Can Nicotine Be Good for You?

[brian64]

No problem Warren...you're right to expect people to back up their statements. And I agree that the pharmaceutical nicotine will go the synthetic route.
Even if tobacco use is never banned entirely, medical insurance rates for smokers will eventually make it unaffordable for most people if the "healthcare system" continues on its current path...IMO.

 

[jitterbugdude]

Yes nicotine can be healthy for you... in the correct dose! If anyone is interested (and has lots of time) get on "PubMed" and read up on it. Nicotine in moderate doses reduces Alzheimer's (AD) by 40% and Parkinson's (PD) by 70%.

Plan on spending A LOT of time doing the research though. Over the past 30 some years I've read 1000's of medical journals on the subject (as a hobby of mine). What I've found is that most of the studies are poorly conducted or the researchers draw the wrong conclusions. The bias in most tobacco studies is evident.
So, without writing a book keep these things in mind when researching. Nicotine is healthy in moderate doses! Disregard studies that use 2 and 3 pack a day smokers. Also, if using a mouse model look up the strain of mice used in the experiment. 9 times out of 10 they use genetically modified (or bred) mice that will develop tumors no matter what happens. If a "pipe smoker" study make sure they identify the sub group that inhales as compared to the smokers that do not.
What we know about nicotine is this:
Nicotine up -regulates the nicotine-acetylcholine receptors in the brain. The very receptors that die off in AD.

Nicotine also inhibits the neurobibilary tangles that are a hallmark of AD. Just about all of the AD treatments available now try to manipulate the acetylecholine receptors. The problem is, once you have AD it's really too late to do anything about it. Nicotine also is a very strong MOA-B inhibitor. MAO-B is the enzyme that destroys the neurons in the substantia nigra area of the brain. Once that destruction reaches a certain percentage of brain cells you have PD and there's nothing you can do about it.
Consider Schizophrenics: Approximately 80% of them smoke about 3 packs of cigarettes a day yet lung cancer is almost non existent in their population.
Other things to research are: Antatabine and Nornicotine. Both of these are considered minor tobacco alkaloids. Anatabine has stronger anti AD effects. Nornicotine does too but there is quite a bit of controversy over the fact that some studies show it forms Tobacco Specific Nitoseamines that cause cancer. It is the reason farmers in this country must grow "Low Converter" (LC) tobacco. LC is tobacco that is periodically tested to make sure it has negligible levels of Nornicotine. Like most things there is a lot of controversy over the conversion and of it really does or does not cause cancer via the formation of TSNAs.
Happy hunting

 

[ray47]

Dang Ray, I'd be spending all day at my bathroom sink. Don't dentists ever recommend anythings besides rinsing?
Pipestud
My dentist recommended that I have all my teeth pulled and he did just that. Now I don't have to go back to him.

 

[warren]

So the obverse is correct then? Nicotine is as addictive, to some, as gambling, sex or anything else which will produce pleasurable reaction. Well said, in a round about way.

 

[stickframer]

Psychological vs. Physical addiction. There are certain times during the day I can have Snus or smoke a pipe and I still jones for a cig :crazy:
Thanks for the info jitterbug. Like the OP states, there are risks and side effects with just about anything. Moderation is key(ha!).
My uunderstanding is that with doses over 14mg, all bets are off and risks outweigh benefits or benefits are erased. Somebody should figure out how much pipe tobacco contains 14mg, of all strains. Then it can be averaged out and we'll all have super powers, be smarter, and look even better. :wink:
There really is a black hole of research out there, much of it biased. And difficult to recreate in normal life.
But what the heck it's interesting.

 

[warren]

billkay: I see a lot of angst on this board from some when having to give up the pipe or, when their smoking areas are threatened or curtailed. Also, more than a few of us have written that our pipes are great nicotine delivery systems. I think you are painting with too large a brush.
I've smoked pipes, cigarettes, cigars and, when working on the flight-line, chewed for over fifty years. I do not presume to affix my smoking experiences or love of nicotine to all pipe smokers. We each enjoy certain aspects of the pipe in different ways. And we can speak only to our own experiences. That is, unless we are addressing someone's related experiences or some sort of research and quoting results and such.
I know one person, when there was a tobacco store in my area, who loved to sit and visit, after he'd had to drop the pipe, in the lounge and suck up the second hand smoke.
I quit cigarettes for five years once. I was a bit testy for a week is all I experienced. Then I discovered a natural, no additives, cigarette and gleefully took them up again.

 

[newbroom]

warren, I've quite smoking cigarettes for 5years or more, 3x and for a year or more several times.

I know well the first week's difficulties and resultant irascibility, and really enjoyed not being a slave to something that I didn't wholeheartedly enjoy.

I think a physical addiction is part of your psyche too. Some substances are more physically addicting than psychologically addictive it seems. Tobacco is both, but the physical withdrawl is not usually notable.

Another substance I have realized, sometimes too late, to which I seem to have a physical need, is caffeine.

Headache and nausea from cold turkey caffeine cessation have knocked me more seriously than nicotine withdrawals.

It's has been bandied that psychological addiction is most troublesome.

I think with addiction, there is always something psychological involved.

 

[warren]

I love cigarettes, more than once, back to the wall, covered and concealed, I've lighted up and tried to focus on the problem at hand. Can't do that with a pipe when hunting someone in a dark warehouse. God bless K-9s, wish we'd had them all throughout my career.
Taxes are slowly driving me to consider quitting cigarettes yet again. I really do not like paying more than my share of them. I'm much too old to quit because of the possible health issues. That ship probably sailed 10 or twenty years ago, the damage has most likely been done. So far though, no little black spots are appearing.
I'm in the same demographic with regard to caffeine. My, possibly, addictive personality is what keeps me away from Vegas, model trains, golf, bars, and etc. If I gave in to all of them I'd be broke by now. I do miss golf! A guy can only afford so many addictions/vices so, it makes sense to pick them wisely.

 

[ltstone]

I don't know too many people who are addicted to cauliflower...

 

[warren]

Don't misunderstand me, It's the taxes not the cigarettes. I dearly love my MCDs.
Re: Cauliflower! Just remember that anybody who ate cauliflower in the 19th Century is now dead. Words to ponder.

 

[mso489]

Okay, this is a little far-out, so I'll try to make it short. I worked with a guy at a research agency, a Native American who did cutting edge research on environmental health who studied the activity of nicotine in the brain, not as an anti-smoking thing, but because it is an interesting bioactive substance that is active in the hippocampus structure of the brain. In his work, at that time, it wasn't doing anything deleterious, but it was certainly there and interacting with cellular activity. Nothing definitive to say it is good for you, or not, but definitely active in structures of the brain. Like a pipe bowl of Tambolaka or Five Brothers!

 

[deathmetal]

The pharmaceutical industry would love to have a monopoly on the legal use of it.

I first heard this from the "legalize weed" types 20 years ago but... they were right.
If industry could co-opt marijuana, it would. How do I know? Because it's a good product. It seems to make many people happier about their state in life
All of these seem like God-substitutes to me, but "God is dead, and we have killed him," as Fred tells us.
Then again, he's not dead for everyone -- and some of them are right.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_GcebkkQhfE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8eUqTkc9qY

 

[jvnshr]

Then I discovered a natural, no additives, cigarette and gleefully took them up again.

Warren, are you talking about Nat Sherman cigarettes?

 

[jvnshr]

Vitamin N is NOT addictive.

Nicotine is a stimulant and it is addictive indeed. As a medicine it is used to quit smoking.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

it's also been proven to slow Alzheimer disease as well as help Parkinsons

I've heard this several times in the last few years, but it's funny that everyone I know that has died of Alzheimers have been smokers, and absolutely every pipe smoker that I grew up with has died of Alzheimers.
Me, I seem to still keep losing the... you know, those... things... those whatchamacallits...
And, the only place in the entire universe where I have ever, ever, ever heard from any person, smoker, cigarettes, pipes, dipping, chewing, or cigars that nicotine or smoking of any kind was NOT addictive was on this very forum. I live in the land where the majority of people smokes or uses tobacco products in some way, Alabama. I set in a B&M with men coming in for their daily cigar or just hanging out, but around lots and lots of pipe men and cigar smokers, and I have never ever heard one of them deny their addiction, EVER! Cigars and pipes do not have the same withdrawal affects as cigarettes, just as they do not have the same effect on their bodies. But, I have never ever heard a pipe guy or cigar guy say in person that they were not addicted. I mean, no one would rob a convenience store to get a cigar or pouch of Captain Black, but just stopping smoking has some physical and mental effects.
It amazes me. I mean if you feel like you have moderated yourself to where just stopping wouldn't cause a disruption in your thoughts or behavior, great! Good for you. But, that is not how the rest of the world thinks of their tobacco use. I mean, back in the 80's you'd hear an alcoholic chain smoker, bent over a table tell you that they could stop at any time. And, that is how I take it when I hear that on here. You're bent over your keyboard compulsively typing, posting on a tobacco pipe forum day in and day out, and you want me to believe that you can quit at any time. Ha ha. OK. ::
Me, Hello I'm Cosmic, and I am addicted to tobacco, pipes, and pipe forums. :: And, I am happy as a clam about it. Wouldn't quit for the world. :wink:

 

[shutterbugg]

Doctors and trial lawyers stand to benefit from nicotine being classified as physically addictive. It is very important to make that distinction from psychological depencency. Doctors, because health insurance pays for cessation treatments which are based on the premise of physical addiction and therefore have a high attrition rate and they get paid to treat the same patients repeatedly. Lawyers, because in lawsuits they can remove blame from the smoker and place it on a deep pocket. So naturally there are studies bound to prove nicotine is physically addictive. On a scale of 1-10 where heroin and other opiates are 10, nicotine would barely register as a 1. Anyone who has ever witnessed someone going through opiate withdrawal can't help but laugh at the notion physical addiction plays a significant role in making hard for people to stop smoking.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

But, comparing it to heroine withdrawals and saying since it aint that bad, it isn't an addiction is silly. Because my house is not the size of the White House, it's not a house? Since my car is did not cost $60,000, then it's not a car? Just because the withdrawal is not as severe does not mean that it is easy peasy to just stop.
And, to deny the experiences of billions and billions of people, and everyone I know that has ever picked up a tobacco product, just so you can write off the whole thing as some big conspiracy is just as silly.

 

[reniaeats]

If you're interested in this topic, you might want to look at some of the experimentation Tim Ferriss has done with nicotine for peak athletic performance. I think, like most things, lumping it into "good" or "bad" all the time is problematic. Almost nothing is that easy.

 

[cosmicfolklore]

True, and just because something is addictive does not make it inherently bad. I don't think that smoking unto itself is inherently bad at all, even if it is addictive. There is much good to it also.

 

[foggymountain]

Nicotine raises your blood pressure, whether you inhale or not. If you have low pressure, it can help. If high pressure, don't take too much of it.