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Comment by Stronico | Hacker News Reader

Well, daily drinking is a good predictor - 100% of practicing alcoholics drink every day after all.

That's not what would make it a good predictor. The proper question is not what percentage of alcoholics drink every day, but what percentage of people who drink every day are alcoholics.

Plenty of alcoholics don't drink every day. It's a question of compulsive and uncontrolled drinking not simply the frequency of drinking. A collage student may destroy their health and social life though binge drinking while not being able to afford drinking every day.

Plenty of people with drinking problems don't drink every day - alcoholics, which I would define as people addicted to alcohol do. If a person is addicted to alcohol they will have pretty immediate adverse affects, i.e. the DTs, which include shaking, hallucinations and seizures pretty rapidly with no alcohol in their system.

Physical dependence != addiciton.

http://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/principles-drug-addict...

Addiction often leads to physical dependence, but you can for example be a light smoker that's addicted to nicotine. However, you generally need to be a fairly heavy smoker before withdraw symptoms show up when you stop. On the other hand people without addiction to caffeine will often display withdrawal symptoms if they stop. This is vary common in people who enjoy soda or tea, but don't use it to stay adjust alertness.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Addiction

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_dependence

They're also 100% human, and they all tend to breathe at least twice a day.

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