7

How natural is this sentence?

He tried to solve his addiction by drinking Coca cola.

Is it ok to say "to solve an addiction"? I normally hear: "to solve an addiction problem or issue", yet I found a video where the speaker says the sentence above.

Video: https://youtu.be/uxNXEhPpfi0 (minute 14:06)

Improve this question
9
  • 5
    Random people on YouTube say all kinds of informal or nonstandard things. I would agree with you, and add that you can try to cure or overcome an addiction. Solve is definitely wrong.
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Aug 1 at 22:05
  • 1
    It seems like your concern is with the word "addiction" being used alone, without "problem" or "issue." This is fine, and in fact more common.
    – Andy Bonner
    Commented Aug 1 at 22:13
  • 1
    Btw ngram for solve vs overcome
    – Andy Bonner
    Commented Aug 1 at 22:16
  • 1
    It is very common in English to leave off a word or two that is understood, or to mix similar words in closely-related contexts. To “solve an addiction [problem]” sounds both natural and reasonable to me (even if it is a little weird).
    – Dúthomhas
    Commented Aug 2 at 5:56
  • 1
    @Dúthomhas Agreed. Or, slightly more natural to my ears, it's a shortcut for "To solve the problem [of|caused by] an addiction".
    – TripeHound
    Commented Aug 2 at 6:39

9 Answers 9

Reset to default
12

I don’t think I have ever heard a medical or psychological problem said to be “solved”. That word is usually used for puzzles and practical difficulties.

An addiction might be said to be “overcome” or (less formally) “beaten”.

Improve this answer
2
  • What about eradicating an illness? Can we say that the vaccines solved the smallpox?
    – Christian Vincenzo Traina
    Commented Aug 3 at 17:51
  • In the case of this question, I don't think the Coca Cola was used to overcome or beat the addiction -- but rather to basically "sidestep" it by substituting one (dangerous) substance with another (benign) one. The word I would usually use is "manage", though as @aantia mentioned in the comments on the question above, I suspect this speaker really did mean "solve", and was deliberate in picking a nonstandard word.
    – yshavit
    Commented Aug 3 at 21:23
7

I would say “To overcome an addiction”

Improve this answer
6

The speaker said,

... they need to solve their alcohol addiction, they need to solve their drug addiction, they need to get rid of their gambling problem ...

In this context, I think most of us understand the intent behind solve. People who treat addictions might perceive them more like chronic diseases that can't be outright cured. I suspect they'd say things like

  • control their alcohol use
  • get sober
  • stay sober
  • treat their gambling addiction

If you mean drinking Coke as a distraction from nicotine cravings, I would say that.

Improve this answer
3
  • I actually took the example from an article about the history of Coca-Cola, where John Perbemton used coca leaves and nut cola to treat his morphine addiction in the 19th century. Would the original sentence make more sense in this context?
    – Marcelo Martel
    Commented Aug 1 at 23:11
  • @MarceloMartel - that reminds me of a girlfriend whose mother, she said, was addicted to alcohol. Many efforts to help her had failed. My girlfriend said she had paid for her mother to go to a hypnotist. 'Did it work?' I asked. 'Kind of', she said. 'She doesn't drink whisky any more, but she has two bottles of Night Nurse every night'. That product is a cold remedy containing 18% by volume of ethanol (alcohol) along with pain killers and other medications. She lived to be 98 though, I later heard.
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Aug 2 at 6:32
  • 4
    I was about to post something similar. "Solve" isn't wrong and everyone will know what you mean, but it is problematic and also sounds unnatural. You often hear "recover from", "cure", or "break" an addiction especially if the speaker believes that the addiction in question can truly be eliminated. People that believe that addictions (or at least the addiction in question) cannot be completely cured often speaking of "controlling" or "managing" it. Treating is clearly related, though not exactly the same.
    – TimothyAWiseman
    Commented Aug 2 at 19:58
4

The other friends here provided already several better direct answers. Another one is "to cure", or maybe even "to get rid of".

But "to solve" might be (at the limit) correct if you intend to say:

He tried to solve the root cause / problem / conflict which was determining his addiction to drinking Coca cola.

And obviously, in the original sentence, the focus is on the effects, not on the causes, so this meaning is not applicable at all.

And even then, he was not curing or solving anything, he was replacing one addiction with another addiction.

As one smoking doctor (a friend of mine) one told me (coca cola drinker): "It would be healthier for you to become a smoker, then to be a drinker of coca cola." I do not know if he was right, but an addiction is an addiction: it is a proof that something needs to be solved.

Improve this answer
2

We could consider wean off. M+W has this example and many others:

Unlike the agonists methadone and buprenorphine, which may help people wean off opioids, a person can't take naltrexone while using opioids. — Sarah Fielding, Health.com, 19 Nov. 2021

He tried to wean off his addiction by ...

EDIT

I paste here an example on the use of wean off with addiction, from the same link I gave earlier:

Getting serious about async requires us to wean off our meeting addiction and replace them with async communication like audio, text, or video messages. — Tom Medema, Quartz, 6 Apr. 2023

Improve this answer
1
  • 6
    To wean off is to gradually lower consumption until you stop. You wean off a substance, not an addiction.
    – Aubreal
    Commented Aug 2 at 12:26
2

As a native English speaker (Br) - Listening to the speaker, he's talking fast and trying to convey a lot very quickly. When I hear him say '...They need to solve their alcohol addiction...', he's framing the addiction as a problem. as in 'They need to solve their problem of alcohol addiction'. But it's typical rapid fire soundbite speech to whip up an audience and it's probably timed to fit in a very precise time limit. Typical in speech making, words of little value are omitted.

Improve this answer
1
  • Absolule;y right. It's a connected speech thing. Well, not omitted on purpose necessarily but omitted yes.
    – Lambie
    Commented Aug 4 at 16:57
1

'To solve' typically pairs with 'problem' or 'riddle'.

If it is paired with [soemthing else] it suggests:

  • [something else] is name for some problem (puzzle)
  • The sentence has obvious meaning of [something else] problem, and the word problem was omitted.

In the case of the video he calls addictions as problems and he uses the word solve accordingly.

It is okay to say such a phrase. I would suggest rephrasing when I saw it written in an article, for example.

Improve this answer
1
  • Thanks for taking the time. I see the difference now between these two distinct scenarios.
    – Marcelo Martel
    Commented Aug 2 at 17:51
1

Another expression for this is “break an addiction.”

The short answer is that we don’t say solve in this context. Thinking about it, it’s subtle. I wouldn’t say, “She solved her addiction,” and to me, “He solved his gambling problem,” would imply he still has it but figured out how to work around it. But it’s such an unusual phrase, I can’t find any real-world examples of people saying it.

Improve this answer
0

It's not the most idiomatic expression. One can "overcome", "address", "combat".

Improve this answer
1
  • Your answer could be improved with additional supporting information. Please edit to add further details, such as citations or documentation, so that others can confirm that your answer is correct. You can find more information on how to write good answers in the help center.
    – Community Bot
    Commented Aug 6 at 20:39

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .