So What Are Drugs?
Everyday hundreds of millions of people wouldn't get out of bed if they knew they would not be greeted with that brown, bitter yet so warm and delicious cup of coffee. Coffee contains caffeine the most widely consumed psychoactive compound in the world. Now, after reading the last sentence you might be tempted to say that drugs are just psychoactive compounds. Well that statement is only partially true. In reality, all psychoactive compounds are drugs, but not all drugs are psychoactive. For instance, the common nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug you may be familiar with as Ibuprofen is a drug, but it is not psychoactive. For a drug to be psychoactive it must affect the mind. A drug is any substance that when administered to an organism will affect its physiology. So there you have it, a substance can affect either just the body, just the mind, or both and still be called a drug. A rapidly growing phenomenon called biohacking has emerged around the world boasting improved productivity, clarity, and mindfulness. Biohacking refers to the practice of ingesting drugs in hopes of self improvement. I believe biohacking has the potential to be immensely beneficial if practiced correctly, but there are definite dangers associated with changing one's body chemistry on a regular basis. The most famous example of biohacking in a Hollywood production is shown in the movie Limitless through the NZT pill. This pill improved Bradley Cooper's IQ substantially along with increasing his productivity and motivation to supernatural levels. Now in the real world, no pill can have such drastic effects without tagging along some nasty consequences with it. The closest thing to the real world limitless pill is ADD/ADHD medication; most notably of which are Adderall and Vyvanse. Adderall and Vyvanse are prescription stimulants that contain amphetamines. Yes! That wasn't a typo. Amphetamines! Children as young as 8 years old are getting prescribed to take drugs everyday almost identical to meth amphetamine and in some cases exactly identical to it for short attention spans and low motivation. How is this okay, right? Now before you go taking your son's medication away, you should realize that the dosages prescribed are usually much lower than what street users looking for a recreational high might take. In my experience, micro dosing amphetamines or methylphenidate (another ADD med) daily which is what a doctor would be overseeing for those 8 year old's can have very positive results along with being neuroprotective.
