The Delusion of being in “Control of oneself” after drinking

I am a social drinker… But I socialize quite often!! However, I have always (mostly) limited the amount of drinks I take per sitting.

Reasons being:

1) It's expensive to drink too much, both for pocket and liver.

2)The fun is in the woozy state and not being sloshed out

3)Alcohol in limited quantities enhance the fun of conversations but reduces it if quantity increases a lot. (Law of diminishing returns)

4) No hangover the next day

5) I like being in control of myself even after a drinking session.

I have always been proud about myself wrt the 5^th point, in fact to an extent of looking down upon people who loose control of themselves after drinking. This post will burst the myth of it.

I held that belief (5^th point) largely because of comparison between “control I possess in my drunk state“ and “control others possess in their drunk state”. But who are the others? It's only those drinkers who loose control of themselves (quite evidently) after drinking. But I had missed one major aspect in my comparison, which is the level of “control I posses in my sober state” and the level of “control the others posses in their sober states”. The following graph will help in understanding of where my delusion came from:

* - There are no specific units for measuring the amount of control one has. The measures used here are coherence in talking (Rather Bullshitting), walking, etc etc. Arbitrarily I am assigning 1 to the absolute but hypothetical saint state and 0 to completely sloshed out state.

The point of importance here is at 180mL (3 pegs of alcohol). My delusion came form the fact that I was more or less like others even when 3 pegs had gone down. But the catch here is, my comparison was between my drunk state to others' sober state. But if the comparison was between my own sober state to drunk state, my control has reduced. So will I stop drinking because of this realization? Let action speak louder than words ;-)

P S: Since I am not used to drinking large quantities of alcohol in one sitting, I get sloshed out quite easily than others (Point at 300mL)

A Number Line Representation of Social Interaction

The dynamics behind how 2 non blood relatives form a relation.

Disclaimer : The below analysis works in the context where there is freedom and opportunity for social interaction. Extreme situations of power, gender hierarchy is out of the scope.

1. First impression OR Forced conditions - I think initially people start talking/socializing voluntarily if the first impression (physical, behavioral etc etc) are compelling or there are forced conditions (Teacher student, colleagues, neighbors etc etc)
   
   
2. Reinforcement/Deinforcement of created impressions OR creation of new impressions - With more and more interaction, if characteristics match the created impression, it continues to strengthen else alternative (Good or Bad) impression starts to get formed. Under forced conditions scenario, a impression starts to get formed assuming there was no strong first impression to begin with (There will always be a little. None of us are so objective in our approaches).
   
   
3. The Outcome - I would like to invoke a concept here. A number line to represent the nature of our social interaction. Unlike the mathematical number line, this has finite numbers on either side of 0. 
   
   1. The 0 - This is the absolute neutral state one can have wrt to the other person. Meaning, the other person is neither a positive aspect to one's life nor negative. I have nothing to gain or lose types. He/she just exists in the one's life because conditions expects that. Eg: A perfectly neutral colleague
      
   2. The + side of number line – If the first impression is good, we already start on the positive side of the number line wrt the other person. With interaction it can continue to progress on the positive side. If the first impression is bad, we already start on the negative side of the number line wrt the other person. With interaction it can cross 0 and come to positive side. If started from 0, it will simply move towards + side
      
   3. The - side of number line – If the first impression is bad, we already start on the negative side of the number line wrt the other person. With interaction it can continue to progress on the negative side. If the first impression is good, we already start on the positive side of the number line wrt the other person. With interaction it can cross 0 and come to negative side. If started from 0, it will simply move towards – side.
4. The limits (A very important aspect according to me) – The number line concept pretty much exist universally. But what differs from person to person is the magnitude of positive and negative numbers. (The positive side and negative side need not be equal).
   
   2. Positive limit - For a person, if the social interaction has reached his/her positive limit (Could vary from small positive to large positive), the he/she wishes/attempts to convert that relation (which has just been in social circle till now) to a personal level. Eg: A very close friend, A mentor, A lover etc etc.
   3. Negative limit - For a person, if the social interaction has reached his/her negative limit (Could vary from small negative to large negative), then he/she wishes/attempts to break away from that relation and throw the other person of the social circle.
      

The above is what a natural progression usually looks like. As always, there will be exceptions. Can one follow such a algorithm in a war field for that matter? Even if someone has loong crossed the negative limit, the soldier should still hang on.
 

Who is a Great parent?

I have been an Anti natalist from a long time now. A simple Google search will help one know what anti natalism is all about and therefore I am not going to expand on that. With that as the premise, the term “Good parent” does not evoke positive feelings in me. In order to be a good parent, one has to be a parent first, which is an act of pure selfishness. The selfishness of having the pleasure of giving birth, raising a child, filling the void in one's life etc etc.

“Selfishness is not as one wishes to live,it is asking others to live as one wishes to live” - Oscar Wilde

But what about the child itself?? Has a consent being taken from the non existent person that whether he/she wants to be born in the first place?

According to Jimmy Alfonso Licon, procreation is only morally justified if there is some method for acquiring informed consent from a non-existent person, and due to the impossibility of this, procreation is therefore immoral

In my opinion, lot of parents simply suck. A good parent at the max is just a bad parent (for choosing to be a parent). So who is a great parent? The answer is, A Non parent!!!

A person who chooses to be a non parent by fighting all the biological needs and social pressures in the pure interest of the child (Non existent of course) is a Great parent.

Finally,

Sleep is good. Death is better. Not being born is the best!

Rational OR/AND Emotional?

It's not uncommon that one gets type casted as a rational person OR an emotional person. In reality, are they mutually exclusive or do they co exist? Is it right to say a person is rational/ emotional person? Or would it be appropriate to say that a person is rational at some points of time/situations and emotional in others??. I think the concept of chemical equilibrium would be of some help in this context.

Let us invoke a constant called K _personality (K_p ). This constant is a measure of both rational and emotional components of a person and it stays more or less constant for a person. At any point in time/situation, our reactions/ behavior are a combination of both the components and K_p tells which of the 2 components is dominating. So the equilibrium condition looks somewhat like this

 

                               [Emotions]

                          K_p =  -----------------

                                       [Reason]

If, K_p < 1, The person's rational component dominates.

If, K_p = 1, The person's rational and emotional components are roughly equal.

If, K_p > 1, The person's emotional component dominates.

In my opinion, K_p is unique to a person. For Eg: If my K_p is 0.5, it implies my rational faculty dominates the emotional faculty. Now what happens if this equilibrium is altered by external factors?? As always, Le chatelier's principle comes into picture.

Scenario 1: If RHS (Emotions) are high under some altered conditions.

Loss of a job, troubled relationship, achievement etc etc can have heightened emotions (happy, sad, anxiety, stress, fear etc depending on the situation). Since the equilibrium is altered, the rational faculty comes into picture to reduce the emotions such that the equilibrium is restored. 
 

• Say I loose a job and troubled by it, then I would say to myself that it's not so hard to get another job and so the situation is not very bad.  
• Say there is lot of jubilation due to an achievement, then I would recall the temporariness of everything in order not to get carried by the happiness.

In such cases, the rational understanding of the world will help to calm down the heightened emotions such that K_p is restored.

Scenario 2: If LHS (Reasons) are high under some altered conditions.

Sometime dwelling too much in the so called “perceived truths of the world”, one can become very numb (Eg: States of Nihilism, agnosticism etc etc). The understanding of the world which initially makes someone comfortably numb, would not be a desirable state to be in for too long. Since the equilibrium is altered, emotions are needed to restore the equilibrium. I would in such cases indulge in activities which brings out emotions of “desirable anxiety” (a risky trek for Eg), Fun and nostalgia (hanging out with friends and going out ) and such things so that K_p is restored.

Probably writing this post itself was an exercise to restore the altered equilibrium for me ;-)