Nicotine vs Smoking

That's a function of nicotine, not of smoking. There are plenty of less terrible ways of getting nicotine into your system.

According to the article, this is NOT smoking but nicotine itself.As written/described in the article, this would cover nicotine patches and gum to which your criticisms do not apply.

Because it's 90% not about the nicotine.

IIRC, vaping pure nicotine might be less addictive than smoking tobacco because tobacco contains a ton of other chemicals

Addiction aside (looking at you too caffeine)... how is nicotine bad exactly?

Smoking appears to be more addictive than nicotine by itself. Pure nicotine in low enough doses has a fairly low addiction potential, and is mostly benign. But smoke, and you get the whole combination of other cigarette content, social pressure and ritual.

Actually, Nicotine (without the rest of the cigarette) actually probably isn't as bad (in particular, might not be addictive).https://www.gwern.net/Nootropics#nicotine

Nicotine is a stimulant, similar to other stimulants such as caffeine. The addictiveness in smoking apparently comes from (1) high dose absorbed rapidly, and (2) combination with other chemicals in tobacco and tobacco products.Nicotine addiction per se (or caffeine addiction) can be harmful to people, but the scale of harm is orders of magnitude away from the harms of smoking a pack of cigarettes a day. In small doses and in moderation, nicotine alone (e.g. taken as patch or gum) can be an ef

Seems like nicotine is fine as long as it's combusted.

source please. afaik nicotine on itself is near negligibly harmful