The Browns wrote:
>
> "Times change. Generations later, these same cultures
> usually see current addiction as a mixed blessing.
> Older sins -- alcholism and drug addiction and
> compulsive gambling -- cannot compete. People who can
> be hooked by drugs are happier with the wire. They
> take longer to die, and they tend not to have
> children. . .
>
> . . . So that by Louis Wu's time, those who could be
> enslaved by the wire or by any lesser means of
> self-destruction had_been_breeding_themselves_out of
> the human race for eight hundred years."
>
> quote from "The Ringworld Engineers," Larry Niven.
>
> Am I unduly harsh and cruel to agree with this
> assessment?
No. I'd be a lot happier today if there were no crack-addicted babies
born, for one thing. Also, the ability to be addicted more easily might
be something we want bred out of the general population anyway, if it's
genetic.
> Genny
> (with a grin as she drinks cafine and lights another
> cigarette).
I am *so* easily addicted to caffeine. I'd be happier if I weren't.
And the weird thing of it is, I swear my mother is a caffeine pusher.
(And an addict, as well -- needs her coffee before she's fully
functioning in the morning. AND very, very picky about what goes into
it.) I've successfully gotten mostly off the caffeine -- none in the
morning, at most one caffeinated drink during the day -- and my sister
has, as well. But my first cup of coffee was pushed on me by my mother,
and when she and my sister were visiting her cousin, who got off
caffeine 20 years ago and won't touch the stuff now, our mother
encouraged my sister to walk the 6 blocks or so with her to get coffee
every morning. (The walk was good. I don't think my sister actually
had the coffee, though.)
Cigarettes, no. Too many chest colds in high school to have been able
to stand being around smokers much, much less take it up myself.
(Later, when I was healthier, I'd hang around with folks on their
smoking breaks, and I can tell you to some degree which brands are worse
in terms of second-hand smoke for me, actually!)
Julia
