What Would You Do Alone in a Cage with Nothing but Cocaine?

“A brilliant and compelling contribution…that has the potential to reframe the public’s understanding of drug use and addiction… . It is a text rooted in radical compassion that supports autonomy, promotes responsibility without blame, and highlights the various factors that can cause and maintain an individual’s substance use over time.”—Cassandra L. Boness, Science”[This book] has changed my understanding of my habits—and maybe it will change yours, too.”—Jacob Rosenberg, Mother Jones“Pickard convincingly shows that while the diseased brain model aimed to destigmatize addiction, it has largely failed to do so while amplifying some addicts’ pessimism about recovery. Addiction researchers and clinicians will be enlightened.” * Publishers Weekly *“Anyone confronting addiction would do well to read Hanna Pickard’s new book, which should change how ordinary people and clinicians think about it. One important insight is that often a cure for addiction depends on the addict finding a new identity, other than that of being an addict. This is a book by a philosopher, based on experience in a therapeutic setting, that has the actual potential to save lives.”—Brian Leiter, Leiter Reports“This book isn’t the usual book about addiction… . nobody seems to be able to agree on what addiction even is, or what domain of knowledge its study belongs to. Who better than a philosopher to kick the tyres of our uninterrogated intuitions and received ideas?”—Sam Leith

Hanna Pickard is Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and Bioethics and Krieger-Eisenhower Professor at Johns Hopkins University.