That's a good tip because it is in fact the same language with various dialect and naming differences, similar to the many flavors of English we have today or different variants of German. Montenegrian is the latest addition to the family.
However, everyone I know has a common understanding about this, so I'm not sure who would be reluctant to admit that it is the same language... outside of the very few extremist groups of course :)
Oh definitely. They're pretty few and far between, too. I actually usually say that I'm learning "Yugoslavian" -- not as a callback to the country, but to the whole region. There are definitely slight differences, but they're all very similar languages, and looking into resources for all of them will be a great way to get an awesome view of the rich and diverse culture of the Balkan peninsula.
Vancouver has been addicted to heroin and opiates my whole life, we had a nice flirt with meth in the late 90s early 00's (good frontline on its west coast spread). East Hastings is ground zero. We used to have the highest concentration of AIDS in North America because of needle sharing. Combination of being a main pacific-rim port, mild weather, aboriginal poverty etc. Lots of people are blown away when they get here and see it.
Vancouver has always been like that. When people talk about drugs and homeless in the streets, Vancouver comes off as even worse than Seattle in many respects.
maybe around when the first logging camps were set up in the early 1800s?
It's been here longer than any of the cities have been.
Oh, opium and addiction that is.
The term "skid row" is said to originate here or Seattle - both have good claim to the term with similar history.
Fentanyl has been here for a long time, but it started getting mass imported a few years ago into drug rules and may be connected to why Canada's legalizing pot now.
The death rates keep rising.
Downtown Eastside has been what seems the heroin center of North America since the early 1980s, well before it spiraled out of control south of the border.
He explained that when Facebook was being developed the objective was: “How do we consume as much of your time and conscious attention as possible?” It was this mindset that led to the creation of features such as the “like” button that would give users “a little dopamine hit” to encourage them to upload more content.
“It’s a social-validation feedback loop … exactly the kind of thing that a hacker like myself would come up with, because you’re exploiting a vulnerability in human psychology.”
People attribute the "I don't know who you are. I don't know what you want..." line from "Taken" to Liam Neeson. I'm sorry, but it's a character played by Liam Neeson who said that!
Seems reality and fiction is getting more and more mixed up... especially if you have Ted or Deadpool showing up to talk shows (then again, this isn't a new thing is it, Bugs Bunny showed up on a talk show in the 1990's).
It's a mix I'd say but technology certainly plays its part.
I used to think that I'm the problem but it has been brought up in online studies and people I know more and more.
Social networks make me miserable. I didn't have Facebook or Instagram for almost 8 years and I started using Instagram recently. It's a strange mix of feelings but I loathe and look forward to opening the app every time.
Most people seem to experience something similar, no matter how hard they try they can't stop comparing themselves to others, hunting likes and other fake internet points.
Technology, especially the widespread technologies like smartphones are something that just happened upon most people.
So most people haven't adapted on how to use them responsibly. Just look around the average cafe, you can usually find a group of people sitting together but not talking about anything, they just look at their phones.
This also seems to reveal an underlying issue, one which I also experienced. Before smartphones usually, you'd make up conversation, smalltalk, even if you didn't want to talk or had anything interesting to say. These days instead of doing that people just seem to ignore each other and do something that is interesting, using their phones.
> Before smartphones usually, you'd make up conversation, smalltalk, even if you didn't want to talk or had anything interesting to say. These days instead of doing that people just seem to ignore each other and do something that is interesting, using their phones.
That is precisely the root of the problem. That means that the interpersonal relationships with friends and family have been hijacked by for-profit organizations pushing "more interesting" content. This contributes to dividing society even more.
That isn't new - just look at old photographs of commuter trains packed to the brim with everyone burying their face in a newspaper. Even the for profit part isn't new. At this point a lack of people for smalltalk is as much of a societal problem as the inability to find a badminton partner in say Eugene, Iowa. It is the norm and it is time to accept that people don't like talking with random strangers about nothing of consequence out of boredom.
Similarly parents not being attentive enough to their children is also sadly not new. (Satisfaction is also likely elusive for kids given the sheer craving they have proving incompatible with maintaining a house and necessary income.)
Although I wonder about the psychological impact of that being combined with helicopter parents going full surveillance state as the discourse shifts from "Tracking bands on your kid? That sounds stupid and horrifying." to being seriously considered and accepted. Like asking for a very locked down "can call only them with GPS" wrisrtwatch-phone." Society pendulums too much for linear social progressions and I hope it does so before we reach "You don't have trackers on your kid what the hell is wrong with you!" norms.
It must be frustrating being constantly watched yet never being able to receive attention when desired.
How are you forced into a conversation with a group of people you chose to go somewhere with? If you didn't want to talk with them, don't accept their invitation to get coffee
It is very rare that you really have to talk to someone, IME. Usually, it's more of a..."I don't really like or have a lot of common with this person but I've known them forever so what the heck"
> Before smartphones usually, you'd make up conversation, smalltalk, even if you didn't want to talk or had anything interesting to say.
No you didn't. You read a newspaper or magazine. Even growing up in the 80s I remember sitting around the table, each of us reading a different section of the LA times, and then swapping 1/2 way through the meal.
That kind of thing was not nearly as widespread as phone usage today; not by a very long shot. Maybe you did that, but I would say that was probably very rare. The use of phones is nearly ubiquitous, because they have addictive properties that paper simply doesn’t.
In Europe there are a lot of these so-called "research chemicals". They are basically illegal drugs but chemically they are different enough that they aren't illegal.
I would say that, if you're speaking of the whole category of "research chemicals"—rather than just the psychotropic ones—it's actually easier to get them in North America than in Europe.
Many of the actual pharma research companies creating this stuff are in the US, so there's no customs between you and an order of random-drug-sample #91245096. And even when there is, both the US and Canada are basically allow-then-deny when it comes to drug importation: if they haven't seen it before—and it doesn't smell like a known-restricted compound to the dogs/scanners—they allow it in.
While there are some pharma companies in the EU, there aren't many, and EU countries basically don't allow drugs to be shipped in from outside the EU, no matter what's in them. Indeed, you can't even order unscheduled, OTC drugs from other countries (e.g. Russia) into the EU. It's a big problem in the nootropics community. (Try to figure out how to get bromantane in Germany. I'll wait.)
I randomly browsed Reddit and wandered onto the 1P-LSD thread and saw that most of the stores mentioned were in Germany, Netherlands, Spain so I just assumed that it was more of a Europe thing.
EDIT: Any ideas why I get "You're posting too fast. Please slow down. Thanks."?
Pharma research companies don't sell direct to individuals.
Most suppliers of research chemicals that are marketed to consumers in the US get their product from China. Whether they have it tested at an independent lab is up for debate.
There was a Times article several years ago about the rise of synthetic cannabis and they said legislators can't keep up with new chemical formulations. They take several months to study and ban one chemical, and the manufacturers turn around and tweak it slightly and it's a "new" drug that hasn't been made illegal yet.
From what I could tell that's almost exactly what's happening in Europe as well. One difference though is that it takes even longer since each member state bans these individually.
From what I saw there are RC variants of many drugs I've never heard of but I saw RC-LSD, RC synthetic cannabis, RC-ecstasy, angel dust...
It is very much a European thing, not as popular in the US due to easier access to cannabis and it was synthetic Cannabis (Spice) that started the whole craze a couple of years ago, followed by "bath salts" which then extended to the whole RC line of drugs.
Tbh the government reactions to this, banning specific substances cannabinoids in particular, have made this situation just that much worse.
This stuff booming like that should have told them the whole story: That there's a very real demand for legalization.
Instead, they continue prohibition practices even further, forcing manufacturers to use other (much more dangerous) substances, a game they've now played so long that by now most of these synthetic Cannabis variants have nothing at all do anymore with the "natural stuff" and instead have become extremely destructive and addictive substances [0]
By insisting on the prohibition stance the regulators literally made "weed" lethal.
>Instead, they continue prohibition practices even further, forcing manufacturers to use other (much more dangerous) substances
The inherent danger in iterative research chemicals is a lesson I had to learn firsthand. I had tried the initial formulations for "spice" a few times and found it to be a pleasant analogue to marijuana. I decided to pick some up several years later, and well, the effects were closer to that of a hardcore disassociative than anything resembling THC. Don't fuck around with products you can't be 100% confident in.
You can't legislate a state of mind, and people have different reactions to different substances, so I'm a little confused as to what form this "broad ban" would take.
(Keep in mind these laws do not apply to fentanyl -- in the United States, fentanyl is schedule II and is available as prescription medicine. Illicit fentanyl is more "illegal drug market" than "research chemicals"; cocaine is in the same boat in the US as well, a schedule II drug that's available on the illicit market. The above might apply to any fentanyl analogues though.)
The Psychoactive Substances Act 2013 was introduced in NZ after its failed experiment with legalising synthetic highs. I don't necessarily agree with the act, but it basically is a "broad ban" of new recreational drugs.
That's extremely non-selective - for instance [1] is a random paper discussing ethanol interacting with the 5-HT2A receptors (at least if you are a male rat that is).
It would likely also lead to unforeseen consequences. For example, the Czech government attempted to ban growing Phalaris, but had to backpedal as it's a common unassuming weed.
The story provides a figure depicting the structural formula of actual fentanyl, and next to it similar fentanyl-like molecules that are being trafficked.
Caption: "Yan Xiaobing was indicted for distributing these similar compounds; making slight changes to the molecular structure can have unpredictable effects on potency."
Also: [I]n recent years, rogue chemists have unearthed instructions for analogues that researchers discovered decades ago but never put into legitimate use.
While Chinese authorities control fentanyl, they’ve been slow to ban new analogues.
Nobody wants to admit it but it is basically the same language, heck was called Serbo-Croatian a few decades ago.