Something like 10% of ALL public school students in Tennessee are on Ritalin. Presumably, the percentages are similar in other states. I have trouble believing there are so many kids suddenly suffering from a disorder that wasn't even discovered until a few years ago. The following rant from a Ritalin user may be of interest (though not too relevant to cryptography): ************************************************************************* Occasionally I will see something about the practice of giving kids RITALIN for alleged attention-deficit disorder. I can't think of better evidence that the owners of the schools and the world are trying to destroy the kids in this country. I was big drug-taker. I've also had occasion to receive medication by prescription. I wil admit that I took a lot of amphetamines. Speed that is. I liked it and took it frequently, so I can attest that it has some very attractive char-acteristics that anyone taking it could not help but like at the time. It also has a gigantic letdown that is nearly intolerable. This discomfort leads ANYONE to do something to alleviate it. It's probably a matter of personal preference as to whether the discomfort of the letdown outweighs the positive feeling of the high. If not, people will keep taking speed. Now for reasons, I also had a prescription for ritalin. You know it's a controlled substance. The fact is it's an amphetamine derivative and imparts nearly the exact same experience, though not as sharp-edged. It has the high and the letdown. And people undoubtedly make the same kinds of decisions as is the case with amphetamines. They say that ritalin has a paradoxical effect on kids - meaning, I suppose, that the reasons that make it a controlled substance for adults doesn't apply to kids. Then they say in the same breath that ritalin treats disorders in the ability to concentrate or to pay attention, which are the exact things that speed and ritalin accomplish in adults. Both of these allow someone to focus exclusively on one task in an enjoyable state of mind and body and accomplish it. Any nervousness is just left over from the channeling of all the generated energy into one task. What is created is not only the false sense of security but the false ability to accomplish things. As time goes on, one aspect of the letdown is the now- understood knowledge that speed is generating false successes. This is a depressing realization that can have detrimental ramifications beyond anything to do with the drug. In college, say, false successes on exams are acceptable and desired because this is one occasion in which performance is measured. But when someone's life consists of false successes, false interactions, and false experiences - and the fact that these are false is well-realized - the result can be a very unhealthy individual self-conception whose validity is proved and reproved constantly as amphetamine use continues. I heard recently that now educators and other quacks find that ritalin enhances performance for everyone (I just said that), and they're thinking of prescribing it for that reason. This kind of poisoning of the self-concepts being developed by kids will create a generation of suicidal invalids. The idea is outrageous. This has gotten extremely long, and I wasn't planning on it. But this ritalin thing is so insidious and is so OBVIOUSLY meant to do harm that I have to write this long thing about it. The whole attention-deficit disorder is a fabrication that traitors use to pump kids full of controlled substances. Now i saw yesterday that kids not on ritalin are paying those who have it, stealing to get it, killing to get it, and on and on. Ritalin is speed, and the idea that educators, doctors, and other alleged public servants are colluding in this way to cripple kids into thinking they have no innate skills and no ability to function without a drug is one of the worst things I have come across in my entire life.