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[onecornerface]

In the late 2000s and early 2010s, there were people insisting Obama was literally THE Antichrist. Where did they all go? Do they still think he is the Antichrist, even though he is no longer President and doesn't seem inclined to somehow run for a third term?

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This is a scene in David Cage’s video game “Indigo Prophecy” (2005): You, the player, a 31-year-old man named Lucas Kane, go into a girls' orphanage. You walk past the nun at the front desk. The nun says “Sir, you can’t go in there!” but you just walk right past her and she doesn’t stop you. She doesn't call the police or security or anything either.

Then you can go into all the girls’ bedrooms, where you can stare at each of them to see if they’re the girl you’re looking for, and nobody has a problem with it.

Finally you find the girl you’re looking for (she is mute, btw). Your character says “I’ve seen you in my dreams! You have to come with me!” And you pick her up and carry her out of the orphanage.

That's what happens in the scene.

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David Lynch's movie "Lost Highway" was inspired by the O.J. Simpson case. Lynch discusses this in an interview he did with Alex Jones. I am not making this up.

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If anyone ever suspects I'm virtue signaling about any topic, I will have you know I was in a pre-publication reading group, with Brandon Warmke, for Warmke's & Justin Tosi's book "Grandstanding," which is by far the most sophisticated book on (sort of) the concept of virtue-signaling. (They reject the term "virtue-signaling," for various debatable reasons discussed in the book, but "grandstanding" is a more refined version of the concept that the term is more-or-less supposed to refer to.) (Is this post an act of virtue-signaling and/or grandstanding? I will leave this an exercise to the reader. In part because I have no strong view on it.)

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I basically agree with this. My criticism was only aimed against the “Therapeutic-only legalization as end-goal” position—which is not to be confused with e.g. “Therapeutic-only legalization as temporary bridge toward broader legalization” or “Therapeutic-only legalization as improvement over full prohibition” positions.

Personal use of psychedelics is NOT obviously less beneficial OR less safe than supervised psychedelic therapy

There is a sizeable faction that supports psychedelic legalization only for supervised therapeutic purposes, and not for personal use. Some people support this position on the grounds that, compared to personal use, supervised therapeutic use is supposedly (1) more beneficial, and (2) safer. I’m not convinced that either of these claims is true.

First, therapeutic use of psychedelics is not obviously more beneficial than personal use. Many benefits of psychedelic experiences are likely hard to quantify and study, and thus will fail to show up in the research data that they use to design and implement the therapy practices. I’m skeptical that they will be able to design therapy to capture these non-quantifiable benefits.

Even the quantifiable benefits may be in question. The science is potentially biased, insofar as a lot of it is driven by advocates and companies—and (1) some researchers see legalization as hostage to proving scientific benefits, and (2) some companies want to prove benefits to justify the sale of new therapies. This raises the likelihood of exaggeration of therapeutic benefits in the research results.

Second, therapeutic use is also not obviously safer than personal use. Some studies have failed to take proper account of evidence of harms reported by a minority of participants, so the resulting safety standards of “research-based” psychedelic therapy may be inadequate. And importantly, there have already been scandals of psychedelic therapists sexually abusing patients—who are extremely vulnerable while under the influence of substances—and other psychedelic advocates covering up for these abusers. Some psychedelic therapists have also been shown to be crackpots in other ways. Using psychedelics by oneself may be safer than using psychedelics under the supervision of people in an emerging field which may have lax standards, some unknown number of whom who may turn out to be sexual abusers and crackpots.

In summary: It is not obvious that psychedelic therapy is more beneficial or safer than the personal use of psychedelics. In therapy, the non-quantifiable benefits are likely neglected, and the quantifiable benefits are possibly exaggerated. There is reason to worry that studies have downplayed some negative effects of psychedelic therapy, and we know some psychedelic therapists have been found to be sexual abusers and/or crackpots.

Psychedelic therapy still probably has immense potential for mental health benefits. The research should continue, and I don’t want to discourage individuals from considering it for themselves. There are also some serious hazards which are more likely in personal use of psychedelics, such as bad trips. My point is more to challenge the idea that personal use is flatly dangerous or of dubious benefit, while therapeutic use is flatly safe and of scientifically established benefit.

A more adequate picture would say: Personal use has one bundle of potential benefits and risks based on a somewhat sketchy body of evidence, and therapeutic use has a different bundle of potential benefits and risks based on a different somewhat sketchy body of evidence. These differences cannot justify making a stark distinction in which therapeutic use is deemed worthy of legalization while personal use is to remain illegal, on the grounds of putative benefit and risk.

[onecornerface]

Personal use of psychedelics is NOT obviously less beneficial OR less safe than supervised psychedelic therapy

There is a sizeable faction that supports psychedelic legalization only for supervised therapeutic purposes, and not for personal use. Some people support this position on the grounds that, compared to personal use, supervised therapeutic use is supposedly (1) more beneficial, and (2) safer. I’m not convinced that either of these claims is true.

First, therapeutic use of psychedelics is not obviously more beneficial than personal use. Many benefits of psychedelic experiences are likely hard to quantify and study, and thus will fail to show up in the research data that they use to design and implement the therapy practices. I’m skeptical that they will be able to design therapy to capture these non-quantifiable benefits.

Even the quantifiable benefits may be in question. The science is potentially biased, insofar as a lot of it is driven by advocates and companies—and (1) some researchers see legalization as hostage to proving scientific benefits, and (2) some companies want to prove benefits to justify the sale of new therapies. This raises the likelihood of exaggeration of therapeutic benefits in the research results.

Second, therapeutic use is also not obviously safer than personal use. Some studies have failed to take proper account of evidence of harms reported by a minority of participants, so the resulting safety standards of “research-based” psychedelic therapy may be inadequate. And importantly, there have already been scandals of psychedelic therapists sexually abusing patients—who are extremely vulnerable while under the influence of substances—and other psychedelic advocates covering up for these abusers. Some psychedelic therapists have also been shown to be crackpots in other ways. Using psychedelics by oneself may be safer than using psychedelics under the supervision of people in an emerging field which may have lax standards, some unknown number of whom who may turn out to be sexual abusers and crackpots.

In summary: It is not obvious that psychedelic therapy is more beneficial or safer than the personal use of psychedelics. In therapy, the non-quantifiable benefits are likely neglected, and the quantifiable benefits are possibly exaggerated. There is reason to worry that studies have downplayed some negative effects of psychedelic therapy, and we know some psychedelic therapists have been found to be sexual abusers and/or crackpots.

Psychedelic therapy still probably has immense potential for mental health benefits. The research should continue, and I don’t want to discourage individuals from considering it for themselves. There are also some serious hazards which are more likely in personal use of psychedelics, such as bad trips. My point is more to challenge the idea that personal use is flatly dangerous or of dubious benefit, while therapeutic use is flatly safe and of scientifically established benefit.

A more adequate picture would say: Personal use has one bundle of potential benefits and risks based on a somewhat sketchy body of evidence, and therapeutic use has a different bundle of potential benefits and risks based on a different somewhat sketchy body of evidence. These differences cannot justify making a stark distinction in which therapeutic use is deemed worthy of legalization while personal use is to remain illegal, on the grounds of putative benefit and risk.

#drugs #psychedelics

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The LAPD were biased against black people in general, and the detective Mark Fuhrman was biased against OJ Simpson. From this and similar evidence, some people inferred that the LAPD was biased against OJ Simpson (a component of the theory that they framed him, which is assumed by most versions of theories of his innocence)—but this isn't so.

The LAPD was biased in favor of rich people and celebrities, and OJ was friends with a bunch of the cops. So on the whole, the LAPD was more likely biased in favor of OJ. This greatly reduces the likelihood that they’d be willing and able to frame him.

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I'm pretty sure the OP misconstrues emotivism and mixes it up with other forms of sentimentalism. Emotivism is more the view that ethical judgments are emotions-- not so much the view that ethical judgments are beliefs caused by emotions. The classic emotivist would probably say we don't have, and cannot have, any ethical beliefs in the sense at issue here.

Emotivism is a revisionary theory of moral concepts and language, involving a revisionary theory of moral psychology (i.e. that moral judgments, even if they may seem like beliefs, are not really beliefs but rather emotions). To be clear, that is a lot weirder than the commonplace view that we tend to form ethical beliefs based on emotion, and I think the OP didn't grasp its weirdness.

Emotivism is rejected by nearly all philosophers today, since it seems unable to explain many important features of ethical language, psychology, reasoning, dialogue, and deliberation. However, its basic appeal lives on in more sophisticated forms of non-cognitivism.

More the point of the OP: Emotivism is one (dated) strand of a very broad cluster of views sometimes called sentimentalism-- some other versions of which do say we do (and/or should, albeit with caveats) hold ethical beliefs based on emotions (rather than saying our ethical judgments are emotions).

honestly like. long term the two most useful subjects i studied in high school were probably cookery & ethics

[onecornerface]

Limitations of (Mere) Decriminalization As for decriminalization (of use/possession), it is obviously correct and entailed by nearly all normative theories and principles, given nearly all remotely plausible interpretations of the empirical evidence. As Douglas Husak has argued, the strongest argument for decriminalization is that there are no good reasons for criminalization. However, at this point, even decrim may face a similar political problem as the extant medical safe supply provision.

One Canadian province (British Columbia) and one American state (Oregon) have decriminalized all small-amount drug possession in the last few years. However, in both cases, the already-present overdose crises (and other related crises of homelessness, etc.) persisted. Decrim by itself was never capable of much averting overdose or homelessness. I don’t think decrim worsened them either. But since BC and Oregon are now known for decriminalization, yet still have ongoing very-visible crises, they’ve been easy targets for scapegoating. It’s easy for prohibitionists to say decrim caused or exacerbated (or, at least, failed to greatly mitigate) the crises, and hence is a “failed experiment.”

I had earlier hoped that advocating for decriminalization and small-scale safe supply might be ways to get more of the public on board with progressive drug reform, opening them up to more significant reforms down the line. Maybe there was a window of time when that could have happened, if the pro-reform movement had operated more strategically in the last several years. Now I am more worried.

Decrim and small-scale safe supply may be too easily weaponized (in the midst of visible crisis), so as to turn the public against reform and back toward harsher prohibitionism. On the other hand, full legalization (if implemented) may be more able to greatly mitigate the crises in a visible way, which would make it harder to turn back the clock on. However, it would also be very hard to get full legalization implemented in the first place. So I’m really not sure what should be done, strategically. In the meantime, my current project is mainly to develop the arguments for legalization.

The inadequacy of non-legalization to address the overdose crisis

I’m writing a paper arguing that only drug legalization—the regulation of an accessible drug supply—has a decent chance to drastically and quickly reduce the overdose rates, at least in countries like the United States and Canada that are facing overdose crisis conditions.

Part of my argument consists in reasons to think legalization can succeed. But here I’ll discuss another part of my argument—reasons to think alternatives must fail. Legalization has a plausible mechanism for drastically & quickly reducing overdose rates, whereas all alternatives lack a plausible mechanism for doing so.

Even reformist proposals, such as decriminalization (of drug use & possession) and drug-checking (like fentanyl test-strips and centralized drug-checking services), are extremely limited in their ability to reduce death rates among the most high-risk drug users. Decriminalization is better than full prohibition, since there are no good justifications to arrest people for drug use, and it may reduce overdoses slightly through some indirect routes—but it does not address the drug supply. Drug-checking can also slightly reduce overdose and other drug hazards as well, by empowering people to manage the drug supply slightly better than they otherwise could. But it is woefully inefficient, limiting its ability to respond to the crisis at scale. I’ll describe this further on.

The source of the problem: Imperfect Prohibition One might notice that if the government ever succeeds in cracking down on all (or nearly all) the illicit drug supply, then there will be nothing left to overdose on—problem solved. So it may appear that this is a reason to continue the crackdowns against the production, trafficking, and distribution of drugs—to seek perfect prohibition.

However, this is the wrong level of analysis, appealing to an inappropriate idealization. In realistic non-ideal conditions (especially in modern countries facing an entrenched drug crisis), perfect prohibition is unattainable, and attempts to reach it will instead result in imperfect prohibition, which is the worst outcome. First, in relevant contexts, the government will most likely never succeed in eliminating all or nearly all the drug supply. Second, if an illicit market continues in operation, then it will likely continue to have extremely hazardous qualities such as high potency, volatility of dose, unmeasurableness, and frequent shifts in composition. I’ll sketch out some reasons why both of these claims are likely. And their conjunction entails that, in the absence of legalization, we will continue to have imperfect prohibition which makes the drug supply worse.

#war on drugs #drug policy #harm reduction #safe supply #opioids

[onecornerface]

Notes on DULF, drug-checking, and legalization The Drug User Liberation Front (whose operation was recently shut down by the police in Canada, pending various legal battles) offered something of a hybrid model, between “traditional” harm reduction and full legalization. DULF bought drugs off the best-reputed dark-net sellers in bulk, then had professionals test the drugs, and finally sold the drugs (at cost) to a select group of buyers on a club-membership basis. This is sometimes considered a nonmedical model of safe supply, and scaling up such a model could be a variant or relative of legalization.

DULF wanted to obtain drugs from legal sources (IIRC they had a willing potential provider, a pharma company in Canada), but the government didn’t let them do it. But the illegal method DULF settled on represents one method of systematizing the drug-checking process and making it more efficient, at least compared to the usual methods.

Their method involved purchase from the best-quality dealers (taking advantage of how dark net markets have a reputation system, providing some degree of self-regulation), then subjecting the drugs to the best available drug-checking services before sale. In this way, the pre-sale drug-checking alleviated the consumer of the usual burdens—the burdens of testing their own drugs, or of providing samples to drug-checkers. DULF’s pre-sale drug-checking system also largely averted the heterogeneity problem.

DULF’s methods of drug-acquisition and (pre-sale) drug-checking may be the next best thing to legalization. However, it is still a weirdly convoluted system which seems to me to emphasize just how much more efficient legalization could be.

Political viability- a few notes DULF has become a magnet for political controversies recently, since they’re kind of the radical wing of the safe supply movement, which has itself become a magnet for political controversies. Nevertheless, they have a lot of support as well.

My impression is that various actors in the Canadian government (like maybe Health Canada) more-or-less agree that DULF’s ideas are worth trying, but don’t want to be the ones targeted by potential backlash. Apparently various government actors have had opportunities to grant DULF certain exemptions, but refused and passed the buck to other government actors. A lot may depend on whether various Canadian politicians and bureaucrats come to believe that more people will get mad at them for supporting DULF or for not-supporting them.

The political-viability concern seems to apply to most any major drug reform. Full legalization is arguably the ideal, but is considered extreme and has (relatively) few open supporters, although some safe supply advocates (including DULF) have voiced support for it. Scaled up medical safe-supply is basically what Canadian advocates have mainly been pushing, largely since it seemed more immediately viable. (sorry for all the adverbs) Medical safe supply may also have seemed a politically viable variant of Swiss-style prescription heroin, which was implemented in parts of Europe some 20 years ago and hasn’t faced much backlash since. However, in the last few years, there has arisen a big backlash against Canada’s still-very-small provision of medical safe supply, putting the whole movement in a difficult position.

The inadequacy of non-legalization to address the overdose crisis

I’m writing a paper arguing that only drug legalization—the regulation of an accessible drug supply—has a decent chance to drastically and quickly reduce the overdose rates, at least in countries like the United States and Canada that are facing overdose crisis conditions.

Part of my argument consists in reasons to think legalization can succeed. But here I’ll discuss another part of my argument—reasons to think alternatives must fail. Legalization has a plausible mechanism for drastically & quickly reducing overdose rates, whereas all alternatives lack a plausible mechanism for doing so.

Even reformist proposals, such as decriminalization (of drug use & possession) and drug-checking (like fentanyl test-strips and centralized drug-checking services), are extremely limited in their ability to reduce death rates among the most high-risk drug users. Decriminalization is better than full prohibition, since there are no good justifications to arrest people for drug use, and it may reduce overdoses slightly through some indirect routes—but it does not address the drug supply. Drug-checking can also slightly reduce overdose and other drug hazards as well, by empowering people to manage the drug supply slightly better than they otherwise could. But it is woefully inefficient, limiting its ability to respond to the crisis at scale. I’ll describe this further on.

The source of the problem: Imperfect Prohibition One might notice that if the government ever succeeds in cracking down on all (or nearly all) the illicit drug supply, then there will be nothing left to overdose on—problem solved. So it may appear that this is a reason to continue the crackdowns against the production, trafficking, and distribution of drugs—to seek perfect prohibition.

However, this is the wrong level of analysis, appealing to an inappropriate idealization. In realistic non-ideal conditions (especially in modern countries facing an entrenched drug crisis), perfect prohibition is unattainable, and attempts to reach it will instead result in imperfect prohibition, which is the worst outcome. First, in relevant contexts, the government will most likely never succeed in eliminating all or nearly all the drug supply. Second, if an illicit market continues in operation, then it will likely continue to have extremely hazardous qualities such as high potency, volatility of dose, unmeasurableness, and frequent shifts in composition. I’ll sketch out some reasons why both of these claims are likely. And their conjunction entails that, in the absence of legalization, we will continue to have imperfect prohibition which makes the drug supply worse.

[onecornerface]

Professional drug-checking services Professional drug-checking services may avert some of the issues with DIY tests, e.g. since the professional services can test a substance more thoroughly for what all it contains, via methods such as various forms of mass spectroscopy. I need to research the details more, but it sounds like they also may be able to test drugs to see what proportions of different substances they contain, which (perhaps in conjunction with weighing the substance) could go some way to empowering people to know their dosages.

However, I’m pretty sure some of the above limitations still apply. For instance, when people provide a sample of their drug for professional testing, there is still a need for the user to account for its heterogeneity in advance, so as to ensure that the sample is adequately representative. This problem could be mitigated by educating and encouraging people to mix and homogenize their drug sample—but uptake of such advice may be limited, especially for people with limited time and energy and resources, such as many of the drug users at highest risk.

Moreover, professional drug-checking services are broadly less accessible and can be time-consuming. Some services presently require samples of drugs to be mailed in, which takes time. This problem can be largely averted by scaling up drug-checking services and providing them at more locations, so people can bring drugs in person.

Within criminalization, this also presents risk to people who want to use the services. If drug possession were decriminalized, some of these risks would evaporate. (This is one of the indirect benefits of decriminalization, despite its limitations.) Drug-checking can also be made more accessible by providing more of it within other harm-reduction outlets, such as syringe provision locations. Drug-checking is also already part of supervised consumption sites, which need to be expanded and scaled up more anyway.

Limits of drug-checking -more discussion However, I expect many drug users will still be unwilling or unable to regularly have their drugs checked in these ways regularly. Admittedly, some of this problem may be solvable insofar as the quality and accessibility of drug-checking technology is likely to improve somewhat over time. But the basic problems of drug composition will remain in place, at least unless drug-checking is scaled up so drastically that the system starts to resemble legalization—more on that further down.

Drug-checking may be most viable for many casual or occasional drug users, such as people who use psychedelics on rare occasions, who can easily test every drug they use, and opt not to use drugs that turn up bad results. When my friends and I used MDMA and LSD a few times several years ago, we subjected them to various tests we bought from DanceSafe or suchlike, with no problem.

But this may not be viable for the bulk of people who are at highest risk of overdose—which disproportionately consists of poor people with severe drug addictions, in bad mental & physical health, who use large amounts of drugs regularly. Many high-risk regular drug users probably don’t have the time and energy to do lots of drug-checking, whether DIY or submission to professional testers.

Moreover, when they find unwanted drugs in their substances, they’re often not willing or able to discard them, opting instead to use them anyway (sometimes more carefully, but still dangerous).

For some discussion of the limitations of professional drug-checking services in light of drug sample heterogeneity (and how they might be improved), see this article: https://harmreductionjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12954-024-00980-5

The inadequacy of non-legalization to address the overdose crisis

I’m writing a paper arguing that only drug legalization—the regulation of an accessible drug supply—has a decent chance to drastically and quickly reduce the overdose rates, at least in countries like the United States and Canada that are facing overdose crisis conditions.

Part of my argument consists in reasons to think legalization can succeed. But here I’ll discuss another part of my argument—reasons to think alternatives must fail. Legalization has a plausible mechanism for drastically & quickly reducing overdose rates, whereas all alternatives lack a plausible mechanism for doing so.

Even reformist proposals, such as decriminalization (of drug use & possession) and drug-checking (like fentanyl test-strips and centralized drug-checking services), are extremely limited in their ability to reduce death rates among the most high-risk drug users. Decriminalization is better than full prohibition, since there are no good justifications to arrest people for drug use, and it may reduce overdoses slightly through some indirect routes—but it does not address the drug supply. Drug-checking can also slightly reduce overdose and other drug hazards as well, by empowering people to manage the drug supply slightly better than they otherwise could. But it is woefully inefficient, limiting its ability to respond to the crisis at scale. I’ll describe this further on.

The source of the problem: Imperfect Prohibition One might notice that if the government ever succeeds in cracking down on all (or nearly all) the illicit drug supply, then there will be nothing left to overdose on—problem solved. So it may appear that this is a reason to continue the crackdowns against the production, trafficking, and distribution of drugs—to seek perfect prohibition.

However, this is the wrong level of analysis, appealing to an inappropriate idealization. In realistic non-ideal conditions (especially in modern countries facing an entrenched drug crisis), perfect prohibition is unattainable, and attempts to reach it will instead result in imperfect prohibition, which is the worst outcome. First, in relevant contexts, the government will most likely never succeed in eliminating all or nearly all the drug supply. Second, if an illicit market continues in operation, then it will likely continue to have extremely hazardous qualities such as high potency, volatility of dose, unmeasurableness, and frequent shifts in composition. I’ll sketch out some reasons why both of these claims are likely. And their conjunction entails that, in the absence of legalization, we will continue to have imperfect prohibition which makes the drug supply worse.

[onecornerface]

On drug-checking -DIY tests As I understand it, there are two main kinds of drug-checking: consumer-level do-it-yourself tests (e.g. fentanyl test-strips) and professional services. DIY drug-checking is limited for several reasons. For one thing, the substances are typically mixed erratically throughout a powder or pill—so a negative test result on one portion of the powder/pill may not represent what is in the rest of the powder/pill. The heterogeneity problem is sometimes called the “chocolate chip cookie effect.” (Much as the chocolate chips may be inconsistently distributed throughout a cookie, amounts of a drug such as fentanyl may be inconsistently distributed throughout a pill or powder.)

I’m not sure all the ways to account for the heterogeneity, but I’m pretty sure they’re all at least somewhat inconvenient and/or fallible. A pill can be crushed, put in a baggie, and shaken, to obtain a sample which can be tested and likely representative of the entire pill. But it is inconvenient to do this for every pill, and it means the pill cannot be swallowed as a pill (so this will be more viable for people who prefer to consume the drug in some other way). Pills may vary in their composition from one pill to another, so testing one pill may not be enough. Yet because of the inconvenience, I expect many drug users would opt to test one or a few pills, and take their chances with the rest.

As for powders, it seems like the representativeness of a given sample for testing will also depend on the quantity of powder. I’m not sure of the specifics and need to research it more. It may also be possible to account for the heterogeneity problem more when preparing a drug for injection, although I’m not sure.

DIY drug-checking also requires doing several different kinds of tests, since there may be numerous possible contaminants or unwanted substances. Even if one’s drug doesn’t contain fentanyl, it may contain other unwanted drugs such as benzos, xylazine, or nitazenes. How many drug-tests can someone reasonably put their drugs through? I believe there are now DIY tests for fentanyl, benzos, and xylazine; I’m not sure about nitazenes.

Crucially, DIY drug-checking also provides basically no information about how much of a drug is present. Insofar as the dosage (rather than mere presence) of a drug is often the key issue, I’m not sure how much benefit drug-checking provides in many cases.

In many locales throughout the US and Canada, all or nearly all the illicit drugs (or at least the illicit opioids) contain fentanyl now. In particular, heroin has been largely replaced by fentanyl. This greatly limits what someone can do in response to a positive result for fentanyl, especially if they use illicit opioids. Also, while initially most illicit opioid consumers did not want fentanyl, now there is a large population of people who prefer fentanyl over other substances, e.g. because their physical tolerance has been drastically raised. Some people would even see the absence of fentanyl as a reason against using their drug now.

This is part of why Canada’s attempted safe-supply via hydromorphone prescription has been ineffective for some people who are now accustomed to street fentanyl. Safe-supply fentanyl may be required for many of them now. However, there are more political and logistical obstacles to including fentanyl within safe supply. The oversimplified notion that fentanyl itself is the crisis may be part of the problem now. Legally regulated consistent known-dose fentanyl is not nearly as dangerous as inconsistent unknown-dose fentanyl mixtures. On the other hand, xylazine-testing may be more viable. Relatively few people prefer to use xylazine, and most of the fentanyl supply does not contain xylazine (at least for now).

The inadequacy of non-legalization to address the overdose crisis

I’m writing a paper arguing that only drug legalization—the regulation of an accessible drug supply—has a decent chance to drastically and quickly reduce the overdose rates, at least in countries like the United States and Canada that are facing overdose crisis conditions.

Part of my argument consists in reasons to think legalization can succeed. But here I’ll discuss another part of my argument—reasons to think alternatives must fail. Legalization has a plausible mechanism for drastically & quickly reducing overdose rates, whereas all alternatives lack a plausible mechanism for doing so.

Even reformist proposals, such as decriminalization (of drug use & possession) and drug-checking (like fentanyl test-strips and centralized drug-checking services), are extremely limited in their ability to reduce death rates among the most high-risk drug users. Decriminalization is better than full prohibition, since there are no good justifications to arrest people for drug use, and it may reduce overdoses slightly through some indirect routes—but it does not address the drug supply. Drug-checking can also slightly reduce overdose and other drug hazards as well, by empowering people to manage the drug supply slightly better than they otherwise could. But it is woefully inefficient, limiting its ability to respond to the crisis at scale. I’ll describe this further on.

The source of the problem: Imperfect Prohibition One might notice that if the government ever succeeds in cracking down on all (or nearly all) the illicit drug supply, then there will be nothing left to overdose on—problem solved. So it may appear that this is a reason to continue the crackdowns against the production, trafficking, and distribution of drugs—to seek perfect prohibition.

However, this is the wrong level of analysis, appealing to an inappropriate idealization. In realistic non-ideal conditions (especially in modern countries facing an entrenched drug crisis), perfect prohibition is unattainable, and attempts to reach it will instead result in imperfect prohibition, which is the worst outcome. First, in relevant contexts, the government will most likely never succeed in eliminating all or nearly all the drug supply. Second, if an illicit market continues in operation, then it will likely continue to have extremely hazardous qualities such as high potency, volatility of dose, unmeasurableness, and frequent shifts in composition. I’ll sketch out some reasons why both of these claims are likely. And their conjunction entails that, in the absence of legalization, we will continue to have imperfect prohibition which makes the drug supply worse.

[onecornerface]

Imperfect prohibition makes the supply more dangerous We should consider the illicit economic incentives and logistics, by which drug prohibition makes drugs more dangerous. If attempted crackdowns on fentanyl continue (even if alongside decriminalization and drug-checking), this may well endlessly create new drug emergencies.

Prohibition (of supply) incentivizes the production of more-dangerous drugs more than equally-dangerous OR less-dangerous drugs—by several mechanisms. At least one crucial mechanism is that more-potent drugs are easier to smuggle.

More potency (in itself) is not necessarily a big problem—when the drugs are legally regulated. Regulation means that, even for potent drugs, people can know the dose and modify their dose proportionate to the potency. But when drugs are illegal and unmeasurable, and inconsistent in quantity and composition, then more potency entails more danger. This cluster of dynamics is sometimes called the “Iron Law of Prohibition” (although I’m not a big fan of the name, since I think it risks conflating a few distinct mechanisms, and it may overstate the law-like quality of either economic dynamics in general or this one in particular).

Additionally, newer drugs (whether newly-invented, or newly-popularized in the illicit market) will tend to be contingently more dangerous simply due to being less-studied, even when they are not intrinsically more dangerous.

It’s not clear how this cycle of illicit drug innovation can be ended—except by giving up on prohibition, and creating/allowing a legal drug supply which can compete with the illicit market.

Reduction in enforcement? It may admittedly be possible to stabilize the illicit drug market somewhat—by drastically reducing the enforcement against trafficking and selling drugs, even without formal legalization. There is growing evidence that arresting dealers and seizing large quantities of drugs increases local overdoses. By reducing enforcement, it may be possible to at least stop making things worse. It may also be possible and desirable to make enforcement more selective and efficient, e.g. by targeting violent drug dealers while leaving nonviolent drug dealers alone.

On the other hand, the illicit drug market tends to be unstable for internal reasons as well, such as the fact that drug organization members keep killing each other (at least at present, both in North America and especially Latin America), and how drug organizations lack the internal coordination needed to self-regulate their supply. I’m not sure how these problems can be mitigated much (especially if our starting-point is an extant crisis) except via a degree of de-facto legalization and self-regulation that borders on outright legalization. (I’ll discuss a scenario that overlaps somewhat with this idea in my notes on DULF a few sections down.)

In any case, even reduced enforcement seems not politically viable at the moment, at least in the United States (and, to a lesser but still severe degree, Canada). Politicians continue to aim (or pretend to aim) at perfect prohibition as the solution, ignoring that their efforts can only exacerbate the hazards of imperfect prohibition.

Overdose crisis not inevitable? “Non-evitable” does not entail “reversible” It may be pointed out that most countries prohibit drugs yet do not have overdose crises—so prohibition by itself does not guarantee causing an overdose crisis. So there is a need for specific inquiry into the situation of America and Canada. There is apparently dispute on whether Europe may be headed toward an overdose crisis, for instance if the Taliban’s (apparent) crackdown on heroin may lead European drug suppliers to shift to more potent drugs such as nitazenes which could cause such a crisis. There seem to be a lot of unknowns on that.

In any case, even if prohibition does not always cause an overdose crisis, this does not mean an ongoing overdose crisis can be resolved within prohibition. There may be path-dependent asymmetries, due to factors such as physical tolerance (on the demand side) and ease of production (on the supply side), which make it hard for an illicit drug market to shift from a more-hazardous equilibrium back to a less-hazardous equilibrium.

Demand/tolerance: In America and Canada, fentanyl has already drastically increased many people’s opioid tolerance, which may make shifting back to (say) heroin less viable. Supply/production: And the illicit market may be biased against shifting from synthetic drugs (like fentanyl and nitazenes) back to plant-derived drugs (like heroin), making it harder to reverse course within prohibition.

The inadequacy of non-legalization to address the overdose crisis

I’m writing a paper arguing that only drug legalization—the regulation of an accessible drug supply—has a decent chance to drastically and quickly reduce the overdose rates, at least in countries like the United States and Canada that are facing overdose crisis conditions.

Part of my argument consists in reasons to think legalization can succeed. But here I’ll discuss another part of my argument—reasons to think alternatives must fail. Legalization has a plausible mechanism for drastically & quickly reducing overdose rates, whereas all alternatives lack a plausible mechanism for doing so.

Even reformist proposals, such as decriminalization (of drug use & possession) and drug-checking (like fentanyl test-strips and centralized drug-checking services), are extremely limited in their ability to reduce death rates among the most high-risk drug users. Decriminalization is better than full prohibition, since there are no good justifications to arrest people for drug use, and it may reduce overdoses slightly through some indirect routes—but it does not address the drug supply. Drug-checking can also slightly reduce overdose and other drug hazards as well, by empowering people to manage the drug supply slightly better than they otherwise could. But it is woefully inefficient, limiting its ability to respond to the crisis at scale. I’ll describe this further on.

The source of the problem: Imperfect Prohibition One might notice that if the government ever succeeds in cracking down on all (or nearly all) the illicit drug supply, then there will be nothing left to overdose on—problem solved. So it may appear that this is a reason to continue the crackdowns against the production, trafficking, and distribution of drugs—to seek perfect prohibition.

However, this is the wrong level of analysis, appealing to an inappropriate idealization. In realistic non-ideal conditions (especially in modern countries facing an entrenched drug crisis), perfect prohibition is unattainable, and attempts to reach it will instead result in imperfect prohibition, which is the worst outcome. First, in relevant contexts, the government will most likely never succeed in eliminating all or nearly all the drug supply. Second, if an illicit market continues in operation, then it will likely continue to have extremely hazardous qualities such as high potency, volatility of dose, unmeasurableness, and frequent shifts in composition. I’ll sketch out some reasons why both of these claims are likely. And their conjunction entails that, in the absence of legalization, we will continue to have imperfect prohibition which makes the drug supply worse.

[onecornerface]

Reasons to doubt the feasibility of eliminating supply The prevalence of drug demand, in conjunction with the trajectory of technological development, makes it unlikely that the government will ever eliminate (or even nearly eliminate) the illicit drug supply.

One may point to potential counterexamples—on a few occasions, drug markets have been crushed by government crackdowns. This point requires in-depth exploration for a proper response, but here’s my very preliminary summary: Most of these cases have been crackdowns on nascent markets (which are more feasible than crackdowns on well-entrenched markets), crackdowns in premodern times (whose success does not entail the feasibility of crackdowns in modern times), and/or crackdowns via extreme authoritarian methods (which are ethically dubious and extremely illiberal even when they work, which they usually don’t).

Seemingly successful crackdowns, such as the “Australian heroin drought” of the 2000s, have been few in number and short-lived, and even these cases are somewhat disputed regarding what happened and why. Moreover, some countries’ reports of successful supply crackdowns are either false or misleading. For a critical overview of the US government’s misleading reports of “success” in supply crackdowns, see the book Lies, Damned Lies, and Drug War Statistics. Finally, sometimes there have also been “successful” crackdowns on drug-A, leading to a corresponding rise in supply for drug-B—which, on my analysis, is no success at all (especially since it generally increases the danger overall, as I’ll discuss).

In general, successful crackdowns on the drug supply have been rare up to the present. Could improved technology make them more successful in the future? Probably not.

For one, I expect the technology to manufacture drugs will continue to improve and be dispersed to the public into the future. The long-term trend will be an increase in ease of making drugs. I’m being rather hand-wavey here, since I don’t know how far this will go (I don’t know enough of the details on extant tech, and maybe there will be technological bottlenecks), but I expect this trend will most likely only go in one direction.

The government’s technology of drug-detection will also continue to improve—but probably not as fast as the technology of drug-smuggling. The government is also not consistently serious in its proposals to crack down on drug smuggling. For example, many politicians in the US claim we can crack down on fentanyl by “closing the border.” If this means shutting down all trade and travel, then yeah maybe you could cut off a lot of the drug trade—but this isn't what anyone actually supports. Rather, they mean “stop the illegal immigrants from entering.” But the vast majority of drug smuggling is by legal American citizens through legal ports of entry, so this “solution” is simply fake anti-illegal-immigrant posturing.

Finally, even if international drug-smuggling can be somewhat interfered with, it will likely tend to shift production domestically and/or to yet new drugs. For instance, even if the government can crack down on fentanyl (or on fentanyl precursors), this will likely amount to only a temporary market disruption—followed by a shift to other novel and/or potent drugs (such as nitazenes) and/or a shift from international production to domestic production (or from domestic production via internationally-sourced ingredients to domestically-sourced ingredients). For these and other reasons, I think it’s a safe bet that there isn't a realistic pathway to cutting off the supply of illicit drugs. Importantly, given the inevitability of the drug trade continuing, the prohibition and crackdowns will make the supply worse—and cut off routes to improvement within prohibition.

The inadequacy of non-legalization to address the overdose crisis

I’m writing a paper arguing that only drug legalization—the regulation of an accessible drug supply—has a decent chance to drastically and quickly reduce the overdose rates, at least in countries like the United States and Canada that are facing overdose crisis conditions.

Part of my argument consists in reasons to think legalization can succeed. But here I’ll discuss another part of my argument—reasons to think alternatives must fail. Legalization has a plausible mechanism for drastically & quickly reducing overdose rates, whereas all alternatives lack a plausible mechanism for doing so.

Even reformist proposals, such as decriminalization (of drug use & possession) and drug-checking (like fentanyl test-strips and centralized drug-checking services), are extremely limited in their ability to reduce death rates among the most high-risk drug users. Decriminalization is better than full prohibition, since there are no good justifications to arrest people for drug use, and it may reduce overdoses slightly through some indirect routes—but it does not address the drug supply. Drug-checking can also slightly reduce overdose and other drug hazards as well, by empowering people to manage the drug supply slightly better than they otherwise could. But it is woefully inefficient, limiting its ability to respond to the crisis at scale. I’ll describe this further on.

The source of the problem: Imperfect Prohibition One might notice that if the government ever succeeds in cracking down on all (or nearly all) the illicit drug supply, then there will be nothing left to overdose on—problem solved. So it may appear that this is a reason to continue the crackdowns against the production, trafficking, and distribution of drugs—to seek perfect prohibition.

However, this is the wrong level of analysis, appealing to an inappropriate idealization. In realistic non-ideal conditions (especially in modern countries facing an entrenched drug crisis), perfect prohibition is unattainable, and attempts to reach it will instead result in imperfect prohibition, which is the worst outcome. First, in relevant contexts, the government will most likely never succeed in eliminating all or nearly all the drug supply. Second, if an illicit market continues in operation, then it will likely continue to have extremely hazardous qualities such as high potency, volatility of dose, unmeasurableness, and frequent shifts in composition. I’ll sketch out some reasons why both of these claims are likely. And their conjunction entails that, in the absence of legalization, we will continue to have imperfect prohibition which makes the drug supply worse.

[onecornerface]

The inadequacy of non-legalization to address the overdose crisis

I’m writing a paper arguing that only drug legalization—the regulation of an accessible drug supply—has a decent chance to drastically and quickly reduce the overdose rates, at least in countries like the United States and Canada that are facing overdose crisis conditions.

Part of my argument consists in reasons to think legalization can succeed. But here I’ll discuss another part of my argument—reasons to think alternatives must fail. Legalization has a plausible mechanism for drastically & quickly reducing overdose rates, whereas all alternatives lack a plausible mechanism for doing so.

Even reformist proposals, such as decriminalization (of drug use & possession) and drug-checking (like fentanyl test-strips and centralized drug-checking services), are extremely limited in their ability to reduce death rates among the most high-risk drug users. Decriminalization is better than full prohibition, since there are no good justifications to arrest people for drug use, and it may reduce overdoses slightly through some indirect routes—but it does not address the drug supply. Drug-checking can also slightly reduce overdose and other drug hazards as well, by empowering people to manage the drug supply slightly better than they otherwise could. But it is woefully inefficient, limiting its ability to respond to the crisis at scale. I’ll describe this further on.

The source of the problem: Imperfect Prohibition One might notice that if the government ever succeeds in cracking down on all (or nearly all) the illicit drug supply, then there will be nothing left to overdose on—problem solved. So it may appear that this is a reason to continue the crackdowns against the production, trafficking, and distribution of drugs—to seek perfect prohibition.

However, this is the wrong level of analysis, appealing to an inappropriate idealization. In realistic non-ideal conditions (especially in modern countries facing an entrenched drug crisis), perfect prohibition is unattainable, and attempts to reach it will instead result in imperfect prohibition, which is the worst outcome. First, in relevant contexts, the government will most likely never succeed in eliminating all or nearly all the drug supply. Second, if an illicit market continues in operation, then it will likely continue to have extremely hazardous qualities such as high potency, volatility of dose, unmeasurableness, and frequent shifts in composition. I’ll sketch out some reasons why both of these claims are likely. And their conjunction entails that, in the absence of legalization, we will continue to have imperfect prohibition which makes the drug supply worse.

[onecornerface]

Poppy & company seem to be fans of the book "Conflict Is Not Abuse." I'd vaguely assumed for years it was probably good, then I read this extensive critical review (below). The book's apparently bizarre theory of conflict vs abuse may accord with, or even help explain, Poppy & company's screwed-up way of interpreting everything.

EDIT: The book apparently says wild ableist stuff about BPD as well, which might or might not be compatible with the specific kinds of wild stuff Poppy et al are likely to believe about BPD. So this may be reason to think they wouldn't agree with everything in the book. Still, there seems a striking resemblance between the book's screwed-up picture of interpersonal relationships and the picture believed by Poppy et al.

Review: https://thingofthings.substack.com/p/conflict-is-not-abuse-review-wow

If I were in Saige’s shoes, I wouldn’t talk to Malcom either. But here’s the thing, you can’t complain that no one will contact you and then victimize yourself when they do. It’s ridiculous how often she parrots “conflict is not abuse” about textbook emotional abuse, but labels actual conflict as abuse.

^

[onecornerface]

Toward the end, the OP seems to briefly acknowledge a more nuanced line of criticism aimed at AI art training, where the training is clearly distinguished from any notion of copy-and-pasting. But then the post tries to discredit this line of criticism by strongly tying it to a legalistic framework of intellectual property law and courts. I think this is basically a good point in itself—but it changes the subject.

Some anti-AI-art critics are apparently trying to combat AI art by fighting for stronger copyright laws. I lean toward agreeing with the OP that there’s reason to oppose the strengthening of copyright law. Copyright law is overwhelmingly biased toward big companies and against small artists, so it may well be foolish to attempt to protect small artists against AI by the weapon of copyright. I don’t know nearly enough about copyright law to be confident on this, but it seems pretty plausible. I haven't yet seen the video mentioned toward the end, but for the sake of argument, I can grant the point.

But the ethics are not reducible to law—neither reducible to what the law is, nor reducible to what the law ought to be. Even if the law is an extremely bad tool which shouldn’t be used for combating AI art by branding it as art-theft (as IP law violation), this does not imply that AI art is *not* art-theft in an ethical sense (rather than a legal sense).

The OP’s argument does not even aim to show that copyright law is *in principle* illegitimate—only asserting that, within existing corporate and government structures, copyright law does more harm than good. This does not contradict the view that copyright law is in principle legitimate, and it certainly does not contradict the view that there are (perhaps non-enforceable) moral intellectual property rights, which might be violated by AI art.

Goetze argues that a Lockean labor theory of property supports a kind of intellectual property rights which might be violated by AI art training. His argument could be used to support a moral right against the nonconsensual use of one’s art for AI training. This does not require that there be a corresponding legal right or enforcement thereof.

Here’s the reasoning error: It seems the OP is trying to invoke *practical* downsides of copyright law enforcement, in order to cast aspersion on *moral* rights to intellectual property. I think this is simply a non-sequitur. It’s like saying “If we made a law against ‘being an asshole,’ the law would be abused—therefore, it’s not wrong to be an asshole.” No, it means this is an ethical issue that the law is ill-equipped to address in a just manner.

The OP basically depicts the anti-AI-art position as saddled with a dilemma of two easily defeated arguments—either AI art is simple copying-and-pasting (which can be debunked by explaining how the diffusion technology really works), or AI art training is an IP violation which should be outlawed (which would risk strengthening big companies and screwing small artists). This framing leaves out more nuanced positions—such as that AI art is a nontraditional form of art-theft, one which should be criticized or combated via some route other than copyright law.

Again, of course, this still leaves the critic with the burden of proof to show that AI art is still bad in some other way, and to propose some route of combating it other than copyright law. As a potential example, it may be that some kinds of artist unionization may facilitate deals with corporations that restrict the latter’s use of AI to replace human artists. (IIRC, some of the recent writer/performer union activities were in this vein?) A strategy of organized labor may avert some of the pitfalls of a strategy of appeal to copyright law.

Goetze's account of AI art as art-theft is underdeveloped and hardly the final word. It has a number of potential weak points, e.g. in its Lockean foundation and in its potential implications. But something along these lines may provide support, consistent with accurately describing the technology, for the notion that AI image-generation (or certain kinds or usages of it) may create a situation that has bad qualities similar to traditional kinds of art-theft, justifying the extension of the concept.

Against Against "AI Art is Art-Theft"

In response to this Facebook post defending AI art against the charge of art-theft--

I’ve occasionally complained that anti-AI-art critics tend to promote sloppy arguments which overstate their case. But now I’m gonna defend the anti-AI crowd—they do raise legitimate concerns, and the OP here is being unfair. The OP singles out two bad anti-AI-art arguments while failing to even acknowledge the existence of better arguments. It fails to refute nuanced versions of the accusation that AI steals art.

My real contention is basically the same as it’s been for a while: The arguments on both sides of this controversy don’t seem well-developed enough yet to justify many confident conclusions, and this goes for the pro-AI side as much as the anti-AI side. The information in the OP is a good overview of some technical details to keep in mind, correcting some common errors on the part of anti-AI-art critics. But the scope of this defense is pretty limited, and doesn’t apply to more nuanced criticisms which have already been made.

Yes, it's true that AI art doesn’t engage in copying-and-pasting images, nor even pieces of images. So it is not equivalent to some more traditional kinds of art-theft. Many anti-AI critics are sloppy and get the facts wrong about how the technology works, and this is bad. But this doesn’t disprove more nuanced lines of criticism.

I haven't checked much discourse on this recently, so I don’t know how many anti-AI critics still make the incorrect accusation of copying-and-pasting. This may still be a common false accusation, or the anti-AI critics may have mostly stopped making it, I don’t know. In any case, some anti-AI critics now make art-theft arguments based on *accurate* descriptions of the technology.

The OP is wrong to treat art-theft as basically equivalent to simple copying-and-pasting, so as to imply that “no copying-and-pasting” guarantees “no art-theft.” The OP does not address the possibility that AI art could be a different kind of art-theft—one which is morally akin to old-style art-theft, but which uses new techniques. There is no comprehensive consensus theory of art-theft, or of related concepts such as plagiarism. There are many forms and variants of plagiarism, and it is entirely plausible that new technologies can enable new forms of wrongdoing which are similar in spirit despite being technically distinct.

There are many forms of wrongdoing which are such that new technologies have facilitated the creation of new subtypes of these actions, in such a way as to NOT meet traditional criteria. New technologies, such as social media, have sometimes expanded the variety of ways in which people can commit crimes or wrongs such as fraud, harassment, and stalking. Sometimes this may be a reason to expand or revise the criteria or standards for these actions—so as to count relevantly-similar technology-enabled versions of these actions, which may not have met earlier criteria.

This does not show that AI art is art-theft. But it would not be surprising if new technologies, such as AI art, may enable new *versions* of old forms of wrongdoing in ways that do not meet all the traditional criteria. In light of this longstanding pattern, the fact that AI art doesn’t involve copying-and-pasting (part of traditional forms of art theft) is consistent with the possibility that it may still commit art-theft in some new way enabled by new technology.

To be clear, I think the burden of proof is on the anti-AI-art critic. It is up to the critic to provide a more plausible account of art-theft and to argue that AI art meets the proposed standard. This may be a harder task than some critics assume. For instance, most forms of art-theft seem to involve stealing particular artworks from particular artists. By contrast, if AI art is art-theft, then it is apparently an unusual sort—one which involves stealing (something like) abstract elements from many artists in a widely dispersed manner. I think more anti-AI-art critics should acknowledge if they are appealing to a revisionary ethical theory or principle, and that a reasonable person may be non-culpably skeptical of the revisionary view.

However, contrary to what OP seems to assume, some critics have attempted to do this. For instance, Trystan S. Goetze’s paper “AI Art is Theft” (2024) develops an argument that, well, AI art is theft—in a manner clearly grounded in a careful and accurate account of how the technology works.

#ai art #art theft