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Is alcohol a drug?

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"alcohol is different from all other drugs."

Your friend is right about this. ^OH is such small molecule with a high range of effects ranging from sedative, stimulant, depressant, delierient, and pain-killer. After decades of research into alcohol, we still don't know how it works, let alone how different dosages work.

That ^OH is so small a molecule, IMO, it could be doing a very number of things.
 
Alcohol can cause similar issues with tolerance and dependence that other GABA-ergic's can produce. This alone may be enough to consider alcohol a drug, assuming that this label implies it's downsides and consequences make it subject to a term that is often synonymous with social stigma and harmful effects.

Putting that aside, I find that alcohol is far too inferior in my eyes to be considered a true drug. Two key aspects are lacking:
- Euphoria
- R.O.A's that allow for immediate effect

Although there is an exception for the latter. Apparently alcohol vaporizers exist and reduce many negative aspects associated with alcohol consumption. I've never tried this and probably never will so I can't comment on the effectiveness.

Either way alcohol is a potentially destructive "drug" or intoxicating solvent if you follow, and if you go bananas with this one you might end up with organ/brain damage or even hepatitis C.

As with all mind altering substances, alcohol can be safe if used in a controlled manner, just like anything else. It just bothers me to know that beautiful substances such as LSD and mescaline are considered HPPD-inducing strychnine adulterated drugs from hell in the eyes of many people including the ones who would literally die if they stopped drinking.

Maybe a little off topic, but just some thoughts
 
Alcohol has no known medical potential (eh, it relieves pain, I guess, if you drink until you act like a fool).
It causes intoxication as one of its primary effects.
I mean I could go on and on but I'm getting tired. Whoever you spoke with was incredibly ignorant or in complete denial.
It is OBVIOUSLY a drug.
The point is, alcohol has substantial psychoactive effects. Therefore it IS a drug.

My best friend's dad thought alcohol was good for him until the day he died... Although the concept of 'good' may have been too difficult for him to understand the years before his death.
 
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rollingstoned! said:
^OH is such small molecule with a high range of effects ranging from sedative, stimulant, depressant, delierient, and pain-killer. After decades of research into alcohol, we still don't know how it works, let alone how different dosages work.
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We know quite a lot about how alcohol works and it's effects actually.
 
"Narcotics" is an overused term to call all psychoactive drugs. Sometimes "narcotics" are only those psychoactive drugs that are illegal as well. The truth is, while narcotics are psychoactive drugs, they're a concrete group of drugs that are capable of inducing narcosis in any form. So, from this point of view only drugs like opioids, cocaine, and (inhalatory) anesthetics.

But then are all of these drugs addictive? I don't think so. The much broader term "psychoactive drug" is the best to describe abused drugs or the better term here is simply abused substances. However, not all psychoactive drugs are abused and not all psychoactive drugs are addictive.

Ethanol is a psychoactive substance widely abused with addictive properties then. Is it a narcotic? Well, I wouldn't call a state it causes at very high dose narcosis, so for me it's not.
 
A drug, broadly speaking, is any substance that, when absorbed into the body of a living organism, alters normal bodily function.

does alcohol effect your bodily function?????

Theres your answer.....This is not ADD worthy
 
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235360287471352662 said:
if you think about it, time is a bit of a drug too.
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Well, everything has similarities to drugs, everything is a 'drug' in some way. But only certain substances meet the criteria for being an actual drug, and alcohol is definitely one of them. Time... isn't.

I agree with J.S. here, it's a very basic question.

Anyway my last comment in this thread.
 
adder said:
Ethanol is a psychoactive substance widely abused with addictive properties then. Is it a narcotic? Well, I wouldn't call a state it causes at very high dose narcosis, so for me it's not.
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Interesting you mention this, as I was also working out a response considering narcosis.
Narcosis is literally the disruption of nervous cell membranes by any molecule that nests inside the membrane.
Therefore, opioids and cocaine are not true narcotics by his definition, since they bind on receptors.

However, most organic solvents (ether, chloroform, kerosene) are true narcotics.
They all have a general effect on consciousness by destabilizing cell membranes of neurons.
Since ethanol is both an organic solvent and an agonist of certain GABA-receptors, it is hard to say if it can be considered a narcotic.

Anyway, fucking Americans hijacking the concept of narcotics... :|
 
any food or drug taken orally is metabolized by the liver first. It's called first pass metabolism for an oral dose of food or drug.
 
3rd_I_blind said:
Interesting you mention this, as I was also working out a response considering narcosis.
Narcosis is literally the disruption of nervous cell membranes by any molecule that nests inside the membrane.
Therefore, opioids and cocaine are not true narcotics by his definition, since they bind on receptors.

However, most organic solvents (ether, chloroform, kerosene) are true narcotics.
They all have a general effect on consciousness by destabilizing cell membranes of neurons.
Since ethanol is both an organic solvent and an agonist of certain GABA-receptors, it is hard to say if it can be considered a narcotic.

Anyway, fucking Americans hijacking the concept of narcotics... :|
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Where did you get that definition of narcosis from? What needs to be disrupted is signaling from one nerve cell to another. Opioids actually cause that, it's not important they don't do it directly, the fact their action effects in this is enough. The same way nerve signaling is interrupted when cocaine is given topically. They do it indirectly by acting on receptors just like a lot of drugs.

And speaking of which anesthetic inhalants also act on CNS, they also cause various effects in e.g. heart, kidneys, liver, and lungs of course, and they may get into interactions with other drugs. The most used now do and those used in the past you mentioned had even more side effects but the base of action actually remains the same.

However, as I can understand putting diethyl ether or chloroform as examples (I believe they're still WIDELY used in developing countries instead of newer and safer anesthetics just as there are deficits of morphine in certain places on Earth and so much poppy is cultivated to smuggle illegally opium and half-products for heroin), I can't understand kerosene there. It used to be used in hospitals but in lamps for lighting. If kerosene is mentioned, then acetone and toluene should be as well. They're no drugs (and in A.E. by "drug" I mean medication, not only abusable), they have no therapeutic index, yet they're abused.

Nonetheless this can go on and on. The first question was if ethanol may be considered a drug. Yes, it may. And as I understand the purpose of using ethanol, this usage of it is clearly abuse. In medicine it's hard to call it a medication as it's used to disinfect wounds and not alone but as 3% ethanolic solution of iodine or 2% solution of salicylic acid in ethanol and water. Sure, one can use vodka or whatever high proof alcohol beverage is at hand when nothing else is available but I guess we're talking here about what pharmacopoeia says. Then ethanol is not supposed to be drunk so getting high by drinking it is not an abuse of a medication but an abuse of a substance, a very simply organic compound, just like huffing acetone, ethyl acetate, and similar.

It wouldn't be classified as addictive if it weren't legal. But it is, we certainly have more alcoholics than heroinists or opioid addicts totally. And that's only because of cultural reasons but to be honest at detox alcoholics are no different than other addicts. And by the way, if only there were drugs banned now available just as alcohol is, I'm sure ethanol wouldn't be so much sought after...
 
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junkie skumbag said:
Dude are you high or somthing?!?! Time is a drug? l0l the fuck bro? how can time be a drug?Can you get high off time?can you put time into your body?can you sell time?

think ya should be in the loung if ya wanna ramble non sensical drug induced gibberish =D
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if time is a drug then big ben is a needle injecting it into the sky.

are the planes, are they sniffing the building?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pl98VOy5y-M
 
adder said:
Where did you get that definition of narcosis from?
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It is the official toxicological definition of narcosis.
It's a bitch to find a good reference for this, but I can guarantee you that the original definition of a narcotic was any substance that disrupts neuronal functioning by destabilizing the cell membrane.
With the advent of opiates and opioids, these substances with a different MOA were also called narcotics.
And then at some point, it was decided that narcotics would be the new term for all drugs of abuse that cause anasthesia (Probably American idea with their gallons and miles and what-not...).
Which is really annoying, since narcosis is still the official name for the phenomenon mentioned previously.

adder said:
the base of action actually remains the same.
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Is that so?
Can you please clarify what chloroform and diethyl ether have in common - judged by MOA - with a modern day anasthetic like propofol or thiopental?
I respect the fact that no one knows everything and all.
But please don't try to make these kind of bold statements unless you have a certain degree of expertise in this area.

adder said:
I can't understand kerosene there. It used to be used in hospitals but in lamps for lighting. If kerosene is mentioned, then acetone and toluene should be as well.
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Please don't do this.
I never implied I was making the 'full list of all substance that can induce narcosis in men' or anything.
You are right acetone and toluene should be on the list, and n-butanol and isobutanol and 2-butanol and tert-butanol...to illustrate it is pointless to make a complete list.

However, I understand why you don't see a place for kerosene in my list.
If you purely look at MOA, then chloroform and ethyl ether should be on the same list as kerosene, acetone, toluene and most other 'solvents of abuse'.
But you are more looking at application; substances that were used as anasthetics can be considered narcotics by your definition, but substances that have exactly the same physiological effects can not.
That's exactly the big issue when putting labels on classes of chemicals.
'Oh, LSD is a drug of abuse...so it can never be used as a medicine, no way!'
You tell me what makes more sense: Grouping chemicals by MOA or by any other attribute?

Excuse me from strolling off the topic, but at least this post is 'advanced'...which makes it on-topic again. ;)
 
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