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jacob_cannell comments on Intelligence Amplification Open Thread - Less Wrong
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How long have you been on piracetam and sulbutiamine? Have you been collecting data on your does over time and any subjective evaluations (a diary/log or whatever)? Individual experiements such as that can be quite useful for others.
Have an idea which works better? After reading about your sulbutiamine experiment I went and got a B-vitamin complex which I now take, and I'm curious about actually trying sulbutiamine next.
I've taken piracetam and measured the effects on a one dose basis.
I notice more 'clear' thinking, but the measurable part is in terms of action/reaction time. My 'maximum typing rate' (my typing speed when I type a memorized sentence and don't make mistakes) goes up about 10%. My reaction time goes down about 10%.
My guitar playing speed seems to improve by more than 10% (haven't actually measured it). The increase is large enough that my friends can tell that I've taken a 'racetam without me mentioning it. One of the first times I took piracetam I had forgotten about taking it and when I went to play guitar I was shocked and confused until I remembered taking it.
That is really interesting jimmy. Is it still legally available in the US? I am motivated now to research it more.
Of course a 10% speed increase isn't earth-shattering and probably doesn't result in anything near a 10% benefit in most tasks, but it's fascinating to me because I wasn't aware that any pharmaceutical could significantly increase speed of thought. Although I guess perhaps some stimulants can, but I've also thought of there effects as increasing alertness more than speed.
Piracetam is still legal, apparently. smartpowders.com, for example, is still selling it, although note the timer gives you only 2 days. There are other retailers, of course.
Wow, that's close timing. The place I previously bought from has already stopped selling it. I gotta stock up now.
Thanks a ton for the warning.
Wait, they have? I was under the impression that smartpowders.com was the first to be notified.
Yeah, but now that I look closer, it looks like it was several months back.
http://www.bodybuilding.com/store/prima/piracetam.html
Yup, bulknutrition.com also stopped selling it months back.
It's legal and cheap in the US. I bought 500g for ~$20 if I remember correctly. Aniracetam is similar and also legal and worth playing with. I have a friend that's into MMA and likes taking aniracetam before grappling.
To cut a few snips from a conversation about it: "more free flowing instictual thought processes instead of frantic fleeting moments when it gets intense.."
" id say no more than a 10% improvement, but i will say i felt invincible on ground and pound days when i got on top, it was just so easy to flow and maintain top position... it seemed like it improved timing and sense of body awareness"
About 3 weeks on sulbutiamine, 5 on piracetam. I haven't gotten any quantitative data. Before I started, I thought I ought to get in the habit of using dual N-back and Anki and some other tests so I'd have a baseline, but didn't really have the energy and motivation to set those up and do them. Once I realized that was stopping me from trying nootropics at all, I dropped that idea and settled for subjective impressions, collected informally. I have some subjective feeling data recorded in my private diary, but it pretty much just duplicates what I posted in comments.
Piracetam and sulbutiamine have pretty much orthogonal effects. If you're already taking a supplement with lots of thiamine, then sulbutiamine will have a smaller effect than it would otherwise since they are analogues of the same molecule, but I think there's a limit to how much thiamine can cross the blood-brain barrier which doesn't apply to sulbutiamine so you may still get some effect.