A New Study Questions The Link Between Teen Pot Smoking And IQ Decline

a reply to: Akragon

I think the real reasons for "dumb couch potatoes" are more tied to the person taking the substance, rather than the substance taken.

I would have to say the idea that more would necessarily be worse for IQ is flawed. A better way would be to account for confounding variables, as it may not take a lot to have an effect and more may not produce a greater effect.

a reply to: Baddogma

Yeah. I'm not that I don't want to accept negative consequences for drugs. It's that for the longest time, the government has been exaggerating the dangers of various recreational drugs and science is showing little by little that the government has been seriously wrong about things.

This applies to more than just marijuana though. There are many other drugs the government has been making up facts about.

originally posted by: amazing
We already knew that. Pot smoking makes you stupid and forgetful and unmotivated and lazy.

Yeah, but the question the study is trying to answer is, does it make you stupid and lazy, or do pot smokers statistically tend to be stupid and lazy to begin with? People are trying to determine cause and/or effect without relying on old stereotypes.

It's a legitimate scientific inquiry, although there's always going to be a challenge with any of these kinds of studies, because we really don't have a very good handle on what we mean by "intelligence" in the first place. Marijuana may make is more difficult to do math problems, but it might actually increase a person's social intelligence and empathy, which can be every bit as important in life -- going through life happily -- as being a math whiz.

Maybe if they made school more entertaining, and to suit the needs of auditory, visual, and hands on learners to make them pay attention, and be less abstract, and attempt to focus on critical thinking, instead of letting the children being tempted by Satan cool aura and leather jacket.

They'd have less dropouts and higher performances. Like math, they don't care about so much about having the right answer, more or less prove your work. It ain't F'in destiny where, it the journey that important. Hell we calculator to do that crap now.

Maybe the teacher need to lay off pot, living in their imaginative world they call reality.