The Shallows of the Addicted Mind

One influential approach to the question of why addiction excuses focuses on the question of what addiction is and, more particularly, on what addiction turns out to be in the light of scientific inquiry, e.g. neurophysiological inquiry into the dopamine system. I note the tension between this approach and the apparent data-point that lay folk, who have not performed the relevant inquiry, can know that addiction excuses. Given this data-point, the moral psychology of addiction should work with the materials to be found in the shallows of the addicted mind.