Smokers

Smokers

  • Total voters
    111
Never have, never will. Smoked a couple cigars after giving in to Shawneous' peer pressure, but the taste in my mouth afterward was just too nasty for me to make a habit of it.

Beer is the nectar of the gods though and if it's drunk in moderation, can be quite beneficial! :beer:
 
I Smoke about a pack (17 cigarettes) a day, sometimes more since more than 25 years. No problems so far.

My grandma smoked about her whole life and died at 94 without any cancer. So maybe I got good DNA.

Cigarette smoke contains many bad substances.

But Benzol fumes in you car, the air in big citys or in workshops, kitchens (espcialy those with a fry), standing at a grill/BBQ and even what comes out of a vacuum cleaner ar a much more biger problem to your health and cancer food than cigarettes.

100 Years ago poeple died wit 55. Now we getting older and develop some sort of cancer or diabetis.

I think there is not much what we can do about that.

At least I don´t drink at all.

Frank
 
I smoked from age 15 to 25 and then quit cold turkey, nearly three years ago. It wasn't actually that hard, because I really wanted to quit that time. Every other time I had tried, it was impossible because I really liked smoking and thought I needed to quit for my health. I'm not really sure what changed over in me, but I haven't even thought of smoking a cigarette in almost three years and I'm sure I never will again.

I do smoke a cigar at most once or twice a year, but only when I can get my hands on a Montecristo #4 from Havana.
 
I smoke about a pack a day. I don't really feel like quitting either.

Big Mac w/ Fries or Cigarettes...either way we're screwed.
 
Heh... this thread is titled "Poll Smokers". I voted no. :)






(Yes, I realize there is a difference in spelling from what I'm implying and, sorry, I couldn't resist.) :cheesy:
 
Let's see. Cigaretts, cigars, pine needles, bananna peels in jail, pot, crack/(brown coke). mmm...acid (LSD25, Redeye, Beige Blotter, California Sunshine, Microdot, Windowpane), morphine, shrooms, coke, horse tanquilizer (=PCP I think), not sure what else. That's the good stuff anyways that I can think of. Never tried herion. Was never into the 'opiates' . Never used a needle.
Happy Now?
(I'm forgetting one, I know it.)

Cigaretts? Ha. Yeah, that'll kill ya.

//lol, oh yeah, I don't do that stuff anymore. Just badass beer now. :)
 
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Sad Max said:
Here's the text of the warnings printed on cigarettes packaged for the US:
...
This impresses me as the only warning addressed by your objection, in that it's a flat statement of causality rather than a description of elevated risk.

Given that tobacco smoke contains known carcinogens, and that over 85% of diagnosed cases of lung cancer correlate to smoking, attributing causality - just not sole causality - impresses me as perfectly reasonable.
Click to expand...

Now I said I was in California and the warnings from the state all start contain " Known by the state of California to cause cancer". Yes the fed warnings tend to be worded better.

The problem with your "known carcinogens" is kind of the problem. That term is generally implied to be a proof and it's not. Those "known carcinogens" are known risk factors, not known "causes". They do not "cause" cancer, they increase your chance of getting cancer. It's a very significant difference. What do you mean by correlate? If a uranium miner smokes and gets cancer which do you correlate to? The answer is of course which ever "cause" your looking for. You can't have a casual causality, it either does or it does under X circumstances or it doesn't. And for the pipe smokers out there you should not use the term "tobacco smoke". The studies are almost excessively done with "cigarette smoke". American cigarette's on average contain less that 20% tobacco. Mostly they contain "reconstituted tobacco" which is neutral cellulose (paper pulp) soaked in chemicals. It is the reason I think that there is the "French paradox", they smoke a lot but don't have the cancer and heart disease statistics of the US smokers.

I don't think smoking is particularly good for you and I definitely think cigarets and american cigarettes in particular are bad for you. But the overall risk has been grossly overstated and generalized in a way to protect the cigarette manufacturers from the actual truth. And that is that tobacco is not the major culprit, corporate greed is. Cigarette manufactures ARE basically furnishing a very calculated drug delivery system. Our government makes WAY too much money from this to really do anything about it, so we get a bunch of meaningless warnings that nobody pays attention to and let an industry that has killed millions keep on going.

Since it may not be obvious. Pipe tobacco has virtually no additives anywhere and in England and some other european countries can have no additives whatsoever. Cigars (at least the pricier ones) are also 100% tobacco. In much of the world tobacco products are tested like food products and very few additives are allowed and those have had safety testing. American cigarettes on the other hand contain dioxin, ammonia, Potassium nitrate, and a couple of hundred other misc. chemicals. It's not the tar and nicotine that makes them a danger it's the toxic soup of "haz-mat's" that are the worry.

For all of that, the number of smokers that die of any of the likely suspects compared to the non smoking population dyeing of the same likely suspects is not all that large. If your not comfortable rolling those dice that's a different matter. I think the non lethal side effects are a much more compelling reason not to smoke cigarettes.

As a "strange but true" side note, back in the days before all the additives (WWII was the impetus behind most of the changes in american cigarettes) smoking was a prescribed treatment for asthma. Nicotine is a vasodilator so , ironically by todays thinking, it made breathing easier.
 
Raptor365 said:
Let's see. Cigaretts, cigars, pine needles, bananna peels in jail, pot, crack/(brown coke). mmm...acid (LSD25, Redeye, Beige Blotter, California Sunshine, Microdot, Windowpane), morphine, shrooms, coke, horse tanquilizer (=PCP I think), not sure what else. That's the good stuff anyways that I can think of. Never tried herion. Was never into the 'opiates' . Never used a needle.
Happy Now?
(I'm forgetting one, I know it.)

Cigaretts? Ha. Yeah, that'll kill ya.

//lol, oh yeah, I don't do that stuff anymore. Just badass beer now. :)
Click to expand...

Yikes. And FYI morphine is an opiate. No nitrous, you slacker ;~) And you skipped over amphetamines and barbiturates...

A funny story. My grandmother had some "Bromoseltzer" from the 30's in her medicine cabinet. According to the label it was a "bubbling barbiturate broth". So in old movies when they tell someone to go "relax and have a bromo" it makes more sense. I always though why would an antacid relax you?
 
I agree that smoking increases your chances of a whole slew of medical issues. You thankfully live in a country than tends to not see everything as black and white. And that has purity laws about consumable substances. I on the other hand live in the land where it's either all bad or all good. I mean you are more likely to get cancer the longer you live (statistically). Actually living is a risk factor for cancer. What is important is how much of a risk factor and what exactly is being looked at. And that is where things start to break down for me. For instance over here just about every food product has a "refrigerate after opening" warning. Now most of those things never used to be refrigerated. Some ARE important and some are CYA warnings to help the manufacturer out incase of a law suit. Tuna fish for example if left at room temperature for any length of time open is likely to make you VERY sick and could in fact kill you. Jam on the other hand can be left out with almost no danger at all. The worst that is likely is that it might get some mold on it and taste off. But they have the same warning. I tried once to find out which warnings were a waste and which ones were actually important. It wasn't much use. With liability what it is over here nobody was going to say anything was safe to leave un-refrigerated.

Anyway I think we pretty much agree.


Anhar Miah said:
I too come from a science background (a Master of Science {MSc}), added with an Engineering Background, added with an Electronics background and a Computing and programming background. I’m not disputing the problem of casual relationship in fact I’m actually agreeing with you on that matter.

What I am saying though is: we can generate predictive models that are based upon sound Empirical data, and from these within certain probabilityies; it is well established that smoking does indeed increase the risk of cancer.

Now lets try out a confusion matrix and see the following:

(1) Correctly Diagnosed with cancer with Smoking correlate
(2) Incorrectly Diagnosed with cancer with Smoking correlate
(3) Correctly Diagnosed Cancer Free with Smoking correlate
(4) Incorrectly Diagnosed Cancer Free with Smoking correlate

What you need to prove is the following:

Predicted Vs Actual


0 | 1 | 0
1 | 0 | 1
0 | 1 | 0
Click to expand...
 
Noiz2 said:
As a "strange but true" side note, back in the days before all the additives (WWII was the impetus behind most of the changes in american cigarettes) smoking was a prescribed treatment for asthma. Nicotine is a vasodilator so , ironically by todays thinking, it made breathing easier.
Click to expand...

I recently had an upper respiratory infection. Much to my doctors dismay, I explained that a cigarette did in fact temporarily ease the discomfort. Perhaps it was because I only smoke additive free tobacco? Perhaps it was in fact the red wine. Ah, the French...

I really think it is the additives jammed into everything that cause the most problems. Red meat has plenty good to be said for it. I think I may even recall steak being mentioned in some sort of "food triangle" published by a trusted source. I don't, however, think it was the pre-packaged country fried steak in that dead man's freezer.
 
Noiz2 said:
As a "strange but true" side note, back in the days before all the additives (WWII was the impetus behind most of the changes in american cigarettes) smoking was a prescribed treatment for asthma. Nicotine is a vasodilator so , ironically by todays thinking, it made breathing easier.
Click to expand...

Yeah, look at the pre war Chesterfield ads with Bob Hope and Bing Chrosby. They all say how healthy it is (and it was always noted that this is a known fact by the whole scientific comunity.)

I smoke a brand called "American Spirit" wich is - I belive - iroically not aviable in the US - is pure tobacco, no additives at all.

If you smoked that for a while and have a Camel or PallMall after that you almost puke because of the taste from the additives.

Frank
 
Noiz2 said:
...Yikes. And FYI morphine is an opiate. No nitrous, you slacker ;~) And you skipped over amphetamines and barbiturates...
...
Click to expand...

hehe. Yeah, I've known and lived/stayed at and have had stay with me a few herion attics, if I can use that term. It's a shame the addiction gives the people such a bad name. Thankfully opiates never took on me. I was into hallucees but not anymore.

I've got a bag of stories but another time I guess. :)


//haha, oh yeah, bennies and stuff I didn't think were worth mentioning. Anyways, it's history now but it's funny now looking back.
 
Hey there Postmaster- We do indeed have American Spirits in the States, they're the only brand I smoke. I didn't know they were available outside the U.S. I agree, those other major brands taste like something scraped off the bottom of a shoe. The funny thing is, whenever I've given somebody one of my cigarettes who doesn't normally smoke Spirits they've always complained they have no flavor.
 
American Spirits have additives in the papers & filter, but not the tobacco. It is quite misleading.

There was a petition put together against their advertising campaign that they didn't use additives. Here is an explanation:

"The paper used in American Spirit has been treated with chemcial additivies to control burn temperature and burn rate. This product does not self-extinquish easily because of these chemical additives. In New York State, American Spirit cigarettes funked fire safety standards which means the product is designed with a defect -that makes it more likely than necessary to cause a fire. Thousands of people die or injuried in fires caused by cigarettes that don't self-extinquish because of the chemical additives put on the paper. American Spirit tobacco is not additive free. Pesticides residues remain on the tobacco. The reference to additive free merely refers to the fact that in the manufacturing process no new additives are put into the cigarettes. Finally, the filter is made out of cellulose acetate and painted with white shoe polish; the tipping paper clued onto the filter and tobacco rod is treated with chemicals so the paper does not absorb moisture. You have been deceived, and you are now participating in a deception to your consumers, by running these ads."
 
The toxic and carcinogenic effluent of your product is tainted with pesticide residue and pyrophorics.

For shame!

People come to you for pure toxins and carcinogens!
 
Jim Klatt said:
American Spirits have additives in the papers & filter, but not the tobacco. It is quite misleading.

There was a petition put together against their advertising campaign that they didn't use additives. Here is an explanation:

"The paper used in American Spirit has been treated with chemcial additivies to control burn temperature and burn rate. This product does not self-extinquish easily because of these chemical additives. In New York State, American Spirit cigarettes funked fire safety standards which means the product is designed with a defect -that makes it more likely than necessary to cause a fire. Thousands of people die or injuried in fires caused by cigarettes that don't self-extinquish because of the chemical additives put on the paper. American Spirit tobacco is not additive free. Pesticides residues remain on the tobacco. The reference to additive free merely refers to the fact that in the manufacturing process no new additives are put into the cigarettes. Finally, the filter is made out of cellulose acetate and painted with white shoe polish; the tipping paper clued onto the filter and tobacco rod is treated with chemicals so the paper does not absorb moisture. You have been deceived, and you are now participating in a deception to your consumers, by running these ads."
Click to expand...


Wow. I hadn't heard about all that. I figured the paper and of course the filter had to be chemically treated, but I was unaware of the controlled burning. Spirits also have a line of organically grown tobacco, but I have no idea if those burn for seven hours. Trust me when I say that their regular tobacco does:


crispyscreenoq4.jpg
 
THis is really of topic, sort of. But in the film the Insider, the story that they were going to write was about all the deaths caused by cigaret manufacturers adding potassium nitrate (salt peter) and other burn enhancers that had caused fires. In your grandfathers day (or mine anyway) if you fell asleep smoking you would wake to a hole in your blanket not your house on fire. Tobacco doesn't burn all that well and if you stop puffing it goes out, unless you put stuff in there to keep it going. A lot of people thought the film really stuck it to the industry, I thought it showed them getting away with murder. I figured that it was the industry that pointed the story to something they could argue rather than the original story that really has no defense. I found it depressing.
 
I smoked for 22 years from 17-39. I quit smoking shortly after my son was born because I knew I had to try to be around for him. Before that time I was in big time denial about my own mortality. It was affecting my health adversely with things like having a cough that never really went away and developing ulcers and acid reflux. I never had any energy and I never felt good because I couldn't remember what feeling good was like after all those years of smoking. I was also incredibly physically but mostly psycholgically addicted. If I didn't have more than half a pack with me at the end of the day I would need to get that extra pack just in case. I absolutley dreaded being without. Everyday I woke up with a smoking hangover. Since I've quit all of the above has changed and I think I'm going to be around for my son for a long time and I honestly don't think that would have been the case if I hadn't quit. I also found for me the only way to quit was the patch because you slap it on and forget about it. That way you still get you fix but it's not in the typical peaks and valleys type addiction cycle. It's a constant yet ever decreasing supply. This allows you to deal with the pschological addiction first while you are still feeding your physical one. Hope this is helpful to some trying to quit! Nobody who knew me ever thought I would. It's been 3 1/2 years now and it will be forever.
 
I don´t think smoking makes you phyical addicted.
I smok a pack a day and love it.
But when working as an editor in a studio, I´m not allowed to smoke there so I don´t smoke for 8 hours or more.
When I come home and find myselfe out of cigarettes I´m often too lazy to get out again and get me a pack.

Never experianced any hangover or cold turkey.

Don´t sound addicted to me.

There are 2 things that realy makes me wonder.

1. Why would the goverment wants you to quit?
2. Why does everything that bothers nobody for 100 years now became a mayor thread to the human race?

(All I say now relates to Germany - might be different in other countrys)

1.
- Tabaco tax is the one of the 4 largest taxes. If they loose that they get in trouble.
- Our health system runs out of money also does our pension system. If poeple die at 65 that would be good for the goverment, if the live up to 85, develop nasty and expensive desases and retirement pension from the goverment - that´s bad for the goverment. A quick lung cancer death is much cheaper for the system.

So thee must be some benefit that cancels that all out and they bite the bullet and say " that will cost us a fortune but it´s worth".
And I don´t think it´s humanity.

2.
When I was young everybidy smoked everywhere.
Offices, Banks, Trains/Planes, TV, Cinema... you name it.
Nobody realy cared.

In the 50s and 60s the US was the healtiest nation in the world. Now with all that Nany State BS from bisycle helmets, protectors, yellow warnig wests, saftey this and saftey that, proctecting this and war against that - where is the USA today?

How often did I fell from my bike without a helmet when I was a kid?
How could the word survive without all the yellow reflection jacets?
How could we live without a zillion warning stickers on every product?

They tread us like idiots and kids and don´t you dare to live a self-determined live. The goverment knows what is good for you, the goverment is always right.

We had that bevore and I don´t want to go back.

Frank
 
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