Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress • Hacker News Board

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#271

Post by closeparen » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:02 PM UTC

ixtli wrote: post #37

Not to reduce a complex topic to an aphorism but: if the world is configured in a way thats antagonistic towards you, a negative response is understandable. A lot of this stuff fits neatly into a tradition of blaming people for their conditions that, by and large, they have little control over. Oh, another aphorism that's always stuck with me is "the difference between 'crazy' and 'eccentric' is a million dollars."

If you look at outcomes instead of responsibility, you get the opposite conclusion. If your suffering is a defect, then maybe we can fix it. If your suffering is a correct response to your circumstances, then it's right and proper for you to experience that suffering fully and indefinitely.

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#272

Post by kazagistar » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

jmole wrote: post #219

danans wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you stick a tiger in a small cage it doesn’t breed — that is an objective observation rather than a moral critique. Huxleys argument is of the same nature — that society is becoming a cage to natural impulse and instinct. That's a false analogy because it uses things that aren't related to each other in the same way. The society=>cage analogy isn't an objective observation, it is your opinion, and also an essent…

the analogy is "an environmental condition that significantly modifies 'natural' behavior". The only essentialist argument is that there was a 'natural' to begin with, which in this case ought to be obvious. Our 'natural' environment, i.e. the environment in which we evolved to prosper, is far different in which the environment that we live today. If you fail to see the analogy, you are either being overly reductive…

The larger brain is an evolutionary adaptation for the purpose of dealing with unique new environments. Doing so is specifically what is natural for humans, and why they so thoroughly spread across the world. Of course, evolution is basically alway does a half-assed job of everything.

I think on average, we are better adjusted to this society then one thousands of years ago. Its hard to be adjusted to not having stable food or medical care or wwhatnot. But for some people, and in some ways, its worse. Thats a tradeoff and, since we have this awesome ability to change the environment, one we can work to understand and fix... not by working towards some ancient ideal, but creative forward thinking. The best environment hasn't existed yet.

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#273

Post by yomly » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:06 PM UTC

razakel wrote: post #264

seesawtron wrote: post #106

It reminds me of what Aldous Huxley wrote (about people in distress): “The real hopeless victims of mental illness are to be found among those who appear to be most normal. "Many of them are normal because they are so well adjusted to our mode of existence, because their human voice has been silenced so early in their lives, that they do not even struggle or suffer or develop symptoms as the neurotic does." They are…

Some more food for thought - occasionally doctors will privately admit that many of their patients aren't really depressed, they're in fact suffering from "shit life syndrome" - in other words, their mood is the normal and natural response to the circumstances they are in. Here's an FT article about Blackpool, a deprived seaside town in the north of England. It has the highest unemployment rate, some of the lowest li…

Anecdotally a doctor friend confirmed this same observation to me after doing a psychiatry rotation - they suggested that most people with depression were just sad but wanted a magic pill to cure the unpleasant emotion.

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#274

Post by sandgiant » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:10 PM UTC

dukha wrote: post #56

I've always been depressive and pessimistic person as far as I can remember. I've been looking at other people only to see how happy they are and how content they with their life. They feel motivated, want something from life and in generally think that being alive is alright, which I just couldn't internalize no matter how hard I tried. Essentially, I've come to the conclusion that there _must_ be something wrong wi…

I think you're on to something really important here.

Some people (normal people if you will) just don't think too much about things. Even when they sometimes go on to make terrible choices for themselves, and others, they might regret it, they might have negative thoughts about it, but they don't become depressed. They are not inclined to ruminating hours on end about their mistakes, so the negative thoughts dissipate over time, they effectively move on.

But if your personality, or brain, or whatever, is made in such a way that you like to think a lot about what could have been, or could be, or how to behave, or what others think of you, any kind of negative thought you might have will stay around, eventually leading to (symptoms of) depression.

So I think you're right when you say that depression is not what's wrong with you. You might just be one of those people that are good at thinking. Perhaps sometimes a little too good at thinking, a little too sensitive. Being sensitive and good at thinking is not be a bad thing at all, but spending too much time having negative thoughts may be what leads to depression.

If this is the case, realizing that you have a choice, in what to think about, is an important step on improving the quality of life, perhaps even learning to life with, or overcome some of the symptoms of anxiety and depression. Accept the negative thoughts, they are just natural thoughts after all, but choose not to dwell on them, let them pass and move on to the next thought, it might be a positive one.

You may also find some inspiration in metacognitive therapy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metacognitive_therapy).

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#275

Post by kazagistar » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:11 PM UTC

Johnjonjoan wrote: post #207

danans wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We are no longer fully human beings This gets thrown about quite a bit without defining what "fully human" means. Given that it is a superlative, does it mean "free from the pressures of modern technological society"? Then it must also mean giving up the benefits of modern technological society, right? There are few true primitivists out there, and for many today it is a sort of technology enabled lifestyle busines…

I didn't mean to imply that all technology is "dehumanising" but I'd argue that most if not all that influences you has done something to your humanity/technology balance. Fully human being is very hard to explain. According to my knowledge of Huxley is that it's someone who has essentially reached an ego state that has certain values(life, beauty, suffering). All is each which is all. I think if you haven't really d…

To be human is to have a brain, and the brain exists to do technology and social organization. Separating the two is absurd... the human animal, left on its own devices, naturally creates technology and societies, so all these things are just as natural.

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#276

Post by mjevans » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:22 PM UTC

closeparen wrote: post #260

dpweb wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, what is the appropriate threshold where we call it mental illness. The article, Jenna's boyfriend cheated. She's seriously depressed. That ain't illness, it's normal. That doctor is a quack. I feel part of the problem is the expectation that humans are supposed to be happy. Happy is just a state of mind, not necessarily our default state. Depression and mental pain have their uses. They alert us, something is w…

Symptoms of depression are bad news for difficult self-improvement projects. Sometimes you need your emotional system to stop punching you in the face before you can climb out of the hole. Negative emotions can easily slip from encouraging action into preventing it. And without the capability to feel pleasure, even success will seem pretty empty. Sometimes your life is actually great and the failure is in your percep…

However the neutrality of the self depends on a fertile environment within which to grow a new life structure. As someone described in a different post about 'shit life syndrome': there are places physically, and I would argue as an extension also socially, where the true problem and root cause is outside.

Care should also be taken to have a society that builds for the success of all, and helps to place individuals within good situations. The help from a drug to fix a temporary problem or a genetic disease might still be required but it isn't a one shot magic bullet.

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#277

Post by verylittlemeat » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:22 PM UTC

P_I_Staker wrote: post #213

verylittlemeat wrote: post #64

Is there any way to get off the euphemism treadmill? First we had to create new terms because the old ones carried baggage. Now we have to righteously and victoriously claim the old ones because we should be proud of our baggage. Call it chemical imbalance or call it people in distress; is any of this language vacillating actually enabling better treatment or is it just a way for people to get honors and headlines wi…

The problem is we're not likely to stop stigmatising people with mental health any time soon. You can't make people believe something they desperately choose not to. We think people are 100% responsible for their behavior, so if they do something wrong or inconvenience us, it's their fault, and they're bad people for it. They should just not complain or feel bad, because you're not entitled to sympathy for your mista…

There was an interesting article [0] from a decade ago about a NY agency called "Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities." When the agency was established in the 70s the social workers fought hard for the clinical word "retard" over prior terms like "moron."

Cut to 2010 and there was public outcry to have the offensive agency name changed but the people working there refused to give it up because they still held on to the more neutral meaning of "retard."

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/08/nyregion/08name.html

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#278

Post by danans » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:29 PM UTC

PaulHoule wrote: post #215

stanfordkid wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think his ideas and cultural critiques are a little more complicated than that — his book Island in particular is worth reading — it is the ideal mirror to the dystopia he describes in brave new world. Essentialism is a moral critique. If you stick a tiger in a small cage it doesn’t breed — that is an objective observation rather than a moral critique. Huxleys argument is of the same nature — that society is becomi…

If tigers were not somewhat dangerous it wouldn't be much harder than breeding housecats, except they are larger and eat more. Every so often they catch somebody breeding tigers in shockingly small cages. How can society not be "a cage" in some respects? How about the arguments from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization_and_Its_Disconten...

> How can society not be "a cage" in some respects?

Calling it a cage is reductio ad absurdum. The presence of social norms does not invalidate the agency of humans or groups of humans in the way a cage does. Characterizing it as a cage is a strawman, often used by those who would simply like to destroy it and erect a "cage" of their own preference.

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#279

Post by milesvp » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:31 PM UTC

I can sympathize with the author. I think they are probably correct in the general, that this tendency to try to treat normal psychological responses as something fixable with pharmaceuticals is a problem.

That said I have some very real anecdotes related to emotional responses to things. These are things I've noticed that very much link short term emotional effects to physiological effects in the brain.

The first, is a tool I learned from someone living with a type1 diabetic. He noticed that occasionally they'd end up in weirdly emotional antagonistic discussions with his partner, and eventually linked it to when his partner had low blood sugar. So, they established, that whenever conversations turn irrational, they pause and do a blood sugar check. Usually addressing this underlying problem made their conversation much more productive (and certainly just taking a break helped too). Similarly with my wife, we've established rules that allow one of us to pause the conversation to make sure the other is dealing with some underlying physical issue, usually one or both of us are tired or hungry when we start fighting. Tired and hungry both have profound effects on brain chemistry, so addressing them can have very real psychological effects.

My other anecdote is related to a correlation I've found with mental health and taking a vitamin D supplement. It's not entirely clear to me whether taking vitamin D prevents my tendency towards mild depression, or if I'm tending towards depression so I stop taking vitamin D. But I know that if I keep taking it on a daily basis, my mood tends to be more stable. If I were to replace it with a sugar pill it may have similar effects, but given I live in Seattle where many tend to be deficient, I'd probably start to notice in a couple weeks.

Re: Let’s avoid talk of ‘chemical imbalance’: it’s people in distress

#280

Post by danans » Thu, Jul 16, 2020, 7:32 PM UTC

jschwartzi wrote: post #254

PaulHoule wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If tigers were not somewhat dangerous it wouldn't be much harder than breeding housecats, except they are larger and eat more. Every so often they catch somebody breeding tigers in shockingly small cages. How can society not be "a cage" in some respects? How about the arguments from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilization_and_Its_Disconten...

A humane society wouldn't require us to shutter our emotions behind closed doors. It wouldn't treat life events such as bereavement or a change in circumstance as if they're merely caused by a chemical imbalance. If my friend or my fiancee dies then I'm damn well going to feel sad. I might cry in public sometimes. To suggest that there is something wrong with me for doing that is massively inhumane. And it's at the c…

> If my friend or my fiancee dies then I'm damn well going to feel sad. I might cry in public sometimes. To suggest that there is something wrong with me for doing that is massively inhumane.

In my experience, US society allows for this form of authentic expression of grief. Take enough walks near overlooks or by bodies of water, and you will eventually see someone openly experiencing grief. Where have you experienced that this is not normative?