Has Alcohol Psychotomimetic and Convulsant Properties?

The article suggests that alcohol, and possibly other similar agents, may under some circumstances have a convulsant and psychotomimetic activity. Alcohol produces an initial suppression of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, but if subjects continue to take the same dose of alcohol REM sleep returns to control levels and may after 5 nights significantly exceed control levels. This recovery and increase in REM time can only be overcome by increasing the dose of alcohol. One might think of morphine as "blocking" some normal or physiological pathway, but when a drug was discovered able to antagonize all its important actions morphine had to be regarded in some senses as a "stimulant" and "agonist". Quite recently a much purer antagonist nalaxone has been discovered. It is suggested that alcohol may be such a drug possessing both stimulant and depressant properties, that is, it is a partial agonist. It may even prove to be its own antagonist. The possible relationship between gamma-aminobutyric acid or GABA and alcoholic dependence and psychoses has also been reviewed.