Addiction as Entrenchment

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Dennis HackethalOP revised 11 months ago·#732·· Collapse

Conjecture: addiction is the result of the entrenchment of a conflict between two or more preferences in a mind.

Picture a smoker who wants to give up smoking but also really enjoys smoking. Those preferences conflict.

If the conflict is entrenched, then both preferences get to live on indefinitely. The entrenchment will not let the smoker give up smoking. He becomes a chain smoker.

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Dennis HackethalOP, 11 months ago·#733·· Collapse

How is this theory new?

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Dennis HackethalOP revised 11 months ago·#746·· Collapse

Prevailing explanations (#734) attribute addiction to desensitization. My theory doesn’t do that.

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Dennis HackethalOP, 11 months ago·#748·· Collapse

Prevailing explanations do not mention entrenchment. They do not refer to any epistemological concepts. My theory does.

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Dennis HackethalOP, 11 months ago·#749·· Collapse

Prevailing explanations are immoral (#739) and false (#742). My theory does not have those flaws from the linked criticisms.

Criticism of #733