According to Pareto's principal 80% of the outputs for something come from 20% of the inputs. It has been shown that this applies to many things. So this means that if you are taking 15 nootropics, (like some people are) 80% of your positive results might only be coming from 3 of the nootropics. 5 might be giving you small effects, 5 might be doing nothing, and 2 might be canceling out postive effects of other nootropics or otherwise causing negitive effects. Think about, when doctors try to treat a disease they don't give you 15 different drugs. They only give you 1 which they know will work.
Also, if you are taking 15 nootropics, which have synergistic and anti-synergistic effects all feeding into each other, the number of possible combinations of dosages of these nootropics would be massive and impossible to test each one for enough time to get an accurate result.
With this in mind, what do you think the best 5 nootropic stack would be?
Here is my list:
Cerebrolysin (neuron growth)
Vincetopine (increased cerebral blood flow and neuroprotection (have not tried it by itself))
Pramiracetam (the only racetam I have tried)
Alpha GPC (choline source for the racetam)
Hydregine (Havent tired it but sounds good)
Notes: Don't have several nootropics which do the same thing. Pick the one which either has the most powerful safe effects or has all or most of the effects of the other drug, plus extra ones. For example, you could say that Cerebrolysin > Idebenone, since both are known for increasing NGF, but there is much more evidence for Cerebrolysin than for Idebone and it is much more powerful.
I think it is a good idea to list the purpose of each drug next to it or which "class" it is from.
In my opinion there are 2 basic classes of nootropics, 1. long term nootropics which either enhance the structure of the brain, or are neuroprotective, and 2. short term nootropics which "overclock" the brain, by stimulating certain neurotransmitters, with the downside of causing downregulation.
The way you should decide on which drug of a class of drugs to use is like this:
1. Effects (assuming decent evidence)
2. Safety
3. Evidence
4. Price
So the only way price comes into play if two drugs (say 2 racetams) have equal effects, equal safety, and there is equal studies for their effects. I know this will favor higher priced nootropics but I would be more interested in seeing which nootropics are the best rather than which is the best for each persons budget, which would mean everyone would come up with different lists.
Edited by 2150???????????, 04 December 2009 - 06:23 AM.