Origins of the myth of dopamine as the ‘pleasure chemical’
Dopamine is the compulsion chemical, not the pleasure chemical.  It turns thoughts into beliefs into actions.  This is why people who take too many dopamine recreational drugs who get leaky dopaminE vesicles tend to easily believe any thought that occurs to them and do all kinds of psychotic things.  A Scanner Darkly by Philip K. Dick had some great portrayals of what this looks like.<p>Opioid are the pleasure chemicals and that&#x27;s why exogenous opioids destroy people.  There&#x27;s nothing that an opioid high can&#x27;t fix, because that&#x27;s literally how the brain is wired.  Once the opioid receptors are activated, the brain is literally done trying to do anything else because the ultimate aim, at least the way the brain is wired, has been acheived.