From: Max More (maxmore@primenet.com)
Date: Thu Apr 10 1997 - 00:22:34 MDT
At 03:53 PM 4/9/97 -0700, Lee D.C. wrote:
>> This list has been a great help in finding and hopefully tomorrow
>> being able to acquire my first helpings of so called "smart drugs". Also i
>> think that the reliabilty of these drugs really isnt in question.
>
>Or course it's in question, or I wouldn't have asked. I find not
>merely insufficient evidence, but /no/ evidence, and not even the
>attempt at evidence that they do a damned thing.
Lee: I'm surprised. I agree that there isn't a whole lot of really good
experimental evidence for smart drugs working on young, healthy people.
However, there is plenty of good evidence that they work on people with
cognitive deficits, and there appears to be *some* good experimental
evidence for affects on young healthy people for at some of the substances.
By good experimental evidence, I mean double-blind, controlled, cross-over
experiments. One of the newest discoveries--ampakines--having been found to
improve memory in older people, are being tested on young folks by
researchers like Gary Lynch at UC Irvine.
Do you discount *all* the studies cited in books like Smart Drugs and
Nutrients by Dean and Morgenthaler. Certainly, the evidence is often in
terms of theoretical arguments that these substances ought to work and come
along with pretty useless personal stories. However, there *are* some
studies that apparently used good methodology. I'm wondering whether you
just haven't come across these, or whether you have reasons to dispute all
such cases.
Max
Max More, Ph.D.
more@extropy.org
http://www.primenet.com/~maxmore
President, Extropy Institute, Editor, Extropy
exi-info@extropy.org, http://www.extropy.org
(310) 398-0375
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