Atlantic: Oblique praise of beer & booze

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What most of us want to know, coming out of the pandemic, is this: Am I drinking too much? And: How much are other people drinking? And: Is alcohol actually that bad?

The answer to all these questions turns, to a surprising extent, not only on how much you drink, but on how and where and with whom you do it. But before we get to that, we need to consider a more basic question, one we rarely stop to ask: Why do we drink in the first place? By we, I mean Americans in 2021, but I also mean human beings for the past several millennia.

Let’s get this out of the way: Part of the answer is “Because it is fun.” Drinking releases endorphins, the natural opiates that are also triggered by, among other things, eating and sex. Another part of the answer is “Because we can.” Natural selection has endowed humans with the ability to drink most other mammals under the table. Many species have enzymes that break alcohol down and allow the body to excrete it, avoiding death by poisoning. But about 10 million years ago, a genetic mutation left our ancestors with a souped-up enzyme that increased alcohol metabolism 40-fold.
--snrp--
Which came first, the bread or the beer? For a long time, most archaeologists assumed that hunger for bread was the thing that got people to settle down and cooperate and have themselves an agricultural revolution. In this version of events, the discovery of brewing came later—an unexpected bonus. But lately, more scholars have started to take seriously the possibility that beer brought us together. (Though beer may not be quite the word. Prehistoric alcohol would have been more like a fermented soup of whatever was growing nearby.)
--snrp--
Human civilization requires “individual and collective creativity, intensive cooperation, a tolerance for strangers and crowds, and a degree of openness and trust that is entirely unmatched among our closest primate relatives.” It requires us not only to put up with one another, but to become allies and friends.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/ar ... em/619017/

Explains many things, so i tells my wife it's in our genes. Plus, it's not my fault that all these craft breweries are competing for market share with new and groovy beers.

CDFingers
Crazy cat peekin' through a lace bandana
like a one-eyed Cheshire, like a diamond-eyed Jack

Re: Atlantic: Oblique praise of beer & booze

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Yes it's fun and each new generation discovers it. In spite of the Puritans and Prohibition, alcohol is plentiful though there are still dry counties and states with more restrictions than others. And of course the national 21 year drinking age.

Every year I go into the doctor for the usual blood and urine panel and always a similarly worded question, how much alcohol do you drink during the week? They want to hear "no more than four" and I nod my head. I start and stop drinking, I've done it all my life, between 2019 and 2020 I stopped for nine months, no medical reason I just didn't feel like a drink, sometimes it's been years. So in answer to the question, no I don't think I'm drinking too much.

States made sure that alcohol was available during the pandemic.
When the coronavirus swept the country, a lot of things government did in response were controversial. Politicians fought over mask-wearing rules and quarantine restrictions.

But one policy, making sure Americans have ready access to alcohol, was truly bipartisan.

"The State Liquor Authority is going to change its rules that will allow bars, restaurants and distilleries to sell their products off-premises," said New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, in mid-March.

Florida's Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis followed suit in May. "I allowed [bars and restaurants] to deliver alcohol, I think that's been pretty popular, we're probably going to keep that going," he told reporters.
According to Nielsen's market data, total alcohol sales outside of bars and restaurants have surged roughly 24% during the pandemic.

They found sales of spirits with higher alcohol content rose even faster, a more than 27% increase over last year.
https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/90877353 ... demic-ends
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: Atlantic: Oblique praise of beer & booze

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Llew wrote: Mon Jun 07, 2021 10:27 am I used this book in my history classes. It's about how each of these drinks changed the world, helping make it what we see today. The six are Beer, Wine, Hard Liquor (esp. Rum), Tea, Coffee, and Coca-Cola. Well-written, fascinating, and non-academic, so it's easy to read.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/387 ... _6_Glasses

Looks good, I added it to my order list.
I am a journalist and author based in London. My speciality is the use of historical analogy in science, technology and business writing. I have done various jobs at The Economist over the years, where I’m now deputy editor with special responsibility for digital stuff.
https://tomstandage.wordpress.com/about-me/
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: Atlantic: Oblique praise of beer & booze

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Years ago, I was talking to my college chaplain, and he told me about an Ice Age archaeological site in Turkey that was mentioned in one of his religious studies conferences. The oldest stone construction in the world. Ritual site - animal totems and such, but no signs of continuous habitation. OTOH, what they did have was booze. Big ass stone troughs with chemical traces of fermentation. People were trudging their asses miles across a high desert plateau to an isolated site where they built the world's first temple out of stone, and they got themselves hammered.

Reasons Jesus transubstantiated his blood into wine, eh?

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