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Comment by cheema33 | Hacker News Reader

I drink socially. Maybe once a month. And usually it is just one beer. And have never craved it. I think if I drank more often, my desire for it would not change. My brain is not wired to crave it I guess. If yours is, then it doesn't matter if you are drinking, socially or not, you have put yourself on a slippery slope.

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>I think if I drank more often, my desire for it would not change.

I highly doubt this would be the case (as in, alcohol doesn't work like that). Let's say that for every 10kg of your bodyweight you drink 2 beers per night (330ml), then by the time you get to day four you might be more worried about not getting a drink.

I would imagine by the time you get to day 4 of drinking 4-5 litres of beer per night, you’d be disgusted by the idea of another beer. You have to build up to numbers like that.

It's a spectrum. I started to slip at some point, stopped drinking for a year and a half, and now I have an occasional beer with friends and it's not a big deal. Peoples' experiences with alcohol are extremely variable.

> I think if I drank more often, my desire for it would not change.

I think that's a dangerous assumption, when you first start using any drug (or any other addictive activity), you can absolutely quit any time you want. But if you keep doing it with that mindset then you'll almost certainly get addicted eventually. The worst part is that you don't even realize that it's happening, it really sneaks up on you.

But the only serious addiction I've ever had (and quit) was nicotine so YMMV with alcohol.

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