[neilv]

I relayed what my friend said that the doctor said.

I'm sure that a doctor commenting on imaging knows vastly more about the topic than I do. And probably more than you do.

Or are you asserting that I'm BSing, friend was BSing, doctor was BSing, or doctor had been fed BS?

[reillyse]

So at this point there is a chain of three people who we have to believe and honestly you’ve left out whatever doctor was doing the imaging - usually a radiologist looks at the imaging and interprets it.

Unless they were doing a scan for “does my brain look like I took a bunch of ecstasy” the probability of the radiologist saying “it looks like the patient did a shit ton of ecstasy is close to zero” .

Secondly there is no characteristic markers for ecstasy use - it doesn’t leave a big X on the brain. This idea is like thinking somebody could look at an xray of a broken bone and name the person who caused the damage.

Lastly the story has the characteristics of a normal BS anecdote , with the allusion to authority (a doctor told me!) and it just so happens to dovetail really well with your life choices and validates you. So yea whiff of BS off this one.

[neilv]

To me, my friend (who's always been sincere) saying that a doctor told them something, is more credible than some random person saying that the chance a doctor actually told them that is close to zero.

[yibg]

This is why using anecdotes to determine truth is not reliable.

[anothereng]

do you need to make a study to know if your teenager hasnt showered when they smell bad?