An Alien's guide to Earth: Part 7b - The alcohol obsession
Aliens beware! Humans have many nasty habits to be fearful of, but only about 17 are as confusing and wasteful as the consumption of alcohol. The substance has adverse affects on their brains, yet many human cultures find it essential for mating rituals, maintaining relationships with other humans and many other facets of life. What little we do know about this strange substance and the humans' use of it can be found here, so if you are venturing to our galaxy's backward neighbour then please read on!
Alcohol and humans, what you need to know:
1. Alcohol causes humans to behave at base level intelligence - ie they revert to a more primitive state. The more they consume, the more primitive they get.
2. Humans, bizarrely, feel like they need to behave in a primitive way and therefore feel like they need to drink alcohol on a regular basis.
3. While in a state of alcoholic intoxication, humans are known as being 'drunk'. This state can be seen in most population centres on the planet on the latter parts of day 5 and 6 of their 7 day cycle. These days are known as 'Friday' and 'Saturday', and can be collectively referred to as 'the weekend'. Unless you are researching humans and alcohol, these days are best to be avoided. For a humorous visit, try 'Sunday'.
4. Human brains have evolved in such a way as to punish humans for the consumption of things which are naturally bad for them, this results in something known as a 'hangover'. This makes humans feel generally ill, sore, woeful for the sudden influx of memories which appear concerning the night before and generally confused as to the people they find themselves sleeping with. It can be most amusing.
5. Despite the obviously dangerous affects on humans, alcohol is still permitted in the vast majority of human society. Many other substances with little or no dangerous effects are banned from human consumption, yet alcohol is not only allowed, but in much of human culture it is seen as necessary. Why this should be, we are yet to learn. For researchers of humans, this point is one of our top priorities. It may help us to know why humans continuously hold themselves back from advancing to the levels which their brains suggest they are capable. Our two main hypotheses for this are they are either really stubborn or drunk all the time.
6. Alcohol is made in many ways, mostly involving some form of distillation or brewing of the plant life which is found on the planet. It would seem that the brewing process is extremely complicated for most types of alcoholic drinks, yet humans have been able to make this for many hundreds if not thousands of years. Some experts have suggested that when humans first discovered alcohol, they stopped being able to make other scientific discoveries for a long time. This may be a direct result of the effects of alcohol on the human mind.
7. No aliens have managed to sample alcohol and survive.
8. Point 7 may not be entirely true. No aliens have returned from missions where sampling alcohol was an objective. It is clear that alcohol has some effect on aliens, but we are not entirely sure what that is. The research teams may still be on the planet mixing amongst the humans and may now be as obsessed with alcohol as the humans are. They may be having a great time. They may be dead. We simply don't know. Our best guess is that if there are any aliens living on the planet Earth, they will be living in a place known as LA.
This pretty much represents our full knowledge of alcohol and it's affects on humans. Anyone wishing to sample or experiment on alcohol directly, heed this advice. Remember, the vast majority of violence on the planet involves alcohol. That said, so does the vast majority of sex, marriage, youth, old age and pretty much everything else.