Hi people, I lost track of several old topics, so I decided to create a new one, which I suppose fits the current sub-forum. If the administrators disagree with it, kindly do not delete my message, just move it to the appropriate topic.

Once there was a rich debate weather automobile massive and irrational usage would be or not, neurochemically speaking, an addiction.

Today I went through this paper, which says

A decade ago Dr. Howard Shaffer at Harvard wrote, “I had great difficulty with my own colleagues when I suggested that a lot of addiction is the result of experience … repetitive, high-emotion, high-frequency experience.

In 2005, Dr. Eric Nestler wrote a landmark paper describing all addiction as a dysfunction of the mesolimbic reward centers of the brain. Addiction occurs when pleasure/reward pathways are hijacked by exogenous drugs such as cocaine or opioids, or by natural processes essential and inherent to survival such as food and sex. The same dopaminergic systems include the ventral tegmental area with its projections to the nucleus accumbens and other striatal salience centers. He wrote, “Growing evidence indicates that the VTA-NAc pathway and the other limbic regions cited above similarly mediate, at least in part, the acute positive emotional effects of natural rewards, such as food, sex and social interactions. These same regions have also been implicated in the so-called ‘natural addictions’ (that is, compulsive consumption for natural rewards) such as pathological overeating, pathological gambling, and sexual addictions. Preliminary findings suggest that shared pathways may be involved: (an example is) cross-sensitization that occurs between natural rewards and drugs of abuse.”*

in: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3050060/

Basically they seem to prove that addiction might not simply come from exogenous neurochemical substances, but also from biological pleasure-seeking repetitive patterns.

Is this debatable, considering the irrationality of driving in many situations, the lack of control people have, and that the automobile is simply a an exogenous non-invasive provider of neurochemical pleasure?

regards

For the average driver, No, Not at all... They drive because it's, easier than... it's more convenient than... it's more comfortable than... it's faster than... etc... Now some people do drive just because it's "fun", "thrilling", and that is/can be addictive, if you drive a powerful car in which you can snap your head back every time you "touch" the gas pedal... Some people can even get that feeling pushing down on bike pedals...

It would seem this forum and many of the people in it would disprove the concept.

yes, you might be right! Even if the notion of practicality is total misleading, because public policies discourage the usage of non-motorized vehicles. But that has nothing to do with addiction. Furthermore it would be philosophically strange to imagine that the majority of the population would be addicted, so I imagine it may vary according to culture and age. But to those that seek psicossexual inputs from the automobile culture, may be, neurochemically, an addiction.

Well, I can assure you, driving a car that has enough power (from a 4 banger) to spin all four wheels, and beat 8 cylinder "muscle cars" can be, "IS ADDICTIVE". Not really sure if this is the right one to use here... But when I drive my wife's Prius C it just doesn't cut it... Riding my bicycle 160KMs in one day, does almost do the same thing at the end of the day tho, it's just a slow burn instead of a big rush...

To expand on my thoughts... No, people aren't driving cars because they are addicted, They also mostly drive cars because, it's the only "practical" way to get from A to B here in N America... The mass transit situation sucks, the roads suck even for cars today, the lack of bike trails the lack of trains, busses, to allow for the "transporting" of people other than cars to their destinations doesn't really exist, Yes, OK they exist, but, efficiency? It totally sucks in most cities so, cars are king.

EDIT: I seem to recall some PBS program I seen a few years ago that basically said some company (like GM) bought the trolley system in some city and scrapped it, so more cars could/would be needed...,

I simply have to disagree. The median trip length in the US is just a few miles, so driving is most certainly not the only practical means of getting from point A to point B in most cases. (Please don't confuse "most cases" or even "many cases" with "all cases".) In many settings, a bicycle is even faster than a car. Over 60% of car commuters spend less than 30 minutes getting to work and the average distance, which is doubtlessly more than the median, is only 16 miles. These are trivial times and distances for any able-bodied person and certainly cannot explain why 86% of all commutes are by personal motor vehicle.

My preferred definition of an addiction is the one a drug treatment nurse once told me. An addiction, he said, is a habit that is destructive to oneself or society. Clearly, many of us have a habit of riding bikes. Just as clearly, this habit is not destructive to ourselves or society. Those people who choose to substitute a driving habit for cycling must consider the fact that driving is indeed destructive to oneself and to society in many ways.

I'm not arguing that there is no place for driving, only that the thoughtless use of cars, the habitual use, if you will, is indeed an addiction because of the damage this habit does.

And I have to disagree too... 16 miles, sure no problem, once you are used to it. but then, there is the type of job and arriving all hot and sweaty not necessarily workable, the weather winter or pouring rain not necessarily workable, you need to do other things before you get to work (drop off kids) not necessarily workable, all these things make the car the winner for most people.

Habitual use is not necessarily because of addiction, usually it's because it just easier...And destructive, Yes in the long term but unfortunately in the short term it seems to benefit most people enough to not worry about it...

Tell us about your physical withdrawal from the addiction to cars? How about electricity? Is that addictive? Do we as a society consume more energy through electricity or transportation? A habit maybe but if LCF is real then addiction is a bit of a stretch. Are we addicted to elevators as well? Is an action accepted by society that is destructive an addiction? Then how about wood houses and clear cutting wood? Not everything society does is an addiction.

+1

It seems to be the fad these days to attribute just about everything to an addiction.


There are real addictions to certain things ... the rest can be chalked up to habit or laziness or complacency or convenience or whatever.

Scientifically, I think the jury is still out on whether there really is non-pharmaceutical addiction, or even whether addiction is a useful paradigm for studying habitual behaviors.

You most often see this debated in the issue of food and eating behaviors. People do compulsively eat types and amounts of food that will harm them, for the sake of momentary pleasure, even though food is not the same as drugs and alcohol that are conventionally described as "addictive."

But I think "addiction" is an excellent metaphor for describing the relationship our society has with driving, if not so much individual members of society.

Yet doesn't the use of the term addiction in this case weaken the word? Doesn't it make anything society accepts for the majority an addiction? Whenever someone wants to cast a slure at people in opposition to their position they simply call it an addiction? We could easily assume from the media we see that New Yorkers are addicted to rudeness. Even if we know some personally who are not?

Then how how do we explain all of the car light and supposed LCF people that post here? Are we saying they had or have a stronger construction and tossed off or fought the addiction cold turkey?

I just see see it as a poor attempt to raise one opinion over another and at the same time deminish the term addiction that some people really have. Think how this would sound to some people you might know, "oh you can easily give up alcohol, I gave up cars cold turkey." Just doesn't ring true somehow. IMHO.

I work 17 hilly miles from home, and arrive at 7 am. There are no showers here, and the location is not served by public transit. It's a professional office environment; arriving all sweaty isn't an option. I used to commute by bike until the company moved too far away to make that practical. Now a car is the only rational way to keep my job.

This is the BF LCF list. Words like "irrational" and "addiction" can have new/flexible meanings and definitions to fit the agenda of posters and/or their addiction to ranting about the use of cars by other people.

Undoubtedly it's a urban paradigm which overpasses frequently the individual choice. The bike modal shares in different countries, as we look into big numbers, clearly show, that it's not about culture or individual choice.

I also agree that driving may be per se not an addiction since disregarding the large negative effects of it, it would be anecdotic to imagine that around 90% of the population is addicted. Metaphorically or socially why not? Most of the technical terms regarding psychology were actually flexible throughout time. This is not math.

Nevertheless driving consumes more energy than home electricity, if you convert both energies to a standard unit (Joules).

If you want to talk about mass 'addictions" the cell phone comes to my mind...

Do you have a source for that? Compared to????

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ener..._United_States

I just don't understand trying to change the language so you can make a word mean whatever you want. So whatever the majority of society does that is different from what a sub set of a minority believes they call it an addiction. That makes using electricity an addiction, cell phones are becoming an addiction. At one time wearing a hat was an addiction, now it isn't much of an addiction but wearing baseball caps might be. Words have meaning and that can be looked up. Somehow I don't believe the American Psychiatric Association list cars as an addiction.

"Cruisin'"... "Road Trip"... ring a bell? Undoubtedly, driving to/from work, shopping, etc. are "purposeful" forms, and probably make up the largest part of miles-driven; but driving as a means of alleviating boredom is a not-insignificant use, as well. As I understand it, "addiction" has physical and behavioral components, and many addicts "recover" by switching substances. Do they cease being addicts? Again, from those whom I know, no, they do not. Many (most?) Americans are not "self-entertaining", relying on (dependent upon?) external stimulation. Driving provides that... a lot; after all, car manufacturers don't advertise their products as "transportation", do they?

I said home electricity! Check your chart!

Reminds me why they created the expression "jay-walking" which now has became standard in transport science.

I'm not saying I think it is an addiction, not because of neurochemical aspects but due the philosophical ones. It would be socially unacceptable to imagine that almost everyone is addicted. But according to that paper, addiction comes not only from exogenous neurochemical substances.
Think about gambling. May that be an addiction, according to the way you see things?

That's my point. The masses need piscossexual viril freudian inputs
And the bike is simply the transport of the poor

I agree. It's not an addiction to enjoy something. And it's certainly not an addiction to do something out of laziness or with little thought at all, as a lot of car driving amounts to.

The OP goes as far as to call food an addiction. So any healthy person is apparently also suffering from food addiction.

I see addiction defined as There is a secondary definition that's much more broad...That 2nd definition invites things like this thread I guess. Using the word like that doesn't serve a meaningful purpose IMO. Car drivers drive cars because it's convenient and sometimes also because it's fun. Some people enjoy baseball and go to a game multiple days of the week. Are they addicted to baseball? What are you getting across by saying people are addicted to cars? Big deal. That means they like cars right?

Or the wise.