"Loneliness is a health threat in the western world, and the UK even has a dedicated minister to address the problem. How to solve it, of course, is a huge challenge, but encouraging people to get out and socialise over a few beers or a bottle of wine at the village pub may be a good place to start."<p>Proximity, unplanned encounters and the privacy to confide with someone have been identified as key factors in making friends as an adult.[cite] I find it unfortunate to read about the closing of so many neighborhood pubs in England over the past decade or so.
The author is Robin Dunbar, of Dunbar's number. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Dunbar" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Dunbar</a><p>Past threads have shown this to be a bit of a triggering topic, but this is an interesting and substantial article. We changed the title to make it less baity, in accordance with the HN guidelines. If anyone suggests a better title (i.e. more accurate and neutral), we can change it again.
Is nobody going to mention that the "research" that lead to this article was funded by the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) and it's conclusions <i>might</i> be biased toward portraying alcohol consumption in a favourable light?<p>Drink more beer/wine/etc in pubs if you want to bond with people.<p>Yes, alcohol can be a social lubricant, but there is no shortage of evidence that social bonding can/does occur without it.
Is getting the "connectedness index" up from 5.9 to 6.6 significant?<p>The "article in the British Medical Journal" is here.[1] The "Whitehall study" has been tracking a group of British civil servants since the 1980s. The alcohol effect seems to be slightly above the noise level. But the level of alcohol consumption at which things start to get worse is quite low. "Alcohol consumption >14 units/week was associated with an increased risk of dementia in a linear fashion". 14 units a week is about one glass of wine a day.[2]<p>Also, in this study alcohol consumption is self-reported, so it's probably low.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.bmj.com/content/362/bmj.k2927" rel="nofollow">https://www.bmj.com/content/362/bmj.k2927</a><p>[2] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_of_alcohol" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_of_alcohol</a>
Taking Devil's Advocate on the article because of alcohol.<p>You can't just instruct an alcoholic not to overdo alcohol. Bonding over a beer is fine if you are able to control your consumption (or you don't care,) but don't push it on people who you know don't drink or have drank in the past but have since quit.<p>As Artie Lange likes to joke “People who don’t have the disease say, ‘Artie, you can have one drink, one beer, one five-dollar bet. If I put down a five-dollar bet on roulette in a casino, half an hour later, it’s beer, vodka, weed. By 11:30, I’m doing blow off a stripper’s ass... By 8 a.m. I’m running guns to Cuba.”
I spent 25 years in bar and restaurant with almost half that time actually behind a bar. Alcohol does indeed grease the social skids. Sometimes positively and sometimes not so much. It all depends on who is doing the imbibing and the chemistry between the various parties. Bartenders are very much attuned to these dynamics...
Wonderful article. Lots of interesting observations and studies cited.<p>The last paragraph -<p>> So, if you want to know the secret of a long and happy life, money is not the right answer. Get rid of the takeaway in front of the telly, and bin the hasty sandwich at your desk — the important thing is to take time out with people you know and talk to them over a beer or two, even that bottle of Prosecco if you really must. There’s nothing quite like a convivial evening wrapped around a pint to give you health, happiness and a sense of wellbeing.
Alcohol's track record in my life thus far:<p>Relationships created: 0<p>Relationships destroyed or severely damaged: 2<p>To clarify, I was not the one affected by alcohol in those 2 cases. So thanks, but no thanks.
Since this article refers to einkorn bread as "grimly tasteless, rather soggy flatbread," I just wanted to say that einkorn sourdough is my favorite type of bread. Definitely worth trying!
So, we get a lot of "alcohol is bad" or "alcohol is good (in moderation)" from different scientists. What am I, a non-scientist, to believe? For my "null hypothesis", which I hold to unless and until a scientific consensus demonstrates otherwise, is that conditions similar to my ancestors' lifestyle is what is most likely to be what I am adapted for. I'm pretty sure my ancestors were occasional drinkers of alcohol.<p>Of course, it would depend on my particular ancestors. If my dad or mom died of cirrhosis of the liver, I would choose differently.
If alcohol consumption is crucial to human bonding, how does the author explain friendship and bonding in communities where alcohol is not consumed?<p>I have never consumed alcohol - historically for religious reasons, but now due to personal convictions - so take my opinion with a grain of salt.<p>I am of the opinion that it’s much easier to fall into addiction and/or abuse of the drink if it’s available as an option. I am not at all condoning prohibition here; that never worked anywhere it was attempted, and never will. Rather, I am looking at this from a personal level.<p>I am definitely open to hearing reasonable arguments for drinking, other than the social aspect, which was covered (poorly, imo) by this article.
I'm going to guess that human tolerance of alcohol has some evolutionary advantage. In addition to being a social lubricant, which seems to be critical to the species, I can imagine it's previous value was that it let us eat not-so-fresh fruit that the other beasties couldn't.
Fact: Tech careers attract many sketchy people and many young people. Alcohol is one of the few legal ways to quickly identify and filter out the union of those two sets, many of whom are the most disturbed individuals that have found their way in. Sadly, it doesn't work on those who abstain due to physical incapacity, religion or the truly psychotic. Just keep parroting expressions with an obsolete context like "free as in beer"... or "Alcohol and social bonding in humans" (as opposed to animals?) here on Hacker News..hah