Don't let anyone tell you that nicotine is a poison...

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BillyWJ

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Wow, that first link is some crazy ranting nonsense. Discounting a scientific study without refuting it using scientific method is not a winning strategy.

The second link is far more interesting, but only deals with the levels of nicotine and delivery methods offered via traditional NRT, like patches or gum. You'll also note the other potential complications, like increased risk of diabetes.

It seems clear to me that more study is needed, specifically at dosages possible via vaping.

EDIT: Here's an interesting study on rabbits. The results are mostly heartening (pun intended), but the significant increase in calcification of the aorta is definitely troubling, as this has been linked to valve failure and other untreatable complications.

Way to over-react and put words in my mouth, "scumbag". Don't be a douche.

I think vaping is a great alternative to smoking, and I'm extremely happy to have converted from tobacco myself, but I also think that it's irresponsible to go around telling people that it's completely safe when that's not been clearly proven yet.

A study from 1970? Really?

All I got from the findings on that were they didn't know why the levels were higher, and more research was needed.
 

ckn71nm

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Why not discuss the medical use of molecules with toxic properties? It goes to the heart of the debate. Toxicologists (those who are experts on the field of negative effects of molecules on the human body), use the term "level of toxicity". And they are correct to do so.

So, sticking with the topic of the thread, if you are eating eggplant, would you consider it "eating poison" merely because it contains nicotine?

In a way and one word, yes. The difference I make is that for example most drugs on the market will have the effects they are supposed to have regardless of their concentration in the body. If you just have one singe molecule of sildenafil in your body and it is not metabolized, it will find a PDE5 and inhibit it. You might not feel the effect because it's just one molecule, but it will do it's job. Same true for nicotine. Regardless how little you have in your body and wherever it comes from, it will still release dopamine and do it's job. Water is different. There is a dose (amount) at which it is toxic, but in low amounts there is no negative effect. That's why sildenafil and nicotine are poison, water is not.

Edit: to be clear. The eggplant is not the poison. The nicotine in it is

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ckn71nm

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Did you read the whole thread? The original premise was to refute an accusation of vaping a poison. The direct analogy with eggplant is you would be eating a poison.

In toxicology, the dose makes the poison, and stoichiometry if the interaction isn't really relevant.

Who exactly are you taking to?

Anyway, I assume it's me. I understand the OP as, simplified, Everything is a poison, even water. Therefor nicotine is in the same league as water and therefor not dangerous.

I'm trying to point out that this is not the case.

Edit: I also want to point out that everyone here seems so hung up on making sure only the newest studies are used to evaluate the case and at the same time uses the definition of poison introduced by a guy who died in 1541, believed in the concept of the four elements, and introduced the idea that, on another level, the cosmos is fashioned from three spiritual substances.

Definition of poison searched on Google: "A substance that, when introduced into or absorbed by a living organism, causes death or injury, esp. one that kills by rapid action even in a small quantity"

Merriam-Webster:
1: a : a substance that through its chemical action usually kills, injures, or impairs an organism
b (1) : something destructive or harmful
(2) : an object of aversion or abhorrence
2: a substance that inhibits the activity of another substance or the course of a reaction or process

I don't' think that water qualifies. Regardless how you define small quantity.
 
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pcrdude

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Yes ckn71nm, my post was directed at you. Previously, I posted links to toxicology information that supports what I posted. That's why I asked if you read the whole thread. Also, if you had read the whole thread, you may have noticed the logical fallacy of false dichotomy before you used it.

The dosage makes the poison is still the founding principle of the science of toxicology.
 

ckn71nm

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Yes ckn71nm, my post was directed at you. Previously, I posted links to toxicology information that supports what I posted. That's why I asked if you read the whole thread. Also, if you had read the whole thread, you may have noticed the logical fallacy of false dichotomy before you used it.

The dosage makes the poison is still the founding principle of the science of toxicology.

Founding principle, yes. Alchemy, the search for a way to make gold from other metals, is the foundation of modern chemistry. Ask a chemist if that is still regarded as the guiding principle. I doubt that you will find any recent research papers on the toxicology of water in humans. Or have to sit through a lecture at a college that tells you everything you need to know in order to avoid water poisoning. Or that you will find treatment options for water overdose taught in med school.

I'm not sure what your background in toxicology is. I worked in biomedical research at a university in the department of pharmacology for the last 13 years. Believe me, no one there regards water as poison or believes that 500 year old principles are a very good guideline to define anything.

"logical fallacy of False Dichotomy"? Just because you used that phrase before and someone complemented you on it doesn't make it any better the second time.

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ckn71nm

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Founding principle, yes. Alchemy, the search for a way to make gold from other metals, is the foundation of modern chemistry. Ask a chemist if that is still regarded as the guiding principle. I doubt that you will find any recent research papers on the toxicology of water in humans. Or have to sit through a lecture at a college that tells you everything you need to know in order to avoid water poisoning. Or that you will find treatment options for water overdose taught in med school.

I'm not sure what your background in toxicology is. I worked in biomedical research at a university in the department of pharmacology for the last 13 years. Believe me, no one there regards water as poison or believes that 500 year old principles are a very good guideline to define anything.

"logical fallacy of False Dichotomy"? Just because you used that phrase before and someone complemented you on it doesn't make it any better the second time.

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I just realized, I'm trolling. Quite a bit. I apologize and I really don't mean to. The argument got the better of me.

from the OP:
So what will kill you?
Everything.

Did I say everything?
Yes I did.

You can drink water for a lifetime and it will have no ill effect. You can ingest the smallest amount of Mercury over a lifetime and go crazy. Some things kill you, some won't. Nicotine is not Mercury I understand that. But it's not water either.
 

pcrdude

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Well, someone didn't do their homework and read the thread.

This is your false dichotomy...

"Therefor nicotine is in the same league as water and therefor not dangerous."

If you go back and read the links I posted as to how the modern science of toxicology still regards dosage as being intrinsically linked with toxicity, you'll find that is how the relationship is still the most important aspect of toxicology.

Is warfarin a poison?
 

ckn71nm

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Then according to you, everything (except water) is a poison?

I saw that you went back and added a post where you admitted to trolling, but I don't think you are.

I think you just may want to think about what the science of toxicology teaches about level of toxicity, as opposed to the unscientific term "poison".

OK, lets be more scientific about it then. Like I said before I worked in a research lab for the last 13 years. My former boss teaches toxicology. Like in every toxicology class, the opening is usually the dreaded "Dose makes the poison" statement along with a history of Paracelsus and all that jazz. A main point of the class is exactly what you are saying about everything being a poison and so on.

Things start to change when you actually do research and get beyond basic education. Toxicology 101 has very little to do with the real world. To treat everything as a potentially toxic substance makes absolutely no practical sense, in a lab or in real life. One thing we do in research is to classify things by their danger to living organisms in the setting the exposure happens. That's why for example a tank with pure oxygen is classified as dangerous (I know, not a scientific term, but just go with it) but the air around us is not. Nicotine in its pure form, as you would encounter it in a laboratory, would be considered extremely toxic; but we can buy liquid with 36 mg/ml at almost every street corner these days. The reason air and e-liquid are considered non toxic is because in the setting in which we encounter them (as O2 and nicotine), they are non toxic. But that does not make the chemicals themselves non-toxic, only the circumstance.

Another very common method of classification is the chemical properties of a substance. I eluded to that earlier. Warfarin for example is a chemical that has one purpose, and one only.
Wikipedia: Warfarin inhibits the vitamin K-dependent synthesis of biologically active forms of the calcium-dependent clotting factors II, VII, IX and X, as well as the regulatory factors protein C, protein S, and protein Z
In low doses it has the benefit of preventing blood clots. In high doses it will lead to hemorrhage. Regardless of the dose, every single molecule will still have the same toxic effect. That makes its toxic property dose independent. The toxic effect on the human body as a whole is, of course, dose dependent. In other words the biochemical effect is toxic and independent of dose, the physiological effect is toxic and dose dependent.

Same is true for nicotine:
Wikipedia: Nicotine stimulates the release of many chemical messengers such as acetylcholine, norepinephrine, epinephrine, vasopressin, histamine, arginine, serotonin, dopamine, autocrine agents, and beta-endorphin
The difference in Biochemical and Physiological properties are the same as above in the example of Warfarin.

Now, substances like water, molecular nitrogen (N2), calcium, magnesium, most types of monomeric sugars or sugar as polymers (cellulose) work very differently. They do not have a toxic effect on the single molecular (or Biochemical) level. They do not disrupt any pathways or essential function of living organisms. Of course they can be ingested is such a high dose that they become toxic on a physiological level. But by default, ingested in a reasonable, normal physiological manner they are non-toxic, on both the Biochemical and physiological level.

I hope you see now that saying that everything is a poison is a simplified, dangerous, impractical (in real life and science) and truly a 500 year old misconception.

The difference for me is that nicotine (as warfarin) is, first not essential to the body, and second dose independently toxic on the biochemical level. Therefore, in common nonscientific terms, poison. Water is essential and only toxic in insane doses on only the physiological level. Hence not poison.
 
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DC2

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DC2

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