Chapter 4·May 27, 6:41 PM
The chapter keeps treating alcohol not only as a social lubricant but as something that reveals how a society thinks about discipline, ritual, and pleasure.
That's a good catch. The book seems to be saying that what a culture drinks tells you what it fears losing.
Right — and Plato using drinking as a virtue test is such an odd detail. It implies that moderation isn't about avoidance but about exposure.
Yeah, that flips the usual framing. Discipline as something you practice under pressure, not in isolation.
What does that tell you about how we think of discipline today?