CHEMISTRY OF THE BRAIN: MOLECULES, MOOD, AND MENTAL ILLNESS - Chemistry: Notable Research and Discoveries - page 98

effects of the drug, which discourages its use. It also helps in cases of alco-
hol addiction (alcoholism), for which the FDA gave its approval in 1995.
Substances such as naltrexone may help, but of course this treat-
ment requires compliance by the patient—naltrexone must be taken
in order to do any good. This prompts questions about how forcefully
authorities should intervene in such cases. A Clockwork Orange, a 1971
film based on a 1962 novel by Anthony Burgess, involves a future so-
ciety in which criminals are conditioned in ways that make them vio-
lently ill when they even consider committing a crime. Although the
conditioning works, the main character in the story is unable to defend
himself when he is assaulted—the very thought of violence leaves him
incapacitated—and the audience is left wondering if this sort of condi-
tioning is the best solution to the problem of criminal behavior.
Similar issues arise in the widespread use of drugs such as Prozac.
he psychiatrist Peter Kramer in his 1993 topic Listening to Prozac
describes cases in which patients claim that taking Prozac brings out
their “true” self. The question becomes whether Prozac is in some cas-
es changing a person's personality instead of fixing any perceived and
possibly nonexistent disorder. Such cases have led to concerns about
excessive use of these drugs, as well as the development of other “medi-
cations” that do not alleviate symptoms of a disease but instead make
the consumer artificially happy or contented.
It is not out of the question that further research in brain chemistry
could lead to an increase in ethically or morally troubling issues. But the
same complexity that daunts scientists who study the brain also works
against the possibility that such troubling scenarios will come about, at
least in the near future. The brain's chemicals, along with the mechanisms
that regulate their use, have developed over an exceedingly long time. Hu-
man neurochemical activity is built upon a foundation perfected by evo-
lution, and it shares many properties with animals such as the laboratory
rats. If researchers have learned anything about the brain in the last few
decades, it is that simple concepts—such as the monoamine hypothesis
of depression and the dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia—are rarely
adequate.
Drugs that affect the brain must act in complicated ways as well.
These complications mean, at least in the author's opinion, that there
will always be side effects that limit a drug's usefulness and effective-
ness—including any present or future “lifestyle” drugs that supposedly
alter personalities. Brain chemistry is a frontier of science in which