Hasn't it been that way for at least a few hundred years? I'm surprised the article didn't mention the OG stimulant, tobacco.

coffee houses (previously a threat to the monarchy) would buckle at their knees in front of the dose in caffiene pills or energy drinks

even tobacco has turned to vaping to deliver more nicotine quicker

Sometimes I wonder if coffee is responsible for modernity.

It literally is. Technologists are all the degenerate intellectual children of Voltaire - who famously drank 40-50 cups of coffee per day.

Perhaps since the beginning of what we came to call society.

Even animals will do things like get drunk on fermented fruit. Humans just figured out how to get a regular supply.

The romans had society. No tobacco or coffee

They were alcoholics, opioid and weed smokers

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substance_abuse_in_ancient_Rom...

Also there’s absolutely no aspect of Rome that I would want to repeat

it was a bunch of pederasty, slavery and overall horrific conditions for almost everybody

Heroin? That was not discovered till acetylation was invented in the 19th century.

I hypothesize that most of the stimulant use is actually due to poor sleep hygiene and jacked circadian rhythms, because of electricity and lighting on-demand.

And trauma, of course.

I don't know how we do it. I am much more clearheaded without coffee or anything of the sorts.

There's a fine line, as with alcohol. A single cup of tea might feel refreshing. A monster energy drink is going to feel like a fight or flight response. Some people are also more sensitive than others and some are addicted more really than others.

Its an addiction, just like a lot of things.

I was on a prescribed stimulant for 6 months. It was nice for work, but it ended up with too many side effects that kind of mess with ones head. It tends to "simplify" complex decision making processes and not just for code but for life decisions.

Simplifying decisions can be a positive outcome, just to add balance to your comment.

And I don't disagree!

> It tends to "simplify" complex decision making processes and not just for code but for life decisions.

Improving executive function is literally the point of prescription stimulants.

Rather than endless spirals about whether you should do ___, it just makes everything sound like a great idea to you...for better or for worse.

Cocaine has the same effect, only amplified.

I do find the economics / work narrative relatively unconvincing. For one workload in the developed world has fallen by about 40-50% over the last 100 years. Consuming stimulants is as popular among call it the 'lazy bum class' (no offense, I grew up in a deadbeat town) as it is among strivers. Coffee goes back five thousand years, Nicotine as far as recorded history, that is 10k+ years.

They've always had recreational or even ritual use, and the health fads against stimulants and cleansing crazes usually come from the work-obsessed than anyone else. So I don't think that we run on stimulants, I'm pretty sure we'd do them regardless.