Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Poll: Is there too much illegal drug discussion?

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arkoma - 22-9-2014 at 10:19

You are focused on dope--EM is just as illegal, JUST (or more so) as likely to draw "bad" attention from the gestapo, and more likely to directly hurt the young people that frequent and contribute to this board. Yet you have no problems with that subforum. Interesting.

My opinions expressed, I'm gonna withdraw from this thread before I end up in trouble with the management.

Good Day to you, Sir. I got a batch (of brownies) to make.

gdflp - 22-9-2014 at 10:25

Quote: Originally posted by arkoma  
You are focused on dope--EM is just as illegal, JUST (or more so) as likely to draw "bad" attention from the gestapo, and more likely to directly hurt the young people that frequent and contribute to this board. Yet you have no problems with that subforum. Interesting.

My opinions expressed, I'm gonna withdraw from this thread before I end up in trouble with the management.

Good Day to you, Sir. I got a batch (of brownies) to make.


As I said before, I have a bias against people making drugs, not quite sure why. This might be the bias;) but I disagree that EM is worse than drugs. They don't have a TLA dedicated to taking down people making energetics.

plante1999 - 9-10-2014 at 14:59

Recently there has been much more drug related discussion, or direct precursors of them. I have nothing against such talk if only for scientific purpose/self use or anything non-profit, when done with appropriate scientific behaviour. However, I think it may be time to have a sub-forum when a good pourcentage of the new posts are about such things.

Metacelsus - 9-10-2014 at 15:21

A sub-forum would imply that Sciencemadness condones making drugs, which would be a legal liability.

Honestly, I don't care much about people talking about drugs here; it's just that I don't want Sciencemadness to get shut down because of it.

Chemosynthesis - 10-10-2014 at 19:43

I am against a drug sub forum, despite having a professional and educational background with them. Plenty of websites cater to illicit chemistry, and they absolutely do invite scrutiny and requests from law enforcement, which has led to some being shut down (most recently Zoklet, since I noticed Arkoma mentioning it frequently). I don't know if Woelen or Nicodem or whoever puts up with unneeded interaction from the government about this site yet, but I can almost guarantee they will if they add a drug sub forum.

Look at how the media seized upon Silk Road over drugs, or RogueSci over drugs/poisons/explosives. The DEA absolutely asks drug cooks where they learned their trade, with an emphasis on internet sites. That doesn't bode well given how many of these largely unsophisticated sites flicker out of existence with great frequency. I doubt any of those sites had our professionalism or longevity, and these two aspects are why I registered here. Ingesting chemicals of indeterminate purity is inherently poor lab practice, and not something I would recommend to armchair pharmacologists who can't synthesize their own narcotics, much less purify them. At least energetics are of an obvious and known risk, and should not be consumed.

I have nothing against someone sharing their questionable chemistry, or even requesting assistance in a completely professional manner so long as spoonfeeding requests, deceptive plagiarism, and basically just scientifically illiterate requests for step-by-step tutorials on drugs is actively discouraged. There are several websites even I can name that are still active to help people of that persuasion, and plenty of schooling I can personally attest to if people are interested in making money on the pharmaceutical industry in a legal manner.

The market demands place a greater financial incentive on narcotic manufacture than energetic materials, and this is against forum rules and spirit. Can anyone here honestly tell me that drug chemistry doesn't bring a disproportionately unscientific element to the site? Is it really that burdensome to someone to comport themselves with a modicum of scientific acumen and honesty when requesting synthetic chemistry assistance? How about just reading the FAQ, posting in the proper subforum, or reading their text/erowid closely? Most of the problems in all of the aforementioned that I see are drug related.

Can anyone here honestly claim that they believe assisting illicit pharmaceutical chemistry won't detrimentally impact hobby chemistry and add bureaucracy to legitimate science? I have dealt with a lot of bureaucracy regarding scheduled narcotics and chemistry both, and would prefer to put up with less of it, since it truly costs scientists time away from experimentation, and slows our technological progress societally.


[Edited on 11-10-2014 by Chemosynthesis]

WGTR - 10-10-2014 at 23:08

Chemistry is both a hobby to me, and something that is part of my job. The hobby part of this involves not only personal experimentation, but also volunteer teaching. I really enjoy electronics and chemistry, and I also enjoy imparting this to the younger generations. So far I have only worked with home and private schooled kids, as I see the need for better science teaching in these areas.

I like contributing and being a part of some of the discussions here. I don't think there is another chemistry forum around that is as interesting and useful as this one. At the same time, there are some dodgy topics that pop up from time to time, enough of them that I don't feel comfortable bringing the kids that I teach here. Their parents trust me, and I take that trust seriously. It's also a matter of my personal reputation and who I associate with.

I would prefer that there would be less drug discussion, although personally, I just ignore those types of threads when they come up. If it became a significant part of the forum, though, I wouldn't be able to stay active here.

Energetics is really a different animal. I think that subforum is well-moderated (thanks Bert), and there is a good purpose for its existence. It's a great hobby/job, as long as laws are being followed. I appreciate that the subforum has not deteriorated into topics like "How to easily make a cheap and effective IED". Several times I've learned from the posts in its threads.

Chemosynthesis - 11-10-2014 at 05:24

Quote:
Energetics is really a different animal. I think that subforum is well-moderated (thanks Bert), and there is a good purpose for its existence. It's a great hobby/job, as long as laws are being followed. I appreciate that the subforum has not deteriorated into topics like "How to easily make a cheap and effective IED". Several times I've learned from the posts in its threads.


Very good point on the distinction. I think it is easy to conflate energetics and pharmaceuticals, but they are not the same at all, legally. I used to be actively involved in legal pyrotechnics a long time ago, before I moved and drifted away, and the American Pyrotechnics Association has no drug counterpart. That said, the pharmaceutical and biotech industries are huge with many very different job opportunities for people of all backgrounds to engage in legally if they so choose, but no need to post on in the forum (both due to availability of institutional knowledge and it being work-related). Some people earlier in the thread expressed distaste at the pharmaceutical industry, but there are stringent differences in standards for industry (including government, which does plenty of research on its own, trust me) in terms of quality control, purification of materials, cell culture, assays, instrumentation, animal models, and clinical testing that will probably never be available to a hobbyist. Sorry, but that's reality despite even my wishes it were more accessible.

Over a decade ago, I was also heavily involved a couple small pyrotechnics forums, and we were fairly adamant about not spoonfeeding inviduals, and I left my favorite one after this environment became more permissive. The unwritten rule was only to answer questions that had procedures, no bomb discussion, and even then pushed people on what topics to learn rather than providing a how-to. Most of the traffic was from adolescents with an interest in wreckless energetics. We chased the majority of them away... but of the people who stuck around, or had read enough beforehand, we found young, intelligent, safe, and productive members. This is contrasted against the people who were given step-by-step guides, easy answers to textbook questions, weren't forced to start out slowly, and were the most reckless and accident prone, more often having to quit due to a safety epiphany.

I often read later that the obstreperous ones were grateful that they were encouraged to learn, because it helped force a miniscule amount of additional responsibility on them, and helped them learn lifelong skills in research and chemistry. Sometimes on this site, I see people posting "helpful" drug information that not only fails to directly address a thread question, but rewards deceptive rather than merely vaguely professional questionable chemistry. I can't control what other people say, but I agree with WGTR that those are the types of threads I would be uncomfortable with spotlighting were I trying to tutor or teach a generation younger than I, or to relatives.

I am convinced handing out drug syntheses further sullies the reputation the hobby chemistry. We have plenty of threads on literature searching, and if people cared to read them and learn rather than request we do their work for them, they could likely achieve the same effect. That they often do not makes me question their lab safety and waste disposal, as those take effort as well, and are a very important and intrinsic aspect of scientific experimentation.

It's interesting that there are many, many unscheduled pharmacophores for people to explore (generally not for consumption, hence the term "research chemical"); schedule III and lower in the US, and many more numerous not explicitly restricted in the UK, Canada, Aus., and NZ. That there is not more interest in these "grey market" pharmaceuticals, but rather inarguably illegal ones is interesting to me.

I currently don't have a problem mentioning to colleagues or even superiors that I visit chemistry forums (that is to say just here, I suppose), but if I felt the site could be remotely construed as a drug forum, I would probably have to become far less active if at all due to concerns my career would stall or end if the next time I tried to switched employers.

That the forum even has a post considering opening a marketplace for hobby chemistry strikes me as antithetically opposed to a more permissive drug environment, as this would necessarily lead to higher risk with negative media exposure, privacy violation, and even purchasing glassware that may have precursor or drug residue. What if you bought glassware from a suspect individual and it was tested at the post office and tested positive for something questionable? Can you be sure this wouldn't reflect on you? What if the person tried to implicate you to get a plea bargain? How much legal help can you afford?


Especially with the younger forum members here. Simple youthful indiscretions can alter your potential academic and professional options irreparably forever. I have met more than one person whose dream job was no longer available (CPA, MD, PharmD, PA, JD, even law enforcement and military, etc.) because of a drunken night out that ended badly. The way many of the forms for these professions are worded means even without stringent background checks, one could not legally leave off expunged crimes. I hate hearing about people who have the credentials for productive jobs that benefit society, but will never reach that potential.

[Edited on 11-10-2014 by Chemosynthesis]

careysub - 11-10-2014 at 08:23

Quote: Originally posted by careysub  
My main concern about drug chemistry discussions here are: a) duplication with other forums and b) the poor quality of many such posts


To expand on an earlier point of mine (which I made obliquely) - I would oppose a drug precursor sub-forum since there are other sites with forums devoted to this.

But I also oppose attempts to ban/censor such discussions from this site because that would tend to lead to suppression of discussion of large areas of chemistry.

We could reasonably ban discussion of preparatory procedures for actual Schedule I substances - other sites provide this, and this would help protect ScienceMadness from being identified as "drug site".

[Note added: Even then, posting links or citations of published literature on the subject should be permissible. Simply because possession has been banned by agency fiat does not make it something that cannot be mentioned a la Voldemort.]

Chemosynthesis is right, involvement with scheduled substances does have unique legal risks, to which it should be added that unlike EM related topics in the U.S. "drug busting" is a big-time profitable business.

The U.S. has institutionalized police agency corruption by allowing them to use claims of "drug involvement" to seize assets, even without any evidence of law-breaking, thus providing a huge incentive for all levels of law enforcement to troll for targets. Although "busting terrorists" gets great headlines that is no inducement compared to the prospect of cold hard cash.

[Edited on 11-10-2014 by careysub]
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