The Ethics Of Adderall

Last night on 60 Minutes, they had a segment about the amphetamine Adderall. It's a drug that is typically prescribed for people with ADHD or other attention disorders but is commonly used by college students to study and do schoolwork along with other people looking to keep themselves focused on any number of tasks. The reason I mention it here is that the debate about it is incredibly similar to the one about performance enhancing drugs in sports.

One of the members of a panel of students from the University of Kentucky assembled by the show said:

Everybody's trying to get an edge. And I mean, and if you can take a pill that will help you study all night to get that grade you need, I mean, a lotta people don't see why they wouldn't do it.

As was the case when PEDs were first being used by athletes, there is some gray area in regards to their legality (it's much closer to black and white now). Adderall is a legal, but people often obtain the pills from others who have prescriptions, which is not. Alan DeSantis, a communications professor at UK explains:

About four percent of our college campus has, actually, legal prescriptions. But what we have found is that while they may get 30 doses, they very rarely would ever take a dose everyday. Which means, at the end of the month, there is always anywhere from 10 to 20 surplus pills left over. And these are the surplus pills that are doled out.

Baseball might have its own problem with drugs like Ritalin and Adderall. As a result of the Mitchell Report, we know that in 2008, there was a 7.6% increase in the number of players with prescriptions for attention-boosting drugs, which Newsweek attributed to baseball's ban on other amphetamines like greenies. Some of those are likely legitimate cases, but given the sharp increase, it's probable that a significant number of players are taking the drug who do not have diagnoses that would hold up under close scrutiny.

In addition to the possibility of addiction, Adderall carries health risks consistent with other amphetamines, especially when taken in large doses. Like steroids or HGH, those who are unwilling to take those gambles don't reap the benefits drug can provide.

Another one of the students on the panel offered an objection to the use of Adderall similar to what we've heard time and time again from opponents of PED usage in sports:

I feel that it is an unfair advantage. If the person next to me that has the exact same schedule takes an Adderall they can stay up the entire night knowing the material and come in and make a grade better than me.

I mean, it is somewhat tempting but at the same time I'm just so proud that I've come this far and I know when I look at my grades that it is purely by my own ability.

Students aren't in direct competition with each other to the extent that athletes are, but those breaking the law by taking other people's pills (or those bending them by faking symptoms to get their own prescriptions) are certainly gaining an unfair advantage.

As medical technology evolves, we are seeing more and more drugs that can make our minds function more efficiently and our bodies stronger. Like anything else, these carry their own risks and the people willing to mortgage their future health are going to be able to gain and edge and cut corners now. Is that inherently fair? Probably not, but there aren't immediate rewards for taking the high road and it's extremely difficult to prevent people from taking the easy way out.

Setting aside the legalities for a second, is there anything morally wrong with taking a drug that makes your brain more potent? Wouldn't you want the option of taking something that makes you ostensibly smarter? According the the show, Adderall is popular among truck drivers because it helps them stay more alert at the wheel, which could potentially save lives. If people can use it without forming an addiction or even a habit, what's the problem with it?

The ethics of this issue are awfully fuzzy, and they promise to become more complicated as drugs become more effective. I'm somewhat of a Libertarian when it comes to drugs, so I think people should be able to make their own choices in regards to the substances they choose to use. But I'm sure your mileage will vary.

How Not To Conduct An Interview, By Mark Grace

On the Bats Blog at the New York Times, Richard Sandomir points out something that never ceases to annoy me about the postgame interviews conducted by network reporters:

Fox needs a question coach for Mark Grace. One of the failings of many sideline/stadium reporters is that they do not jot down good, solid, clear questions to ask the stars of a game.

There usually isn’t much time to prepare, but coming up with three pertinent thoughts to frame as questions, or as leading statements, shouldn’t be as hard as a nervous Grace made it when he interviewed Jimmy Rollins after the Phillies’ 8-6 win against the Yankees in Game 5 of the World Series on Monday.

Sandomir uses Grace as an example and transcribes some example from last night, but you could easily switch his name with Kim Jones, Ken Rosenthal or countless other reporters. (Here's a clip of the Rosenthal & Grace interviews from last night). It seems as though, in the cutthroat world of TV journalism, interviewers are constantly trying use their queries to display how smart they are as opposed to asking questions that lead to good responses.

Since the best baseball players - the ones most likely to be interview after the game - are interviewed so frequently during the season, they answer the questions - or in many cases weak leading statements - with relative ease. The player knows what the interviewer is getting at and usually obliges them with the type of vague and vapid answer they think they are looking for.

ESPN has actually tried to correct this problem by hiring an interview guru named John Sawatsky to conduct seminars on the proper way to interview (sort of like the "question coach" Sandomir suggested). Here is an 8 minute radio segment and accompanying article from NPR from back in 2006 on that very subject.

Sawatsky is a full time employee in Bristol and has his own office, complete with a giant question mark on the door. Max Kellerman used to talk about the "Sawatsky Technique" on his old radio show on 1050AM in New York, but would struggle to take the advice, like he did in his botched interview with Floyd Mayweather after the Juan Manuel Marquez fight.

In the seminars, Sawatsky uses interviewers like Barbara Walters and Larry King as examples of exactly what not to do. Don't ask long-winded questions (or worse, make long-winded statements) or pose inquiries that only demand a "yes" or "no" response. Ask only one question at a time. Try to learn, not validate your own opinion. Don't try to insert yourself into the interview, because the interview isn't about you:

The best questions, argues Sawatsky, are like clean windows. “A clean window gives a perfect view. When we ask a question, we want to get a window into the source. When you put values in your questions, it’s like putting dirt on the window. It obscures the view of the lake beyond. People shouldn’t notice the question in an interview, just like they shouldn’t notice the window. They should be looking at the lake.

Makes sense, doesn't it? No one wants to hear Ken Rosenthal or Kim Jones awkwardly attempt to interject their observations on what just happened. They want to hear what the player was thinking. Typically the athletes don't really have anything interesting to say either, but maybe if the people interviewing them could put some effort into crafting questions that would provoke some thoughtful responses, that wouldn't be the case.

Back Off Asshole, He's Mine [Non-Sports]

[Ed Note: Since I'm not at work today, there are going to be a few non-sports posts. Hope you folks don't mind.]Does this guy know that Captain Chesley B. Sullenberger III is mine, or am I going to have to be a bitch about it?

Liking 60 Minutes is one of the things, (along with my affinities for scotch, golf, trout fishing and 70's music) that makes me a 55 year old trapped trapped in a 24 year old body. Well, last night, 60 Mins had an awesome several segment feature centering around Cap'n Sully and his retelling of the perfectly executed landing in the Hudson River.

[Ed. Note: I couldn't pause for a screen grab. Pretty craaaay-zaaay pic, right?]

The landing wasn't dumb luck. Sully showed incredible grace under fire, calculating every single thing that happened, even positioning the plane near some NY Waterway Ferries so as to close the gap between landing and response. It probably helped that he was previously an Accident Investigator and Saftey Lecturer.

I don't care how many cases you've studied or how many lectures you're given. Nothing can prepare you to look at this knowing you have to put a plane with 155 people on it down into a 30 something degree body of water adjacent to one of the most densely populated areas on the planet.


"Oh m'gosh y'all! We almost died!" I'll forgive her though, she's pretty hot for an older gal.

Those are not tears shown below. It's only a saline fluid that the masterminds at NASA who programmed this marvelous man-chine included just in case it was ever forced to show "emotion".



And now a special message from Andy Rooney:

Mrrraahh!

(scowls)

You know what would cut down on the number of plane crashes? NOT FLYING!

(face contorts with anger)

It seems to me that everyone nowadays is flying somewhere. Vacations, business trips, family reunions. Why can't they just do it how I did it back when I was young? Get your family, load up your horse and buggy, and try not to die of dysentery.

Why not drive one of those newfangled automobiles or take a train? I've taken many trains in my day. It's a good time to read the Saturday Evening Post or the Farmer's Almanac.

At least no one ever tried to drive a train into a building as a terrorist attack!


Bonus Oregon Trail GChat featuring a special guest appearance from Carmen Sandiego!!! Brendan, as always, has the strategery down pat.

Brendan: love me some dysentery

the key to that game was shooting buffalo and then trading it for dollars at the trading posts

1:30 PM

Brendan: why one would waste bullets on the squirrel and rabbits is beyond me.. seeing as they were hard as hell to kill, and gave you like 2lbs of meat

1:31 PM me: absolutely

Brendan: it really made no sense

me: remember how you had to ford the rivers too?

Brendan: yeah was just going to bring that up

it was toll road or you're getting in the water

Brendan: and to hell if i was paying a damned toll

1:32 PM communists

me: yeah who was fucking collecting tolls anyway?

it was the 1800s
me: if anyone it should have been the native americansBrendan: lol, true that

Brendan: you also had to have a shitty occupation to get the multiplier bonus at the end

1:34 PM another great memory was making up witty names for your fellow travelers... You had to stop for 3 days because Boobies has cholera

1:36 PM me: lol

http://classicgaming.gamespy.com/View.php?view=GameMuseum.Detail&id=266

1:37 PM if you scroll down there is a pic of a tombstone that says "Here lies Pepperony[sic] and cheese

1:41 PM Brendan: or where in the USA is carmen san diego

that was an epic game.. because once you won it wasn't over.. as you always could improve your rank

me: yeah loved that show too

Brendan: Rockefellas

1:42 PM me: "Alright, Gumshoes..."

yeah forgot about those fuckers

Brendan: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuzc4jgwlT8

me: odd for a children's game show to have its own a capella group, but whatever

1:43 PM wow they are still milking it, huh?

Brendan: well that was in 2000

but hell I would

1:44 PM crazy and unexpected beatbox at the end of that clip

and i'm pretty sure he has his neck pierced

A-Fraud?

Despite my strong personal dislike for his postseason performances, I have been reluctant to call Alex Rodriguez "A-Fraud." I never understood the meaning of the term. How exactly was he fraudulent? Given his personality, A-Hole seemed like the proper A-hyphenated nickname. I myself preferred the name "Mr. 162" label -- for his propensity for regular season greatness and postseason suckitude.

However, Selena Roberts and David Epstein of Sports Illustrated have launched a nuclear bomb that give this "A-Fraud" nickname proverbial legs. According to four sources of the two writers of the once-great periodical, in 2003, when he won the American League home run title and his first AL Most Valuable Player award as a shortstop for the Texas Rangers, Alex Rodriguez tested positive for two anabolic steroids. According to the sources, Rodriguez's name appears on a list of 104 players who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in Major League Baseball's '03 survey testing.

The results of that year's survey testing of all players were meant to be anonymous under the joint agreement between the commissioner's office and the players association. However, the results were discovered after Feds seized the '03 test results from Comprehensive Drug Testing, Inc., of Long Beach, CA as part of the BALCO investigation by the government. The list of the players is currently sealed. However, sources who know contents of the list told SI that A-Rod tested positive for testosterone and an anabolic steroid known as Primobolan. Some anonymity...

According to the 2007 Mitchell Report, in September 2004, Gene Orza, the chief operating officer of the players' union, violated an agreement with MLB by tipping off a player (not named in the report) about an upcoming, supposedly unannounced drug test. Three major league players who spoke to SI said that Rodriguez was also tipped by Orza in early September 2004 that he would be tested later that month. Rodriguez declined to respond on Thursday when asked about the warning Orza provided him. Wow. you're tipped off and still cannot even pass. Certainly a clutch performer...

Great. Distractions. Just what A-Rod needs. Just what the Yankees need. As if screwing Madonna was not enough. As if the Torre book was not enough.

Rodriguez has repeatedly denied steroid use in the past, including in a "60 Minutes Interview" with Katie Couric. In the interview, when asked by Couric if he had used steroids, human growth hormone or another performance-enhancing drug, Rodriguez said categorically, "No."

"I think baseball's done a fine job of implementing some very strict rules," Rodriguez said in the interview. "I mean, I got tested eight or nine times. I know some of my teammates got tested, you know, seven, eight ... times and, you know, if you think about where the game is today versus where it was six years ago, I think Major League Baseball has made some nice strides."

"I've never felt overmatched on the baseball field," Rodriguez said. "... I felt that if I did my, my work as I've done since I was, you know, a rookie back in Seattle, I didn't have a problem competing at any level."

Many people, myself included, thought that A-Rod was untainted and could not wait until he eventually dethroned Barry Bonds as the Home Run King. This news, which turns A-Rod into "A-Fraud," is like somebody stepping on your junk with steel toed boots.

Fortunately for A-Rod, unfortunately for Yankees fans/the Yankee organization, it does not appear that A-Rod's contract will be able to be voided.

Alex, can't you just retire? You have already made more money than anybody needs. As a liar and a cheat, everybody hates you, including Yankees fans. Your records and statistics mean nothing after you cheated or are accused of cheating. Retiring would spare you the public scorn that will disintegrate your already weaker than peanut butter brittle psyche and let you screw as many muscular broads as you want. Maybe you can work with fellow New York cheater Elliot Spitzer. Retiring would be a win-win situation for everyone. PLEASE! JUST DO IT! THINK OF THE CHILDREN!