I can help but feel lied to when there is only a laundry list of "good"s and no analysis on downsides.
When I read "it helps with this" "it prevents this", I always ask "but at what cost". Can an exogenous molecule that was so adaptive be missed this bad and now consuming it will just fill that gap we had for millions of years?
Let's not kid ourselves. Concentrated caffeine is a drug and not a nutrient. We drink it because it is psychoactive and we habituate to it. Try drinking redbull as a caffeine-naive person or not drinking coffee as a daily drinker. If an exogenous substance is that potent, it is a drug. (Even though I like it myself too, it is also pretty shit of a drug in my opinion, with 5 hr half-life, a dice roll every time whether it is gonna create more sleep than focus and a steep tolerance curve.) Magic mushrooms also have nutritional value, nicotine also has some benefits, beer has tons of calories, they might even have adaptive value with occasional use. You might enjoy them, you might drink coffee everyday. That is fine. But they are all drugs and not nutrients.
> Can an exogenous molecule that was so adaptive be missed this bad and now consuming it will just fill that gap we had for millions of years?
I think the simplest answer to this is that for most of human evolutionary history, calories were scarce. And caffeine, like all stimulants, boosts metabolic rate both through thermogenesis and increased activity. That's a hard downside to overcome, even with a plethora of other health benefits.
For our hunter-gatherer ancestors, an endogenous chemical that burned an extra 100 calories a day could very likely mean the difference between life or death during a drought. That's not the case today, because calories are essentially free (in fact we're literally dying due to a surfeit of calories).
I can't believe I never thought of this. With this in mind, it seems that any drug is more likely to be a net positive iff it increases metabolic rate. I wonder if that is the case.
A lot of nutrients (e.g., caffeine, vitamin D3, the fiber in raw carrots) are the closest thing we have to a "free lunch" because the evolutionary pressures that limited access to these nutrients are gone.
Our brains used to compete for scarce calories and nutrition, but now we can vastly increase these things with little to no downside.
There is no scientific distinction between food, drugs, and nutrients. They're all molecules. All that matters is the dosage.
> There is no scientific distinction between food, drugs, and nutrients. They're all molecules. All that matters is the dosage.
A few micrograms of LSD and a cheeseburger is not different only for their dosage. One stores solar energy in its molecules in a form we can harvest. Other crosses blood-brain barrier in a way that alters its functioning drastically. Their structural-functional organizations are drastically different, hence the different categories.
Your CPU is also just a bunch of molecules probably as much as your PCs power button, but one packs a very different nature of consequentiality in that small "dosage" of matter than the other.
The one that stores solar energy crosses stomach barrier in a way that alters it’s functioning drastically by giving it energy. Who knows if LSD equivalents found in plants helped proto-humans (from cells to any mammal) develop key aspects of the brain and therefore we are still receptive to them. Just because it’s used as a recreational drug today doesn’t mean that “it’s altering it’s functioning drastically” that’s just today’s society’s opinion on it or just because today we’re just simply abusing it by using large quantities of LSD (just like over eating and going obese, you’re drastically changing the body).
LSD works more like a toxin than a nutrient. I don't mean that LSD is deadly, it is actually a pretty safe drug in that regard, but the way it works is similar to how toxins work.
The way it works is that to some neurons, it looks a lot like serotonin, a neurotransmitter produced by our own body. In technical terms, it is a 5-HT2A agonist. But unlike serotonin, it doesn't want to get out, causing the affected neuron to fire constantly.
Not so different from carbon monoxide, which takes the place of oxygen in red blood cells and doesn't want to let go.
Even if the effects are completely different, they are both caused a molecule that mimic what our body normally uses, but not only it doesn't behave normally, but it is also much more durable. Causing a large effect with a small dose.
And in fact, LSD is derived from ergot fungi, which are toxic and have causes many deaths in the past.
The fact that LSD is of the family ergotamine, and that the fungus ergot which happens to contain ergotamine has caused deaths, is a meaningless statement.
Chemistry and psychopharmacology is an incredibly complex topic, and it isn't as simple as saying "Well, X is related to Y, and X causes A, ergo Y must cause A."
There's a concept called "structure-activity relationship" (SAR) in medicinal chemistry, and it's the study between a molecule's "physical" (for lack of a better word) shape and it's effects.
If you aren't familiar with medicinal chemistry, as a human your assumption is probably to go "Well, X molecule is really close to Y molecule, so they must do similar things."
Unfortunately, this just is not how it works.
Look at amphetamines. Saying something is an "amphetamine" is meaningless, because what an "amphetamine" is and does is entirely dependent on _which_ amphetamine it is.
Regular "amphetamine" is a simple stimulant.
Then you have psychedelic amphetamines, like 2,4,5-Trimethoxyamphetamine, which aren't stimulatory at all and act more like LSD.
Both of them are, by definition, "amphetamines", but no commonality in terms of effects/psychoactivity.
A single structural change makes the difference between being benign or being incredibly toxic, being a stimulant or a psychedelic, etc.
You can't talk about these things with sweeping generalizations.
The only way to have a legitimate, rational discussion about chemicals is to completely rid the physical structure from your head and discuss it in terms of it's receptor affinity, ligand-binding, and Ki values.
Everything else is complete pseudoscience and quackery.
So the categorization of toxins vs. nutrients is just "bio-active molecules which are either detrimental or beneficial" to the organism?
Or do nutrients always have to transfer solar energy as some post above alludes to? Vitamins functionally support the organism without delivering energy - but they are considered as nutrients too.
Or are we going to include the criticality of its absence? The absence of vitamin C causes scurvy. The absence of caffeine merely means losing luxury benefits "on top of" what we strictly need.
In that way and as the benefits seem to outweigh the negatives, one could definitely argue that caffeine is a nutrient.
But I grind up my old computers, pulverize them into powder, fill empty gel caps with it, and take 1000mg of it every day. It standardizes my daily dose of computer usage. Don't try this with Apple products though: LSD has nothing on them.
According to Ray and his research, yes. Eating cooked carrots will promote unwanted bacterial growth in the intestine, and can increase the absorption of beta carotene, which in increased amounts can suppress metabolism.
A key distinction between drugs and the other two is that the body easily develops an increasing tolerance and dependence on the former, unless strict moderation is applied. Yes, this also applies to sugar.
Sort of like nicotine. I don't think we would have made the transition to desk work as easily as we did without it. I'm pretty sure the US space program depended on it.
Interesting observation. I think it could be argued that the average nicotine user today us a dramatically different kind of person than they were then.
During the time frame that the user you replied to was referencing, nicotine consumption was the norm. Now, with the extensive change in societal perspective that nicotine consumption has undergone, those who still use gravitate towards the uneducated and less successful.
BTW if nicotine were such a powerful mental booster, nicotine patches would be vastly more popular. They provide all the upsides of nicotine without any of the downsides of smoking (harmful byproducts of burning, the smell, the need to go outside, etc).
I still think something else keeps smokers smoking: the taste, the ritual, looking cool, etc.
Do they though? I've wondered this before as a non-smoker.
I assume patches are slow release but smoking provides a bigger hit all at once. Sometimes that's important, both in terms of impact and building tolerance.
Nicotine without smoke is still not a great thing to consume and has it's own negative effects such are arterial hardening leading to increased heart attacks and strokes. While it is far better than smoking, it still known to cause long term health problems. Getting the stimulating effects of nicotine also takes fairly sensitive portion control. Too little and it is not going to stimulate, too much and you will want to barf for the next 45+ minutes.
It's odd, I rarely drink but sometimes I will and alcohol motivates me to just bang out code or do something else that I've been putting off for a while. I've noticed this at night for personal projects but also after the rare work lunches.
I'm not saying it's good quality code, but it definitely removes the barriers to starting that I often struggle to get over. And starting is the most important step of iterating, I can fix it up tomorrow.
I've noticed the same thing sometimes. I particularly notice when there's a thing where there's an obvious flawed approach to the problem, but the flaws probably don't matter.
Interestingly, I can replicate that mind-state even without alcoho. The same is true of a couple other states of mind that I originally arrived at though the use of mind altering substances (sadly it does not work for caffeine though).
> I particularly notice when there's a thing where there's an obvious flawed approach to the problem, but the flaws probably don't matter.
Yeah absolutely. I often get hung up in architecture astronaut mode about whether this is the right solution, and entering that "who cares? make it work or nothing matters!" mindset is very liberating.
I've been taking some herbal anxiety pills because a friend suggested them.I didn't expect much but it does seem to let me focus on the process and not the what-ifs when I need to.
For me it's Kratom. It's helped me out of deep depression and also does more to help with migraines than any painkiller I've tried.
I've been using it regularly for about 5 years now (with occasional cycles to reduce tolerance). So far, I have found no downsides except for the taste.
When I stop taking it, there's one day of grumpiness which I would say it of similar strength to effect of stopping coffee after a regular habit.
(EDIT because I'm not allowed to make a new comment for some reason, this is a reply to the comment below)
Every person is different and you must take care of what you put in your body. I take kratom because it's a double whammy that reduces two problems - depression and migraine - to manageable levels, while having low potential for addiction. I have so far encountered no negative effects from taking it, only positives.
However, I would prefer _not_ to take it. I would prefer _not_ to have depression and migraines and not to need any drugs to maintain a normal lifestyle.
I work on this by maintaining a healthy diet, exercising regularly, sleeping well, meditation, and maybe I'll get there someday. In the meantime, kratom has increased my quality of life a lot over the past few years. This is not intended as a suggestion that anyone else should take it, just an anecdote about my experience.
Regarding constipation - I have heard this before, but never personally experienced it. I mix each dose (<1tps) with a full cup of water, which probably helps.
Yeah, it's not a wonder drug. There are serious risks. And in terms of treatment for something like depression, it should be regarded like any other depression treatment: it may work for some and be crap for others, and do awful things to some people. If you have access to quality professional mental health care, that should be your first stop, before self-educating.
Interestingly a number of these things on this list aren't unfettered good things. E.g reducing iron absorption, or increasing fuel efficiency, e.g if you're vegan, or you're trying to lose weight respectively those aren't good things. So I think that resolves the mystery, it's not a missing nutrient, it's just a chemical that can be used to offset consequences of other patterns of consuming exogenous molecules
Regarding absorbing iron on a plant based diet, it's important to distinguish between heme iron and nonheme iron, and that namely most vegans have no trouble getting enough iron from beans and greens.
I don't consume energy drinks under normal circumstances. I save it for that once every 6-12 months when it's 11 PM and something critical needs to be done by SOB. With it I can get 4 hours of zone quite reliably. Then at 3 AM I crash, hard.
Unfortunately this isn't how caffeine works. Your body adjusts quickly to daily use. Any perceived increase of "boost" due to long term daily caffeine usage is mental. (Which probably has value for many people)
Except not exactly, because for some of us fast metabolisers, half life of caffeine can be less than 4h, meaning by fasting from 1600 to 0800, you are down to trace levels, and the body is reversing its tolerance.
I've done informal tests and steady state caffeine every day for a month is not the same as abstaining. You alleles, and hence mileage, may vary.
For poor metabolizers like me, caffeine has about a 12 hour half life and I can’t even sleep if I have a small dose in the morning. I know this is true because I’ve accidentally taken caffeine in various forms and it’s always 3am and I’m banging my head trying to figure out why I can’t sleep until I realize I had a chai tea or something without thinking.
In fact caffeine is a huge detriment to my ability to be productive, and the last time I quit coffee it took a full month and a half for the grogginess and lethargy to go away. Never again!
This is what convinces me caffeine is a drug and not a vitamin or nutrient. If I miss my daily vitamin I don’t even notice but if I miss my daily dose of caffeine it’s difficult for my brain to function on account of the inevitable withdrawal headache.
You would certainly notice if you missed some essential vitamins. The modern diet is just good enough to get you enough of all of them without too much effort.
Alternative hypothesis: Vitamins have a longer half-life in your body, therefore missing a dose does not cause the concentration in your body to drop as quickly.
I’m a poor metabolizer of caffeine and actually it’s far worse when it’s a long half life. I literally can’t sleep until 4am if I drink tea in the morning.
From Robin Hanson's "The Age of Em: Work, Love, and Life when Robots Rule the Earth"(2016):
> Today, people who are seen as “workaholics” tend to make more money, to be male, and to focus their socializing on scheduled times such as holidays. They also tend rise early to work alone and they often use stimulants (Kemeny 2002[0]; Currey 2013[1]).
[0]: Kemeny, Anna. 2002. “Driven to Excel: A Portrait of Canada’s Workaholics.” Canadian Social Trends 64, March 11.
[1]: Currey, Mason. 2013. Daily Rituals: How Artists Work. Knopf, April 23.
I work in a fairly demanding work environment and have a big family and always thought this. But I found out I could do without caffeine. I replaced it with lifting weights four times a week and cardio 3 times a week. I sleep better, no longer drink alcohol.
It is nice to drink coffee of course. But I think it comes at a hidden cost. I feel much less stressed out now and I am more efficient at work too.
So perhaps you can try it out for just a month? Drinking no coffee and see how you feel?
I also went down the path for harder drugs, modafinil even speed for a while. But in the end it is not worth it.
That was exactly my point. The molecule is not novel. It indeed existed and we had the opportunity to evolve with its ambient presence. If the laundry list of advantages were that important, it would have created selective pressure on those who didn’t consume it. But it didn’t prove itself as indispensable while other nutrients did; that’s why they are nutrients and caffeine isn’t.
>It indeed existed and we had the opportunity to evolve with its ambient presence.
It may exist in a number of plants all over the world but that doesn't mean that people were harvesting and using it outside of certain isolated cultures until fairly recently, compared to evolutionary timescales.
If anything I'd expect significant genetic variation representing adaptations only present in some groups.
Carbs are not essential indeed. But consuming carbs when available gave us net selective advantage, which is why it's been the biggest part of our post-agricultural diet. And those carbs didn't exist in isolation but in the context of other macro and micronutrients including vitamins.
Can't say the same about caffeine sources, they weren't consumed for their nutritional content, and the supposed selective advantage of their consumption apparently didn't matter as much as carbs'. We didn't witness a supremacy of caffeine using populations, but we witnessed ones that could utilize carbs.
>a dice roll every time whether it is gonna create more sleep than focus
This is highly individual. There are people who can go to sleep after drinking a cup of coffee, who feel sleepy after drinking small amount (how small actually varies) and then people like me that can go on for 5 more hours no matter how tired, even after being awake for more than 24 hr - there is no dice roll, works 100 %.
That you can sleep does not imply you get the same quality of sleep. It's well known that alcohol and caffeine reduce sleep quality. So even if you can sleep after having a coffee, it's probably still not a good idea. Have a decaf if it's after 3pm.
This always reminds me that there is a difference between public health policy and individualised care.
Generally speaking, you're probably correct, and yet for some individuals some of the time some amount of alcohol, caffeine, psilocybin, mdma, etc etc etc, may have a beneficial effect for some period of time.
In case you aren't aware, there are a number of active clinical research trials underway demonstrating the efficacy of MDMA and psilocybin, under the support of the FDA:
In other words, these medicines are being explored specifically through the lens of public health policy. The question of their benefits being a statistical anomaly (when used in appropriate settings) is looking increasingly unlikely.
Some anecdata: I generally do not feel caffeine at all after ~2 hours. This is consistent under all circumstances; whether it's the morning cup puttering out around lunch time or whether it's an after-work latte fading long before I need to sleep.
Honestly, if I'm truly tired I can go to sleep immediately after drinking a cup. I don't generally intend to do this, obviously, but I've never felt like coffee prevented me from sleeping. It gives me clarity and makes me feel invigorated, but it doesn't feel like the opposite of sleep.
Studies on that are inconclusive at best, mainly due to the fact that people who rely on caffeine for daily function often do so due to having issues with sleep in them first place.
And no it’s quite likely not the the chicken the the egg problem.
Don’t get me wrong downing 3 double espresso shots 30 min before bed time is probably not a good idea however there is nothing that indicates that caffeine consumption during the day would have an impact on sleep in fact many studies showed that moderate amounts of caffeine even 2 hours before bed did not have a negative impact on sleep and a few studies even showed improvement in REM sleep when caffeine was taken but again nutrition studies are notoriously problematic.
I drink coffee/espressos each day, probably too much. Just recently after not having my usual Americanos I had a massive headache before bed. Advil did nothing so I figured it must be a caffeine withdrawal headache. They're hell and there's no way I can sleep with one so I made a shot of espresso and downed it quickly. Within 30 mins my headache went from a jackhammer pounding my skull to a distant woodpecker, and after another 30 mins I was asleep and slept fine. The big confounding factor with caffeine studies might be tolerance.
I had a similar experience on a long flight. I figured I'd avoid caffeine so I could sleep better, but I just woke up a few hours into the flight with a bad headache. Headed back to the galley to get some coffee, then slept halfway well.
Excedrin or the generic OTC "migraine" medications are good for this: a bit of caffeine, aspirin, and acetaminophen. Easier to carry around than having to scout out coffee and a bit more general purpose than caffeine pills alone.
The big confounding factors with caffeine is that nutrition based studies are extremely hard to run to the point where they are almost as bad as sociology studies.
Controlling for all the factors is nearly impossible.
Age, life style, genetics and everything else in between introduces so many variables that you simply can’t estimate or predict their impact on the study.
Even in your specific example it might be caffeine dependency or it might be something else completely like giving up 3-4 americanos a day and not making up for the liquid intake loss which left you more dehydrated in the evening.
Long time ago when I was chronically tired and with random sleeping patterns (going out, staying late...) I could drink strong coffee 30mins before sleep and have no problem getting to sleep. But some time later when I normalized with daily rhythm and stress I could not, I had to drink last coffee before 4pm, then a few years later before 2pm and less coffee. Now, when I am religious about getting to sleep before 11pm and am mindful about my energy levels, stress, eat well for long periods, train moderately, one coffee in the morning is more than enough to feel strong kick until the evening almost. I am thinking of even dropping that for some black/green tea. I think that so many people are chronically overstressed, undersleeped and with overworked adrenal glands, that they can’t even notice the real downside until they get into a better position for some time. And coffee in a run down body is just for keeping things bearly going.
Anecdotally as a caffeine addict I sleep fine but worry a bit about the opposite problem, that after the morning coffee effect wears off I get sleepy. I'm not sure if I might have more consistent energy if I stopped.
The main issue with caffeine, however, is that it is very bitter and so most caffeinated beverages come with a large amount of sugar to mask the taste.
When I started drinking coffee regularly in college, I decided I would only allow myself to drink it black to avoid sugar and milk (I can't digest lactose).
It didn't take long at all before I preferred it that way. Now I love a back espresso with no sugar.
Same with tea, for me. I drank tea and tisanes with sugar and milk when I was young. Then over time I went to just sugar, and then plain. Now I prefer tea/tisane/coffee plain.
> Let's not kid ourselves. Concentrated caffeine is a drug and not a nutrient.
Coffee can contain both nutrients and contain a drug. They are not exclusive.
The title is misleading in focusing on caffeine. But the article mostly focuses on the benefits of coffee and tea, while occasionally also talking about the drug it contains.
Your analogies don't always work. Nicotine is not consumed as a food. Neither are magic mushrooms consumed on a regular enough basis to be considered for nutritional purposes. Beer however is a better analogy. And both beer and coffee, in moderation, have a lot of studies so far showing a correlation with longer lifespans. So, is that from the nutrients? From the drug within? Or from both? All are possibilities until we pinpoint causation.
In one study [1], of "nearly 500,000 adults in Britain, those who consumed instant, ground and decaf coffee – even as much as 8 cups daily – had a slightly lower risk of death over 10 years than those who did not."
Another large scale study [2] on coffee included 400,000 adults.
Suffice it to say that studies of ~1/2 million people cover a wide range of economic statuses. And there have been enough of these large scale studies already to perform meta-analysis [3], again leading to the same conclusion.
We have similar large scale peer reviewed studies over alcohol. So you'll have to do a lot better than a guess about what the actual causation might be.
> and have the intelligence to keep their habits within moderation.
Wait, I thought poorer people can't afford to drink beer and coffee regularly? Which is it?
The idea that moderation comes with intelligence or wealth is a false stereotype that deserves to die. Plenty of wealthy people and plenty of intelligent people have addiction problems. Wealth and intelligence are bad predictors of addiction. A far better predictor is family history.
>Plenty of wealthy people and plenty of intelligent people have addiction problems. Wealth and intelligence are bad predictors of addiction. A far better predictor is family history.
Family history is strongly correlated with wealth and intelligence, though. [0]
Studies comprising "adults in Britain" consist almost exclusively of mostly relatively well-to-do and highly educated people, compared to the rest of the world. [1]
Britain basically controlled the world during the entirety of the 1800s. They're a lot better off than most still as a result of that extremely long reign.
> Family history is strongly correlated with wealth and intelligence.
And? What does that have to do with your original and wrong claim that wealth and / or intelligence lead people to be better at moderation when it comes to addictive substances?
> Studies comprising "adults in Britain" consist almost exclusively of mostly relatively well-to-do
Your claim was about wealthy. You are moving the goal posts from wealthy to "relatively well-to-do" and "compared to the rest of the world".
And that does not explain why Brits who drink coffee live longer than Brits who do not. Or why the very many studies outside the UK show the same results.
I can't think of a single thing we put in our bodies that couldn't be harmful if done to excess. Maybe I lack imagination though-- comment below with candidate "safe" substances!
Concentrated vitamin A can also kill you, and a complete lack of it can bring health issues too. Even too much water can be bad for you, along with too much sugar. Too much of X is not a sufficient argument to say something is bad.
During lockdown I quit coffee cold turkey, I didn't feel anything. No changes in energy level or anything. I don't even feel anything other than the flavor difference between tea and coffee.
Most tea contains caffeine too. Usually less, but if you drink more tea than you drank coffee you might just take as much caffeine (or more, even) as you did before.
Caffeine has the unfortunate side effect of raising my blood pressure about 10 mmHg. While I love coffee I had to give it up. I can't imagine that would be good for me long term.
> I can help but feel lied to when there is only a laundry list of "good"s and no analysis on downsides.
Keep in mind that there's a strong selection bias here. We've been drinking coffee for hundreds of years. If over that time we had ever noticed it had any notable negative side effects, we would have relegated it to the very very long list of substances which are more of a mixed bag.
In the short term over the duration of effect. I don't think I've ever seen a reliable study that demonstrated any reliable evidence of long term harm from coffee with any certainty.
When I read "it helps with this" "it prevents this", I always ask "but at what cost". Can an exogenous molecule that was so adaptive be missed this bad and now consuming it will just fill that gap we had for millions of years?
Let's not kid ourselves. Concentrated caffeine is a drug and not a nutrient. We drink it because it is psychoactive and we habituate to it. Try drinking redbull as a caffeine-naive person or not drinking coffee as a daily drinker. If an exogenous substance is that potent, it is a drug. (Even though I like it myself too, it is also pretty shit of a drug in my opinion, with 5 hr half-life, a dice roll every time whether it is gonna create more sleep than focus and a steep tolerance curve.) Magic mushrooms also have nutritional value, nicotine also has some benefits, beer has tons of calories, they might even have adaptive value with occasional use. You might enjoy them, you might drink coffee everyday. That is fine. But they are all drugs and not nutrients.