that easy for me. Do
| you do any prep work, i.e. "story planning" (presumably in
| a less formal way than you would at work)? I find that, for
| my side projects, I can do a lot of damage while high _IFF_
| I have a very clear idea of exactly how the feature should
| work; but if sober me hasn 't worked out clear acceptance
| criteria for the thing I'm doing, either I daydream and
| don't actually get anything done, or I wind up doing
| something totally unrelated, like an opportunistic refactor
| of something irrelevant to what I sat down to work on.
| brokebroadbeat wrote:
| manager here, but weed helps me unwind and destress after a busy
| week or day, think i'd jeopardise that work/life balance by
| ripping shotties during work hours
| emrex wrote:
| The only time that canabis helps me personally at work is when I
| am almost at a burn out. Smoking on the weekend (not while
| working) it gives me a fresh start the next week, well rested.
| Never helped me to be a better developer while high, actually for
| me it is the oposit.
| jsscss wrote:
| A+ wordplay in the title of the actual survey.
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