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Comment by diminoten | Hacker News Reader

Well okay sure, but engineered or not, alcohol is very addictive. There are probably more addictive substances, but alcohol really is up there on that list. You could probably engineer a better addictive substance, but not one nearly as pervasive in global culture.

There's something truly unique about alcohol that isn't true of any other addictive substance on the planet.

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> There's something truly unique about alcohol that isn't true of any other addictive substance on the planet.

Except nicotine, sugar, caffeine, etc.

Honestly I'd say your argument is a much better fit for sugar.

I'm saying this as someone who went off it for a few years, and now back on it, trying to quit.

Tremendously addictive, and it's EVERYWHERE.

Birthday? Cake. Meeting up with friends? Drinks. Easter? Candy. Date? Chocolate. Did something good? Reward with cookies.

I sound like I'm on some bandwagon, but I'm not trying to argue that honey or agave or anything else is better, but there's very little sugar naturally in any real food, and we can't escape it.

Alcohol is at most gatherings, but it really isn't nearly as pervasive.

Aren't fruits full of sugar?

Sure, that is naturally occuring, and I wouldn't advise eating too much of it either, but at least the ratio is offset by a lot of fiber (and water), so you get somewhat full.

But I get your point, it shouldn't really be about what's naturally occuring, but how it affects your body. I stay away from fruit as well.

The problem with sugar is, IMO, glycemic index. With glucose being an index of 100, no sugar being an index of 0, and something that takes a moderate amount of time to convert from starches/etc to sugar being 50, things that are higher than 50-60 tend to spike your blood sugar and cause insulin to scavenge the sugar out and store it in fat. Doing that often causes things like insulin resistance and obesity as you get hungry again when your blood sugar drops.

Fruits have a surprisingly low glycemic index because they aren't processed and you have to get through fiber and digest the cells before having access to all of the sugar. I've changed my diet to avoid sugar and notice that I very rarely feel actively hungry/crashy vs. before, and most fruit is just fine.

http://www.glycemicedge.com/glycemic-index-chart/

I checked the table you linked and:

Apple: 38 Banana: 51 Pineapple: 66 Watermelon: 72

vs.

Ice Cream (premium): 37 Sponge Cake: 46 Frosted Flakes: 55 Snicker's Bar: 55

Fruits really are very high GI compared to regular snack foods. They're relatively healthy for other reasons though.

A perhaps better measure is glycemic load, which takes mass into account. 400 calories of frosted flakes is about 100g. 400 calories of watermelon is 1.3kg. Watermelon's glycemic index is worse, but at reasonable serving sizes, fruits generally end up being way better.

You also cherry picked, figuratively speaking. More literally, you didn't pick the cherries at an index of 22. There are a lot of fruits in the 20s to 40s. I tend to stay away from both pineapple and watermelon.

Somehow I've never really had a sweet tooth at all. I usually decline sweet foods when people are handing around cake or cookies, or only accept to be polite and take a small slice. But get some nice savoury food near me and I'll scarf it all down. For some reason umami is to me what sugar is to others.

I'm the same way. I call it a salty tooth. I couldn't care less about desserts, but if someone offers me some smelly camembert, or bread and olive tapenade, or a bonito rice ball, you better watch out because it's all going into my mouth.

Definitely.

By the way, if you're looking for a way to get a clean break from sugar, following the paleo induction plan "Whole30" has worked well for me. The initial withdrawal symptoms are not fun, but the limited time span and the clarity of the program made it relatively easy to do.

Feel free to email if you want to discuss. I'm so glad to be off it again; I feel healthier and my mood is so much more positive and even.

Thanks! I'll look into it.

I didn't have any trouble quitting last time, but having a family and more commitments now makes it tougher to completely revamp your habits.

What I find most fascinating is how I can look outside myself and notice how my rational brain time and time again gets disregarded by impulse, while knowing what I know. It's like observing someone else.

I have clear memories and notes over how (as you describe) my mood was better and I felt healthier, yet an immediate impulse with a fleeting effect takes priority, while knowing it will only prolong the problem.

> There's something truly unique about alcohol that isn't true of any other addictive substance on the planet.

Alcohol is a viable a substitute for carbohydrates for feeding nerve cells. Ethanol -> acetate -> ATP. Some research was published a few years ago about how the brains of heavy drinkers switch to running on acetate....

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-03/joci-eba0301...

Huh. It looks like alcohol is in the middle of the common drugs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substance_dependence#Dependenc...

I'm not sure about pervasiveness, though. In the US, a lot more people are caffeine dependent. And Facebook's MAU is way higher than alcohol's.

pervasiveness is a factor. If you think of the addiction as an "infection" then relapse/reinfection is a lot easier when the reinfection vectors are pervasive.

I read this in a drug information pamphlet a long time ago; basically it said that cocaine and heroin both bind to a different set of receptors to the other, but alcohol binds to both. Which is what makes it uniquely addictive. Its obviously not as strong as either of those drugs but combines the nature of both.

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