It Turns Out That Smoking Marijuana May Actually Make You A Safer Driver

[Serpo]

It Turns Out That Smoking Marijuana May Actually Make You A Safer Driver
Travis Okulski | Dec. 19, 2011, 10:55 AM | 4,576 | 10




An amazing study authored by professors D. Mark Anderson (University of Montana) and Daniel Rees (University of Colorado) shows that traffic deaths have been reduced in states where medical marijuana is legalized.


According to their findings, the use of medical marijuana has caused traffic related fatalities to fall by nearly nine percent in states that have legalized medical marijuana (via The Truth About Cars).

The study notes that this is equal to the effect raising the drinking age to 21 had on reducing traffic fatalities.

One key factor is the reduction in alcohol consumption. The study finds that there is a direct correlation between the use of marijuana and a reduction in beer sales, especially in the younger folks aged 20-29.

A drop in beer sales supports the theory that marijuana can act as a substitute for liquor.

The study also finds that marijuana has the inverse effect that alcohol does on drivers. Drivers under the influence of alcohol tend to make rash decisions and risky moves, whereas those under the influence of marijuana tend to slow down, make safer choices, and increase following distances.

http://www.businessinsider.com/it-turns-out-that-smoking-marijuana-may-actually-make-you-a-better-driver-2011-12#ixzz1h2KwyWAQ

[midnight rambler]

Yeah, if ya could only remember where you are and where you're headed.

[banjo]

I would assume that there would be discounts on insurance....

8)

[Neuro]

Yeah, if ya could only remember where you are and where you're headed.

Who cares! ;D

[Neuro]

I would assume that there would be discounts on insurance....

8)
Pfffffftttt..... ...... ..... wheewwwww... YEAH!!! ;D

[Tumbleweed]

Beer makes me slow down and drive more careful so I don't attract the attention of the cops.

[Bigjon]

Beer makes me slow down and drive more careful so I don't attract the attention of the cops.

Well out in the sticks, we have gravel roads and gravel roads will make you slow down and cops will only be seen on those roads if you are being set up for a DUI/DWI.

In the big city of Mpls/St Paul we found that rush hour provides the perfect cover for drunk driving. Only the better drivers are on the road at that time and the cops are nowhere to be seen. Just one arrest during rush hour on the highways can cause a traffic snarl so bad that thousands of people will have hours added to their commute.

Just blend in with the traffic and let them carry you home.

[StackerKen]

Yeah...I already knew that..Thanks for sharing though :)

He is something interesting

http://www.nature.com/news/2005/051013/full/news051010-12.html

News
Marijuana may make your brain grow

Cannabinoid injections sprout new neurons in mice.

Geoff Brumfiel
One synthetic cannibinoid has the same effect on part of the brain as antidepressants.One synthetic cannibinoid has the same effect on part of the brain as antidepressants.© Punchstock

Most addictive drugs inhibit the growth of new brain cells. But injections of a cannabis-like chemical seem to have the opposite effect in mice, according to new research. Experts say that the results, if borne out by further studies, could have far-reaching implications for addiction research and the application of marijuana in medicine.

For several years now, researchers have been interested in how drugs affect a part of the brain known as the hippocampus. This region is unusual in that it can grow new neurons throughout a person's lifetime. Researchers have theorized that these new cells help to improve memory while combating depression and mood disorders.

“It makes marijuana look more like an antidepressant and less like a drug of abuse.”

Many drugs, such as heroin, cocaine and alcohol, inhibit the growth of new cells in the hippocampus, which scientists believe could emotionally destabilize addicts. Understanding how drugs affect the hippocampus may have a critical role in treating addiction.

Neuropsychologist Xia Zhang and a team of researchers based at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, aimed to find out just how marijuana-like drugs, known collectively as cannabinoids, act on the brain.
Expanding the mind

The researchers injected rats with HU210, a synthetic drug that is about one-hundred times as powerful as THC, the high-inducing compound naturally found in marijuana. They then used a chemical tracer to watch new cells growing in the hippocampus.

They found that HU210 seemed to induce new brain cell growth, just as some antidepressant drugs do, they report in the Journal of Clinical Investigation1. This suggests that they could potentially be used to reduce anxiety and depression, Zhang says. He adds that the research might help to create new cannabinoid-based treatments.

"I think it's a very exciting study," says Amelia Eisch, an addiction researcher at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. "It makes marijuana look more like an antidepressant and less like a drug of abuse."

Eisch adds that much more work must be done before scientists can reach any definitive conclusions about the benefits and costs of marijuana. First and foremost, researchers need to establish that THC has the same positive effects as the synthetic HU210. Then they must develop more sophisticated experiments to firm up the correlation between neuron growth in the hippocampus and emotional balance.


Finally, she says, scientists must understand why cannabinoids have a different effect on the brain than other addictive drugs.

Although his findings point to potential benefits of smoking pot, Zhang says that he does not endorse its use. "Marijuana has been used for medicine and recreation for thousands of years," he says. "But it can also lead to addiction."

He says his group's next studies will examine this more unpleasant side of the drug. Other addiction researchers will be keenly interested in the results, because this cannibinoid acts so differently on the hippocampus than other drugs.

[Bigjon]

Marijuana is our DEA's cash cow. If they move us to a cashless society where we all have a totally trackable plastic card, they are going to have to make drugs legal.

[osoab]

Marijuana is our DEA's cash cow. If they move us to a cashless society where we all have a totally trackable plastic card, they are going to have to make drugs legal.


We could just revert to the barter system.

[Silver Rocket Bitches!]

Whatever they spent on this study was too much. It goes without saying that a MJ smoker is going to get a tinge of paranoia and their driving habits will become paranoid as well.

[Neuro]

About the neurotrophic, antidepressant effects of pot. I did do an online research about this a few years ago, as I had a couple of patients with ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis) then, and it is a promising drug for this field, as it does seem to stimulate certain areas of the brain, and the formation of brain cells, apart from being an antidepressant and an apetite stimulant, both of importance to ALS sufferers. I recommended them to eat it in space cakes or drink it as a tea though, as smoking it would not be good for their lungs, as they commonly has decreased breathing ability. One of them was a relative of a patient of mine, and the other lived far away from me, so I don't know if they followed up on my advice, or what the effect was or if they applied it. I think it has been proven useful for anorexia also. As a chiropractor I don't prescribe drugs (which I generally think is vastly overprescribed), but I do think there is a time and place for that too, especially in cases where the cause of the problem may be outside of the scope of chiropractic. Pot is probably one of the safest drugs one can use, for medical or recreational purposes.

[Heimdhal]

Neuro,


something else you may consider turning your patients on to is vaporizing. Vaporizing gives you many of the benefits of smoknig (that is, instant relief/absorption) WITHOUT the nasties of smoking, like the burnt particulate, resin, etc.

Eating IS a good method though, nothing wrong at all, just offering another option ;)


I've been looking into high CBD (which is the NON psychoactive chemical in MJ) in use in children with brain development disorders like autism, autism spectrum, epilepsey, etc. One thing I was watching, a kid with some type of autism like disorder had severe epilepsey, having at least one, but often multiple, seizure EVERY DAY. The kid was like 5 or so. The dad said he had not had a single day without a seizure.

Long story short, dad gets a doctor to prescribe medical MJ, he gets a very high CBD strain used as a tincture taken orally. After one treatment the kid went at leat 4 days with NO seizures at all and the dad said he was making more eye contact and trying to speak (something he had been unable to do).

[Old Herb Lady]

Neuro me thinks you need an herbalist in your practice !



There are no incurable diseases & people with ALS need MASSIVE doses of good nutrition to help
regenerate & rebuild their nervous system. Their nerves are shot & need more than just what any pot plant can provide.

It may work like a drug & ease the symtoms & be better than any prescription drug on the market, however the nerves need much much more.


Herb formulas to rebuild & restore the nervous system such as:

http://www.herbsfirst.com/descriptionsformulas/nerveformula.html



Eliminate all processed foods, and all foods with additives, such as artificial colors, artificial flavors, artificial sweeteners, and preservatives.

Eliminate processed dairy foods from the diet, stay away from sugar.

Eat lots of good oils.....flaxseed oil, olive oil.

I could go on & on about adding ginger & cayenne but that's once a person gets started on a good rebuilding program.



In addition to the chiropractic adjustments that you give I think massage therapy, reflexology, acupressure or any other complementary bodywork helps also.


I know , I know, I know how pot is an "herb" . For every time someone tries to tell me that if I had a nickel, I'd be rich.


I don't care if people use pot, I'm just saying that if you want a natural healing to occur within the nervous system it takes alot more than the marijuana plant .


Just my 2 cents !

[Neuro]

Heimdahl, that is a great story, however I do think the boys father should look into chiropractic as well... I had epilepsy myself between the ages of 15-31, not that severe though (1-2 seizures/year when I refused to have it medically treated after the age of 20), after having my neck adjusted properly in the last years of chiropractic college (believe it the tutors at the college clinic refused to have the interns correcting my neck because I didn't have what they thought were neck symptoms), still for the last 12 years I have been seizure free. Probably not all people with epilepsy will have the seizures go away from chiropractic adjustments completely, but it should be looked into...

Herb lady I agree that a herbalist, or other body therapists may be/ is useful in my practice, however I don't understand your dogmatic resistance to Cannabis. And there are a few disorders that are uncurable, such as ALS, one of the patients I mentioned above actually lived and believed in a herbalist lifestyle, he lived in a solar powered house, and mainly ate vegetables from his own garden, and he had tried many herbal cures, not Cannabis though. In some cases you can only slow down the progression. That certainly doesn't mean one should give up, or not try a herbal approach, it just means that it doesn't work perfectly every time...

[Old Herb Lady]

I don't care if people use pot Neuro ! I'm just trying to explain that it's not the end all cure all that people have their hopes tied up in.

and like say someone gets completely cured from an illness, completely cured using the cannabis.

There would be no lesson learned in how to take care of their own body, how to maintain a healthy body , no natural healing experience
except that "they used cannabis and got cured ". so then how long after getting cured would it take to destruct the nervous system again if the
lesson wasn't learned ?

That's what I'm saying, natural healing takes alot of work not just cannabis or not just one modality.

People have the right to do whatever they want with their own bodies, but i just think the whole cannabis thing is soooo over rated, that's all. If people are so obsessed with the healing qualities of cannabis, then why aren't they obsessed with the infinite amount of other healing herbs that can do what cannabis does & so much more ?
I don't understand why ? The only one reason that I can think of is because it is famous for being schmoked & getting high .


ETA: also Neuro, who says ALS is incurable, the doctors, the AMA, TPTB ???? Just because THEY haven't cured it or they don't have a cure doesn't mean that it's not curable.
There are no incurable diseases just incurable people.

[Neuro]

Herb lady in terms of curability, in chiropractic we have a theory called limitations of matter, the underlying theory is that the body has the ability of curing most ailments itself given the right circumstances, iow no nerve interference to the area that needs healing, the body being in chemical (nutritional) mechanical and emotional balance. However there are certain conditions where the body has no opportunity to restore an area to its proper function. For instances if a leg is amputated it is not going to grow back out (unless you are a lizzard maybe). Another example is that due to a bone infection, because of a clumsy surgeon, the blood supply to my left head of femur was destroyed while extracting a screw that was put there a year prior due to a fracture, which lead to a collapse of the bone, and a lot of pain. However healing was no longer possible because there was not sufficient blood supply to the bone, and I limped for some 20 odd years. Last year though I had a hip prosthesis put in the place of the collapsed bone, and that restored the biomechanics of my hip, and I could walk and run normally without pain. It didn't cure the avascular necrosis though it bypassed it.

ALS is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder, maybe due to genetics, that is not reversible, once a nerve cell has died you cannot get it back... And usually it leads to a slow horrible death, progressive muscle weakness where the digestive and respiratory system shuts down...

[Old Herb Lady]

Thanks Neuro !! I appreciate your reply and you.

I am so sorry for the problems you have endured.

Please know that I highly respect you & highly respect your opinion.
Please know that I am respectfully disagreeing with you.

ALS is curable. There is no reason for a person to suffer a horrible, torturous death like that. All neuro diseases can be healed with the proper protocol and unfortunately the education is not out there because of well, we already know why. (ALS, MS, fibromyalgia, dementia, alzheimers etc. all curable )

Now in the case of amputation, if a person's leg is severed/ CUT OFF say in a war, then that is a TRAUMA. There was no disease in the body to be healed. I don't do trauma only interested in healing diseases. No you can't grow back an entire limb, but who knows, not sure about that one yet. Now if a person has a limb that has gangrene and the doctor wants to save the person's life & cut their leg off...that's where I'd say WHOA !!! That limb is not going to need cut off...an intense protocol is in order to get the flesh, the bone, the nerves everything back into it's healthy state. Imagine the look on someone's face to see rotting flesh turn around & be healthy ! It sounds unimaginable !

Now surgery that is another trauma to the body telling us that we shouldn't be in there. If the surgeon does damage & compromises the blood supply to a bone, your body can still be nourished to get blood to that bone. Yes, blood supply can be rebuilt to the bone no matter how preposterous that may sound.

I respect medical doctors in the highest degree in the cases of trauma.
Like accidents where immediate surgery is needed & they need to put your body pieces back together from an accident, a burn, etc.
Trauma Care in this country is absolutely phenomenol. (not sure about your country) Anyways on the healing of incurable diseases we differ, but I am 100% in favor of regular chiropractic visits along with nutrition together to heal the body. (along with many, many other modalities).

Everyone should go to get a chiropractic adjustment very often IMO !!!
I see the adjustment as a necessity of life and not a luxury !

Some linkies ...
http://curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=1526590#i


http://www.herballegacy.com/Complete_Tissue.html

http://www.mynaturalmarket.com/dr-christopher-complete-tissue-bone-100-caps.html

[lapis]

and like say someone gets completely cured from an illness, completely cured using the cannabis.

There would be no lesson learned in how to take care of their own body, how to maintain a healthy body , no natural healing experience
except that "they used cannabis and got cured ". so then how long after getting cured would it take to destruct the nervous system again if the
lesson wasn't learned ?

That's what I'm saying, natural healing takes alot of work not just cannabis or not just one modality.

ITA! It seems like a lot of people who are into natural health use herbs and homeopathy as crutches and/or replacements for drugs. Instead of doing the hard work behind finding out the cause of their health problems, they just want to quickly eliminate their symptoms (and of course sometimes you need to if you're having acute ones).

But there are no short cuts to being healthy. You've got to have a good diet as a foundation and cut out the crap. In my case, trying to be a low to no dairy soy-eating vegetarian was my downfall. At the time I didn't know that, so when my health problems got worse instead of better, I turned to herbs, homeopathy and aromatherapy.

Of course you can get some miraculous cures with these modalities; in my case, homeopathy cured a chronic UTI condition I'd had for years. But it didn't make me healthy.

[StackerKen]

I've been looking into high CBD (which is the NON psychoactive chemical in MJ) in use in children with brain development disorders like autism, autism spectrum, epilepsey, etc. One thing I was watching, a kid with some type of autism like disorder had severe epilepsey, having at least one, but often multiple, seizure EVERY DAY. The kid was like 5 or so. The dad said he had not had a single day without a seizure.

Long story short, dad gets a doctor to prescribe medical MJ, he gets a very high CBD strain used as a tincture taken orally. After one treatment the kid went at leat 4 days with NO seizures at all and the dad said he was making more eye contact and trying to speak (something he had been unable to do).

From Projectcbd.com

Cannabidiol —CBD— is a compound in Cannabis that has medical effects but does not make people feel “stoned” and actually counters some of the effects of THC. After decades in which only high-THC Cannabis was available, CBD-rich strains are now being grown by and for medical users.
The reduced psychoactivity of CBD-rich Cannabis may make it an appealing treatment option for patients seeking anti-inflammatory, anti-pain, anti-anxiety and/or anti-spasm effects without disconcerting euphoria or lethargy.

CBD has helped my wife tremendously!

here is a vid that show's the boy

From Projectcbd.com [quote]Cannabidiol —CBD— is a compound in Cannabis that has medical effects but does not make people feel “stoned” and actually counters some of the effects of THC. After decades in which only high-THC Cannabis was available, CBD-rich strains are now being grown by and for medical users. The reduced psychoactivity of CBD-rich Cannabis may make it an appealing treatment option for patients seeking anti-inflammatory, anti-pain, anti-anxiety and/or anti-spasm effects without disconcerting euphoria or lethargy

Scientific and clinical studies indicate that CBD could be effective in easing symptoms of a wide range of difficult-to-control conditions, including: rheumatoid arthritis, diabetes, alcoholism, PTSD, epilepsy, antibiotic-resistant infections and neurological disorders. CBD has demonstrated neuroprotective effects, and its anti-cancer potential is currently being explored at several academic research centers in the U.S. and other countries. .{/quote] CBD has helped my wife tremendously! here is a vid that show's the boy

[Dogman]

[QUOTE=StackerKen;497757]

Ken, If you and the BOSS have the time on Sunday, we always have a good chat going starting 6:30 ct you all show up! The chat link is always posted on Sunday..

Sorry for going 1922

[osoab]

[QUOTE=StackerKen;497757]

Ken, If you and the BOSS have the time on Sunday, we always have a good chat going starting 6:30 ct you all show up! The chat link is always posted on Sunday..

Sorry for going 1922

We chatting on Christmas?

[Dogman]

Some might, I have nothing going on that day, no family. Others may also be loose that night.

Who knows?

If anything I will start one and keep the door open. ;D

[osoab]

Some might, I have nothing going on that day, no family. Others may also be loose that night.

Who knows?

If anything I will start one and keep the door open. ;D

I don't know what time I will have an opportunity at this point.

[StackerKen]

Thanks Dogman!
I will try to get there soon