If I ask Susan why she applied for a particular job, she will
set out grounds, namely inputs to the reasoning process, plus the consequent of
those grounds, namely the conclusion that she would like to do that job, which
is why she applied for it. This is a ground–consequent relation.
When I ask Susan why she sneezed, however, she does not
proceed to set out grounds, namely inputs to the reasoning process that led to
the sneeze. This is because the sneeze was involuntary, was not the result of a
reasoning process, and is attributable, rather, to a chain of causes. She might
answer that paprika always makes her sneeze. What we understand by this is that
she is cooking with paprika, the paprika is getting into the air though the
cooking vapours, the vapours are being breathed in and resting on the mucosa of
the respiratory system, and this is triggering an involuntary sneeze response.
This is a cause–effect relation.
Let’s turn to alcoholism. I drank for four years, from 1989
to 1993, over which period every aspect of my life deteriorated substantially.
I decided to stop drinking in January 1993, just after New Year, yet resumed
drinking within two weeks. Let’s ask the question, why did I start drinking
again? In fact, let’s ask the question, why was I drinking all through that
period?
Was I aware of the gradual impairment of every aspect of my
life? Yes.
Was this clearly as a result of my drinking? Yes.
Was the continuation of this deterioration a foreseeable
consequence of continuing to drink? Yes.
Did this impairment trouble me? Yes.
The first sub-question to ask is, was I drinking
voluntarily?
I did not want the foreseeable consequences. The answer to
this is therefore no, unless I was insane. The insane are unable to reason. We
now look as though we have found a reason: alcoholics, though sane generally,
suffer from temporary insanity, and, in this temporary insanity, a drink seems
like a good idea.
“The almost certain consequences that follow taking even a glass of beer do not crowd into the mind to deter us. If these thoughts occur, they are hazy and readily supplanted with the old threadbare idea that this time we shall handle ourselves like other people. There is a complete failure of the kind of defense that keeps one from putting his hand on a hot stove.” (Page 24, Big Book)
Is this the end of the story?
First of all, a nuance. There are situations where one feels
one has no good reason to drink; one simply wants to. This is the case covered
above: the ‘can’t I just have a beer?’ situation. But sometimes the drinking is
apparently deliberate:
“In some circumstances we have gone out deliberately to get drunk, feeling ourselves justified by nervousness, anger, worry, depression, jealousy or the like. But even in this type of beginning we are obliged to admit that our justification for a spree was insanely insufficient in the light of what always happened. We now see that when we began to drink deliberately, instead of casually, there was little serious or effective thought during the period of premeditation of what the terrific consequences might be.” (Page 37, Big Book).
This is really just a variation, however. Either way, there
is the “appalling lack of perspective” (Page 5, Big Book) that allows the
perceived benefit to outweigh the perceived cost.
Alcoholism therefore appears to be the persistently
occurring insanity of believing that the first drink is a good idea.
There is a slight fly in this ointment, however.
Two experiences.
1. On Tuesday, 2 June 1992, I wanted to go home from the
city centre to watch the last episode of thirtysomething, a show that was the
bright spot of my life. But the impulse to drink was strong, and, miserably, I
went to the pub to drink instead. I had a horrible evening. I did not want to
drink, but I was drinking.
2. On Friday, 25 December 1992, I knew that if I started
drinking, I would drink way too much. It would be a bad idea. I would not have
fun. There was nowhere to go to enjoy myself. And yet I drank, and I had a
miserable time, and I got so stocious I had to take to my bed, with a bottle of
gin and bottle of Cointreau. I drank, slept, woke up, drank, slept, woke up,
until Boxing Day.
In both cases, I was suffering no delusion, no insanity
whatsoever, at the mental level. But I ‘did the insane thing’: I did something
that was counterintuitive, irrational, even though my reason was functioning
perfectly.
In both cases, I was fully aware that I was acting under
internal compulsion, and that that compulsion was beyond reason and willpower.
My reason put up a perfect argument, yet this had no effect on the impulse,
which was implacable. I did not perceive myself to have a choice in the matter,
so the impulse won and I drank.
The conclusion must be drawn that I was only ever drinking
under compulsion, and that the temporary insanity was alcoholism’s method of
easing the path to the first drink, convincing me that a drink was a good idea
and I was acting of my own free will. However, when reality bled through the
bandages of the temporary insanity, and I coldly understood what was happening,
I drank anyway, as if by clockwork. Turns out the impulse was always going to
win, and the ‘reasoning’ was really the rationalising cover story, constructed
after the impulse arose.
Once there is any suspicion that compulsion might be
involved—entailing the powerlessness of the individual to resist that
compulsion—the individual’s thoughts and feelings cease to constitute reliable
evidence of anything. If you think someone might be a spy or in the pay of a
paymaster, what they say immediately falls under suspicion, because professed
innocence is what you would expect both from the innocent and the guilty. If
compulsion conceals its nature with the appearance of free will, the person
acting under free will is going to ‘explain’ their actions, providing grounds
for the consequent. They will be indistinguishable from someone with free will
in their presentation of ‘reasons’.
Thus, to determine whether I am powerless over alcohol,
drugs, and other behaviours, the matter of what I think and feel in the period
of premeditation is irrelevant. It constitutes no evidence whatsoever.
If I repeatedly behave in a way that is foreseeably damaging
and I regret the damage, there are four possible bases: error, general
psychosis, temporary insanity, or compulsion. In a person of normal
intelligence, error is implausible if the behaviour recurs persistently. In a
person who is not generally psychotic (and few alcoholics are), general
psychosis provides no explanation. Temporary insanity is plausible but drops
away as an explanation when the person drinks against their perceived will and
with full knowledge of their condition. The only remaining candidate is
compulsion.
Now, when compulsion is operative, motivation is neither
here nor there. When I am compelled by anything—be it another person or an
imperious urge, an overriding impulse, an implacable necessity—the person, the
urge, the impulse, the necessity is the cause, and the action is the effect.
Motivation is moot.
If I am a passenger of the bus, and the bus turns left, I
turn left because the bus has turned left. You would not ask me for my
motivation, because the bus turned left without my being consulted.
If I take an action at gun point, the answer to the question
‘why did you take the action?’ comes in the form not of motivation but by a
mere statement of compulsion: I was compelled; that is why I took the action.
Since alcoholism concerns powerlessness, it concerns
compulsion. I am compelled to take the first drink and thereafter compelled to
take the rest. I am in the territory of cause and effect, not ground and
consequent.
What this means is that all of the discourse in AA about the
perceived benefit of what alcohol did for me, the special effect it had, the
reasons I had for drinking, the feelings that it relieved, my mental,
emotional, material, and spiritual condition before I ever drank and during my
drinking, what I was feeling or thinking in general or on any particular
occasion, the notion I drank in response to anything, the notion I drank on
feelings of X, Y, or Z, the purpose of drinking, or any related topics are predicated
on an error, namely that alcoholic drinking is explained by a ground–consequent
relation, when it is really explained by a cause–effect relation. One’s story
might mention thoughts and feelings only to demonstrate the opposite: that they
had nothing at all to do with one’s drinking.
It is often said, quoting the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, that Step One is the only Step that can be taken perfectly. I might hazard the assertion that it is the only Step in AA that has almost never been taken at all. If someone answers the question, ‘Why did you drink’ with ‘Because I was compelled by alcoholism: I was powerless over alcohol’ (or something equivalent), then they have understood Step One. If thoughts, feelings, motivations, and purposes enter into the explanation, then the individual has not yet started to under the concept of compulsion.