2018/06/13 by Hanna Pickard · 1 citation
Neuroscience · Psychology · #Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior #Pain Management and Placebo Effect #Psychedelics and Drug Studies
paper · doi:10.4324/9781315689197-2
openalex publication_date 2018/06/13 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/04/04
The orthodox conception of drug addiction within science and medicine is a neurobiological disease characterized by compulsive drug use despite negative consequences. Addiction is better characterized as involving choices which, while on the surface puzzling, can be explained by recognizing the multiple functions that drugs serve, and by contextualizing them in relation to a host of interacting factors, including psychiatric co-morbidity, limited socio-economic opportunities, temporally myopic decision-making, denial, and self-identity. The orthodox conception’s solution to the puzzle has two parts. The first appeals to compulsion to explain use in face of negative consequences. The second appeals to neurobiological disease to explain compulsion. The orthodox conception explains the puzzle of why addicts use drugs despite negative consequences by appeal to the claim that use is both compulsive and caused by a neurobiological disease. Despite the fact that addicts are notoriously prone to denial, it has received surprisingly little attention in both philosophical and scientific research on addiction.