I think Steve was wrong on this, as he was wrong on other things, i.e. that pancreatic cancer could be treated with a special diet. Maybe if Steve sought medical attention earlier he would still be with us today changing the world.
I wouldn't conflate his position on hallucinogens with his opinion on alternative medicine. He doesn't have to be either all right or all wrong.
Concluding that he wouldn't been the same successful person without doing LSD. There's no evidence of causation. That's the fallacy.
I'm not sure why so many people are excited about this, it seems like a cheap pro-legalization play in light of his death.
Who's making that conclusion? As far as I can tell, nobody's attributing his success entirely to LSD. I'm sure he'd have been successful without it. But a person is a product of their experiences, and he plainly states that LSD factored strongly into it. You can disbelieve him, but I don't know why one would have trouble believing that.
I tend to agree that this is only getting so much play right now because of the Jobs connection, which is getting annoying for some, but that doesn't make the points being made any less valid.
Everyone who even brings up that he used LSD as a point of interest. At least that's the implication being made.
> that doesn't make the points being made any less valid.
No, the points are not valid. That's why we have a scientific method that proves causation.
It's the exact same fallacy that someone falls into with e.g. alternative medicine. A person's cancer went into remission while they were eating tree bark. They are free to believe it helped them, but that doesn't mean it's scientifically, or even remotely, the case. Taking their word for it doesn't make it true.
Unless you were a personal friend of Steve Jobs, I don't see how you can possibly support this statement. You're saying that you know, for sure, that Steve's experiences with drugs did not influence his intellectual development or his sense of aesthetics in any useful way?