Resolute... that's interesting!
I've always figured that something that occurs so readily in nature (fermentation) can't be all bad for the human body. There isn't a chance that the most prehistoric man didn't experience alcohol in some permutation.
I recently read the results of long-term studies that showed that, in comparing mortality rates between abstainers, moderate drinkers and hard-core alcoholics, even the hard-cores lived longer than the abstainers. The studies accounted for every kind of variable the researchers could think of: Smoking, hypertension, liver disease, cancer and many more. No matter how they sliced and diced the data, no matter what factors they added in or eliminated, people who drink -- even drink too much -- live longer than people who don't. Obviously the moderate drinkers lived longest of all.
I think that's kind of cool.
