As a rule, smoking is first vanity and then addiction.
One starts smoking out of vanity, and cannot quit due to addiction.
Both vanity and addiction are forms of dependence.
Vanity is dependence on the opinions of others; addiction is dependence on drugs (be they natural, “internal” drugs, like those which induce the rush the gambling addict feels).
Wow, that’s a short thesis.
I was hoping to expand on it.
For instance, while formulating this thesis (which I had already formed in my mind), I saw that the agreeable feeling flattery gives the vain man is also induced by substances.
Sauwelios you’re great - no I really mean it 
)
Not always.
Hallucinogens are not for the vain – that’s the pleasure based. That is not to say that pleasure is unattainable, or even unwanted, merely that it’s heightened by the negation. Paranoia conquering the fear the exit to evolve.
Staying sober all your life is fine so long as you consciously make the decision to obliterate any notion of that word. In this world, few, if any really do.
Thanks, krossie.
Gobbo, what does that post (by Erowid?) on hallucinogens have to do with this?
As for flattery not always being substance-induced, I am not sure. It was just a thought. It may also be simple neurons (no adrenaline or endorphines or anything). Perhaps my reduction of both vanity and addiction to dependence on substances is an oversimplification. Perhaps I should stick to the original thesis. In any case it is dependence I wanted to criticise, not substances. This should especially appeal to Americans.
Sounds a lot like the thesis of Nietzsche who saw smoking as firstly a vanity and later a habit of young men.
Exactly.
Vanity is a traditionally female weakness. It is the polar opposite of pride, which is traditionaly male, of course. Pride is superlative vanity, vanity a relative lack of pride. This is a good example of Nietzsche’s thesis that there are no antitheses, only gradations which may behave as antitheses.
Are not women a kind of young men?
Nietzsche calls it habit, I call it addiction. The Dutch word for “addiction” (Dutch being my native language) is verslaving, in which you can clearly discern the word “slave”.
I would rather say that young men can be a bit feminine…
From what you wrote, it would appear you know what it has to do with hallucinogens.
According to my Latin-Dutch dictionary, an addictus was “sb. who was assigned to his creditor as temporary slave”. So even to the word “addiction” there is an inherent meaning of “slavery”.
The weak man - the vain man - the slave.
Everyone has an addiction. Everyone.
We slave to ourselves.
The question is of how far you remove one from the other.
Addiction has to do with replacing endorphins, which are sometimes inadequate for establishing the I’m OK necessary for insuring the maintenance and growth of the human organism. The blood-brain-barrier (angels with swords at the gates of Eden) allows tricksters to enter the inner sanctum. Endorphin receptors accept good imitators. None of this has anything to do with ego or other such moralistic descriptions.
Really? Why then are there some who overcome their addiction, and many who do not? Is it not because there are - psychologically - stronger and weaker men? The weak man remains forever in the shadow of his dragon; whereas the strong one has the strength of will, the lion’s will to challenge his dragon, to speak a holy “No”. This does indeed have nothing to do with morality, but with strength - beyond good and evil.
Health is good; sickliness is bad;
Strength is good; weakness is bad;
Pride is good; vanity is bad;
Manliness is good; effeminacy is bad.
My ethical criticisms are simply appeals to honour.
And is strength not determined by the physical lottery of genetics? Your concept of strength as bootstrap- raising, requiring only the correct belief made palpable is quite antiquated.
A lottery? Genetics are not random. You sound like a bad loser: “it’s not fair!”
The “correct belief” follows from strength, of course - not vice versa.
No loser here. You just seem to have trouble understanding me. On any ethical issue a lottery is more moral than an either/or concept of absolute certainty. As you would have it, all who appear “weak”, whatever that means, are that way by choice. Tell that to AIDS victims who are children, devoid of sexual experience. Tell that to the mentally ill. Remember, Nietzsche’s final ten years of life were spent in negation of the superman he thought humans could become.
Ah, that must be it.
Yes, for then at least everyone has equal “chances”. But genetics is no lottery…
I never said anything of the sort. They are that way by fate. As Nietzsche says, vanity is an atavism.
Those poor people, who just lost out in the “lottery” of life, eh?
Nietzsche’s final ten years were spent in vegetation, not negation.
Negation via vegetation… 