As the second decade of the 21st century progresses, the population approaches seven billion. With so many people, how are people supposed to stand out in job applications, or catch the administrators’ eye as he or she reads applications to highly prestigious colleges and universities? More and more people are asking this question, and more and more people are finding help in a small pill. Originally diagnosed for Alzheimer’s disease and ADHD, these drugs are increasingly used off label in universities and workplaces. In society, people call this form of off label use of neuroenhancing drugs chiefly two different things: smart drugs informally, and nootropics formally. The word nootropic originated from a Romanian Dr. Corneliu E. Giurgea, a combination of the Greek words nous, meaning mind, and trepein meaning to bend or turn. These drugs do not increase intelligence per se, but do increase concentration levels and clarity of thought. According to Ann Robinson from the Guardian, they do this by increasing levels of noradrenalin, acetylcholine, and dopamine at the junction between nerves to improve transmission or electrical activity.
Since relatively few studies have been taken, the companies selling these drugs claim that there are little to no side effects harmful to the drug consumer’s wellbeing. However, the absence of side effect information is because this alternative atypical use of these drugs is very new to society. As the popularity of drugs such as Modafinil (Provogil, Alertec) increase, the amount of professional medical studies done, does not. Most of the funding instead of going to the research of long-term effects goes to creating and enhancing new drugs. However as seen with the popular nootropic in ...
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Talbot, Margaret. "Brain Gain." The New Yorker [New York City, NY]. N.p., 27 Apr. 2009. Web. 3 Mar. 2010. .
Boggan, Steve, and Tim Stewart. "Brain-Enhancing Drugs: Legalize 'Em, Scientists Say." Mail Online. N.p., 9 Mar. 2010. Web. 9 Mar. 2010. .
Sahakian, Barbara. Guest Lecture. Smart Drugs. Royal Institution of Great Britain, London, Great Britain. 22 February 2010.
Bannerman, Lucy. "Bring 'Smart Drugs' Out of the Closet, Experts Urge Government." Times Online. UK]. The Times, 27 Feb. 2010. Web. 28 Feb. 2010. .
Psychoactive drugs are classified into five different groups depending on how they affect the brain. In this essay I will be looking at three of these groups: stimulants, depressants and hallucinogens and how they exert influence on neural processing.
In the article “Brain Gain: The Underground World of “Neuroenhancing” Drugs” (Yorker 2009) Margaret Talbot discusses the misuse of prescription drugs that enhance academic performance at the college level. First Talbot introduces readers to a young college history major at Harvard University named Alex who receives a description of a demanding, busy life which seems impossible to control without the safety unapproved adopted use of a drug named Adderall. After that Alex’s dependency on the prescription drugs cognitive enhancers is described when he asks his doctor to increase the amount of intake and the listing of his daily routine on using Adderall during a week that required him to write four term papers. Next Talbot describes a personal
Sharpe, Katherine. “Medication: The Smart-pill Oversell.” Nature: International Weekly Journal of Science. Nature Publishing Group. 12 Feb. 2014. Web. 7 March 2014.
Depressants also called downers are a drug which slow down the central nervous system.Barbiturates, Benzodiazepines, Alcohol, Heroin, and Marijuna. Depressants cna be smoked, swallowed, and injected. Short term effects are slurred speech, drowsiness, low blood pressure, ect. Long term effects are addiction, sleep problems, death. Withdrawal symptoms are insomnia nausea and weekness. Tolerance can develop very quickly and then addiction.
Illicit drug use and the debate surrounding the various legal options available to the government in an effort to curtail it is nothing new to America. Since the enactment of the Harrison Narcotic Act in 1914 (Erowid) the public has struggled with how to effectively deal with this phenomena, from catching individual users to deciding what to do with those who are convicted (DEA). Complicating the issue further is the ever-expanding list of substances available for abuse. Some are concocted in basements or bathtubs by drug addicts themselves, some in the labs of multinational pharmaceutical companies, and still others are just old compounds waiting for society to discover them.
This idea sounded ideal, especially with the discovery of psychotropic medication, but it eventually led to an increase in repres...
Nadelmann, Ethan. "DRUGS: THINK AGAIN." European Coalition for Just and Effective Drug Policies. Sept.-Oct. 2007. Web. 02 Mar. 2011. .
If people seeking neurological enhancement are given access to these types of drugs many more ethical issues will be raised. Firstly, are these drugs even safe? Many pharmaceutical therapies for cognitive enhancement are relatively new, and therefore there is a severe lack of information about their long term usage. Of course, side effects are a concern with any medicine currently available to patients. However, not all drugs available deal with systems so complex as the brain and nervous system. The dangers presented are amplified greatly because of the importance and intricacies of this system.
Pennington, Bill. "A New Way to Care for Young Brains." SIRS. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Nov.
Victoroff, Jeffrey Ivan. Saving Your Brain: The Revolutionary Plan to Boost Brain Power, Improve Memory, and Protect Yourself Against Aging and Alzheimer's. New York: Bantam, 2002.
Using mind constricting drugs leads to immoral outcomes and therefore, mind constricting drugs must be illegal in order to at least minimize the amount of such outcomes. Making mind constricting drugs illegal prevents people from using substances which can only lessen one's quality of life and inevitably, destroy ma...
Wolf, M. (2011, June 4). We should declare an end to our disastrous war on drugs. Financial Times. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.proxy.consortiumlibrary.org/docview/870200965?accountid=14473
Substance abuse complicates almost every aspect of care for the person with a mental disorder. When drugs enter the brain, they can interrupt the work and actually change how the brain performs its jobs; these changes are what lead to compulsive drug use. Drug abuse plays a major role when concerning mental health. It is very difficult for these individuals to engage in treatment. Diagnosis for a treatment is difficult because it takes time to disengage the interacting effects of substance abuse and the mental illness. It may also be difficult for substance abusers to be accommodated at home and it may not be tolerated in the community of residents of rehabilitation programs. The author states, that they end up losing their support systems and suffer frequent relapses and hospitalizations (Agnes B. Hatfield, 1993).
Many students and young people trying to leave marks on their jobs now use brain-enhancing "smart" pills to help boost their exam grades or their ability to work long hours without tiring. It's quite possible that employers will start to demand that employees use stimulants. Drugs, originally made for dementia patients and children diagnosed with ADHD, are now available without prescription. Healthy individuals use them solely to improve their memory, motivation and attention, without any prior consult with their doctors. Many of these drugs are available on the Internet which comes in handy to young people who want to save their money for the future. What they do not take into consideration when buying stimulants on the Internet is the risk of not knowing for certain what they are getting. Moreover, long-term consequences and safety of the technologies are not known. Scientists haven’t done enough research to know how much of an impact even a short period of using such substances leaves on our brains.