[batbomb]

> And there are the illegal ones like amphetamines that have a significant effect, but will also cause a great deal of harm the more you use them. So, there seems to be a clear correlation between the size of the effect and the harm done.

There's definitely legal amphetamines, non-amphetamine stimulants (modafanil, methylphenidate if you want to put it there), and lots of literature statistics about what is and isn't a dose which can perform harm, and often a classification for the older drugs as GRAS. There's things which may behave like a stimulant or can replace a stimulant, but aren't really stimulants (bupropion, atomoxetine).

If you're talking about Meth, well, then, yeah. It's illegal and often harmful. It's also not likely to be pure.

For the most part, anything which people consider a performance enhancing brain drug has probably been used or posited as a treatment for ADHD or Narcolepsy. It's often a stimulant or a reuptake inhibitor, usually relating to dopamine in some way. There's a ton of FDA-approved drugs out there that meet this description.

[MichaelGG]

Methamphetamine is NOT illegal in the US (trade name Desoxyn). It's Schedule II, less harmful than LSD in the DEA's psuedo-think. Now, convincing a doctor to rx meth for ADD or weight loss may be difficult, but it's possible.