Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017) • Hacker News Board

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#181

Post by iliketosleep » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:32 PM UTC

lzol wrote: post #116

riskneutral wrote: post #80

I used to feel this way, then I discovered meditation and now I am almost always in a positive state of mind. In my experience, it is depressed people who are not seeing realistically, and they are caught in cycles of mental delusion. Happiness achieved in this way is just about truly accepting the "depressing" realities and being okay with it all including your own depressing reactions to the realities, and then not…

You can practice mindfulness and meditate daily and still be depressed about the state of the world you live in. You can recognize negative experiences, embrace them, and still feel empty afterwards. You can see yourself as a bristle on the brushstroke of the universe and still feel insignificant. You can see that life is just a game and not want to play. In a world with 7 billion people all playing their own game, t…

To take it further, for some people meditation can crystalize beyond all doubt that they don't want to play the game. The only thing that appears to possibly change such people is massive life upheavels.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#182

Post by tim333 » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:34 PM UTC

Funes- wrote: post #21

akuji1993 wrote: post #2

My therapist said to me once: "I really like pessimistic patients a lot more than overly optimistic ones. A depressed, pessimistic person is judging the world very accurately and is not crushed by a negative outcome, as they have already thought about exactly that. They might even completely circumvent the negative outcome, because they thought about every possibility beforehand. Optimists on the other hand can be cr…

>A depressed, pessimistic person is judging the world very accurately. Absolutely not. I've dealt with a lot of pessimistic, depressed people--I've been clinically depressed, as well, in the past--, and we can be the most closed-minded, whiny, oblivious people out there. I think that's exactly how depression actually works: one is enslaved, kept away from experiencing the world as it is, by their extraordinarily redu…

There is a difference between predicting the odds of good and bad stuff accurately. If you take someone like Warren Buffett, he's known as a cheerful optimist and focuses on stuff like the economy making everyone richer over time but he's in the insurance business and better at figuring the risks of death, illness or a nuke taking out NYC more than most.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#183

Post by _def » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:34 PM UTC

What most people describe as "realism" is often just a depressive view. There's always two sides of a coin, realistic or not. What seems "real" to you depends on which side you spend most of your time.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#184

Post by cowb0yl0gic » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:34 PM UTC

izzydata wrote: post #91

riskneutral wrote: post #80

I used to feel this way, then I discovered meditation and now I am almost always in a positive state of mind. In my experience, it is depressed people who are not seeing realistically, and they are caught in cycles of mental delusion. Happiness achieved in this way is just about truly accepting the "depressing" realities and being okay with it all including your own depressing reactions to the realities, and then not…

Is it fair to acknowledge all of the worlds atrocities and then dismiss them so you can be happy?

The trick is to recognize the things that are wrong, decide what (if any) course of action you can/will take to address them, then focus on that path. The rest you have to keep at arms' length. There are so many things wrong (and so many things that are so very, very wrong) that it should be overwhelming to a reasonable mind to try to "feel" them all.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#185

Post by dwaltrip » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:36 PM UTC

A lot of people in this thread are justifying their own pathologies with the title. Nothing more powerful than a story that soothes the ego.

Maybe there is some truth to the idea. I wouldn't be surprised, although we probably can't make that general of a statement.

Either way, don't let something like this article stop you from improving your life. One thing is for sure, we can't accurately predict all of the possibilities for ourselves. Might as well aim for a few improvements, eh?

For what it's worth, I'm currently dealing with mild / moderate depression and anxiety. In my opinion, it's a shit way to be and I aspire to experience less of it in the future.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#186

Post by zentiggr » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:36 PM UTC

ModelTheorist12 wrote: post #158

gfodor wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not necessarily. David Deutche argues that theories can be argued as having merit based upon if they are good or bad explanations, regardless of application. A good explanation is one that fits the data and is hard to vary. The flat earth theory fails on both.

Given a finite data set, an infinite number of functions/curves can explain it. This is curve-fitting 101 stuff. All explanatory models are either an over-fit or an under-fit to the data. With the fine print being "acceptable error rate". "The Earth is flat" may be wrong, but it could be acceptably wrong to me. This is tackled by model-dependent realism ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model-dependent_realism ) and by…

Your false dichotomy is that sure, your flat-earth approximation is fine, but only on basically personal scales (up to a few miles or so).

You can't charactierize your loacl approximation as a general theory because it will fail as soon as you scale up to horizon effects, and breaks completely when reaching planetary scale.

If you want to keep your flat theory in its applicable scale, fine. Just don't expect to project it outside of its useful scale.

Just like the Newtonian model works well until you reach the scales where relativistic effects demand the shift to relativity.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#187

Post by jrs235 » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:36 PM UTC

rtkaratekid wrote: post #165

cryoshon wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

keeping my realist comments to myself took me more than two decades to become competent at. it'll take me another two decades to master. the trick is to understand that all people live in a marginal headspace where engagement with the nature of the world is heavily filtered and limited so that their psychology can continue to mostly function on a day to day basis. this is true whether you are a "realist" or "pessimis…

Piercing the veil... what an appropriate turn of phrase. I resonate a lot with your third paragraph. I also think it can be rude and unnecessary to expose people to this paradigm if they're not ready. It's a bad analogy, but it's almost like poison. If you're used to some types of poison, they wont cause injury, but if you're not... it could kill you. Trouble is, in my mind life is filled with these poisons and peopl…

I recommend the following book under a few caveats the first one being no one without their highschool diploma or G.E.D. (General Education Diploma) should read it.

The Underachiever's Manifesto: The Guide to Accomplishing Little and Feeling Great (Funny Self-Help Book, Guide to Lowering Stress and Dealing with Perfectionism)

https://amzn.to/2pvYI6b

It will surely pierce a lot of people's beliefs.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#188

Post by x2f10 » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:37 PM UTC

rtkaratekid wrote: post #102

I'm not so depressed these days (thankfully) but this "realism" does tend to manifest is different ways. I'm very self-conscious about not dragging people down because some thoughts that I think daily that are normal for me, seem to be absolutely psychologically crippling for people who previously hadn't, or didn't want to think such things. Usually when I do express these thoughts they're in the form of semi-dark hu…

>But sometimes I wonder why I can lose friends so fast by just saying things that are true or are very likely to be true.

I am like you. However, I hold the old quote to be true: "People may not remember exactly what you did, or what you said, but they will always remember how you made them feel." It doesn't matter if the things are true or not. You stating those things makes people feel scared, worried, and/or defeated. If you had those feelings when another person was around, how often would you want them around? This is not a criticism but simply another viewpoint.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#189

Post by asdfman123 » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:38 PM UTC

dwaltrip wrote: post #185

A lot of people in this thread are justifying their own pathologies with the title. Nothing more powerful than a story that soothes the ego. Maybe there is some truth to the idea. I wouldn't be surprised, although we probably can't make that general of a statement. Either way, don't let something like this article stop you from improving your life. One thing is for sure, we can't accurately predict all of the possibi…

Making anything negative part of your identity is a dangerous thing to do, because if you make something part of your identity, it's much harder to give it up.

Re: Depressed People See the World More Realistically (2017)

#190

Post by mkane848 » Wed, Oct 16, 2019, 3:40 PM UTC

kypro wrote: post #82

I don't think it's the case that all depressed people are realists, but that realists in general may be more predisposed to depression or being depressed. It seems likely some people suffering from depression have real mental illness, and a much much smaller number of people are ultra realists and get depressed over real negative events and facts. I know there have been times in my life where I have suffered from dep…

Sorry for your loss <3