Chapter 61

There are two common views of addicts: one is the “bad person” view and the other is the “chronic illness sufferer” view. I believe a simple resolution to the contradistinction is this: It is clearly a combination of both. No matter how you view the problem though, these fundamental truths remain: There is no cure for addiction; a lifelong fight against the compulsions is required; the fight gets easier with time.

If we are to possess knowledge, any progress we may experience in the advance of truth discovery does not raise us above the need for occasional reproof and correction. It is true though that our correct judgments, with respect to their proper context, must not contradict themselves. The pursuit of greater knowledge or understanding can initially reach its aim with perfect ease as merely a logical proposition to separate the content from the context to discover if there are deeper interrelationships. There are, of course, many issues that do not fall within the scope of my present inquiry, but this by no means hinders me from uncovering a systematic method of truth discovery which must always be recognizable by means of obedience to the principles of non-contradiction.

On such a difficult subject as understanding the disease concept of addiction, a task with which general logic will have nothing to do, I must go beyond the given conceptions thus without being contradictory. For inasmuch as the conception of cause, in and of itself, must have a basis outside that of being a reproduction of distinctive, misguided imagination. Indicating the general conditions for rules or the case to which the rules must be applied is formal and entirely without content here. Our duty at present is to render as conceivable whether or not the principles that govern the conditions are sufficient as a criterion for truth.

Upon further discovery, I seek to make a positive use of these principles; for it is quite possible to possess truth in accordance with a synthesis of multiple conceptions. Such knowledge would, as such, never amount to anything and would be completely without validity apart from a simple treatment approach. One way to successfully treat an addict for his self-inflicted disease is through compelling moral rehabilitation over a long period of time.