This is not the case for milk chocolate, which contains potentially harmful saturated fats, or candy bars that dilute cocoa with a long list of other ingredients.

An accumulating body of evidence suggests that this translates into health benefits for those who consume cocoa or dark chocolate with a cocoa content of 60 percent or more. Benefits have been seen in endothelial function, a measure of blood vessel health, blood pressure, insulin levels, and serum lipids.

Dark chocolate may be conferring vascular benefits via several pathways.

Perhaps men not motivated to quit smoking for fear of heart attack or lung cancer will be motivated by this. It may be difficult to quit smoking, but it almost invariably proves far more difficult to live with the consequences of not doing so.

They include vitamins, which are organic compounds our bodies need to function normally, and minerals, which are inorganic compounds our bodies need to function normally.

This is just the combination that might lead to very bad judgments. Feeling less intoxicated and more alert, one might get behind the wheel of a car, but with impaired coordination and reaction time, that decision might spell disaster.