The Morality of Alcohol

[Bryan]

Getting drunk is not immoral and drinking is not immoral as long as you know what you are doing and what it is doing to you.

Getting drunk is immoral. It impairs your judgement and ability to think rationally (along with all the other negative physical effects).

Have any of you actually been drunk?  The only thing drinking really causes (in terms of consciousness) is make you slur when you talk and not have really great motor skills.  It doesnt inhibit your rational faculty to the point of sheer stupidity.  It doesnt MAKE you do anything you wouldnt normally do, and if anyone tells you it does then they just want an excuse for acting stupid. 

How drunk is drunk? Have you ever drank to the point where you've blacked out for several hours? Have you ever been so drunk that you can't stop your hands shaking the next day when you sober up? In multiple scenarios, getting drunk can kill you. This is "slightly" more serious than making you "slur when you talk and not have really great motor skills". Of course drinking doesn't "make" you do anything, but, at the very least, stops you from "making" proper decisions.

Alcohol is just as serious a drug as cocaine or heroine. The only reason it's legal is because it's "socially" acceptable.

[Nxixcxk]

If it was true that drinking one drink destroyed your ability to focus, that would mean that after one drink, people would not simply be finding it hard to think, they'd be unresponsive to reality (which of course would make drinking immoral). But, I simply have never observed this. I can drink a beer or two (spaced out appropriately) and be 100% fully aware of reality - reality at that time usually being my dining experience or the good conversation that I am having with a buddy of mine.

One drink won't completely destroy your ability to focus, but it seems as though it should hinder it. I don't see how 10 shots can destroy your ability to focus, and 1 shot won't have its effects...even if minimal. It's not like all the sudden you hit the "marker" of 10 shots, and bam, your ability to focus goes away; but rather, it happesn gradually, one shot at a time.

It is widely agreed upon by all sorts of medical experts that the average person can have about one drink an hour with no cognitive effects whatsoever (the exact amount per person depends on a number of factors such as body wieght and metabolic rate).

I hate studies due to the numerous variables that aren't accounted for when tallying the results. I weigh 170lbs, am in good shape, don't drink, and know that if I were to have one drink, my mental faculties wouldn't be as good as they were prior to the drink. Thus, I find it hard that one drink doesn't impair the cognitive abilities of your "average" person. I'd like to know who these "average" people are, what they weight, what they eat, how many times they drink alcohol/month, what their life styles are like, etc. Nevertheless, your comment definitetly contradicts my personal experience with alcohol.

Drinking alcohol is not immoral. Intentionally getting drunk is. I'll point straight at Dagny Taggart and Hank Reardan as examples that even Miss Rand's heroes sometimes enjoyed a drink or two. They had wine at dinner together, and celebrated some occasion or another (I can't recall) with a glass of brandy.

This passage bothers me. Simply b/c Ayn Rand says it or writes it doesn't mean that it is necessarily true. P.S. I also remember her characters smoking cigarettes.

Alcohol is just as serious a drug as cocaine or heroine. The only reason it's legal is because it's "socially" acceptable.

If a drug's "seriousness" subsumes the drug's ability for one to become addicted, then it's incorrect to say that cocaine/heroine are as serious as alcohol.

[Bryan]

If a drug's "seriousness" subsumes the drug's ability for one to become addicted, then it's incorrect to say that cocaine/heroine are as serious as alcohol.

Coming up with a standard to measure the addictiveness drug would be very difficult. When I said that alcohol was a serious drug I meant the potential devastation it could have on one's life.

[dondigitalia]

I weigh 170lbs, am in good shape, don't drink, and know that if I were to have one drink, my mental faculties wouldn't be as good as they were prior to the drink.  Thus, I find it hard that one drink doesn't impair the cognitive abilities of your "average" person. I'd like to know who these "average" people are, what they weight, what they eat, how many times they drink alcohol/month, what their life styles are like, etc.  Nevertheless, your comment definitetly contradicts my personal experience with alcohol.

My stats are basically the same, and I have never observed any difference in my cognitive function after one drink, which is all I've had at one time for a very long while, so I can't say how much more it would take. I know that the average male weighs 175 lbs, is 5'10", and has a metabolism that burns about 2400 calories a day. These stats are consistent and frequent in the several fitness magazines I subscribe to. I can only assume that these are the statistics used to arrive at "1-drink-an-hour." Those figures are only averages, and as with all drug-effects, individual experiences will vary. It is up to each individual to know how much alcohol will impair their cognitive functioning, and act accordingly.

This passage bothers me. Simply b/c Ayn Rand says it or writes it doesn't mean that it is necessarily true. P.S. I also remember her characters smoking cigarettes.

I've never claimed that everything Miss Rand said or wrote is necessarily true. In fact, there are a good many points on which I disagree with her. To the best of my knowledge, however, her entire Ethics was true (as was every other philosophical statement she made). As far as her characters smoking cigarettes is concerned - had they known the full harmful effects of cigarettes were at the time Atlas Shrugged was written, I would regard her characters' smoking as immoral. An honest lack of knowledge is never immoral.

[Hal]

Many people have posted varients on the following:

Being drunk is like taking a break from reality itself. It dims your awareness and makes you uninhibited, or to put it another way, irresponsible.

Getting drunk ...  impairs your judgement and ability to think rationally (along with all the other negative physical effects).

This is utter nonsense and I've no idea why so many people believe it. I'm perfectly conscious, aware, and 'responsible' after I've been drinking. Alcohol does change the way in which I view and interpret the world, but this change does not consist in making me irrational, a/immoral, or incapable of reasoning and making decisions. Perhaps that is how alcohol affects you, and if so, I would advise you to avoid it. But you should avoid telling yourself that everyone else's experiences are the same as yours.

Edited April 1, 2005 by Hal

[Inspector]

You just keep telling yourself that, Hal. Alcohol consumption is proven to impair judgment.

[Hal]

I'm more than capable of introspecting my own experiences, thanks.

[Inspector]

I'm more than capable of introspecting my own experiences, thanks.

Not when under the influence of a substance that is known to impair judgment. It also impairs the judgment of whether or not it is impairing your judgment. In fact, I have heard that your judgment is the FIRST thing to go, before even motor skills and reaction time. So by the time you even realize you're drunk, your judgment is already gone.

[Hal]

Not when under the influence of a substance that is known to impair judgment. It also impairs the judgment of whether or not it is impairing your judgment. In fact, I have heard that your judgment is the FIRST thing to go, before even motor skills and reaction time. So by the time you even realize you're drunk, your judgment is already gone.

But this is utterly tautological - you're just asserting that it impairs judgement and then dismissing people's claims to the contrary since their judgement is held to be impaired (compare: "You are possessed by demons. What, you deny it? But denying it just what I would expect a demon to do!"). I'm tempted to ask for the evidence that alcohol impairs judgement, but a better question is "what would this evidence even look like?". How could one prove a claim like this - the best you could do is to show that some people judge 'differently' when drunk than they do while sober, and that in some cases these judgements are worse. But in other cases people might make judgements of a similar standard, or perhaps even better. And in the cases where they are judging 'worse', it might not be the alcohol that is directly causing them to do so, but rather a symptom of the alcohol which could manifest itself in other ways. For instance, I'm quite prepared to admit that alcohol changes the way people think, and also that it causes the "loosening of inhibitions". But I would claim that it is this loosening of inhibitions which causes people to make poor judgements rather than these being a direct result of alcohol itself. Some people may respond to their inhibitions being loosened by making bad judgements, but others may respond differently - people can handle the same stimuli in various ways.

Personally I find alcohol makes my thought take different patterns. Not 'better' patterns than normal, but not worse either. I normally think about the same sorts of things I do when sober, but in slightly different ways, and I often have ideas which probably wouldnt come to me while not drinking. But these ideas generally arent 'irrational', and they arent normally things which I would reject when the alcohol has worn off any more than I reject some of my sober thoughts at later times. It's very rare that I'll do something while drunk that I'll seriously regret the following day (probably just as rare as me doing something regrettable while sober).

Edited April 1, 2005 by Hal

[Inspector]

I understand it's tautological from your perspecive, but not to those who have tested it. I don't have the name of the study I saw, so feel free to ignore me if you like.

The test of judgment was asking "are you impaired?" and administering motor skills tests. Drunk people maintained that they were not impaired, even after failing the tests. There was a lot more to it (other trials, circumstances, etc), of course, but that's it in a nutshell.

[Hal]

I understand it's tautological from your perspecive, but not to those who have tested it. I don't have the name of the study I saw, so feel free to ignore me if you like.

Well, it's not the case that 'my judgement is impaired so I cant tell that my judgement is impaired', because at other times when my judgement has been impaired I've been perfectly aware of it. For instance when I've drunk too much, and become more drunk that I would like to be, I know that I start acting irrationally and will generally regret it the next day. And I've experimented with other drugs and found that some of them also cause my mind to function in ways I dislike, and I have realised this and not taken them again. But with moderate alcohol use none of this happens.

The test of judgment was asking "are you impaired?" and administering motor skills tests. Drunk people maintained that they were not impaired, even after failing the tests. There was a lot more to it (other trials, circumstances, etc), of course, but that's it in a nutshell.

There's an important 'after the fact' issue here - sometimes when drunk you will think you are acting rationally, but the next day you will realise you werent ("it made sense at the time..."). This often happens to me when I get 'too' drunk. But normally I can look back and find myself acting perfectly rationally, just different. Edited April 1, 2005 by Hal

[Inspector]

This often happens to me when I get 'too' drunk. But normally I can look back and find myself acting perfectly rationally, just different.

If it happens at all to you, then you are conceding my point. I never said that your judgment was impaired after ONE drink. I said simply that it is impaired by the time you are "drunk."

[Hal]

If it happens at all to you, then you are conceding my point. I never said that your judgment was impaired after ONE drink. I said simply that it is impaired by the time you are "drunk."

Being drunk isnt a binary thing. It's possible to drink too much alcohol and lose control, but this isnt what I do on 99% of ocassaions (I struggle to remember the last time I ended up that way, but it certainly wasnt within the last 2 years). I'm not talking about drinking until you lose consciousness, but rather 'getting a bit drunk with friends'.

Edited April 1, 2005 by Hal

[Nxixcxk]

Easy now gentlemen, easy now.

My stats are basically the same, and I have never observed any difference in my cognitive function after one drink, which is all I've had at one time for a very long while, so I can't say how much more it would take.

Interesting. I'm tempted to experiment more with one drink, as I can't remember how "full" my stomach was when taking that one drink. But according to your statistics, I would fall close to the "average" guy, with possibly my metabolism being a little higher.

I've never claimed that everything Miss Rand said or wrote is necessarily true.

And I'll take your word for it that you haven't. But I've definitely seen it elsewhere on the boards where a poster said "Ayn Rand said, dotdadotdadotdadot," where s/he was clearly alluding to it being right simply b/c Rand said it.

As far as her characters smoking cigarettes is concerned - had they known the full harmful effects of cigarettes were at the time Atlas Shrugged was written, I would regard her characters' smoking as immoral. An honest lack of knowledge is never immoral.

I found it quite dissatisfying that her characters smoked. I mean honestly, how intelligent do you have to be to know that cigarettes rape your body? Even if there weren't statistics out there to prove this was so, it seems quite obvious that when you take your first puff of cigarette (not that I have, but I've watched others) and almost throw up, that there must be something bad about the product.

It kind of reminds me of those people that tell me I should be sympathetic towards older folks who have lung cancer due to the fact that they didn't know smoking was bad for their health--no, of course it wasn't bad for their health, for some reason they just smelled like shit after smoking, coughed regularly, had tar stains on their teeth, had trouble breathing, and forgot to use common sense in order to figure out it was the choice to smoke that was ruining their lives'. (When I was younger I used to practice self-parasiting, where I'd chew up my whole arm uncontrollably...thankfully, even though there were no tests to show this was inimical to my health, I used common sense and found out that it was. (j/k, but you get my point)).

Alcohol does change the way in which I view and interpret the world, but this change does not consist in making me irrational, a/immoral, or incapable of reasoning and making decisions.

If you are viewing and interpreting the world differently than you usually do, and are still somehow making rational decisions, this tells me one of two things: 1) When you're not drunk, your view and interpretation of the things around you are incorrect and thus you're not capable of making rational decisions or 2) When you're drunk, you have a false sense about how you are viewing and interpreting things.

Your argument is tantamount to saying that someone taking hallucinogenic mushrooms is capable of rational decisions, even though their view of reality is distorted. If this is not what you're arguing, please clarify.

I'm tempted to ask for the evidence that alcohol impairs judgement

I haven't experienced enough times being drunk while trying to compare and contrast my mental abilities to say for certain that alcohol impairs judgement, but it definitely, unequivocally makes it harder to maintain focus--and focus is a prerequisite of judgement; one must make the choice to focus before making the choice to judge. Thus, from this we can see that judgement qua judgement isn't necessarily being impaired, but focusing one's mind is.

but a better question is "what would this evidence even look like?"

I completely agree with what you're getting at here, and would bet that most of the studies conducted regarding this issue were done poorly, or at least the testers may have jumped to conclusions.

[Hal]

If you are viewing and interpreting the world differently than you usually do, and are still somehow making rational decisions, this tells me one of two things:  1)  When you're not drunk, your view and interpretation of the things around you are incorrect and thus you're not capable of making rational decisions  or 2)  When you're drunk, you have a false sense about how you are viewing and interpreting things.

Some things are open to interpretation rather than having right or wrong answers. I dont mean that I interpret things like '2+2=4' or 'the sky is blue' different, but rather things such as personal feelings and my attitudes towards certain aspects of life. I also sometimes approach ideas from different angles than I do normally.

Your argument is tantamount to saying that someone taking hallucinogenic mushrooms is capable of rational decisions, even though their view of reality is distorted.  If this is not what you're arguing, please clarify.

Well, they could make rational decisions while hallucinating. For instance, suppose someone hallucinates a poisonous snake and runs away from it - in a sense this is a rational judgement (it is rational to run away if you believe there is a poisonous snake in front of you - what would be irrational would be walk towards it, pick it up, and sing it a song). There is ambiguity here because we could use the word 'rational' to describe just their conscious decisions (ie how they consciously choose respond to sensory input), or instead how rational their 'world' is while hallucinating (even if they arent consciously creating this 'world'). We can sensibly talk about someone making a rational decision in an irrational or unreal situation - we can behave both 'rationally' and 'irrationally' in dreams, but this is a different thing from saying the dreamworlds themselves are rational. But anyway, none of this applies to alcohol because alcohol isnt hallucinogenic. Edited April 1, 2005 by Hal

[Inspector]

Being drunk isnt a binary thing. It's possible to drink too much alcohol and lose control, but this isnt what I do on 99% of ocassaions (I struggle to remember the last time I ended up that way, but it certainly wasnt within the last 2 years). I'm not talking about drinking until you lose consciousness, but rather 'getting a bit drunk with friends'.

But the point is that when you are drunk, your judgment is impaired and since it impairs your judgment of that judgment, you're going to have to "ballpark" it pretty close to the side of sober if you want to ensure your judgment ISN'T impaired.

[Hal]

But the point is that when you are drunk, your judgment is impaired and since it impairs your judgment of that judgment, you're going to have to "ballpark" it pretty close to the side of sober if you want to ensure your judgment ISN'T impaired.

That's not really true. If we were to graph 'rationality' against 'alcohol consumed', I think you would be implying that there's some kind of direct relationship where the more alcohol you drink the less rational you are. But this isnt true (for me anyway) - its more like "I drink a bit of alcohol and am still rational, I drink more and remain rational but start seeing the world differently, I become drunk yet am still rational, but then a point is reached where going any further causes my judgement to be seriously impaired". It's like the point of being 'too' drunk causes our graph to resemble a cliff, and once you go over it you're going to fall very far, very quickly. But the surroundings of that cliff are quite pleasant, and I enjoy going for a picnic there once in a while. As long as you dont fall off, you can have an enjoyable time with no negative consequences.

Even this is a bit of a simplification because I find that my focus and concentration often actually increase after drinking a moderate amount. Not to an extent where they are greater than my 'most focused' sober states, but higher than they are normally.

Edited April 1, 2005 by Hal

[Inspector]

I am saying that the "pleasant" part you're talking about is actually where your judgment is impaired. You just don't know it because the alcohol is clouding your... well, you get the idea.

[Hal]

I think we've both exhausted our justifications (or at least I have) and have reached the point where we're just repeating ourselves, so I think we should agree to disagree and leave it at that.

Edited April 1, 2005 by Hal

[Nxixcxk]

Gotcha Hal thanks for the clarification

[ArmyPatriot]

Morality runs hand in hand with enjoying your life. Eventually you get to the point where you do whatever you get the greatest joy from, and most of the time this joy comes from achievement and relating/spending time with people of similar interest to yourself.

I drink coffee like a civ. I do so because I only sleep about 4 hours a night and sometimes when I'm reading something complex it can get tough to stay awake. I realize the reasons in which I do this, it makes sense, so I continue to do this.

If you didn't notice my user name, yes, I'm in the Army. Lower enlisted, and on top of that I just got back stateside a couple weeks ago. I have an extremely stressful job, but it's probably not for the reason that you're thinking. Anyone who knows anything about the Army knows that there isn't always the brightest people in charge and many times we'll waste hours upon hours doing something one way when it could be done 10x more effieciently with a little thought.

By no means am I complaining about it though. I'm mearly stating the facts. If I didn't love what I am doing I wouldn't be doing it. My job merely has a few trade-offs that make it tough.

So after 4-5 hours waiting in line to fix something that shouldn't have needed fixing in the first place, we finally get released. At this point I'm about to lose my mind from the raw stupidity I have just dealt with.

Your damn right I'm going back to my room to have a beer. In fact, I'll probably go get my buddy Wes, because Wes isn't a bad guy, and then we'll have a couple beers. We'll probably crank up some good music, kick back, and relax.

By this point I might be satisfied, so I'll get on the internet or pick up a book and start reading and studying. By chance if I'm still feeling a little "irked", I'm going to get on my bike and fly down the highway around a couple corners at about 110 mph.

Is this dangerous? Hell yes, and that's why I love it. Because I'm confident in my self and my ability to laugh in the face of this danger.

Morality (through an objective perspective) is the clearest path to happiness.

It's not IF you drink, or IF you do this and that. It's WHY.

Are you doing something because it will make you happy? Are you doing it because you love your life and love to relish on the thought of how good it is to just be alive? Or, are you doing it to lose yourself; to forget who you are and what you've done?

Maybe you're drinking because whatever you are doing in the meantime is that pointless, that mundane a task whereas the only thing that you can do to make it the slightest bit worthwhile is to get drunk. Should this be the case, why don't you do something constructive next time. Then you probably won't even want to drink.

The funny thing is that there are actually only a few people that I enjoy spending recreational time with. Occasionally I'll be forced into that situation where the only polite thing to do is spend some time with the other ones. In this situation, am I going to have a couple beers?

You're damn right I am.

[Inspector]

I think we've both exhausted our justifications (or at least I have) and have reached the point where we're just repeating ourselves, so I think we should agree to disagree and leave it at that.

I can agree to that. I leave open the possibility that you actually can tell when you've had too much and when you haven't.

[davidmsc]

"You have picked up a random stranger at a singles bar while drunk."

Being drunk is immoral, and any actions that result from such drunkenness are likely immoral, too.

[JMeganSnow]

"Being drunk is immoral, and any actions that result from such drunkenness are likely immoral, too.

How, exactly, is being drunk immoral? Is being intoxicated immoral? How about being short on sleep? Research has shown that you exhibit similar impairment to legal intoxication after something like 48 hours with no sleep. Is taking NyQuil immoral then? Sleeping pills?

I can't imagine that a particular mental state could be immoral, especially devoid of context as you've stated it here.

[brit2006]

How, exactly, is being drunk immoral? Is being intoxicated immoral? How about being short on sleep? Research has shown that you exhibit similar impairment to legal intoxication after something like 48 hours with no sleep. Is taking NyQuil immoral then? Sleeping pills?

I can't imagine that a particular mental state could be immoral, especially devoid of context as you've stated it here.

This is what I mean about Objectivists holding a Christian value system.