Intoxicants have symbolic and ritualistic significance and they are widely used to provide excuses for social ineptitude, poor performance and bad behaviour. The author strongly challenges the conventional wisdom regarding alcohol and illicit drugs. He promotes the viewsupported by research evidence, that there are obvious non-pharmacological explanations of the apparently “magic” influence of intoxicants and that the pharmacological effects on mood and behaviour are non-specific and for the most part emotionally neutral or unpleasant.The book also describes how the subjective influence of alcohol and other drugs and behaviour they allegedly induce can be changed by undermining widely held beliefs about their effects.It substantiates the emerging view that the “magic” or “pleasurable” experiences commonly ascribed to alcohol and other drugs have little to do with their chemical action.He further states in his book that people, in self-handicapping, arrange circumstances in order to keep intact their self-image of competence and intelligence and that objects of attribution may be used for this purpose, notably drugs and alcohol. Intoxication is an alibi for defective performance and unacceptable behaviour.