this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2023
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Do e-cigarettes actually work? (self.nostupidquestions)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by CaspianXI to c/nostupidquestions
 

I have a friend who has been using an e-cigarette for 10+ years. He doesn't seem any less addicted to smoking as back when he was using old-fashioned cigarettes.

I understand e-cigarettes are supposed to help you quit... but has anyone actually had success with them? Or, is it more like trading one vice for another?

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[–] Cyanogenmon 65 points 1 year ago (5 children)

Current e-cig user here.

Honestly, as a smoker, it's a godsend. The smoke goes away so quickly, it has higher nicotine than cigarettes when purchased the RIGHT way, and since I can now smoke inside, I can puff on it all day every day as I work from home!

In all seriousness, it's worse imo. It sets the precedent from the 50s of smoking EVERYWHERE and now without any of the negative outward effects like smell or yellowing of the teeth/walls.

It's honestly made my addiction worse. To each their own for sure, but in my experience it just made my bad habit SLIGHTLY healthier, but much more accessible.

It requires a significant amount of willpower to break the addiction, but for those of us that do not, definitely do not pick this up. It will not help. If you have that willpower, it is useful.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It seems useful for people who were addicted to cigarettes by providing a potentially less harmful alternative.

But, for the generation that didn't have addiction to cigarettes prior to E cigarettes I wonder how many went on to pick up the addiction to nicotine they otherwise wouldn't have, since smoking cigarettes seemed to be going out of style.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I do kind of wonder what the endgame of addictive product development is. I mean, if you assume that technology can both reduce negative side effects and make the product more-potently-addictive, absent some sort of social movement or something opposed to them, I would think that we would get closer to a point where there is stupendously-addictive stuff that has no intrinsic harm other than the addiction itself, but that the addiction could be crippling and extremely hard to kick.

Science fiction has explored the concept:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirehead_%28science_fiction%29

Wireheading is a term associated with fictional or futuristic applications of brain stimulation reward, the act of directly triggering the brain's reward center by electrical stimulation of an inserted wire, for the purpose of 'short-circuiting' the brain's normal reward process and artificially inducing pleasure. Scientists have successfully performed brain stimulation reward on rats (1950s) and humans (1960s). This stimulation does not appear to lead to tolerance or satiation in the way that sex or drugs do. The term is sometimes associated with science fiction writer Larry Niven, who used the term in his Known Space series. In the philosophy of artificial intelligence, the term is used to refer to AI systems that hack their own reward channel.

Wireheading, like other forms of brain alteration, is often treated as dystopian in science fiction literature.

In Larry Niven's Known Space stories, a "wirehead" is someone who has been fitted with an electronic brain implant known as a "droud" in order to stimulate the pleasure centers of their brain. Wireheading is the most addictive habit known (Louis Wu is the only given example of a recovered addict), and wireheads usually die from neglecting their basic needs in favour of the ceaseless pleasure. Wireheading is so powerful and easy that it becomes an evolutionary pressure, selecting against that portion of humanity without self-control.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

Estimates put out after research by Public Health England suggest that vaping is 95% better for you than smoking. So unless you’re vaping 20x more than you were smoking you’re probably benefitting.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Use your willpower in a small burst to buy a low nicotine juice and literally throw away the high nicotine stuff. You need to actually toss it and never use it again. Yes, it costs money, but do you want to quit or not?

Now use the low nicotine juice for a set amount of time (say, a month) and then switch to zero nicotine juice. Try to keep the same flavors you're used to already.

Eventually you will stop smoking because youre only getting the positive feelings from the habit itself and not the nicotine.

[–] p5f20w18k 2 points 1 year ago

Same situation here, vape more than I used to smoke.

Only concern I have is long term affects, since we don’t actually know what they are yet.