Why We Drink
MY SUPERPOWER IS that I don’t get hangovers. Not because I don’t drink: I’ve been fallingdown drunk on multiple occasions. But I’m always fine the next morning, much to the chagrin of my groaning companions fumbling for the Alka-Seltzer. I don’t know why this is. I’ve always attributed it to some sort of Northern European genetic gift—like I’ve been built to survive in frigid atmospheres, hiking through snow with a baby on each hip, swigging from a flask of aquavit.
Not everyone is well-adapted to drinking alcohol. Some quickly become nauseated, get flushed, and generally find drinking very uncomfortable. As Edward Slingerland suggests in you might expect that to be adaptively useful, from an evolutionary standpoint. Those who don’t drink drink would have spread and become dominant.
