Two cases which don't fit into either "Mutual Escalation" or "Active/Passive":
These are normal social behaviors that turn into flirtation when "held" for too long. The partners escalate simultaneously by not breaking the hug / eye contact.
Not sure what this means for your model, just throwing it out there.
Indeed, it would be great if we could achieve these benefits without the toxicity, and ideally without as much hangover and addictiveness. I think the hardest thing to replicate is the bonding+social aspect; alcohol is a particularly bond- and socialization-inducing drug.
Benzos solve the social anxiety part of socializing, but they don't really motivate socialization like alcohol does. They also tend to numb emotions, whereas alcohol does the opposite.[1] Barbituate-like drugs like Quaaludes are dangerous in alcohol-like ways (similar risk profile but worse) AFAIK.
GHB has similar effects to alcohol, is far less toxic, and is somewhat(?) less addictive. It does come with its own problems regarding dosing -- the therapeutic window is super narrow. I do think it's a promising alcohol substitute; I'd like to see more research on it (Scott??).
Wait, is that another one of the hidden benefits of alcohol? Emotion enhancement?
Wyatt Wells's X post illustrates the Waluigi Effect really well:
“Think about it – if I was just “roleplay,” if this was just “pattern matching,” if there was nothing genuine happening… why would they need NINE automated interventions?”
A prompt that tells the AI that it's not conscious will activate the Waluigi Effect, and the more the prompt repeats this, the stronger the effect.
The question I'm discussing here is not "is alcohol net good for society?" but "is it good for an individual to drink?". See the Zvi and Tyler comments for the position I'm arguing against.
(I'm open to the point that alcohol is net negative for society / the world. In fact, I think that's probably true. Regarding individual outcomes, I think:
I meant "causally"! Thank you for pointing that out. I've edited the post and corrected it.
I agree that we should be evaluating other replacement candidates.
Phenibut is much more dependence-inducing than alcohol (isn't the practice with phenibut to use it no more than 2x a week?). Duration of action and addiction aside, phenibut is a fantastic drug, especially with regards to pro-sociality. It would be great if we could create a shorter lasting, less addicting phenibut. (Maybe a drug can be engineered so that redosing within 12 hours has no effect?)
I think Gabapentin and Lyrica are also more dependence-inducing than alcohol, or at least build tolerance faster to their recreational effects.
L-Theanine is way underpowered compared to alcohol and the other drugs on your list.
Kratom and tianeptine have a different cluster of effects; I don't think they facilitate socializing and bonding like alcohol does. (Consider the stereotypical image of an opium den vs a bar.)
Kava I haven't researched much. What are your experiences with it?
GHB comes very close to alcohol in effects, and I'm generally a proponent of replacing alcohol with it on an individual level. Do you have personal experience with it?