> >Sociology has been miserable failure on this topic, IMHO. Addiction is
> >proving to have a rock-solid and powerful biological basis. It is a
> >disease.
>
> The sociological literature debunks the idea that there is a biological
> basis for addiction. As far as I know, there is no rock solid evidence,
> yet, that show that people who are addicts are so becasue they were
> congenitally born to become addicts.
But there is a biological basis for addiction! It's well-documented physiological science. Read around outside sociology. "Ignore" is not "debunk."
> All you're pointing at is that long-term drug use changes the "reward
> circuitry of the brain". So? That doesn't change the research findings:
> Some of the so-called effects of the drug have nothing to do with the
> drug,
> as defined by its _chemical_ structure in and of itself, but have mainly
> to
> do with the social conditions under which addicts use drugs. Nothing about
> opium, for ex, that cause additcs to starve themselves. When they're
> around free, prepared food, they eat and maintain healthy weights. So, one
> so-called danger of the drug isn't about the drug, but wholly about social
> conditions. That doesn't mean that opium doesn't make addicts tolerate
> hunger better, that is surely an effect that results from the drug itself.
> It just means that opium doesn't make people not want to eat at all and it
> means that, if there's a danger there, the danger lies in lack of money
> and
> lack of ready-to-eat affordable meals or maybe just social isolation of
> living only around other opium addicts with no one around to say, "Chow
> time!"
I'm not arguing that it's _all_ biology. I'm arguing that talking about the topic without starting in biology is worse than a fool's errand. Of course the social context of drugs is overwhelmingly important. But drug addiction is biological as well as social. It is not a mere "story," unless you want to treat everything in the world that way. But, then, why would you care about sociology?
>
> >And BTW, since when do you get to separate the lifestyle impacts of drugs
> >from the drug itself?
>
> I'm not sure what you're getting at. Can you give me an example of how the
> chemical structure of a substance invariably causes social behavior? I can
> think of examples, I'd like to understand, though, what you mean, because
> it's not clear.
Opiates alter brain functioning, learning, and behavioral tendencies. Again, the literature in medicine is mountainous.
> > That's exactly the same as what the NRA says about
> >guns.
>
> LOL. First of all, whatever it is that the NRA says -- I have no clue what
> you're driving at -- this is called logical fallacy. It's the same
> maneuver
> as painting someone's posish as "like the nazis".
Untrue. The NRA wants to talk about guns as if they are a neutral technology. Handguns are people killers, and their availability immensely increases the murder rate in any society over what it would be otherwise. In direct analogy, the junkies on this board want to say that opium has no inherent problems. It does, if you are somebody who holds a humanist/democratic view of individuals.