The Irrationality of Alcoholics Anonymous

[Tanj]

Good for Rock. I don't know who that is.
Does Rock help anybody?

Sadly, Rock is unable to help those with Chronic Severe Irony Deficit Disorder.

 

[Sketcher]

I hear it's useful to join if you ever get busted. Even if you don't have a drinking problem.

 

[Belk]

The Bad Science of Alcoholics Anonymous

Thought provoking article about alcoholism and drug abuse and the ways society treats (or doesn't treat) them.

Thank you. I was unaware of this.

 

[samiam]

Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but the original post (and the article it links to) is so inaccurate, a correction needs to be made.

I find it interesting that one of the first defenses people jump to is "AA always works when people put their best effort into it."

It also happens to be true. Fiorentine 1999 shows that, of people who work the AA or NA program, 75% stay sober. Moos and Moos 2006 shows that, of people who seriously work the AA program, 67% are sober 16 years later (compared to the 33% sober 16 years later who didn’t go to AA at all).

Fact is, as the article demonstrates, it doesn't always work. It doesn't even work most of the time. The best numbers that could be found are in the single digits.

Any claim that AA success is in the single digits is at best dubious, and is probably downright false. AA has a 67-75% success rate (I already named the peer reviewed science demonstrating this). It has been shown that people who go to more AA meetings because of randomization stay sober more, see Humphreys 2014.

Instead of saying "well, those 90+ percent of people just didn't try enough, so why should we care about them?"

There has never been a peer reviewed paper concluding AA had a 5% or 10% success rate. The old 5% success rate figure comes from AA critics misreading a confusing and poorly labeled graph; the actual 1-year retention rate when the graph is correctly read is 26%.

 

[durangodawood]

....Taking drugs is not the answer.....

Well we heard from a person here who said that a particular drug was the answer for him.

I didnt sense he was lying or even mistaken.

 

[grasping the after wind]

AA may be a poor performer but it has actually worked for some people. A much higher success rate than any socialist state has. Yet some people will still put forward socialism as a solution while perhaps condemning AA. AA's success when, it is successful, may stem form it being voluntary where a socialist state requires compulsory compliance or elimination. If AA simply went about eliminating those that did not comply it could claim 100% success.

 

[grasping the after wind]

Well we heard from a person here who said that a particular drug was the answer for him.

I didnt sense he was lying or even mistaken.

If the drug needs to continue being taken then that would just be switching addictions would it not? I do not know whether that is the case but if the drug leads to a cure I would want every alcoholic to take.

 

[durangodawood]

If the drug needs to continue being taken then that would just be switching addictions would it not? I do not know whether that is the case but if the drug leads to a cure I would want every alcoholic to take.

Not sure. I dont think needing a drug for a medical condition, and taking it without the feeling of craving, is really an addiction.

Plus the alcohol has all manner of awful side effects when abused that (presumably) the other drug doesn't.

 

[grasping the after wind]

Not sure. I dont think needing a drug for a medical condition, and taking it without the feeling of craving, is really an addiction.

Plus the alcohol has all manner of awful side effects when abused that (presumably) the other drug doesn't.

I do not know the drug in question either so cannot say an about side effects but IMO if one must take a drug or give in to an addiction one is as addicted to that drug as the other. One addiction may be less harmful than the other but one is still addicted.

 

[Belk]

AA may be a poor performer but it has actually worked for some people. A much higher success rate than any socialist state has. Yet some people will still put forward socialism as a solution while perhaps condemning AA. AA's success when, it is successful, may stem form it being voluntary where a socialist state requires compulsory compliance or elimination. If AA simply went about eliminating those that did not comply it could claim 100% success.

I think I missed where it was claimed that socialism was a good method for curing alcoholism?

 

[samiam]

I think I missed where it was claimed that socialism was a good method for curing alcoholism?

Well, I can see how such an argument can be made. Salon magazine argued in 2014 that AA does not help people stay sober (those arguments are dubious, as I pointed out earlier in this thread). Salon is a far-left magazine which can be argued supports socialism (the other two publications which parroted those same dubious numbers, NPR and The Atlantic, are also left-leaning). Although I can’t link to a specific example, some people who claim AA has a low success rate make the case that the state should pay for them to have some other treatment (such as expensive therapy or medication-assisted treatment). Therefore, people who think AA doesn't work are socialists who think the state should cure people of alcoholism.

Never mind that this argument ignores the fact that well-known AA critic Stanton Peele has written for the Libertarian magazine Reason, but there you go.

 

[durangodawood]

I do not know the drug in question either so cannot say an about side effects but IMO if one must take a drug or give in to an addiction one is as addicted to that drug as the other. One addiction may be less harmful than the other but one is still addicted.

I see it like, say, high blood pressure medication. Sure, for your health you need to stay on it. But its not quite proper to call it an addiction.

 

[grasping the after wind]

I think I missed where it was claimed that socialism was a good method for curing alcoholism?

I think you may be missing a lot of things.

 

[grasping the after wind]

I see it like, say, high blood pressure medication. Sure, for your health you need to stay on it. But its not quite proper to call it an addiction.

Except blood pressure medicine addresses a symptom of an underlying health problem not of an underlying addiction. If one must take one drug to keep for taking another then one is still addicted.

 

[durangodawood]

Except blood pressure medicine addresses a symptom of an underlying health problem not of an underlying addiction. If one must take one drug to keep for taking another then one is still addicted.

Alcohol addiction is considered an underlying health problem, and not just a willpower deficit, by pretty much all health professionals.

 

[bhsmte]

I do not know the drug in question either so cannot say an about side effects but IMO if one must take a drug or give in to an addiction one is as addicted to that drug as the other. One addiction may be less harmful than the other but one is still addicted.

Being 'addicted' and needing a drug for a medical condition, are two entirely different things.

Many people take drugs to control diabetes or blood pressure, but are not 'addicted' to the drug.

 

[Belk]

I think you may be missing a lot of things.

So it is completely irrelevant to the topic at hand?

 

[Nithavela]

Moderators, please close this thread.

 

[samiam]

Moderators, please close this thread.

I take it that you concede that the numbers in that old 2015 article from The Atlantic are, at best, dubious (in particular, AA has a 75%—not 10%—success rate) and that the scientific evidence shows that Alcoholics Anonymous helps keep alcoholics sober.

If you’re going to start a thread using very dubious numbers and questionable evidence, I don’t think it’s fair to ask the thread to be closed once the weak evidence is questioned.

 

[grasping the after wind]

Alcohol addiction is considered an underlying health problem, and not just a willpower deficit, by pretty much all health professionals.

I haven't said anything about will power now have I.