The Merriam Webster dictionary defines alcoholism as “continued excessive and usually uncontrollable use of alcoholic drinks.” The definition is quite valid if uncontrollable refers to uncontrollable by others. The record is clear, however, that alcoholics can and do control their drinking when they want to.

Even AA based treatment centers usually expect alcoholics and addicts to voluntarily stop drinking and using. Publicly funded treatment centers often demand that an alcoholic or addict stop using before being allowed to enter treatment. The discrepancy between how alcoholism has been defined and the real life patterns of alcohol abuse has led one leading alcoholism researcher to say that alcoholism exists “in our language and in our minds, but not in the objective world around us.”94

Of course, the phenomenon of long term drinking of alcohol to excess does indeed exist. The problem with the dictionary definition and others is that they are loaded with implied or explicit reasons for, or characteristics of, the behavior.

To keep things in the broadest of perspectives, addiction will be defined here as the continual repetition of a normally non problematical behavior to self destructive excess. This definition leaves room for a broad range of behaviors including but not limited to: alcohol and drug addictions, “love” addiction, sex addiction, religious addiction, work addiction, compulsive exercise, television addiction, overeating, bulimia and compulsive gambling. This difinition also assumes no origin, lifetime course, or resolution for these behaviors. Although no physical cause is implied, there is room for one or, for that matter, any other presumed cause. It is also free of the circular trap inherent in definitions such as “the