[Milvaedd_]

I don't think people take it to improve longevity. I take it because I have periods of times when I can't eat well enough and I can feel myself getting sluggish. Multivitamin actually help me feeling a little better in those periods (it may be a placebo but I would prefer a test on that specifically instead of longevity)

[eru]

You can run double-blind studies on yourself, if you are curious.

Gwern is famous for running lots of self-blinded experiments on himself.

There's various ways to go about this. But basically, you need to find a way to get two different pills that look and taste the same, one containing your active ingredient and one containing a placebo. Eg you quickly crush your vitamin pill (and the placebo) and fill the result in a capsule each. Put each in an empty film canister (or so) and label the bottom.

Shuffle both canisters (not looking at the bottom), and pick one at random. Consume the pill, and note down the effects over time. Keep the two canisters.

Repeat for as many days as you like.

After you've run your experiment, and collected all your data and wrote all your analysis software, you can unblind and actually look what you took each day (and put that in your data collection, too).

Instead of varying each day, you can also randomise to vary entire weeks or months; that's especially useful for vitamins that might take a while to show any effect. (You can pick based on how fast they seem to help with your sluggishness.)

If you have a friend to help you even a little bit, blinding becomes a lot easier.

[Milvaedd_]

Hmmm, I have no idea how to get or make the placebo pills, I don't have any tools to make them myself, I wonder if my pharmacy or a local lab would accept to do it for me. I might actually do that but I would need to try two cures instead of a random pill every day because I currently start "feeling better" after a few weeks of taking it.

I am actually curious enough to try it but I would need to do it next semester or next year because I would need to also buy or secure enough multivitamins for the year (two cures a year, it would not be a double blind anymore if I get them just before the cure) and since some of them are prescription I'll have to talk about it with my doctor, see if he would prescribe enough and if yes, how long is their shelf life and how I would go to get placebos.

[eru]

You can buy empty capsules that you can fill yourself.

So you fill some inert powder into the placebo capsules, just so they have the same weight as the one you crush your non-placebo in.

[olalonde]

Makes me wonder if there's a risk of losing a placebo effect by knowing it's a placebo effect.

[Milvaedd_]

We know that placebo can work even if you tell the person that they're taking a placebo. The placebo effect is so famous that people already expect a benefit from it.

But I guess it varies by individuals so maybe some people would lose it.

[eru]

Now, designing a controlled experiment to investigate that claim is a good challenge!

[raverbashing]

Pretty much this (and it was doctor prescribed - as much as this might be debatable)

Life is not just how many years you live, or rigid classifications of diseases

[mihaaly]

I am also taking to prevent petty non-dangerous diseases or to raise some aspects of my everyday life above baseline, where the baseline is the ballanced diet (yet not rich in some ingredients by nature). Not to mention counter ballancing one prescription medicine's side effect. Basically for quality of life and for feeling good, not to avoid death. : )