Can smoking be good for you?

[Vintage lover]

I have heard from doctors that, although smoking is not recommended, your lungs to clean and heal themselves. You just have to give them time. I don't know if this applies to this forum or not, but the issue of second hand smoke has been found by numerous researchers to not be as true as previously claimed. The one study which is commonly used by organizations advocating smoking bans has actually been thrown out by a federal judge, on the basis that the data was "cherry picked", and "not accurate". It's still used though.
Now I don't believe that smoking is healthy for you, but I do believe that it has kind of gained a bit of a reputation since the cancer article in Reader's Digest, and with a reputation of causing cancer, many cannot help but form preconceived opinions and beliefs.

 

[Subvet642]

I've got this pink spot on my lung that I'm trying to get rid of.

 

[shortbow]

Take it for what it's worth, but studies have been done that say that PIPE smokers live longer than non-smokers. Honest.

In my case, the mental therapeutic value is worth the risk of physical illness inherent in tobacco use. I'm also just immature enough to enjoy doing something that is so egregiously un-PC.

 

[Vintage lover]

Typically, it is believed that cigarette tobacco has much more additives than cigars or pipe tobacco, or possibly even shisha. Which begs the question, has anyone seen any studies relating to shisha's health effects? To my knowledge there are numerous differences between the preparation and consumption of shisha as opposed to more common tobacco (pipe, cigar, cigarette).

 

[Chainsaw]

In the past I always smoked a pack and a half of large( not those girlie American 20 packs, big 25 Canadian packs) smokes, coffin nails, cancer sticks, tobacco tubes.

I was still doing 10 to 12 hours of concrete, two hours of Marshall arts, jogging 2 to 5 clicks/kms. And sleeping in the truck on the way to work. I never had a problem with my breathing.

P.s. Favorite smokes, Dumaurier, Mcdonalds, Peter Jacksons. The Indian smokes were kinda fun... Chiefs, Smugglers, Putters! And of course for 8 to 20 dollars I could grab a carton of sweepings! Mmmmm.... Sweepings!

 

[Chainsaw]

Oh, I just for reference I bought a pack of 27s at the reserve one time. They were called 27s and had 27 in a pack! Cheers

 

[Mav]

Take it for what it's worth, but studies have been done that say that PIPE smokers live longer than non-smokers. Honest.

In my case, the mental therapeutic value is worth the risk of physical illness inherent in tobacco use. I'm also just immature enough to enjoy doing something that is so egregiously un-PC.

Heard the same about pipe smoking. In addition, it gives you something you can collect and spend a huge amount of money on.
Smoked a pipe for about 15 years; had to give it up last Fall, due to a middle- aged development of asthma. Besides the calming effect of nicotine (which is weird, since it's a stimulant), it was like taking a brief vacation every hour or so.
I don't miss it all that much, since I took up dipping Copenhagen, what with it being a safe alternative to smoking, and all.

 

[Paisley]

Stimulants

Just today, I read that brain waves of people with ADD showed drowsiness, so the theory is that they do things to keep themselves alert. They're sometimes prescribed Ritalin, which is a stimulant.

 

[Louise Anne]

A few years ago started a small item about smoking in the 20's and before for ladies, It all got a little confusing separating out clear facts from speculation which could be bias one way or the other.
so I

The way I see it today is not so different from LizzieMaine.

From what I can work out the working class women might have smoke tobacco in pipes along side me for a long while the difference is that it was not seen to be socially acceptable image for a upwardly mobile young lady in the Edwardian era to smoke a pip in pubic
I not sure when cigarettes wear mass produced economically by machine maybe it meant that it was not passable for a women to smoke without a pip and the fancy cigarette holders were used instead.
The sight of a middle class lady lighting up openly in public was really the shocking thing and not so much it been about a women

Below is some of what I had writern down I found out and not bothered to finish and your see some are the same as LizzieMaine post

The tobacco industry had tried for several previous decades without success to market cigarettes to women, but now seeing that women were smoking more they reinvigorated there efforts to enter this initially small market and to increase it in size, which within a few years they successfully did.
Some of the first cigarettes targeted to women included features that were designed to appeal just to women, such as an ivory tip, a red fashion tip to blend in with the smoker's lipstick.

By 1924 Philip Morris (London) started advertising Marlboro cigarettes as a woman's cigarette based on the slogan "Mild As May". The tobacco industry targeted women by advertising cigarettes as a diet tool in the Lucky Strike Campaign. "Reach for the Lucky instead of a sweet campaign launched in 1928 is one of the finest examples available of promoting nicotine as an appetite suppressant.
In one particular advert, a beautiful, slim woman is seen posing for the camera directly under the slogan." To keep a slender figure,
" Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet." According to American Tobacco Company, a man named George Washington Hill was inspired when he saw two differently shaped women on the street. 'Right then and there is hit me; there was the young lady that was stout and chewing (gum), and there was the young girl that was slim and smoking a cigarette... there it was, right there in front of you.' Cigarette consumption for women as a result of these advertising campaign increased in the late 20's by 30% for ladies.
Ladies would try smoking purely because of seeing other ladies smoking and wanting the same image, and a fashion to be copied , apart from thinking it was a way of keeping slim.

Can smoking be good for you?
I expect it depends on who you are! if you made your fortune from tobacco than maybe you could say they been good for you or is.

 

[shortbow]

Something else from the FWIW file. I've read that the spike in lung cancer in the middle of the last century was not so much a result of the increase in cigarette smoking, but in the way modern tobacco is grown.

I can't remember the chemistry, but in the piece I read the fault was laid at the door of the new chemical fertilizers which when burned in the tobacco produce radon gas, a highly carcinogenic radioactive substance.

Were I to smoke ciggies, I would go for the organically grown tobacco offered by companies like American Spirit. They're hideously expensive up here in Canuckistan though.

 

[Paisley]

Take it for what it's worth, but studies have been done that say that PIPE smokers live longer than non-smokers. Honest.

Sponsored by the tobacco industry, maybe? Unless you know enough about statistics, the sponsors, study methods, the subject itself and the politics of whatever journal a study appears in to make a judgment, and then take the time to slog through it, it's good to take any study with a big ol' grain of salt.

 

[Chainsaw]

Do you think if we measure the years of happiness of a smoker, in comparison to that of a non smoker, we will find that on average smokers live happier lives? And is it because they blow their smoke in the faces of the non smokers?

 

[Chainsaw]

Here's something for you smoking enthusiasts.

My German recounted stories to me from WWII. I would have to guess that this is a post war story. He and his friends growing up during the war, would collect all the discarded cigarette packs the soldiers would disgard. They would then all get together and play cards with them.

Lucky Strikes of course, would be an ace!

 

[Tiller]

Smoking increases memory, reaction time, and a person's awareness.

As a dedicated pipe smoker, "the ritual" allows me time to think about issues. As the great Albert Einstein said,

"I believe that pipe smoking contributes to a somewhat calm and objective judgement in all human affairs."

As a New York pipe smoker though, my blood pressure increases every time I purchase tobacco, and see all the added taxes :rage: lol.

 

[Tiller]

Sponsored by the tobacco industry, maybe? Unless you know enough about statistics, the sponsors, study methods, the subject itself and the politics of whatever journal a study appears in to make a judgment, and then take the time to slog through it, it's good to take any study with a big ol' grain of salt.

I know of one study done by a sociologist, who was looking at the risk of pipe tobacco smoking since there are so few studies on the subject. He found that people who are non inhaling pipe smokers, and not former cigarette smokers, lived longer then non-smokers by 42 months (or something like that). He attributed this to lower stress, since most pipe smokers tend to have less stressful lives.

I'll give you a very dumbed down version of his study as I remember it. He argued that cigarette smoking was a result of an increased work life (I believe that is how he said it). His main theory is that pipe smoking, due to the ritual that it is required, takes a longer amount of time to get lesser nicotine (compared to cigarette smoking), and therefor has a healthier affect on an individual, because the body adapts much better to it over time. Cigarette smoking on the other hand is much faster, and due to inhaling delivers more nicotine to your system in greater quantities, at a increased rate. Which causes people to smoke more and more to get the same "buzz".

Cigarette smoking also attracts people who have "fast paced" lives, compared to pipe smokers. Basically cigarette smokers tend to be a part of a "go go go" lifestyle, well pipe smokers tend to come from a more laid back background.

I've talked to the guy on some forums before, when I have some free time I'll see if I can find him again. In all fairness though he himself is a pipe smoker (or I should say became one lol), so again take it with a grain of salt. If I can find him again, maybe he will allow me to post his research [huh].

 

[Mav]

Smoking increases memory, reaction time, and a person's awareness.

As a dedicated pipe smoker, "the ritual" allows me time to think about issues.

Indeed. When I first switched to the pipe from cigs, I was still occasionally teaching classes at trade societies and union halls. Being that you could still smoke indoors, when I was asked a technical question where the answer wasn't coming to me immediately, I'd say "hmmmm.....", squint, look up at the ceiling, and start screwing around with my pipe, until the questioner answered his own question.

 

[Vintage lover]

As a New York pipe smoker though, my blood pressure increases every time I purchase tobacco, and see all the added taxes :rage: lol.

Yes, those taxes intended to encourage a healthier life style infuriate me for many reasons. Mind you, the people who encourage these taxes use the same study created by the EPA which was thrown out by a Judge in 1998. I remember reading that when someone tried to get Sinatra to quit smoking, and said that it would kill him. He replied "you die your way and I'll die mine". lol

 

[Paisley]

Do you think if we measure the years of happiness of a smoker, in comparison to that of a non smoker, we will find that on average smokers live happier lives? And is it because they blow their smoke in the faces of the non smokers?

You could do a study in this thread--there's plenty of blowing smoke.

 

[Paisley]

I know of one study done by a sociologist, who was looking at the risk of pipe tobacco smoking since there are so few studies on the subject. He found that people who are non inhaling pipe smokers, and not former cigarette smokers, lived longer then non-smokers by 42 months (or something like that). He attributed this to lower stress, since most pipe smokers tend to have less stressful lives.

I'll give you a very dumbed down version of his study as I remember it. He argued that cigarette smoking was a result of an increased work life (I believe that is how he said it). His main theory is that pipe smoking, due to the ritual that it is required, takes a longer amount of time to get lesser nicotine (compared to cigarette smoking), and therefor has a healthier affect on an individual, because the body adapts much better to it over time. Cigarette smoking on the other hand is much faster, and due to inhaling delivers more nicotine to your system in greater quantities, at a increased rate. Which causes people to smoke more and more to get the same "buzz".

Cigarette smoking also attracts people who have "fast paced" lives, compared to pipe smokers. Basically cigarette smokers tend to be a part of a "go go go" lifestyle, well pipe smokers tend to come from a more laid back background.

I've talked to the guy on some forums before, when I have some free time I'll see if I can find him again. In all fairness though he himself is a pipe smoker (or I should say became one lol), so again take it with a grain of salt. If I can find him again, maybe he will allow me to post his research [huh].

Most of this sounds reasonable to me.

As you mention, stress, lifestyle and dose all come into play (confounding variables).

What you describe sounds like an epidemiological study, which shows associations, not causes. Pipe smokers might live longer than non-smokers, but we can't see if smoking caused them to live longer, or if the other factors you mentioned (less stress, etc.) are some of the causes.

I like Tom Naughton's criteria when considering a study: does it make sense from an evolutionary standpoint, and does it square with my observations. I don't think we're adapted to inhale a great deal of any kind of smoke. As for observations, I've known too few pipe smokers to say.

 

[nobodyspecial]

You could do a study in this thread--there's plenty of blowing smoke.

No kidding, the entire thread is just plain nuts.