Ideas Wait, so addiction might not be a brain disease?
Mar 3, 2026
Hannah Pickard, philosopher of addiction who sees it as a behavioural disorder; Jovita Bydlowska, memoirist writing about relapse and long-term recovery; Dr. I. Michael Kaufman, retired physician and addiction memoirist. They probe whether addiction is driven by social circumstance and psychology, revisit famous rat experiments, discuss motives like self-medication and identity, and weigh diverse paths and supports for recovery.
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Addiction As Loss Of Psychological Intelligibility
- Addiction is a pattern of drug use that has lost ordinary psychological intelligibility.
- Hannah Pickard defines addiction by continued use despite severe costs like loss of jobs, housing, relationships, and health.
Rat Choice Experiments Challenge Brain Hijack Theory
- The classic isolated-rat cocaine experiment misled researchers by using an unnaturally impoverished environment.
- Choice experiments show rats prefer saccharin or social reward over cocaine when given alternatives, questioning the 'brain hijack' narrative.
Addiction Can Be An Act Of Self Harm
- Some people use drugs as deliberate self-harm rather than self-medication.
- Recognizing self-harm allows clinicians to apply suicide and self-harm interventions rather than only brain-disease treatments.
