It gets you drunk, hungover and sick. And yet we go back for more. What’s the attraction of alcohol?

According to Professor Edward Slingerland, author of Drunk: How We Sipped, Stumbled, and Danced Our Way to Civilization, alcohol is the key to civilisation. In this insightful episode of Drinks Insider, he tells host Felicity Carter that much of what we think about alcohol is false.

We did not, for example, develop a taste for it because over-ripe, fermenting fruit has more calories. Nor did we value it primarily as a way of rendering dirty water safe to drink.

Instead, it’s a cultural technology that helped early humans forge larger cooperative societies, overcoming the limitations of small-group living. Without it, we’d never have learned to trust strangers.

In this episode of Drinks Insider, Prof. Slingerland discusses:

• Why the standard evolutionary “mistake” theories of alcohol are wrong


• How our thirst for beer was probably the driving force behind the development of agriculture


• Why we value alcohol as a form of social glue


• How alcohol helps drive creativity and novel thinking


• Why humans have been complaining about drinking for centuries


• How alcohol won against other intoxicants like cannabis

Professor Slingerland argues that alcohol's benefits in fostering social cohesion and creativity have been fundamental to the development of human civilisation, even if modern high-strength options present new challenges.

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