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  1. #1

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    Snake oil?

    Have been doing a fair bit of research(well, bullshit I've checked two sites, one of which was wiki) and have decided to ask on here, as some people may or may not have some experience with these. Essentially they're(legal) drugs that improve cognition, motivation, memory, and material retention.

    Just some background on what Nootropics are:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nootropic

    Is this just bullshit, or are there any reputable sources with reading material I can peek at? Has anyone taken these, what was your experience with them.

  2. #2
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    I know Joe Rogan spends like 10 minutes plugging them on all his podcasts, that's about it.

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    I have not necessarily heard of them before, but I can tell you from scanning the page that many of the recommended Nootropics would have large side effects (like if you somehow took Vasopressin in a way that isn't going to just get digested) and many of them work in opposite ways. Also, even if they do what is claimed (which they may not) many of them rely on assumptions that have never been proven (for instance, why are growing neurons good for you? How will increasing your blood/oxygen level in the brain over normal levels be good for you?)

    I would stay away from them.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Hirokei Kiaza View Post
    I know Joe Rogan spends like 10 minutes plugging them on all his podcasts, that's about it.
    Where I heard of them originally lol.

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    Omega 3 is a good example. In America during food processing Omega 3 is replaced in a lot of things with Omega 6 in order to give it a longer shelf life. In Japan that doesn't happen, and not to use a stereotype as an example but, compare Japanese average intelligence to American average intelligence. Fish = packed with Omega 3. Japanese eat a LOT of fish.

    It takes about 2 or 3 weeks but if you're taking "quality" fish oil pills or some other form of Omega 3 on a regular basis, you will notice a difference. A bit more energetic, clear thinking a bit easier, all around better mood, better concentration.... It does work. Don't take that Wal-Mart shit though, or most any multivitamins. Your body only has certain receptors for this shit and low quality stuff or most multivitamins in general only a little bit is actually received by your body because of the chemical structure, and 90% of it is pissed out without ever having a chance to be absorbed.

    Sources: family background in medicine/healthcare and a good friend of mine is a 60 year old retired MD, gastroenterologist at that, and physician who I had a long converstaion with about the stuff about a year ago.

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    Quote Originally Posted by AidenCarby View Post
    Where I heard of them originally lol.
    Mah Nigga lol.

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    incredibly overrated although maybe you will get a placebo effect if you believe they work

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    Quote Originally Posted by Asai View Post
    Omega 3 is a good example. In America during food processing Omega 3 is replaced in a lot of things with Omega 6 in order to give it a longer shelf life. In Japan that doesn't happen, and not to use a stereotype as an example but, compare Japanese average intelligence to American average intelligence. Fish = packed with Omega 3. Japanese eat a LOT of fish.

    It takes about 2 or 3 weeks but if you're taking "quality" fish oil pills or some other form of Omega 3 on a regular basis, you will notice a difference. A bit more energetic, clear thinking a bit easier, all around better mood, better concentration.... It does work. Don't take that Wal-Mart shit though, or most any multivitamins. Your body only has certain receptors for this shit and low quality stuff or most multivitamins in general only a little bit is actually received by your body because of the chemical structure, and 90% of it is pissed out without ever having a chance to be absorbed.

    Sources: family background in medicine/healthcare and a good friend of mine is a 60 year old retired MD, gastroenterologist at that, and physician who I had a long converstaion with about the stuff about a year ago.
    Damn good input, thanks.

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    Some work, most don't.

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    "Nootropics" as a broad category looks like a clusterfuck of some marginally-useful drugs combined with a huge helping of pseudoscience, new-age self-help drivel, and fancy names given to mundane shit, a la Neuro-Linguistic Bullshitting. Good luck sorting it out. It's not a meaningful category; look at each substance individually.

  12. #12

    The ones that work are very addictive and have dangerous side-effects.

    No free lunches in nature.

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    Acai Berry drinks made me lose 400 pounds.

    Spoiler: show
    Snake oil.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Pikarya View Post
    Acai Berry drinks made me lose 400 pounds.
    Oh shit, they've caught on in the UK now?

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    It takes about 2 or 3 weeks but if you're taking "quality" fish oil pills or some other form of Omega 3 on a regular basis, you will notice a difference. A bit more energetic, clear thinking a bit easier, all around better mood, better concentration.... It does work.
    I've been taking: http://www.seven-seas.com/cod-liver-...ength-capsules
    for a good 2-3, maybe more, years now.

    I do wonder if what you've listed is true, because, either I'm with completely incompetent/useless people, or I am really above average no matter where I go. It doesn't matter if I technically don't know as much as some people, but present me a problem/issue, I will logically get it down very quickly and understand it, and fix it for you. Everyone else seems useless in this regard. I don't personally know anyone (except my mum) who takes Omega 3.

    Case in point, some recent scenarios at work:
    Needed a "large file distribution" solution. 6 months later nothing happened despite ongoing meetings and discussions. I get involved somehow and 2 days later I present them DropBox and YouSendIt, along with various other vendors.

    Client is trying to access a database site which uses MAC and IP address authentication via Citrix. Their local machines were already authenticated, but on Citrix it's not picking them up. About 4 weeks went by with users and another team testing on a special citrix server, but it wasn't working no matter what. The users can login, but it registers them as a new user because it doesn't pick up their MAC Address. Turned out that the browser needs a plugin to send this information across. In the span of 36 hours I managed to figure out what was wrong. The manual even states that this is the purpose of the plugin.

    No one bothered to contact the vendor.
    No one bothered to read the manual
    No one bothered to take notice of the big fucking information bar you get in IE (i know, IE lol, but hey it's a business decision, not mine) when a plugin is required

    I did it all in 36 hours. I'm now in the process of testing a local install of the plugin which would by pass the need for a plugin.

    ---

    Basically I wonder if me taking these oils are making a difference, as placebo as it may be.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Derock View Post
    You just work with retards. Anyone with half a brain could have found both of those solutions.
    But... but ... I just think to myself ... surely they can't be that bad? I'm just expecting a line of standardness ... afterall many of these people are more senior to myself.

    I just think that, some tasks are actually easy if you give 10 minutes of dedication to it, yet no one seems to care or know where to start ... I dunno anymore lol

  17. #17
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    I think the tldr of the topic as a whole is;

    Will they make you smarter? A: Fuck no, there is no garden of eden fruit of wisdom you can take and know astrophysics.

    Will they chemically help your body/mind to make problem-solving and concentration easier? A: Yes. Some of them. Omega 3 namely. Anything that's labeled and advertised as "smart pills"? No, it's most likely just like a multivitamin/placebo and you're pissing it out.

    Nootropics as a whole is just a marketing ploy, really.

    ALA, DHA, & EPA are the omega 3's. You can NOT make them in your body, they have to come from your diet, and they are more important than people think. Though you should note fish oil only has DHA & EPA. ALA is the missing piece of the tri-force, which you can get from cooking with flax seed or olive/soybean oil. It has a lot more beneficial effects than just the mental ones. The only argument I've ever heard made against them is the fact that they can thin the blood. That only happens if you're taking the supplements DHA & EPA (fish oil by itself). So again, solved with flax seed or olive/soybean oil in cooking.

  18. #18

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    Wasn't really interested in them as a pill to make me smarter, but just one to improve cognition and focusing/paying attention.

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    lotta misinformation in this thread. if you give a shit, read this. if you'd rather listen to generalizations made by people with very little experience, fuck you.

    i will start this by saying that if you think that nootropics as a whole are a marketing ploy, take the fuck a look around at EVERYTHING. it is not the drug, it is the phenomenon of NOOB MARKETERS MARKETING TO NOOBS THAT THINK UNFATHOMABLE GAINS ARE REAL. if you completely steer away from the desire for evidence and generalize an entire field of study that people WAY FUCKING SMARTER THAN YOU have spent 20+ years studying, fuck off. stop clogging the thread with your random generalized bullshit and lack of any meaningful information.


    1. You have a barrier in your brain that is a double edged sword. This barrier is supposed to be protecting your brain from the boogie man, but sometimes its just an asshole and stops you from getting important shit. similarly, sometimes it lets shit in because its stupid. its nature man, cant expect it to be perfect.

    2. You have a chemical network in your brain that is more complex than any shit video game you've ever played, or all of them combined for that matter. Your entire perception of reality is controlled by drugs (more or less). clinical depression, anxiety, attention disorders, hyperactivity...etc. Most of this shit is controlled by chemicals in the noggin.

    3. You can alter the chemical balance of your brain, but ONLY if the substance can cross the barrier mentioned in 1. A nootropic is, in a nutshell, a supplement that can cross the barrier.


    So, the fuck does this mean?

    Basically, YOU AND YOU SPECIFICALLY - NOT THE ENTIRE FUCKING DEMOGRAPHIC OF "HUMAN" may benefit from supplementing certain chemicals that are active in your brain. A great example of this is the gaba (a&b) receptors in the brain. GABA is one of the biggest parts of the chemical balance of the brain. there's a shitload that we don't know about gaba, but in essence, it stops neurons in the brain from being active or as active as they typically are. this is why gaba is typically sold as a relaxant, but there are cases where it may result in being a net stimulant, DEPENDING ON THE FUCKING PERSON INDIVIDUALLY GODDAMMIT.


    there's a SHITLOAD of chemicals in the brain dude. you don't really wanna go down that path unless you're going to be using it practically - you'll probably need at least a bachelors in chemistry before even starting to apply it to the brain, and even then, it's fuck hell bullshit complex.



    the misconception is that you can take these and they will magically change you as a person immediately. no. wrong. fuck wrong. fuck goddammit wrong. no. if you find a good mix of positive supplements, your overall performance for the day is going to go up. the aggregate of small, functional improvements is a generally smarter individual.


    i bet weed is a placebo/snake oil too. weed functions by crossing the blood-brain barrier and getting into cb1 and cb2 receptors. nootropics are chemicals that pass the barrier and become available for the brain to use, via receptors, for chemical processes. oh shit weed is a nootropic, NO WAIT ITS SNAKE OIL LOL PLACEBOOOOOOOO shut the fuck up, smoke a blunt and tell me its placebo



    this is a fairly new field. it's not like we can just look at everything happening in the brain at once and break down every chemical process and then cross examine it relative to 500 other brains and be like "YO NIGGA YOU NEED THEANINE." it's not that fucking simple.


    tl;dr idiots sensationalists in this thread that dont know what the FUCK they are talking about

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