Going out to the bar is one of life’s great pleasures. And yet there’s always some busybody chiming in with their “blah blah blah Sobruary” or “yadda yadda cirrhosis and liver failure.” Well look who’s laughing now teetotalers and buzzkills: a new study from Yale notes that alcohol can have a positive effect on your brain, and not just when you sit down to read at the bar. We’ll drink to that.
Scientists at Yale found that the brains of heavy drinkers produced acetate, an energy-boosting chemical, in response to what they called “heavy drinkers” imbibing alcohol. That is, people in the study who drank were able to fuel their brains with alcohol in addition to sugar. So really, everyone at the bar is just more highly evolved, so there.
And while the scientists behind study posit this as a bad thing, and a reason why people have such a hard time quitting drinking, we’re not sold. After all, the study found that the acetate release happens for people who drink just eight alcoholic beverages per week, which is what, two or three trips to the bar in a week? Hardly heavy drinking for anyone who lives around here.
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Yes, go ahead and believe this, while your brain atrophies and your judgment, common sense and basic cognitive abilities (needed to drive by the way) are impacted in a negative way with just a few drinks. Have you ever been around a person who acts smarter after they have been drinking? This is an unproven study, but the effects of alcohol on the brain have been proven through countless studies, and this one probably means absolutely nothing, but drink on my friend. Your body will bear the damage silently, but you will continue to believe you're getting smarter all the time!