The Molecule of More

DRUGS

Inexperienced drinkers get the two confused. They start

drinking, push their blood alcohol level up, and experience

the pleasures of dopamine release, then mistakenly believe

that the pleasure is the pleasure of intoxication. So they

keep drinking more and more, trying in vain to get the rush

back. It ends badly, often bent over a toilet.

Some people figure this out on their own. A woman seen

at a cocktail party said she always had more fun with mixed

drinks than with beer. At first this appeared to be nonsense,

because alcohol is alcohol whether it comes from a beer

or a daiquiri. But science validates the woman’s experience.

A mixed drink is more concentrated, and it’s usually sweet-

ened with sugar, so people tend to drink it faster. Mixed

drinks usually contain more alcohol than beer or wine.

Therefore a mixed drink delivers a lot of alcohol fast, a burst

of dopaminergic stimulation, as opposed to an evening of

slowly increasing intoxication. This woman wanted elation,

not inebriation, so of course the mixed drinks let her have

a better time. She was getting a dopamine hit from a few

cocktails that an evening of many beers couldn’t deliver.

THE CRAVING THAT NEVER STOPS

Although craving never stops as long as an addict keeps using drugs, the
brain gradually loses its ability to deliver the high—the desire circuit
simply reacts less and less, so much so that they might as well replace
the drug with salt water.^1

1 When scientists injected long-time cocaine users with a stimulant similar to cocaine,
they released 80 percent less dopamine than healthy people given the same drug.
The dopamine released by the addicts was about the same amount that the scien-
tists saw when they injected a placebo—an inactive substance, such as salt water.