Overlooking Terris: A Speculative Reconsideration of a Curious Spot-Blindness in the History of Alcohol-Control Science

Abstract

The authors argue that the overlooking or forgetting of a beverage-specific element of Milton Terris's classic 1967 paper linking per capita alcohol consumption with cirrhosis mortality trends sheds new light on the subsequent paradigmatic history of alcohol epidemiology. The historical standing and subsequent citation of Terris's paper are re-examined, and Terris's reasons for not reminding the alcohol epidemiology literature of this aspect of his paper are explored. Aspects of presentation and content of the 1967 paper are also discussed with respect to the explanation of the subsequently lost beverage-specific element of Terris's article. The authors suggest that an evolutionary aspect of the relationship and competition between the modern alcoholism and alcohol controls paradigms in alcohol epidemiology may offer the key to accounting for this historical-forgetting puzzle.