Adam Rogers is the author of the new book Proof: The Science of Booze. He is articles editor at Wired, and he lives in Berkeley, California.
Q: You write of alcohol, “Our history with the stuff is our
history on earth, a history of humans becoming modern, tool-using,
technology-making creatures.” Why is there such a close connection?
A: It is one of the first ways we started to make stuff, one
of the first examples of a thing that happens in nature that we changed and
domesticated.
This is something that few animals really do, to tune it and
hone it. They tend to do it by instinct. We, instead of taking what nature
gives us, we build from it. [Alcohol] has traveled with us from the moment we
became civilized to today.
Q: In the book, you discuss hangovers and the lack of
information about what causes them. Why is there such a lack of information?
A: I can only speculate on the “why.” Some of the people who
do the work say that one possible reason is that government funding agencies
are worried about the effect of working on a drug that could make people drink
more. There’s a vast amount of research on addiction, and that makes sense.
You could argue that hangovers [lead to] lost wages and work
time, but there’s a little bit of a moral question [when it comes to]
government research. Why the drinks companies don’t fund the research—maybe
some of the same moral issues [come into play]. Now, [many of the people who
study these issues] are at a meeting in Seattle—it’s possible they’ll introduce
new information.
Q: You also talk about the impact of ethanol on the body. What
happens once the person tastes the alcohol, and what is the effect?
A: That’s a huge question. Pieces of it are not well
understood, especially the effect of alcohol on the brain. Ethanol is a very
volatile small molecule, and it evaporates at a lower temperature than water.
It dissolves a lot of other substances, and carries flavors and aromas. We
perceive five tastes, but there’s a lot more going on. Also, there’s a burning
sensation from the ethanol, and a cooling sensation from the ethanol.
As the molecules move to the inside part of the nose,
thousands of nerve endings pick up pieces of what you’re smelling and tasting. That’s
how the brain generates flavor.
This is all before it has an effect on the brain and the
gut. When it gets to the gut, the body starts to break down the ethanol using
enzymes. With digestion, the pancreas, kidneys and liver are involved.
Alcohol inhibits a hormone that keeps you from peeing too
much, so you will pee out more liquid. The body can’t keep up, and the ethanol
makes its way to the brain. It passes through the blood-brain barrier like a
ghost.
What it does in the brain is not well understood. No one is
sure which receptors are responsive to ethanol. What does ethanol do to the
brain? Inhibition of inhibition. It slows down the brain’s ability to slow us
down. It’s telling the brain we don’t have to feel we’re up and awake.
This is the impact with one or two drinks. In the book, I’m
less interested in the impact of binge drinking. With just [a small amount], it
will change your behavior and the way you perceive situations.
Q: What surprised you most in the course of the research for
this book?
A: Not being able to articulate the complete mechanism [relating
to the effects of ethanol] surprised me. I knew there was a huge body of
research on the effects of ethanol, but it surprised me that there was no
mechanism.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: When I pitched the idea for the book, I planned on not
having history [be a big part of the book], but the history of ethanol was so
fascinating, it’s in the book. How we make and consume it is a lens on our
relationship with the natural world and how we study it.
--Interview with Deborah Kalb
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