On the subject of alcohol...
Many years ago some World War I aviation experts had a discussion about the pervasive use of alcohol before and even during flight by those early aviators.
Reasons given at the time were to steady nerves, and ward off the debilitating cold so often experienced in open cockpit airplanes, even in summer.
During their primary training the student pilots were often encouraged to take a nip or two before flying to help them relax. During that time all aviation was extremely dangerous. Nerves were often an issue.
In combat a flask filled with brandy was considered a standard item of personal flight gear.
Later, the historians wondered if the alcohol use had contributed to the accident rate. The old pilots that survived the war claimed that in addition to the alcohol making them feel less fearful, and numbing the cold, they believed that they actually flew better with a little alcohol in their system.
Today we would laugh and say that is like the drunk that thinks he can still drive just fine. But we are not talking drunk, just a little under the influence.
Some psychologists put the question to the test. In a controlled experiment they had two groups learn a new, unfamiliar task that took some hand and eye coordination.
One group learned while sober, the other group while slightly under the influence. After the task was mastered, each group was tested sober. Sure enough, the group that had learned the task with a bit of a buzz performed less well when they were tested sober.
The conclusion was that performance of a task learned while under the influence will be performed better at a later time if also done under the influence.
Therefore, if World War I pilots learned to fly under the influence, they probably did fly better when they continued to fly slightly buzzed.
If we learned to shoot sober, we should normally expect to shoot better sober. And safer, too.
