Is cannabis a placebo? – Cannabis | weed | marijuana

Is cannabis a placebo? What does that even mean?

A placebo is traditionally a pill with no active ingredients. Drug researchers will split the test subjects into one group that will receive the actual substance and another group that will receive a placebo, a “sugar pill”.

If the group receiving the real substance does better than the placebo group, the researchers conclude that the drug is working.

However, placebos are not foolproof. Especially when it comes to psychiatry. For example, many studies on antidepressants show that placebos work just as well as the drugs.

The results are even more impressive when you are given a placebo pill that causes a side effect (an “active” placebo).

Let’s say you’re suffering from depression or anxiety and you enroll in a new drug trial. Researchers give you a sugar pill that causes dry mouth as a side effect. You don’t know it’s a placebo, but the objective side effects trick your mind into thinking you’re less depressed or anxious.

Is that what’s going on with cannabis? Is cannabis nothing more than an active placebo?

break blind

It is common in drug trials that a participant becomes “blind” when they realize they are not taking the drug. Suppose the researcher tells you that the side effects are drowsiness and you never feel sleepy. They might conclude they gave you the placebo.

On the other hand, if you experience drowsiness, you might conclude that it is a real drug. If it’s an antidepressant, you may feel less depressed.

Blindness is a problem for researchers. In the case of antidepressants, blindness changes expectations. It becomes impossible to determine whether the participant resolves their depression through the pharmacology of the drug or their beliefs about the drug.

To get around this, researchers use an “active” placebo. However, when participants feel the side effects, they believe they are taking the actual drug. In studies using active placebos, 78% had no clinical difference in outcomes.

Most antidepressants work just as well as placebos. So does this also apply to cannabis? Is cannabis an active placebo?

It’s true – most of the psychological and emotional effects of cannabis aren’t actually caused by the pharmacology of the herb.

let me explain.

Is cannabis a placebo?

In the late 1960s, two Harvard researchers conducted a controlled study of the effects of cannabis in people who had never used it or had any experience with it. This included seeing how other people were using it.

The results were inconsistent, with no cultural framework to support the experience. Two books resulted from this study. dr Andrew Wiel’s The Natural Mind: A Revolutionary Approach to the Drug Problem. And Drug, Set, and Setting: The Basis for Controlled Intoxicant Use by Norman E. Zinberg, MD

As Weil wrote:

In my opinion, the best term for marijuana is active placebo—that is, a substance whose apparent effects on the mind are actually placebo effects in response to minimal physiological effects.

And it’s not just cannabis. According to Weil and Zinberg, any drug that induces a high also creates an active placebo in the user’s brain.

This does not deny the pharmacological effects of cannabis. When you consume cannabis, phytocannabinoids activate your cannabinoid receptors. You feel high or stoned.

But everything else is expectation. This is not controversial with LSD. “Set and setting” determine whether your trip will be good or bad.

Likewise, cultural conventions and learned associations influence how we think about what cannabis does to the mind.

Is cannabis really just a placebo? No way!

Cannabis is by no means a placebo. I have to be out for lunch. But that’s not a bad thing, it’s a liberating realization.

On the one hand, the responsibility lies with the consumer. Yes, cannabis will feel like someone has wrapped you in a warm blanket. If it’s a good strain, you’ll feel the headband. But how you interpret these physical feelings is entirely up to you.

Does cannabis relax you after a hard day’s work, or does it stimulate your creativity like an afternoon coffee? Perhaps cannabis makes you feel anxious and paranoid and you only use it when you are in pain.

Does cannabis make you more sensitive? aroused? Or are you becoming more withdrawn or callous?

Correlation is not causation

I remember a time when I was hitchhiking in California as a younger man. A surfer guy picked me up south of Monterey. “Do you want to smoke a joint?” He asked. “Sure,” I said. So we did. During driving. He became a terrible driver and I got out soon after.

I couldn’t understand why. Did he fake it? Cannabis keeps me focused and focussed. This guy has been distracted and impaired.

I’ve met people who got belligerent after a dab. Others become more comfortable. Some people become bold and talkative, while others become shy and nervous.

But the only thing cannabis does is send phytocannabinoids through your body. Everything else is in your head.

Think about it: have you ever been out for a walk or in the shower and had an idea? Or maybe a solution to an annoying problem? You didn’t think of that. It just appeared out of nowhere.

Walking and showering are relaxing. They relieve stress. This affects the endocannabinoid system and in turn, your mind surprises you.

Influencing the endocannabinoid system with THC can also turn the mind into a playground.

Is cannabis a placebo?

Is cannabis a placebo? A lot depends on what you use it for, but in general, cannabis (like all drugs) is an active placebo.

That’s not to say that cannabis doesn’t relieve pain or other physical ailments. The brain and body still process phytocannabinoids, which have real pharmacological effects.

But does cannabis relieve stress? When associating cannabis with the intention of relaxing, the answer is yes.

When you’re at a party and a friend invites you to smoke a sativa joint with them. what is your intention Experience a THC upper and get more alive?

Stimulation and relaxation are two different things. How can cannabis do both? Stoners have known this dichotomy for a long time, and respond by pointing out sativa and indica strains.

However, sativa and indica cannabis strains are only relevant to growers. The bushy, resinous plant produces more body buzz than its taller, thinner relative.

As such, we interpret this physical buzz as a relaxing “in-da-couch” and the heady buzz of the sativa strain as a stimulant. But we are merely confirming that cannabis is an active placebo.

And that’s not a bad thing.

Christmas without Santa Claus

Do you celebrate Christmas? Over 2 billion people worldwide celebrate the holiday in one form or another. For some reason in the West the Nativity has turned into a celebration of a fat man riding a sleigh of flying reindeer delivering material goods by breaking in and breaking in.

Well, I suppose we let him in voluntarily. The chump goes down the chimney and only asks for milk and biscuits as payment.

If you’re reading this, you probably know it’s a myth. Santa Claus is not real. But I bet you’re still in the mood for the Christmas festivities.

Even non-Christians will celebrate the holiday. Why? Because it is fun. It’s fun to get in the Christmas spirit.

It is also fun to take drugs that have pharmacological effects. The effects on your mind are up to you. Sets and settings. It’s been a psychedelic mantra for years.

However, this applies to all medicines. From opioid addicts living on the streets to middle-class, middle-class cannabis users.

In fact, this is how we solve the opioid crisis. Not by providing more medication, but by demonstrating that opioids do not provide the value the addict believes. But that’s another post for another day.

So I’ll leave it at that: cannabis is an active placebo. But that’s okay.

There’s no way to figure out why the holiday season is so magical by looking at the chemistry of Christmas trees and wrapping paper. You know it’s about your thoughts and how they make you feel.

Likewise, the effects of cannabis are not due to its cannabinoid content (unless you are looking for purely physical effects). It’s about set and setting – your expectations.