The biology of desire
by Marc David Lewis · first published 2015
100% recommend
Why HN recommends it
A neuroscience account of addiction as a learned, desire-driven habit, not a choice or simple disease. Readers value field examples like the Vietnam heroin case and its framing of quitting as retraining the brain.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
"Neuroscientist Lewis (Memoirs of an Addicted Brain) presents a strong argument against the disease model of addiction, which is currently predominant in medicine and popular culture alike, and bolsters it with informative and engaging narratives of addicts' lives ... Even when presenting more technical information, Lewis shows a keen ability to put a human face on the most groundbreaking research into addiction. Likewise, he manages to make complex findings and theories both comprehensible and interesting...This book, written with hopeful sincerity, will intrigue both those who accept its the
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A very good book on this is Biology of Desire by Marc Lewis. Cites the Vietnam heroin example, and gets into the neurobiology of bad habits. Key points are that addiction is neither a choice nor a disease, and self-control is a depletable resource…
on “To Change Habits, Try Replacement Instead” ↗…Sam Keen - Your Mythic Journey - Finding Meaning in Your Life Through Writing and Storytelling →→ Idries Shah - Learning how to learn - psychology and spirituality in the Sufi way →→→ Marc Lewis - The Biology of Desire - Why Addiction Is Not a Disease And always fiction mixed with non-fiction, recently Tess Gerritsen, currently Zygmunt Miłoszewski (his books are in Polish only, I believe). Regarding frequency, it…
on “Ask HN: Which book do you want to read next?” ↗Not the commenter you were replying to, but Biology of Desire by Marc Lewis was a good one. There was also a lot of good info in The Sober Truth by Lance Dodes, but it's more of a rebuttal against 12 step programs.
on “Alcohol-related deaths spiked during the pandemic, a study shows” ↗…and someone that has been going on a run every day for a decade. It's just that their autopilots have been trained to prefer a different action in response to similar stimuli. I recommend the book "The Biology of Desire" by Marc Lewis, an ex cocaine addict turned neuroscientist.
on “Andreas Kling – Failure is also a habit” ↗…happens to be one of the primary impulses that feeds it. Addicts often turn to their drug of choice to feel relief from the shame…of their addiction to their drug of choice. > I recommend the book "The Biology of Desire" by Marc Lewis, an ex cocaine addict turned neuroscientist. Adding this to my reading list. In a similar category, Anna Lembke is a psychiatrist and addiction specialist who wrote a book titled “Dopamine…
on “Andreas Kling – Failure is also a habit” ↗…be. There's a lot of anecdotes surrounding this but a popular one is rate of morphine abuse during and after the Vietnam war. The rates plummeted. A really good book on the topic of addiction is the Biology of Desire by Marc Lewis. I would also caution against any conflation of environmental and behavioral intervention as "willpower". These are not the same things (you didn't say they are, but you didn't give any…
on “Rethinking addiction as a chronic brain disease” ↗…thing that can help, but the main idea is that you want to make your brain associate the bad behavior with bad outcome, and strengthen the association of good outcomes with fear/desire circuit. Book: The Biology of Desire: Why Addiction Is Not a Disease - https://www.amazon.com/Biology-Desire-Why-Addiction-Disease/... Youtube: The Neuroscience of addiction - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOSD9rTVuWc Edit: typos
on “Once an Addict, Always an Addict?” ↗I like the book “The Biology of Desire” on addiction. It views addiction as an instance of the same kind of desire-driven habit-forming learning that’s the core of our motivational system. And so quitting an addiction is not exactly just quitting…
on “How to make quitting your addiction easier” ↗…program and exploring that community helped me immensely- I love communities and I can take from programs what I need and leave the rest. Life changing book in this space to grok addiction IMO is The Biology of Desire. Not just opinions, actual neuroscience and field investigation combined from a PhD. 6 years later I have 3-4 years of runway and possible 20+ years runway in equity (at current valuations). I’m pretty…
on “Ask HN: Have you invested in self-development and done inner work?” ↗This is my latest effort to combat my own period of extreme loneliness. Reading through The biology of desire by Marc Lewis, there is a part where he mentions that addicts and other people struggling to improve their condition have a hard time visualising their life as a continuous thread from the better day,…
on “Ask HN: Do you lack someone to share your achievements with?” ↗…brain works. Another thing to consider is whether freelancing, your only career, is something you’ve chosen to enable yourself to pursue addictive behaviors. I’ve just read a book on this called The Biology of Desire, the thesis of which is addiction is not a “disease”. More of a dysfunctional inter operation of brain systems in response to anxiety and trauma. It has several stories of how people recovered and reconfigured…
on “Ask HN: Is it 'normal' to struggle so hard with work?” ↗