Smoking (or other forms of nicotine administration) is self-medication for a significant portion of the population, due to the not-completely-understood action of nicotinic receptors in the brain...
I think it's particularly harmful and sad to say there's no possible conversation about something when you are of two minds yourself!
> Smoking (or other forms of nicotine administration) is self-medication for a significant portion of the population
It is believed to be, but it isn't.
We could make the same argument for alcohol or even heroin, that stop a cough and relieves from physical pain.
> I think it's particularly harmful and sad to say there's no possible conversation
As a smoker, there is no possible conversation on the fact that smoking kills, cigarettes are killers, no matter the benefits one can take out of them, they are "responsible for more than 480,000 deaths per year in the United States, including more than 41,000 deaths resulting from secondhand smoke exposure. This is about one in five deaths annually, or 1,300 deaths every day. On average, smokers die 10 years earlier than nonsmokers"
This is a fact that can only be acknowledged as true, even though personally many people decide to ignore this fact and smoke anyway (including myself).
I think it's particularly harmful and sad to say there's no possible conversation about something when you are of two minds yourself!