[onlooker]

First I must preface this new topic with the caveat that I am not in any way a professional or expert in mental health. I wish to speak in broad terms about the mental health of people around the world. We get caught up here with doom scenarios and a back and forth of how, when and by how much are we going to collapse as a civilization and species. So I think being that this forum allows us to entertain thoughts not directly relevant to climate, peak oil or the economy, I will speak a little about this. It seems that the mental health of people around the world is not good and I believe it is a reflection of the current situation in the world. We have so much inequality economically, we have still violence and wars, we have oppressive governments, we have extreme poverty among other things. In this context I believe people are feeling anxious, depressed, frustrated and angry. Plus, it seems that normal people cannot get the authorities to really act to address our overriding concerns relative to environment, economy etc. Also, I do believe that while we are social animals being now so populated too much contact is having a negative effect as we get tired of dealing with each other. Plus we seemed to be at a stage in our evolutionary development whereby we are not at peace and are constantly restless. Not to mention worry and anxiety seems to be pervasive as many realize the world is not a very nice place and getting worse fast. So what do others think?

[kanon]

There are those who consider modern psychiatry to be based on fraud and phony diagnosis. Massive Fraud: Psychiatry’s Corrupt Industry I hope we are not laying the groundwork for a new "doom-disorder" diagnosis. There does seem to be something depressing about the accumulating deterioration and the hopelessness it engenders. Is that a mental disorder or is it rather mental health?

It seems that the mental health of people around the world is not good and I believe it is a reflection of the current situation in the world. We have so much inequality economically, we have still violence and wars, we have oppressive governments, we have extreme poverty among other things. In this context I believe people are feeling anxious, depressed, frustrated and angry. Plus, it seems that normal people cannot get the authorities to really act to address our overriding concerns relative to environment, economy etc.

Is it realistic to expect the authorities, out of the goodness of their hearts, to act on behalf of ordinary people? It may be that worrying about the mental health of the public is a symptom of the Stockholm syndrome. The mental health of the "authorities" is the real concern here.

[Newfie]

My Wife is a Psychoanalyst. For various reasons I've found myself talking to a number of counsellors over the years.

My take is some are good, some not so, and you get the occasional flaming nut case. We currently talk to a marriage counsellor who has been very helpful to us. The one before that? Let's not go there, OK?

Sanity, or mental health is a very subjective concept. Basically it is a measure of how well you cope in the society you find yourself, in the position you find yourself. Nothing more. Bat shit nutzoid here is perfectly fine there.

Because of this personal belief I don't think one can answer the question in any meaningful way.

[SeaGypsy]

Wrong.
Having read the Behavioural Diagnostics Manual it is clear what psychiatry defines as sane or normal. Being focused on pathology, the manual does not spell out non pathology, which can easily be deducted by cancelling out pathological behavior. When this equation is complete, the deduction is clearly that 'sane' or 'normal' people are goal oriented, with socially acceptable goals & socially acceptable, logical (@ least to someone other) pathways to those goals. Even showing an interest in discussing/ sleep dreams, fears & anxieties, neurosis & disfunctional relationships, frustration with 'the way things are' lends the practitioner the starting point for a pathological diagnosis. These are facts on paper & in practice. A total nut job who is capable of persistent redirection of conversation with a shrink, towards stereotyped socially acceptable goals & pathways, can walk out with a clean bill of mental health.

Personally my view on mental health derives from anthropological study of tribal remnant groups with extremely low incidence of pathological behavior. The primary similarity seems to be in group size & structure, with the ideal collective around 70 people with an approximately even age spread, a birth or 2 a year, a death or 2 a year. The mere fact of the fracturing nuclear family in megalopolis paradigm is plenty enough to warrant plenty of shaved monkeys losing the plot. Of course psych is a huge industry & doesn't hand out DIY kits.

[Pops]

Personally, I am amazed at the mental abilities we possess, that we can have any grasp of the universe no matter how limited it might be in reality. We've only been in this position for a very little while now, not too long ago we were eating bugs and glad for it.

Mental Health is an ideal if not a myth. That any of us can tell the difference between what is going on "out there" in the real world and what we internally think, imagine, perceive is going on, is pretty amazing.

I look back at some of my decisions, actions, perceptions, worries, goals, etc, etc, and wonder "what was I thinking?" From this vantage, of almost 58 years, some of them seem more than a little misguided, dysfunctional, and wound up as greatly wasted time and effort.

But for most of us I think we spend first third of our life trying to live up to the position and role we learned as a kid in a family, the second third we try to figure out what role we might or should actually play in the world and in the last third, if we're lucky enough and stare at our bellybutton enough, we learn to forgive both our family and ourselves for the miscues, missteps and outright mistakes of the first two thirds and kind of accept the imperfect thing we are.

I'm hoping.

[Timo]

I look back at some of my decisions, actions, perceptions, worries, goals, etc, etc, and wonder "what was I thinking?" From this vantage, of almost 58 years, some of them seem more than a little misguided, dysfunctional, and wound up as greatly wasted time and effort.

In retrospect, i should have had more forethought.

Coulda, shoulda, woulda. It's driving me crazy just thinking about the absence of any do-overs. Then again, if we didn't go crazy, we'd all be insane.

There are no do-overs. To stay healthy, we need to learn from our mistakes, and apply those lessons to our actions in the future. In that sense, globally speaking, humanity is indeed insane. We refuse to learn from past mistakes, and repeat our actions over and over and over again, each time expecting things to eventually get better. If money is the end-game, bravo! Well done! If self-worth matters at all, game over.

[Newfie]

"we learn to forgive both our family and ourselves for the miscues, missteps and outright mistakes of the first two thirds and kind of accept the imperfect thing we are."

Lofty goals I strive to achieve.

[vox_mundi]

High levels of moral reasoning correspond with increased gray matter in brain

Individuals with a higher level of moral reasoning skills showed increased gray matter in the areas of the brain implicated in complex social behavior, decision making, and conflict processing as compared to subjects at a lower level of moral reasoning, according to new research from the Perelman School of Medicine and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in collaboration with a researcher from Charité Universitätsmediz in Berlin, German.

Moral development research pioneered by psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg in the mid-20th century shows that people progress through different stages of moral reasoning as their cognitive abilities mature.

A total of 67 MBA students were administered the Defining Issue Test to determine which pattern of thought or behavior, known as cognitive schema, each student used when reasoning about moral issues. In it, students were presented with complex moral dilemmas such as medical assisted suicide and asked them to choose the relevance of each of 12 given rationales. Based on the results, subjects were then assigned to one of seven schema types which represent increasing levels of moral development.

Subjects also underwent personality testing and were placed into one of the following categories: neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience, conscientiousness, and agreeableness. Analysis showed higher scores in openness to experience and lower scores in neuroticism for participants at the more advanced levels of moral development.

With regard to brain structure, the team observed increased gray matter in the prefrontal cortex in subjects who reached the post-conventional level of moral reasoning compared to those who are still at a pre-conventional and conventional level. In other words, gray matter volume was correlated with the subject's degree of post-conventional thinking.

Level 1 (Pre-Conventional)

1. Obedience and punishment orientation

(How can I avoid punishment?)

2. Self-interest orientation

(What's in it for me?)
(Paying for a benefit)

Level 2 (Conventional)

3. Interpersonal accord and conformity

(Social norms)
(The good boy/girl attitude)

4. Authority and social-order maintaining orientation

(Law and order morality)

Level 3 (Post-Conventional)

5. Social contract orientation
6. Universal ethical principles

(Principled conscience)

Might explain some of the differences of opinion on the board

[Timo]

"Might explain some of the differences of opinion on the board."

Indeed. 50 shades of grey matter!

I had a traumatic brain injury 6 years back. Lucky to be alive, actually. Cognitive processing skills are still in recovery.

[Newfie]

"Might explain some of the differences of opinion on the board."

Indeed. 50 shades of grey matter!

I had a traumatic brain injury 6 years back. Lucky to be alive, actually. Cognitive processing skills are still in recovery.

FWIW, my Wife and I are a very close couple, unusually so. We have a certain bond that we can only describe as a "resonance."

After being together a few years we discovered that each of our fathers had received very severe brain injuries that left their congitive skills intact but they were both very quiet, reserved personalities. My Father had his skull split by a truck, the plates over lapped afterward. Her Father was shot in the head by a sniper in Italy which removed a hunk of his skull. Upon reflection we believe that having this similarity has contributed to our feeling of resonance.

No particular point here, just a related oddity.

[Timo]

WOW! Both of those traumas, just to survive either of them, are incredible! Even more incredible that both fathers ended up only more reserved than normal, but otherwise OK. Seriously, unless you've been there, these types of stories are easily passed over as interesting, but not much more than that. Being a TBI survivor, though, gives you an entirely new perception on events like these. BRAVO to both of them! And to you and your wife, too!

Obligatory question, though. Were each of you born before or after their accidents? I'm not sure what difference that makes, but you mentioned a resonance between the two of you that might inexplicably be attributed to an alteration to their brains.

My skull was split down the middle from the spinal column to the bridge of my nose. I landed on the back side of my head, but the frontal lobe suffered the worst damage. It was the ricochete of my brain inside my skull that broke the frontal plate. There was a 3 mm split front to back, and that was apparently enough to accommodate the swelling, so no surgery. That split, though did cost me all feeling in my right foot, and it also severed my olfactory nerve, so no smell. My shit don't stink! There are otherr perrpetual problems, as well, such as diplopia (double vision) that refuses to go away for good. My brain just can't accommodate the vision from both eyes at the same time. I rcently had a macular (mother) pucker in my left eye, needles stuck in there to fix it, and now 24/7 fuzzies in that eye. It will eventually get better, but my brain can't handle both eyes being different. So, almost a constant sense of motion sickness and dizziness. Sucks.

My biggest regret through all of this, though, is that the trauma didn't result in any new savant abilities, like instantly being able to play the guitar or piano better than anyone else on the planet. Or being able to speak Kalahari without studying it for 20 years. That really sucks!

In retrospect, i should have tilted my head 3 degrees to the left prior to impact. THEN i'd have every savant ability i could dream of. I want a do-over!

[MD]

I was perfectly fine until I stumbled across peak oil and this nut house. Now I am as nuckin futs as the rest of you.

[onlooker]

It is no measure of sanity to be sane in an insane world.

[SeaGypsy]

RD Laing. It is a measure of sanity to stay put of prison & the funny farm though

[Newfie]

Timo,

My Father's accident occurred when he was 13 (1926?), he needed to learn to speak over again. He had been pronounced dead by 2 out of 3 doctors. He stuttered for a while, although I didn t dpexoerience that. When upset he could not speak.

My Father in Law was a young man in the German army, from an upper middle class family. He had been shot twice and mustard out twice, only to be "recruited" a third time as a courier. He was shot and left for dead,in a ditch, where he was found by American troops (1944?) and recouperated in an American hospital. As a little girl my Wife could lay her hand in the cavity where his skull plate used to be. While I don't know details, it is said that before the injury he was gregarious, but different afterward. He got a PhD in Chemistry and became the principal chemist at a chemical works in Bavaria.

Both incidents occurred well before our births, 1950 and 1952.

My Wife just noted that she believes that their quiet, non-verbal manner trained us both to be sensitive to subtle clues. Hyper sensitive far too often, something we struggle with. Paradoxical.

Your injury sound dreadful. I have cold cocked myself a couple of times I. Recent years, once suffering delayed seizures as a result. Very minor by comparison but frightening. I can't imagine your situation.

We are curious, does closing one eye or wearing an eye patch help?

[onlooker]

I am thinking that most of us can agree on some factors that constitute mental health or lack thereof. One is the subjective one of are you able to achieve goals you set out upon. Finding a job, finding a love interest, balancing your budget etc. Also, I think we can agree that a persons actions can signify to others some mental disorder. Acting out in a serious venue like workplace, unable to communicate in a coherent manner, unable to keep a job or relationship for too long are some subtle manifestations of a disorder. Of course we know more overt examples terrorist act etc. So discerning mental health while difficult can to some degree be achieved. The problem is as noted previously is the collective mental health of our leaders and also humanity in general. As Timo stated one definition of insanity is doing over and over the same thing and expecting different results. So we continue to careen forward at high speed to our collective demise. Certainly that has to be construed as some mental failure or disorder of our species.

[SeaGypsy]

The problem with expecting any semblance of sanity from government & leaders in general firstly requires an honest relationship with the therapist then the development of a consensus ethic. No therapist. No honesty. No consensus ethic. No sanity. The goal of politics is reelection full stop.

[Newfie]

It has been said that individuals have intelligence and planning ability. Large groups have much more difficulty expressing those traits.

Perhaps a similar statement can be made of sanity; individuals can be sane, but when we act collectively in large groups our actions become insane.

[SeaGypsy]

One half of the paradox. The other being that the group defines sanity.

The second biggest population in the world think there's nothing insane about saying the same few words over and over thousands of times a day for life.