ditto
One day more than we pay farmers to burn their crops in the fields instead of bringing them to market.
Of course the world would be better without cigarettes. It’s also be better without cancer, violence, Lady Gaga, and other dangers to life. The question shouldn’t be are we better off without cigarettes, but rather could we get rid of cigarettes.
The problem I have with utilitarianism is that it often neglects reality. People would be more healthy without cigarettes, therefore there should be no cigarettes. However, we’ve already seen the results of trying to prohibit substances, and they are worse than the results of just leaving it legal. If you’d just slip in a line into your philosophy saying ‘And if you take unintended consequences into account…’ then a utilitarian should endorse NOT driving cigarettes into an underground activity.
Which is what a flat out prohibition would do. Granted, your proposal at least takes into account current smokers. But regardless of what society does, some people under 18 will become smokers. Your idea would put tobacco on the same legal area as the drug trade. And we all know how good America is at stopping that…
I’m not really disagreeing with your point here. But I wonder what the standard of ‘better’ is in questions like this. Why is the world better if there were no cigarettes, and fewer people die of lung cancer, heart disease, etc.? Those people might consider themselves better off for not dying, or having high medical care costs, or just from saving money, but how would you say that the world as a whole is better?
Also, time will tell with the Lady Gaga thing, IMHO too early to make a determination on that yet.
Ya know, this is one of those things that really can’t be argued. You either accept that people living life with less suffering is good or you don’t. I suppose I could make an argument about genetic diversity, the need to keep population high enough to allow the specialization which makes society as we know it work, or the fact that if people are allowed to die from preventable diseases then who knows how many Einsteins, MLK’s, Hawkings, etc. might be lost. But still, it mostly is you either accept this premise or you don’t.
That being said, I’ve never heard a convincing argument for why it wouldn’t be. The times I’ve seen someone try to argue that point, it usually boils down to an egotistical ‘everyone but me sucks, so everyone but me should die’. Either that or they were based on Malthusian ideals/overpopulation fears, both of which have long ago been pretty much discredited when applied to humans. Both of which also boil down to the egotistical thing I already mentioned anyway.
I wasn’t taking it to the extreme like that. I guess the question was more about ‘noticeably better’, and related to the small beneficial change, and possible detriments if this were a case of prohibition.
Also, assuming I’m right about giving Gaga a little time, do you have any ideas about how much time would be appropriate?
Ah, sorry. I misunderstood. If smoking were wiped out, the average lifespan would go up. Assuming long life is better than a short one, that’d be a good thing. However, contrasted to the crime that went along with the booze and drug prohibitions, I think cigarette prohibitions would be worse than leaving it be. I’d rather people die in their 40’s from cancer than die in their teens from gang violence.
However long it’d take to load a gun?
How much did the cultivation and trade in tobacco contribute to the development of America? I would think that, without tobacco, the USA would be very different, due to its value as a cash crop in the 16 and 1700s.
I speak from the position of once being a tobacco farmer.
Tobacco is really easy to grow, it is a weed after all. The farm I worked on was a really good one that did all the correct topping, spraying, etc. You are only allowed to sell so much by government regulations, a tobacco allotment. Some farmers take a lot of pride in their crops.
But I knew others that just threw it out to grow, hardly did any work to make it a better crop, and still grew enough to make a tidy profit every year.
One plant can grow to easily be 6-8 feet tall, I don’t know how many cigarettes that would make but I imagine quite a few. One of my cousins kept a few plants back every year to make his own “natural” smokes.
Society doesn’t exist as anything other that a collection of individuals. Apparently a number of those individuals really like to smoke. Ergo would society be worse off without tobacco. Society would be worse off without any substance which gives any number of individuals a personal pleasure without harming anybody else.
I think society would be bettter off, but it seems like it would be next to impossiable to remove it.
Maybe some kind of alternative?
And they cut down stands of trees, drain wetlands, and plow up ditches to plant more corn. It all balances out.
There is the great expense for society for the health issues of smoking. There is the diminished ability to participate in healthful physical activities. Then there are house fires caused by smoking. There is a lot of smoke damage and odor that sinks into the home and clothes. There are lots of burn scars from cigarettes on pool tables , furniture and car seats. There are forest fires caused by cigarettes thrown out windows. There is the trash of cigarettes tossed into streets and packages in parks and roads. There are car accidents caused by people trying to light a cigarette while driving. There is the guilt of passing along a dangerous habit to your children. There is a guilt of exposing your family and friends to dangerous second hand smoke.
Let’s assume this is serious, and not an attempt at TriPolar like sarcasm.
I think eliminating those problems are a drop in the bucket of the world’s ills. A prohibition would have some undesired side effects, but I don’t think anything like prohibiting alcohol or other some other drugs.
Not tearing down your ideas here, just showing the opposing point of view:
There are a lot of unhealthy activities besides diminished exercise from shortness of breath. Not very many house fires started from smoking. Alarms and modified cigarettes have nearly eliminated that problem, which was not that large to start with. Pool tables will still have plenty of beer stains, and, lets say DNA stains. And furniture and car seat burns are unsightly, but hardly slowing the pace of human progress. Forest fires intentionally started are a much bigger problem than accidental ones from tossed cigarettes. Trash from cigarettes is negligable. And contrary to popular believe, highly degradable. Car accidents from lighting a cigarette? It happens, but those idiots will hit something eventually anyway. Guilt? The problem is people not feeling enough guilt about the things they do. And second hand smoke, a problem, exagerrated, but that’s one of the few actual benefits.
One problem in dealing with this is the hyping of tobacco related problems for political reasons. The following is an unconfirmed theory presented by someone, sometime, used for demonstration purposes only: Lung cancer deaths may drop by only a third if nobody smoked anymore. One third of the cases are unrelated to smoking, another third would occur a later in a persons life if they are genetically predisposed and exposed to common pollutants. Back to reality: Far more deaths and illnesses are due to cardio-pulmanary problems than cancer. The medical community missed the boat by using cancer as a scare-tactic. But there are plenty of those problems in people who don’t smoke. Another incremental improvement, but not a panacea for health problems. And some people would smoke other things with just as many or more problems than tobacco, or consume other harmful substances.
I’m curious if there would be a means of phasing out cigarette usage here in the US with tighter restrictions. Suppose the age to buy tobacco started increasing by 1 year every year. Existing long time smokers wouldn’t be restricted, but it would be harder and harder for the young, who are most susceptible to nicotine addiction to get cigarettes. Also, the next level of problem would be parents who allow their children to smoke. This would certainly cause an uproar if enforcement were attempted, but maybe there’s an approach I hadn’t thought of. Is there any possibility of lowering the nicotine content in all cigarettes? I don’t really know, but it seems like less nicotine would reduce the frequency of addiction. My perception is that people turn to low nicotine smokes only after they are already addicted.
I think any solution for the future would entail stopping the next generation from becoming addicted.
Not true, of course. Cecil himself has talked to the benefits of smoking (well, OK, nicotine)
One other thought: I’d like to see some objective research as to whether the health costs supposedly imposed on society are actually outweighed by a) the tax revenue brought into the government by tobacco sales, and b) the reduced life expectancy that tobacco use results in, with the huge benefit to society being that we (society) save on the extremely expensive health care costs of the elderly.
Or as Cecil put it
Not only would outlawing tobacco be a mistake (unenforceability, a rampant black market, encouragement of organized crime) but people constantly discount the economic benefits of smoking.
Apart from the obvious (tobacco companies, farmers, convenience stores and smoke shops), there’s the air freshener industry, garbage collectors, tree cutters (for the paper) and most importantly from my standpoint the health care industry elements that get a big boost from smoking.
Cardiologists, pulmonologists, urologists, oncologists and pathologists (hurray for me) derive an important percentage of our income from the diagnosis and/or treatment of smoking-induced disease. Just today I diagnosed lung carcinoma in another long-term smoker (let’s see, tracheal biopsy, bronchial brushings, bronchial washings - that all runs into money).
So anytime you hear pundits griping about the economic impact of smoking - pshaw, pay no attention. There’s money in it, if you know where to look.
Theoretically, Jackmannii, those societal resources would be diverted to other uses. If the OP is suggesting that tobacco never existed in the first place, then we’d probably have those farming, paper, medical, and industrial resources repurposed to something else that generated equal GDP (or, lowered the cost of those resources, as there were now more of them available - either way the country benefits). If the OP is suggesting that tobacco were somehow eradicated off the face of the Earth starting today (say, through some kind of desease or weavil), as it appears is the case with a re-reading of the post’s grandfathering comments, then those changes would still happen, but over time.
I have no doubt that you personally benefit by the existence and legality of tobacco products. But were the crop suddenly eradicated, I’m sure that you’d end up with a clientele with a different set of demons (weight control comes to mind, since they say that smoking can help keep you thin, or at least thinner than you’d otherwise be).
Then the matter becomes the tradeoff between the costs to the country of treating the medical conditions associated with smoking, combined with the costs of lost productivity, set against the costs of treating far more old timers in their golden years who would/should have otherwise bought the farm by hitting the coffin nails.
I wonder if anyone out there has ever done the math.
I agree - to a point. But smokers don’t just go their own way. They get in the way of everyone around them when they blow smoke in the room they’re in. They are the among the most rude and inconsiderate people on the planet.
My point was that we eliminate the ability to grow food for the expanding population that needs the housing, which also requires the clearing of wetlands, trees, etc. so no, it doesn’t “balance out”.
Society would be better off without tobacco, no doubt; that is, if tobacco never existed. Otherwise, I think the freedom to choose one’s own path is a more noble (and realistic) goal than minimizing world suffering through legislation.
I don’t see what the concern is about future generations becoming addicted. I’m 25 and started smoking at 19. It’s not like I wasn’t educated about the risks beforehand, therefore I chose my addiction.
I think you’ve been whooshed.