Do you know about the Rat Park experiment? Alexander got a bunch of lab rats addicted to cocaine by adding it to one of the two water bottles each rat could chose to drink from. All the rats eventually drank exclusively from the water bottles in which there was cocaine. After that, Alexander built Rat Park. Unlike the cramped and sterile cages the rats were usually kept in, he created a large, diverse environment full of all the things rats loved: places to dig, places to den and lots of enrichment. To everyones surprise, when placed in the Rat Park all together, all the rats stopped choosing to drink the cocaine water and all voluntarily drank only from the pure water offered. Whats the conclusion? Obviously, when an animal is able to live appropriately, with all the things it needs to satisfy its needs plus all kinds of diverse positive options for socializing and so on, even if addicted, an animal will prefer and chose sobriety. We are living in the equivalent of a chaotic mass of small, cramped cages, psychologically. Our environment does not make it easy to live a sensible and satisfying life. With the decline in community caused by free market ideologies and the lack of enticing motivations available, many of us are becoming addicts
Posted on: Wed, 26 Nov 2014 06:33:34 +0000
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