7 ms·
Anyone know the reasoning? I'm assuming its attempting to prevent alcoholism? I know Greenland and Iceland (to a lesser extent) suffer somewhat perhaps due to t
by Quarrelsome 6y ago
Anyone know the reasoning? I'm assuming its attempting to prevent alcoholism? I know Greenland and Iceland (to a lesser extent) suffer somewhat perhaps due to the light and isolation being contributing factors.
- AdrianB1 6y agoYou are mostly right, it is to prevent alcoholism like other attempts are still made in different countries to limit or ban soda and sweet drinks, cigarettes, some drugs, some or all guns. It is in general good for public health and bad for average IQ.
- C19is20 6y agoWhy would preventing alcoholism be bad for average iq?
- jonsen 6y agoCould mean users are mostly low IQ and will die early.
- AdrianB1 6y agoBrain needs challenges and stimulation to develop; when people are taken care of, average IQ of society decreased over time. If you check the numbers there are several metrics where we regressed in the past hundreds of years, including reaction time, testosterones production, fertility etc. Good times create mediocre people and the times were better and better in the past centuries, while people got more and more mediocre.
- byproxy 6y agoWhat’s wrong with being mediocre?
- throwaway98797 6y agowe must move forward, not backward; upward, not forward; and always twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom!
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- Rule35 6y agoNot mediocre compared to some hyper-competitive person, but mediocre compared to your potential. It seems pretty obvious that fully self-actualized people are happier. They get more of what they want, and feel fulfilled for doing so.
- curryst 6y agoYour potential is an utterly subjective objective. I'm not arguing for or against, but feeling "fully self-actualized" is equally accomplished by achieving your goals or lowering your goals until they're easily achievable. It's more a function of self-esteem than it is any kind of objective challenge. Those with healthy self-esteem feel self-actualized, those with poor self-esteem will feel as though they're never at their best.
- Rule35 6y ago> Your potential is an utterly subjective objective Good one. > but feeling "fully self-actualized" is equally accomplished by achieving your goals or lowering your goals until they're easily achievable. It's more correlated with finishing what you set out to do. But there's definitely a useful component of comparing yourself with others - if your bar is too low you'll know it even if you don't have the courage to raise it. > Those with healthy self-esteem feel self-actualized, those with poor self-esteem will feel as though they're never at their best. Why with the worst way to interpret this? Those who feel accomplished build self-esteem. Yes, it is circular, but it needs to start with something real. You can't just wait to feel good without doing anything to cause it.
- astrange 6y agoAlcohol is purely bad for you, there's not much hormesis effect aside from the social ones - studies finding things like red wine is good for you have reverse causation issues. If you want to challenge people then give them useful challenges. Just randomly poisoning everyone is not useful. The testosterone effect is not true (it went down in Finland and then went back up), and might've been positive (getting married causes both low testosterone and more children). Less children is due to being less religious. Remember, eugenics isn't real!
- 8fGTBjZxBcHq 6y ago> Good times create mediocre people This is not even remotely true I don't know what you're basing this on.
- the_only_law 6y agoYes, I’m sure increased, abusive consumption of a neurotoxin is sure to raise average IQ.
- AdrianB1 6y agoNobody said that, you just put words in my mouth. Decreasing alcohol consumption is a positive thing, no doubts. Governments nanny-sitting people makes them dumb.
- pmiller2 6y agoSome of the hardest drinkers I know are Finns. I'm not sure exactly why that would be, i.e. why Finns might drink more than Norwegians or Swedes, but this has been my observation. Keep in mind, n=low (I'd have to think about it, and I don't want to expend the brainpower right now).
- jonsen 6y agoThe statistics link in a sibling comment says Danes consume most among the nordics.
- Thlom 6y agoThe Danes drinks every day while the Finns drink it all in one sitting.
- hollerith 6y agoOK, but Finns aren't Nordics.
- jonsen 6y agoOh they are: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_countries https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_countries
- hollerith 6y agoOops, my bad. (Finns are not considered Scandinavians, and I conflated Scandinavians with Nordics.) Thanks for correcting my mistake.
- jonsen 6y agoRather common mistake, even among Scandinavians.
- rendall 6y agoThat Scandinavian thing isn't so cut and dried. Culturally Finns pretty much are Scandinavian. The only thing different really is the language. It's probably best to refer to Finland as Nordic, but calling it Scandinavian isn't such a terrible error, either
- fulafel 6y agoNorway seems to have the lowest consumption per capital among the Nordics: https://www.statista.com/statistics/693505/per-capita-consumption-of-alcohol-in-the-nordic-countries/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/693505/per-capita-consum...
- RocketSyntax 6y agoiceland taxes the heck out of it, and there are only a few stores where you can buy
- jfengel 6y agoBut not, weirdly, at the airport. And they're proud of that. There are all kinds of signs up about how you can buy it at the airport on arrival and carry it in, duty free. I paid $20 apiece for shots at a bar in Reykjavik. I paid (IIRC) $5 for a bottle at the airport. (The bars are especially expensive. I'm told that all the Icelanders pre-game before going out drinking. If you plan to drink while in Iceland, pick it up on your way in.)
- RocketSyntax 6y agolots of airports do duty free. it's a good way to get regional hooch on the cheap.
- marvin 6y agoI can't speak for Svalbard specifically, but Norway in general has a long history of heavily taxing and regulating alcohol. Alcohol stronger than beer can only be purchased at the state-run "wine monopoly", alcohol percentage stronger than 60% classified as narcotics and illegal, opening hours for alcohol sale (beer included) are mandated to be much shorter than for stores in general, no alcohol sales allowed on public holidays, Sundays or Saturdays after 3pm/6pm (wine+ and beer, respectively), etc. Culturally, you can trace this back to the Protestant Christian heritage, where excessive alcohol consumption was considered both sinful and destructive. I'm certain there was something to the heavily negative view on the health- and socioeconomic effects of alcohol at the time (combined with poverty, hunger, cold, dark winters, isolation and the need for cooperating to thrive in such a climate), so I don't think it just boils down to unsubstantiated religious feelings. There is still consensus that this is a good way of doing things, although the minority Christian conservative political wing are loudest about it.
- GekkePrutser 6y agoTo be fair, excessive alcohol consumption (as in alcoholism) is very destructive. However I don't think it's fair to punish everyone for this. Many people have no issues limiting their alcohol and a once-in-a-while binge is not an issue. But anyway I would never want to go near Svalbard, wayyy too cold for me anyway :) And I couldn't cope with 3 months of continuous darkness.