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Getting too stoned always has been—and always will be—an absolutely awful feeling. You reach that tipping point where your high turns from mellow to paranoid, and all of a sudden you’re stumbling uncontrollably down a rabbit hole of terrifying thoughts which all lead to the conclusion that the world is ending. Nobody likes how it feels.

Ever since recreational cannabis became legal, the risks of overconsuming have raised debates about potency. (Remember Maureen Dowd’s 2014 hotel room freak-out?) That panic has returned with force in recent months, as cannabis has become more popular than ever, and dispensaries are advertising ever more potent products. Earlier this year, the New York Times blasted the cannabis industry for fighting bills that limit potency. Such laws have been proposed around the country, including in New York , Colorado (where it applies only to people under 25), and Florida, and would put caps on THC flower potency between 0.3 and 15 percent. (Commercially available cannabis usually contains at least 20 percent THC.)

The problem is that lawmakers and the media alike deeply misunderstand how cannabis potency actually works. Peter Grinspoon, a physician, Harvard Medical School instructor, and author of Seeing Through the Smoke, on medical cannabis, told Slate that limits on the simple percentage of THC in cannabis products could actually hurt medical patients for a number of reasons. People adjust their doses based on the strength of a product—so if they’re smoking a product that’s half as strong, for example, they might end up smoking twice as much, doing further damage to their lungs. Studies have shown that consumers will naturally use less when the product is stronger.

“When I was growing up, one of the arguments against cannabis was that it was so weak, you had to smoke so much, and it was bad for your lungs,” Grinspoon said. “Now it’s stronger. And the argument is it’s so dangerous because it’s so potent.” On top of potential lung damage, Grinspoon says that weakening potency will simply make cannabis more expensive for medical patients, and “twice as expensive for people on fixed incomes, like veterans and older people.”

Existing and past laws limiting cannabis potency are misguided not just because they might actually lead people to consume more, but because they’re written in a way that fails to understand the complexity of cannabis potency, according to Brien Hoffhine, director of cultivation at Loudbird Cannabis in Boulder, Colorado. The misunderstanding originated with the 2018 Farm Bill, which stipulates that cannabis potency should be determined by the percentage of the cannabinoid delta 9 THC—the most well-known intoxicating component of cannabis—in a product.

“They just had no idea how the science actually worked,” Hoffhine told Slate. What the lawmakers misunderstood is that THCA, which is often present in higher quantities than delta 9 THC and which does not influence legal potency levels in the Farm Bill, can convert to delta 9 THC when it’s smoked. On top of that, there are many other cannabinoids in the plant that can make a high more powerful.

Hoffhine admits that consumers gravitate toward high-THC products, and that influences what he grows and sells. He says that if the weekly menu that Loudbird puts out has products with THC levels below 20 percent, they won’t get any orders.

But the percentages listed on product labels and menus don’t tell the whole truth. THC potency is determined through mandatory lab testing. But, Hoffhine explained, labs can return dramatically different results for the same plant. It’s an open secret in the industry that brands will shop around labs to get the highest potency result, and multiple studies have shown that potency labels on products are usually inflated. So when the New York Times reports that a certain brand is selling the most potent weed around, they might inadvertently be promoting the brand’s dubious marketing claims.

Masha Ty, who works for ACS Laboratory, which tests cannabis products in Florida, told Slate that her lab has lost clients because they refused to inflate their THC numbers. “We don’t give them the high numbers that they want to see, so they leave,” Ty said. “It’s bad, right? But we’re under NDA. We can’t really call them out.”

Ty emphasizes that, unlike alcohol, cannabis potency is influenced by multiple components, and varies quite a bit based on the individual consumer. There are at least 118 cannabinoids in the plant that go beyond the well-known THC and CBD, and they all interact with one another to produce different kinds of highs. Different individuals, too, have different endocannabinoid systems, which will affect their response to different products. Terpenes, which exist in all plants, can also contribute to the quality of the high. These compounds help “steer” the experience, Ty explained, because they can make it focused, relaxing, or uplifting.

Newer to the market are THC distillates and concentrates, which can contain up to 95 percent THC. These products are more potent in some ways, but they also provide a more one-dimensional experience, because they only contain THC.

Grinspoon is concerned about how the market has gravitated toward high-THC cannabis. “I think we fetishize high THC, and we could do a lot better with lower THC,” he said, adding that CBD can mitigate some of the addictive qualities of cannabis, and other cannabinoids have more medical benefits.

Grinspoon, Hoffhine, and Ty all agree that potency limits aren’t the answer, but they also find that the market focus on THC is misguided. To fix this, they want better research and education about all of the components of cannabis and how they affect different people differently.

For example, if people understood the science behind cannabis edibles, they’d know why some people simply aren’t affected by them , no matter how potent they are. “Some people don’t even process it,” Ty explained. “So they eat gummies and nothing will happen to them.”

It’s just one example of how deeply complicated cannabis potency is. Until lawmakers learn to understand it, they have no hope of effectively regulating it.

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