My journal about addiction

[Jemmons]

7. The importance of food addiction is that it is a model of general addiction that is easy to

research and understand and can provide a general model of how addiction to drugs, medications, gambling or shopping works. We are all addicted to oxygen, food and sex because these items sustain us as individuals and sustain the human race. Same is true for other species and any species in our evolutionary past. Addiction to drugs like heroin depend on activation of compulsive behavior patterns that in their original form are promoting survival and procreation.

This is the reason why rational thinking is not a strong antidote to addictive behavior: Instinctive behaviors are promoted by brain structures that are not under the control of our rational mind. If you want a person to act compulsively you need to hijack some instinctive behavior pattern and inject the action as an instance of that biological compulsion.