It's not interesting enough to put on the blog yet. Its' interesting
though. Especially because a mental health friend is also involved in
the conversation.
Sunday, 31 October 2010
Edward Scisscorhands and We
My pretty lady friend who I think I may have now pissed off came up with
a great expression. Edward Scissorhands. The metaphor is perfect for her
for what she's feeling like at the moment and I totally get what she
means. The blades on the fingers unwittingly cut people without meaning
to. The pubic fear the werido Edward Schissorhands, the freak all
dressed in black. People fear the cuts, the jibes, the unintended
criticisms. They don't want to be hurt.
a great expression. Edward Scissorhands. The metaphor is perfect for her
for what she's feeling like at the moment and I totally get what she
means. The blades on the fingers unwittingly cut people without meaning
to. The pubic fear the werido Edward Schissorhands, the freak all
dressed in black. People fear the cuts, the jibes, the unintended
criticisms. They don't want to be hurt.
I can't remember what Edward Scisscorhands looked like underneath the
black leather outfit. He was just a little boy psychologically. He was
no monster. He was just lost in a strange world that wouldn't accept
freaks. He spend his time making wonderful creations with his hands, the
creations the people so loved but the maker and his tools were reviled
like the mad. He was just a lost human being desperately looking for the
same things everyone else wants. The same as everyone else but for the
outside veneer.
It really feels like We.
The extermination of the genotypes of mental illness begins
http://www.ethox.org.uk/research/genetics/is-the-prevention-or-cure-of-autism-a-morally-justified-quest
"
Is the prevention or cure of autism a morally justified quest?
"
Is the prevention or cure of autism a morally justified quest?
Virginia Bovell
Affecting 1% of the population, autism spectrum conditions are the focus
of extensive contemporary genetic and other aetiological investigation.
*Some scientists have raised the possibility of advances in knowledge
leading to the ability to prevent autism, while in the UK it may soon be
mandatory for couples using Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis to choose
embryos that are not affected with markers indicating serious
disability.* The ethical implications of advances in our genetic
understanding of autism, which may in due course lead to the possibility
for antenatal screening, are all the more significant because of the
emergence of a pro-diversity autism lobby. Its members positively affirm
not only the equal rights of autistic people to exist but – in some
quarters – assertively state the advantages of autism relative to being
'neurotypical'. To date this polarisation of perspective has not been
explored within the context of contemporary debates in medical ethics,
which is why I have chosen to investigate it in greater depth. This
research project will aim to describe and dissect the beliefs, values
and assumptions that underpin contrasting viewpoints, and to clarify
which issues need to be explicitly debated, to ensure that developments
in research, policy and practice are driven with an awareness of the
ethical underpinnings and their implications for people with autism,
their families and the wider community.
"
This is the scary stuff I was worried about: the attempts to remove
types of people under the guise of the label of mental illness. It's the
first steps to eliminating autistic peoople.
But I don't know what it's like to be a motehr. I don't know what it's
like to raise an autistic child. I don't appreciate the burden perhaps.
The value of autissm is the problem. It's a serious disability but it
also helps people to be exceptional. There's a character in Boston Legal
who's diagnosed with Asperger's - which is a sort of high functioning
autism if I remember right. He's a total genius and written law, i.e.
knowing all the cases and obscure cases which no one else ahs heard of.
But he's discriminated against because he finds social relationships
hard, is weird and can be hard to get on with. One lawyer accepts him
for who he is and when he does that the disability is removed.
The dysfunction is in society, not the individual's genetic code.
article on medical ethics
Hi Nicky
Just wondered what you thought of this.
http://www.ethox.org.uk/research/genetics/is-the-prevention-or-cure-of-autism-a-morally-justified-quest
s the prevention or cure of autism a morally justified quest?
Virginia Bovell
Affecting 1% of the population, autism spectrum conditions are the focus
of extensive contemporary genetic and other aetiological investigation.
Some scientists have raised the possibility of advances in knowledge
leading to the ability to prevent autism, while in the UK it may soon be
mandatory for couples using Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis to choose
embryos that are not affected with markers indicating serious
disability. The ethical implications of advances in our genetic
understanding of autism, which may in due course lead to the possibility
for antenatal screening, are all the more significant because of the
emergence of a pro-diversity autism lobby. Its members positively affirm
not only the equal rights of autistic people to exist but – in some
quarters – assertively state the advantages of autism relative to being
'neurotypical'. To date this polarisation of perspective has not been
explored within the context of contemporary debates in medical ethics,
which is why I have chosen to investigate it in greater depth. This
research project will aim to describe and dissect the beliefs, values
and assumptions that underpin contrasting viewpoints, and to clarify
which issues need to be explicitly debated, to ensure that developments
in research, policy and practice are driven with an awareness of the
ethical underpinnings and their implications for people with autism,
their families and the wider community.
Link to recent report showing planned move of commissioning to GPs isn't based on international evidence
http://www.library.nhs.uk/COMMISSIONING/ViewResource.aspx?resID=392363&tabID=290
"
The report shows that there is little, if any, evidence that smaller
organisations are better at commissioning than larger ones. It also
argues that the transition will be costly, almost certainly resulting in
a dip in performance in the short to medium term.
"
The report is by the think tank Civitas.
http://www.civitas.org.uk/pdf/nhscommissionoct2010.pdf
There's an executive summary on page 3. It's also covered in the BMA and
the amusing title with the inneuendo in should hopefully mean more
doctors read it.
Madness quotes
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/madness.html
Here's the ones from the first page.
"
A leader is one who, out of madness or goodness, volunteers to take upon
himself the woe of the people. There are few men so foolish, hence the
erratic quality of leadership in the world.
John Updike
A lot of people thought this dream must be madness, but we are not crazy.
Gloria Trevi
A person needs a little madness, or else they never dare cut the rope
and be free.
Nikos Kazantzakis
A tavern is a place where madness is sold by the bottle.
Jonathan Swift
About half my designs are controlled fantasy, 15 percent are total
madness and the rest are bread-and-butter designs.
Manolo Blahnik
Actors are able to trick themselves into treating anything as if it's
fantastic. It's a kind of madness really.
Tom Baker
Afflicted by love's madness all are blind.
Sextus Propertius
All cities are mad: but the madness is gallant. All cities are
beautiful: but the beauty is grim.
Christopher Morley
America has entered one of its periods of historic madness, but this is
the worst I can remember.
John Le Carre
Anger is a momentary madness, so control your passion or it will control
you.
G. M. Trevelyan
Anger is a short madness.
Horace
Books have led some to learning and others to madness.
Petrarch
But mathematics is the sister, as well as the servant, of the arts and
is touched by the same madness and genius.
Marston Morse
But my doubt would not be overcome. Kierkegaard had declared that it was
only to the consciousness of sin that Christianity was not horror or
madness. For me it was sometimes both.
Georg Brandes
But what is liberty without wisdom, and without virtue? It is the
greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness,
without tuition or restraint.
Edmund Burke
Can a moment of madness make up for an age of consent?
Basil Bunting
Drunkenness is nothing but voluntary madness.
Seneca
Eighty-six percent of the gun death of children under the age of 14
internationally is right here in the United States of America. It is
madness.
Nita Lowey
Even if one takes every reefer madness allegation of the prohibitionists
at face value, marijuana prohibition has done far more harm to far more
people than marijuana ever could.
William F. Buckley, Jr.
Everybody's a mad scientist, and life is their lab. We're all trying to
experiment to find a way to live, to solve problems, to fend off madness
and chaos.
David Cronenberg
"
A BBC article on schizophrenia, divergent thinking, neurobiology and psychosanology and psychopathology
D2 receptors are one of the sites that antipsychotics act on.
The term "skunk works" is surprisingly nothing to do with cannabis
though this drug has often been associated with creativity. Skunk works
was the nick name given to the advanced R&D division of one the US
aircraft manufacturers. I think it was Lockheed. They developed the
SR-71 Blackbird, still the fastest proper aeroplane in the world.
This ramble from the BBC explains all.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10154775
"
Creativity is akin to insanity, say scientists who have been studying
how the mind works.
Brain scans reveal striking similarities in the thought pathways of
highly creative people and those with schizophrenia.
Both groups lack important receptors used to filter and direct thought.
It could be this uninhibited processing that allows creative people to
"think outside the box", say experts from Sweden's Karolinska Institute.
In some people, it leads to mental illness.
But rather than a clear division, experts suspect a continuum, with some
people having psychotic traits but few negative symptoms.
Art and suffering
Some of the world's leading artists, writers and theorists have also had
mental illnesses - the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh and American
mathematician John Nash (portrayed by Russell Crowe in the film A
Beautiful Mind) to name just two.
Creativity is known to be associated with an increased risk of
depression, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
The thalamus channels thoughts
Similarly, people who have mental illness in their family have a higher
chance of being creative.
Associate Professor Fredrik Ullen believes his findings could help
explain why.
He looked at the brain's dopamine (D2) receptor genes which experts
believe govern divergent thought.
He found highly creative people who did well on tests of divergent
thought had a lower than expected density of D2 receptors in the
thalamus - as do people with schizophrenia.
The thalamus serves as a relay centre, filtering information before it
reaches areas of the cortex, which is responsible, amongst other things,
for cognition and reasoning.
"Fewer D2 receptors in the thalamus probably means a lower degree of
signal filtering, and thus a higher flow of information from the
thalamus," said Professor Ullen.
He believes it is this barrage of uncensored information that ignites
the creative spark.
This would explain how highly creative people manage to see unusual
connections in problem-solving situations that other people miss.
Schizophrenics share this same ability to make novel associations. But
in schizophrenia, it results in bizarre and disturbing thoughts.
UK psychologist and member of the British Psychological Society Mark
Millard said the overlap with mental illness might explain the
motivation and determination creative people share.
"Creativity is uncomfortable. It is their dissatisfaction with the
present that drives them on to make changes.
"Creative people, like those with psychotic illnesses, tend to see the
world differently to most. It's like looking at a shattered mirror. They
see the world in a fractured way.
"There is no sense of conventional limitations and you can see this in
their work. Take Salvador Dali, for example. He certainly saw the world
differently and behaved in a way that some people perceived as very odd.
He said businesses have already recognised and capitalised on this
knowledge.
Some companies have "skunk works" - secure, secret laboratories for
their highly creative staff where they can freely experiment without
disrupting the daily business.
Chartered psychologist Gary Fitzgibbon says an ability to "suspend
disbelief" is one way of looking at creativity.
"When you suspend disbelief you are prepared to believe anything and
this opens up the scope for seeing more possibilities.
"Creativity is certainly about not being constrained by rules or
accepting the restrictions that society places on us. Of course the more
people break the rules, the more likely they are to be perceived as
'mentally ill'."
He works as an executive coach helping people to be more creative in
their problem solving behaviour and thinking styles.
"The result is typically a significant rise in their well being, so as
opposed to creativity being associated with mental illness it becomes
associated with good mental health."
"
"
Useful links from Gail Hornstein
http://www.gailhornstein.com/works.htm
personal experience stuff, survivor and voice hearing.
A paper on the stigma of mental illness shown by psychiatrists
Here's a survey of attitudes. One of the authors, Louis Appleby, is a
pretty senior honcho in mental health in the UK.
pretty senior honcho in mental health in the UK.
Personality disorder: the patients psychiatrists dislike
http://bjp.rcpsych.org/cgi/content/abstract/153/1/44
The paper seems to have become pay-walled. It's these little slips in
reality that make people paranoid that there's a controlling force in
this universe, a controlling force which I battled against and continue
to battle against. I always have a sharp knife by my bed. Well...I do at
the moment anyway. Since the troubles I had with the other consciousness
a few months ago that cost me so much.
But I know these things are delusional. People aren't so sick as to try
and induce suicide by making my world unreal. That would be so sick only
a psychiatrist would do it. At least the sort of psychiatrist that needs
electro-shock immediately.
"
A sample of psychiatrists was asked to read a case vignette and indicate
likely management and attitudes to the patient on a number of
semantic-differential scales. Patients given a previous diagnosis of
personality disorder (PD) were seen as more difficult and less deserving
of care compared with control subjects who were not. The PD cases were
regarded as manipulative, attention-seeking, annoying, and in control of
their suicidal urges and debts. PD therefore appears to be an enduring
pejorative judgement rather than a clinical diagnosis. It is proposed
that the concept be abandoned.
"
Thorium, what influences decisions and the search fo the best answers to the world's energy needs
There's a good article on Wired.com I came across that covers the
progress in the search for clean, safe and affordable energy that
doesn't destroy the environment.
progress in the search for clean, safe and affordable energy that
doesn't destroy the environment.
At the moment most nuclear reactors use uranium as the main fuel. The
uranium fission process is pretty volatile and this can lead to a
meltdown but safety systems such as carbon control rods which SCRAM the
reaction mean disaster can be averted. A nuclear meltdown can be
catastrophic as the images from Chernobyl show. Just Google that and see
the devastating effects.
There was a competing technology involving Thorium that was developed in
the mid-20th century. It wasn't used commercially though.
Uranium needed for modern extractors is hard to find and takes a lot of
refining. Sophisticated techniques have been developed such as
bioengineering bacteria to get the elusive U-235. It means operating
costs are expensive however capital outlay costs are lower.
The by-products of uranium fission are much more difficult to dispose of
than those from thorium reactors (both kinds) but there's an important
by-product which is a significant reason for the popularity of the
uranium reactor over the thorium one: the former produces plutonium. The
needs of the Cold War could be met by uranium reactors but not the
thorium design.
Today one of the unique selling points of thorium reactors is they don't
produce plutonium. Plutonium is hard to detect because it releases alpha
particles which are easily shielded whereas the products of thorium
decay product gamma rays which can penetrate lead and be detected.
Thorium reactors mean there's no risk of proliferating weapons-grade
nuclear material.
The very latest thorium reactor designs are art. The reaction is primed
with a proton accelerator which generates neutrons to keep the process
going. Without the beam of protons producing neutrons to smash up the
thorium nuclei the reaction quickly stops. There's no need for carbon
control rods because the system
can't self-perpetuate.
Thorium is also a relatively abundant material with enough easily
available through modern mining techniques to power the human race for a
thousand years. The operating costs are significantly less.
The thorium is contained in small beads that are encased in tennis balls
sized containers. Layers of some of the toughest material in the world
encase the beads and balls. I think they use silicon carbide. Reactors
are expected to have a life measured in decades and these structures
have to survive the heat of a nuclear process. This is one of the
reasons why the capital cost is so high. The big unknown is whether
these structures can last the length of time thorium reactors are meant
to last. The capital outlay is significant - over a billion dollars for
a plant. The significant amount of energy produce in its lifetime and
the low operating costs mean it has the best value and offers the
greatest potential for profit unless there are unforeseen problems with
thorium reactors in the ultra-long term, i.e. if the silicon carbide
bombarded with neutrons and kept at a high temperature breaks down after
30 years.
It takes a massive shift in thinking though and this seems like the
barrier at the moment. The capital outlay and the undetermined risk may
also be a problem. Uranium reactors have amazing safety systems now and
the technology is cheaper in the short term.
There's a middle ground which combines the relatively low outlay of
uranium reactors with some of the safety aspect, such as gamma breakdown
fission products, but still has the problem of a meltdown. The mature
safety systems mean the probability is low. The lower cost to modify an
existing plant makes economic sense. The wired.com article explains the
technology.
So there may be no energy crisis in 30-40 years when global prices of
carbon-based fuels will rise significantly as the costs of extraction
sky rocket. There's one problem which as far as I am aware can't be
fixed by any of the current power generation methods apart from coal and
oil but I know little of this fringe area. The working week creates two
massive spikes in demand in the day. To meet this demand coal and oil
stations can "quench", a process whereby production is ramped up for a
short burst to meet the peak demand. It's sort of like why bipolar
people are good at media jobs. Two things I've guessed at are advances
in energy storage and a European or international power grid. Society
may change as well. Already flexi-time means more people are spreading
out when they get to work. 40 years can bring a lot of change in the
working week and it may be what's required if the technology to meet the
peak demand can't be developed to replace fossil fuel plants. Energy
generation may also decentralise though I think we're still a long way
off from a nuclear power plant in everyone's home. It's possible though.
The media reporting of research and reviews )and a little bit on why there's some pretty cool scientiffic technqiues in mental health research)
Someone made a point that media reporting on papers rarely reports on
negative findings, i.e. study shows x doesn't work. Most of the
coverage, certainly in mental health, are signle studies which usually
have methodological flaws. They don't even have to be double blind
randomised control trials to get reported. As long as the effect is
interesting or the research touches on another popular news story then
it might get reported amongst the articles reporting on the
misdemeanours of celebrities and whatever tripe constitutes news these days.
negative findings, i.e. study shows x doesn't work. Most of the
coverage, certainly in mental health, are signle studies which usually
have methodological flaws. They don't even have to be double blind
randomised control trials to get reported. As long as the effect is
interesting or the research touches on another popular news story then
it might get reported amongst the articles reporting on the
misdemeanours of celebrities and whatever tripe constitutes news these days.
They rarely report on reviews, meta-analysis and systematic reviews (or
qualitative papers either come to think of it). A very poor paper that
was severely flawed (such that the students who were subjects were told
what the research was about) showed that caffine might induce psychosis.
They didn't even bother to say "psychosis-like." This is the sort of
research I wipe my arse with. It was done by a post grad and wasn't
important as a study. Yet it found its way into the meidia.
Reviews often show negative findings, i.e. the hypothesis can not be
definitely proved. Some od show positive results of course and these are
rarely reported either. This screws my guess that it's studies that
don't show what a reporter published in the past that don't get
reported, i.e. if the report reports that fish is effective for health
then a review comes out that shows it doesn't (this is just an exmaple)
then they may not report it. They donj't report the results of positive
reviews either.
They're not scientists of course but they report on science and
communicate it to the masses. They aren't trained to critically evaluate
and they don't know the hierachy of evidence and why systematic reviews
are so valued. Systematic reviews are a total bitch. They pick the
highest quaity trails only. They seek to establish if publication bias
inflates the effect of using meta-analysis. They chose the trials so
meta-analysis can be best applied (i.e. those that create the least
problem of comapring apples and oranges) (but this can be flawed too).
And often they find that when you look at lots of studies and compensate
for publication bias effect sizes in mental health quickly diminish to
barely above the placebo group.
It's when you read papers that take almost 1,000 psychological therapies
papers and stick their numbers into a meta-analysis that you start
seeing the power and the effort of proper science. 1,000 papers and the
effect size is about 1 if I remember this paper right. In physical
healthcare this would be considered a tiny effect size. In mental health
it'll just about do. The paper I'm thinking of was actually looking at
publication bias and used a meta-analytical technique called a funnel
plot. (My browser's crashed by search "psychological therapy publication
bias 2010" at the British Journal of Psychiatry website and yoy should
find the paper.)
A funnel plot is used to estimate if publication bias has happened.
Publication bias is the effect where trials which show negative findings
aren't published. This is common with pharmaceutical research and when
unpublished data is added such as in the Kirsch paper in 2007 the effect
size rapidly diminishes. The funnel plot can detect if studies haven't
been published. It works on the principle that large sample sizes mean
the results will be closer to the true effect size or thing that's being
measured whereas smaller studies will have a larger variance around the
average. The greater variance of positive and negative effect sizes
around the average should be uniform and decrease with increased sample
size (btw - this is much easier if you can see what afunnel plot looks
like. google or Wiki it). This is what draws the funnel shape that's
expected without publication bias. At the left of the graph where samole
size is smallest there's the biggest variance so lots of studies are
dotted all over the place but as you go right the scattering becomes
less and less which creates the funnel shape tapering off from left to
right. If the shape doesn't look like a funnel and there's a hole near
the left of the graph where studies with negative findings should be
then there's been publication bias which would inflate the effect size
shown in a meta-analysis. In this paper I mention with around a thousand
papers on psychological therapies put into a funnel plot the publication
bias reduced the effect size by about a third.
This is real science attempting to gain sound truths rather than
something that might titillate the masses however I'm optimistic that
the public aren't so stupid that they wouldn't want to learn about the
funnel plot, the problem of publication bias and the problems of all the
science they get told about..
Notes on Corpus Callosum
This is the bit that connects the two brain hemispheres.
'deficiencies' are found in certain mental disorders.
There's no treatment for agensis, i.e. where a person is born with a
partially or totally missing corpus callosum. Many people survive and
lead normal lives.
http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/agenesis/agenesis.htm
It's not found in marsupials which is something I find interesting. They
have an equivalent bit of the brain in function but I assume it works
differently. Might look into taht a bit more. It's amazing just how
different neurological systems can be and still animals and individuals
still function at high levels (in relation to the average or the
'normal' corpus callosum). The human corpus callosum isn't as fast as it
should be. Other mammals have much better transmission times between the
two hemispheres. Humans still manage to have all the things that raise
them above the animals though and the things that make our race below
animals.
My assumption is that interconnectivity between the two hemispheres is a
good thing and more speed means better efficiency and performance. In
fact this was the logic behind the idea that women's brains are
different and better than mens. It was thought their corpus callosum was
bigger so their brain hemispheres worked better. As always, a review of
evidence proves this isn't true, i.e women don't have bigger corpus
callosums for definite when you look at a lot of MRI studies.
My electronics knowledge makes me wonder if the human brain had to hae a
sort of more complex instruction set. Reduced transmission speed would
want me to make the coding instructions sent inbetween the two
processing units more efficient. It would be CISC rather than RISC. This
is totaly guess work though.
Brain biology is pretty interesting stuff though.
A really unethical experiment to establish the strength of the relationship between genotype and phenotype
Adopted twin studies are like gold for genetics research. They enable
the genetic predisposition to be compared. I've read stuff in one of
Oliver James books where adopted twins brought up in two totally
different families from birth had things in common such as flushing
before and after they went to the toilet.
the genetic predisposition to be compared. I've read stuff in one of
Oliver James books where adopted twins brought up in two totally
different families from birth had things in common such as flushing
before and after they went to the toilet.
Genetics research already values twins. They have the most number of
genes in common (the monozygotic ones anyway). But if they're brought up
in the same environment, i.e. with their natural parents, then their
influence makes it harder to determine what is genetics and what is
upbringing. Theories in the late 20th century point to schizophrgenic (I
forget how the word is spelt) or refrigerator mothers who were the
reason for schizophrenic offspring. As you might imagine this
perspective quickly fell out of favour however there may be a grain, or
perhaps a sand pit, of truth.
Kraeplin or Bleuler noted characteristics in children who were taken
away from schizophrenic mothers. Damn it. Wish I could remember where I
read that.
What I'm talking about though is totally horrible. I'm talking about
taking twins away from schizophrenic or manic depressive parents (on the
current evidence these two disorders have the same genetic root) then
assigning them to two very different families in very different
cultures. This needs to be done lots to get a large sample size and
compensate for random effects and biases. This could be the most
unethical experiment in history though there have been some pretty
terrible ones like Dr Money's one to work out how strong nature or
nuture were (a child who accideently had his penis electrocuted off in a
circumscion accidient was made to think he was a girl, brought up as a
girl and had his genitals surgically altered to make him think he was a
girl. It is a sick and interesting experiment. The guy shot himself
around the age of 33.
There are cases and papers on adopted twins. I've not had much luck
finding the ones for schizsophrenia and bipolar though. These would be
the best subjects to establish the true level of genetics versus
upbringing. It's sad to note that many severely mentally ill women may
have their children taken into care.
Once this is established it's the first step to discovering the
different genetic types of human being. This will be a fascinating
exploration, to understand us through our genes as well as through the
environmental factors (upbringing, schooling,life expieriences, local
culture etc). This would be the first step to ensuring genetic knowledge
isn't used to wipe out a type of human being, one that is part of the
human race but isn't udnerstood or appreciated in 2010 (but may be in 3010).
Dual or triple spectra of mental health and treatment (a ramble with a short rant at the end)
The dual continua model - distress and disorder - is often forgotten.
The distress continuum was pushed as an idea through the 20th century
and the dual continua model was developed because a person could have a
high level of psychopathological but be doing okay. A newer definition
of mental health was considered in the New Horizons strategy: flourishing.
The distress continuum was pushed as an idea through the 20th century
and the dual continua model was developed because a person could have a
high level of psychopathological but be doing okay. A newer definition
of mental health was considered in the New Horizons strategy: flourishing.
This could be a third spectrum but there are so many conceptualisations
already. The disorder spectrum becomes confused by personality disorders
since they're not traditional mental illnesses with supposed biological
cause. They're extremes of traits that everyone has. Sadly I think so
are most mental illnesses too. It is suggested that people with
personality disorders also suffer less distress from their illness. The
dual continua model came about in the 20th century and it was only in
the 21st century that psychiatric in the UK gave into pressure to accept
personality disorders like other mental illnesses.
Flourishing is important to me. I think people should have the chance to
achieve their potential and their potential to society be realised to.
But like everything in mental health this can just end up as a coercive
tool. In a person's best interests they may be stopped from taking a
certain direction in life just as they themselves may chose something
they believe to be in their best interests but no one else (or the
person deciding on their best interests) agrees. The quote about Jesus
going back to carpentry had psychiatry been around resonates with why I
question the practical implementation of flourishing rather than the
vision. The vision is great. All government departments working together
to ensure the mentally ill are supported to achieve their rightful place
in society. It's just that psychiatrists have been electrocuting people
to induce seizures (in extreme cases) and this is the practical reality
of all the different conceptualisations.
In this area of enabling the severely mentally ill to retain and regain
their life chances the UK fairs poorly. 5% of people with schizophrenia
are in employment or education whereas other countries in Europe have up
to 25%. Schizophrenia has a well defined psychopathology and that's all
that the NHS seems interested in treating. The revisions to the NICE
schizophrenia guidelines showed they're clearly not interested in the
distress continuum. They recommended against counselling, supportive
psychotherapy and social skills training. These can work to reduce
distress rather than attempt to change the psychopathology of the
supposed illness.
There are few attempts to address the new continuum of flourishing.
There are few successes in correcting the injustice of only 1 in 20
people in the UK with a diagnosis of schizophrenia being in employment
or education. My concern is that within that 5% there are many people
reduced to doing menial jobs because of the stigma. Their value to
society is wasted and the human suffers, but the doctors are satisfied
as long as the disorder is dealt with. It's far cheaper to chemically
restrain people with a diagnosis of schizophrenia for life and leave
them to rot without giving them the support they need to re-establish
their life course. They're left to live out their natural lives with the
burdens of exclusion, poverty and lost life just waiting for death or
taking their own lives.
Finland must have an extraordinary mental health and social care system.
They're system means that people with a diagnosis of schizophrenia live
longer and have better life outcomes. People with a diagnosis of
schizophrenia in the UK have a standardised mortality ratio (or risk) of
about 5. It means they're 5 times more likely to die than the general
population. In Finland the SMR for schizophrenia is about 1. A recent
report published by the Royal College of Psychiatry stated that people
with schizophrenia or bipolar in the UK die on average 20 years earlier
than other people. The figure that used to be bandied about was a 10
year reduced life expectancy.
Thank goodness the motto of the RCPsych is Let wisdom guide otherwise it
wouldn't be funny.
The world's a garden
And psychiatrists are the gardeners who spend their time point out that
roses have thorns which should be cut off in case they hurt people. They
can't see the beauty of the rose. The profession is seriously mentally
ill because of that problem in my opinion. How can they not see the
whole flower, the thorns, the stem and the beautiful flower?
roses have thorns which should be cut off in case they hurt people. They
can't see the beauty of the rose. The profession is seriously mentally
ill because of that problem in my opinion. How can they not see the
whole flower, the thorns, the stem and the beautiful flower?
She loves you
What would you think if that thought came into your head?
It came into mine two nights ago. Other people may have interpreted it
as their own thought but I don't. There were 2 other people in the room.
A good male friend and a very pretty girl who I'd met once before.
A 'normal' experience of consciousness would lead me to think that part
of me had assessed her body language or part of me wanted to believe
that this lady loved me. Whatever was the cause of the thought, it was a
thought created by me.
I didn't sense it as my own thought. It could have been my friend's
thought in my head. "you" could have meant him or me, but the thought
was from him and appeared in my mind. Here's where it gets stranger. It
could also have been a thought from the pretty lady's head. She was the
only she in the room, by physical gender. The soul or spirit, or the
psychology of the individual, isn't defined by biological gender. I
might be a bit of a girly man (metrosexual) and my mate was cooking up
chutney and gumbo. Who was the "she" isn't determined by biology alone
in this mad world I live in.
The thought could also have come from outside the room from someone
significant in my life. A spurious transmission.
I explain this small bit of my life to explain how different
consciousness can be after the period of discover of inner consciousness
very different from 'normal' or consensus experience. Other people may
go through moment like this but dismiss it, ignore it or chose not to
explore it.
Even the word "love"could mean many things in the way I experience
certain thoughts. I didn't explore into the meaning.
There's that direct thinking sense then there are other senses. As you
can imagine it takes longer for me to process what's going on. The other
sense was a more conscious sense of what was happening in the room. Body
language and language. The pauses. Eye movements. subtle tells. External
reality processed by the conscious engine we call the human mind.
Reality processed 'normally'.
I think the pretty lass may have been interested in me. I'm not sure.
I'm arrogant, loud, talk about myself and bore people with facts. I have
a pony tail, am going bald, stink because I'm rarely showering at the
moment, dress fairly badly at the moment and don't even bother to cut my
nails. But some women overlook all that. Or they don't notice it all
when they first meet me and it can be in seconds of meeting that lasting
desire is triggered.
But the real elephant in the room, the big unspoken thing seemed to be
the relationship between the other people in the room. My mate is a
good, decent man. He's nothing like me. He's honourable, sensitive to
women and shy. He's one of the real good guys in life, the meek who will
inherit the earth. Seperate to my internal process were the signs and
cues and tells bending what was being spoken between the two other
people in the room. The problem is accurately attributing what's really
happening. I don't have good Theory o the Mind but I try to be accurate
rather than assess based on guesswork or intuiiton. It might leave me
looking somewhat autistic or socially dense. Were I to guess I'd say
that the triendship had that underlying later to it that many male
female relationships have, the When Harry Met Sally effect.
But I don't know. This is an insight into what I face in processing a
stuation often to disregard the information and keep going with the
possibility of the information still present but the truth that I act
upon is based on the thing I'd called objective, and often this is
absent. If the pair had kissed in front of me then I think I'd be
confident to say there may be some underlying attraction in the
friendship. Even the When Harry Met Sally theory - stated in the film as
male-female friendships canm't exist without attraction also being
involved (I think that's what they said anyway) - isn't a fact of the
situation. I can make a guess from the cues but to act on them would be
wrong, and those cues can be misinterpreted.
It's a shame if those two can't get together and thrash it out in bed. I
quite fancy the lass too. It's emotionally exhausting having to go
through the long process of getting her to accept my self-harm scars. I
think I might see if she wants to be friends first. Lovers come and go
but friends stay, and it's not owrth investing my emotions to show my
self-harm scars to someone who's not going to bother to stay in my life.
Saturday, 30 October 2010
The strange alternatives I have to live with (ramble)
I let a lot of things slip that other people wouldn't. Some of it is
part of how I survived psychosis and survive schizotypy.
part of how I survived psychosis and survive schizotypy.
I'm thinking about why I feel less suicidal. I think it's either because
the SJW I took for a week (but haven't) was enough to kick start my
healing process (a decision perhaps rather than an active effect of the
drug), the skunk I've been smoking or the food I've been eating because
of the skunk. Or was it fiding out I could kill myself clean. This is
the best thing to happen all year. I hope I can go to a clinic in
Switzerland and have my life terminated. It makes everything easier.
Suicidal ideation I can't handle has reduced. I know the alcohol doesn't
help in terms of depression stuff but I'm ok with that (again, perhaps
self-belief based on evidence rather than anything scientific).
That's where the thought process started. But there's something else I'm
having to deal with. The gear I scored the last two times is somewhat
similar. Short deals, seemingly high grade however I don't feel the
right buzz. Two different areas. Two different set of curcumstances. The
gear, the pridce, the quality was all similar. It's unusual. It is the
sort of thing that is a coincidence. Thrice would be too much. But so is
twice. These sort of strange perceptions of unusual coincidence are
statistically possible but the number of times it happens to me is
statistically almost impossible, but still probable. The first time I
managed to get skunk in a while was just before breaking up a fight. It
is improbably to a high degree that there is any connection so I must
rest in submissiveness. But god works in mysterious ways and likes to
fuck with me. My arm of scars is always a reminder.
The non-corporeal force may be trying to hurt me again and I warred
against the control it exerted on me before. We were at peace for a
while. I was at peace with We. I hold that peace because strange things
that make no sense can happen based on a good knowledge of the truth
that science presents. There are things that are spurious coincidences.
I am smoking something that can cause paranoia too so I tread gently
with thoughts that make me angry or paranoid. By that I mean acting on
my beliefs or intuitive thoughts.
I survive this potentially delusional experience. It keeps me sane.
There is more to this world that science tells us. Science will get
there eventual;y and when it does it will be beautiful. There may be
more to know about life and our existence than we can ever imagine. Any
knowledge of history or the history of science will help you to quickly
reach the conclusion: there's more we don't know we don't even know
about than we could ever even concieeve.
To take an example from a life development course I attended many years ago.
There's what you know.
There's what you know you don't know.
Then, there's the shit you don't know you don't know.
The latter is the hardest thing. Few even consider this. Koalas have
double penises. The marsupial is something that to the outside would
look totally similar to a placenteral mammal but isn't. The difference
isn't just in the reproductive system. Their brains are set up in
different ways. They represent a signidicantly different type of
organism to mammals and egg-type animals. But you'd never know if you
looked at them. Koalas are quite, kangaroos are gunny and possums are
..well...they're just possums.
I don't even know where I'm going with this. Oh yeah. So there's the
stuff that people accept they don't know. It's the sort of stuff they
know through listening to critical psychiatrists such as Bentall and
Moncrieff. But then there's the real funky stuff. The Einstein stuff.
Welll...really...Colombus might be more appropriate. Exploring uncharted
lands of science.
The internal experience of consciousness has always eluded science,
language and society. Mental health lacks true science but it lacks the
basic thinking. What are you pathologising? Is it an illness or is it
part of the human condition?
Is there something more to consciousness that's yet to be understood.
People believe in the possibility of aliens. Atheists often do. Yet
their perception can be limited. The assumption is aliens look like
grey, bug eyed humanoids. The assumption si they're like us. They take
physical form. The length of time involved in evolution created human
life. Consider the length of the universe. Consider what could have
evolved way beyond our comprehension in that time. All I know of time
and change is the more time there is, i.e. the later you look, the more
change there is. Consider how much humans have evolved in 2000 years.
We're still barbarians but at least we're reaching for the stars. Now
consider how short that time is in the length of the universe.
Why can't my non-corporeal force, the thing that I commune with, the
voice in your head or whatever other intepretations of the same concept
be an alien consciousness we barely have the power to describe with our
pitiful language. Every epoch tries to understand this influence. Those
that come in to awareness of this otherness are influenced by and judged
by the norms of their time.
It is not a good god or a bad god. I know I'm too small to understand
the truth. I think the only objective statement is...it is. Those that
"touch the sky" (as Hendrix would put it) have been called many names
and many labels over the years. It's coming to Halloween soon. A
celebration that also resonaes with the persecution of the mad. The
witches. Those who today would get a diagnosis. Thankfully treatments
have a long way to go. Society moreso.
But I chose to imagine. One day the mad will be accepted. Maybe we'll
all be mad in this utopian future. Or normal. The labels will have no
meaning because the individual will be the valuable thing. As society
shifts from Industrial Revolution values to the the third wave of
humanity, somewhat guessed at by Alvin Toffler in his book the Third
Wave, the value of the mentally ill becomes seen.
There are many human qualities that a computer has yet to achieve. Ford
is a manufacturer that was the rising star of the Industrial Revolution.
It epitomised it. The same thing could be produced very cheaply for
everyone. Advanced technology could proliferate to the masses while the
elite still afforded bespoke or small run commodities based upon valuing
excellence or personal fit over the quality of an inferior good. The
masses got cars the same, TVs the same, the same schooling, the same
testing, the same education and the same work structures. Everything
became standardised and robot like because the state of society valued
logic and ration and reason above everything else. Science became the
new religion.
But science is a religion and the same problems of dogma and prejudice
and bias affect the religion that hates all those things. The Age of
Reason was a turning point but the philosophy and faith of science had
had proponents for many centuries. It was Hero who theorised the steam
engine however there was no will because humans could be used as slaves.
I think it was Archemidies but I'm not sure. Anyway, some other Roman
geezer worked out that when you launch a projectile into the air it
doesn't just run out of energy and drop. It slowly falls in a parabolic
curve. The scienctists of the time believed different but he guessed
otherwise. When they tried to bombard a city the predictions of the
consensus of science kept falling short. Archemidies or which ever Roman
geezer worked it out said that they don't just run out of energy like a
car or something. His guess (hypothesis) worked though and the Roman
projectiles hit the target closer.
Think it was Newton who invented gravity. ( :~0 ) But then other people
attribute other people to the steam engine. The Roman's really knew
their shit. They used to treat mania iwth spring waters but I don't
think they understood the neurochemical effect of lithium. In fact I
still reckon the lithium levels would have been too low compared to the
levels used in the treatment of bipolar today. Perhaps it's just the
effect of the patient believing the healer. It was only in the late 19th
century that Karl Lange started experimenting with it's use in
psychiatry (the reference is an obscure paper in the BJPsych which I
can't remember). It was only in the mid-to-late 20th century that it was
licensed for use bythe FDA.
Romme references a book called The breakdown of the bicameral model:
.....and I forget the rest of the title. Somehting like "a higher state
of awareness" or something. Anwyay, what it says is perhaps our
perception of consciousness has become flawed. Knowledge can still
become forgotten, or ignored and blinkered out because it's a hard thing
to accept the possibility of. Just read Romme and Escher's book
Accepting Voices. It's well worth it. Keep an open mind. And enjoya
glass of wine while you're doing it. Then step into the world of the
didn't know I didn't even know about that. I'm going to have another
spliff now.
A rant on the new Care Quality Commission report
It's nice to have a good rant once in a while. It's in response to a
recently published CQC report covered in this Guardian article.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/oct/27/mental-health-patients-hospital-law
recently published CQC report covered in this Guardian article.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/oct/27/mental-health-patients-hospital-law
Here goes.
I've been illegally detained. This is when a person isn't sectioned but
not allowed to leave the ward either or discharge themselves. It was for
a period of 3 days till I confirmed with the local Mental Health Act
manager that I had the legal right to leave. I spoke to some lawyers
about it and started a court case. They told me the hospital did this
regularly and had some money set aside to hire lawyers to slow down
claims. I was also acute tranquillised without need and put in a
seclusion room that didn't meet the hospital policy or human rights law.
The policy stated that it should be correctly temperature controlled,
there should be proper communication with the outside and there should
be toilet facilities made available.
Psychiatric patients don't have the right to fresh air and sunlight.
Irrespective of the therapeutic value, this is a basic human right.
They're incarcerated. This is societies greatest punishment since the
last person was hanged. They've committed no crime but the same protocol
is used. Long stay patients loose significant basic rights. A right to a
normal life shouldn't be taken away just because a person has "an
unsound mind, is a vagrant or a drug addict" (or something along those
lines).
The amendments to the MHA 1983 in 2007 took away so many rights. It also
allowed for something quite frightening to me. It expanded the
definition of mental disorder to include psychopathy and it removed the
treatability test. this was done because of the perceived danger of
people with dangerous personality disorders. It was through the work of
the Zito Trust which promoted the prejudice of the psychopathic killer
(what happened to her son was still very sad though but the result is
sadder in my eyes). By removing the treatability test it allowed for
incarceration without healthcare, judicial process or serious crime
committed. I don't know if anyone has yet had this happen to them.
Incarceration is the punishment for serious crime but there's a massive
legal system which costs billions of pounds in legal aid alone to ensure
that no one who is innocent is punished. The other frightening thing is
the quality of some prisons compared to some psychiatric wards.
The overuse of the CTO is worse than the worst estimates but this
coercive tool is becoming ever popular internationally. France is about
to introduce something similar. It's psychiatric parole. It's a coercive
medico-legal tool that allows psychiatrists greater power to force
medication on patients who want alternative treatment. people have a
right to chose but it's violated by the current laws.
It's been woefully overused and this was known well before the CQC
report came out. It's also significantly used more on the black
population (the information's in one of the reports that are available
to the public at the NHS Information Centre. I would guess that it's
used a lot more on black men but the report didn't break down the
figures by gender. After all, the UK is one of the leaders in the world
at overdiagnosising black men with schizophrenia (9x more than their
white counterparts whereas this doesn't happen in the Caribbean). This
was noted in the New Horizons consultation document last year.
In a recent report the Royal College of Psychiatry estimated that people
with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or bipolar live 20 years less on
average. This was much higher than I used to remember. People used to
quote 10 years. It's not surprising though if they're being treated so
badly. They're being locked up, forced on drugs and given no other
treatment. People with depression and anxiety can get access to CBT or
counselling through the multi-million pound IAPT scheme while people
with a diagnosis of schizophrenia are just left to rot on medication
with only 50% getting access to CBT. those are the lucky ones. Some
can't even get toilet paper.
The reproductive systems of marsupials is amazing.
Placentary mammals grow a foetus to a baby inside the female of the
species. The rest (monotremes) lay eggs.
species. The rest (monotremes) lay eggs.
Marsupials have a short gestation period then have to crawl into the
mothers pouch where they stay for several months.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsupial#Early_development
They also have two sex organs, i.e. the male has two penises for the
females two vaginas.
http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://i1-news.softpedia-static.com/images/news2/Two-Headed-Penises-Four-Headed-Penises-and-Double-Vaginas-2.jpg&imgrefurl=http://news.softpedia.com/news/Two-Headed-Penises-Four-Headed-Penises-and-Double-Vaginas-43001.shtml&usg=__3pGndsufFjlYFwQ3dZSdVY0lBDE=&h=250&w=300&sz=15&hl=en&start=79&sig2=3uk_LOZ9GvIjcm5lYoWOPw&zoom=1&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=kV5l3igEa3i2_M:&tbnh=97&tbnw=116&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dkoala%2Bpenis%26start%3D60%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dopera%26sa%3DN%26rls%3Den%26ndsp%3D20%26tbs%3Disch:1&ei=yEjMTPLcNYSQjAf6zI3XBw
I think that last detail will be an amusing bit of pub banter.
Just realised I haven't felt suicidal for a few hours
Wow. That's great. Got through the stuff in the morning. That's
relatively easy to deal with. Hmm. Not a bad day.
relatively easy to deal with. Hmm. Not a bad day.
Evidence to suggest that OCD is a brain illesss
Using the same methods as have been used to show schizophrenia reduces
brain volume in children OCD too has been shown to do the same. I
haven't read the study by the abstract of this MRI paper seems to
indicate the existence of different patterns of brain development,
patterns which the researcher considers pathological.
brain volume in children OCD too has been shown to do the same. I
haven't read the study by the abstract of this MRI paper seems to
indicate the existence of different patterns of brain development,
patterns which the researcher considers pathological.
Corpus callosal morphology in treatment-naive pediatric obsessive
compulsive disorder.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9460091
"
1. Abnormalities in association circuits have been described in
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and may reflect neurodevelopmental
abnormalities. Primary and association cortices are topographically
mapped in the corpus callosum (CC). The authors hypothesized alterations
in CC subdivisions that connect association, but not primary cortices in
pediatric OCD. The authors predicted that normal age-related increases
in CC area would be absent in OCD. 2. The authors compared the
midsagittal magnetic resonance images of 21 psychotropic-naive,
nondepressed OCD patients, 7.2-17.7 years, and 21 case-matched healthy
controls. Total CC area as well as that of the anterior, middle and
posterior genu, anterior and posterior bodies, isthmus, and the
anterior, middle and the posterior splenii were measured. 3. All of the
CC regions except the isthmus were significantly larger in OCD patients
than in controls. CC area correlated significantly with OCD symptom
severity but not illness duration. The age-related increase in CC size
seen in normal subjects was absent in OCD patients. 4. These findings
support theories of abnormal association cortex development in OCD but
also suggest possible abnormalities of other primary cortical regions as
well.
"
A thought on open relationships
Why give up something good? We are born free and we die free. In-between
we make our freedom. People fancy people and sex is good. People can
learn to overcome jealousy. Some already have and We hopes I find more
of them.
we make our freedom. People fancy people and sex is good. People can
learn to overcome jealousy. Some already have and We hopes I find more
of them.
Abraham (or Ibrahim) was a psycho (a piece about stigma and language and concepts)
Moses was a psycho
Jesus was a psycho
Mohammed was a psycho
Buddha was probably a psycho
The guy in the Bharva Gita was a psycho
Jesus was a psycho
Mohammed was a psycho
Buddha was probably a psycho
The guy in the Bharva Gita was a psycho
This is about stigma. First I've chose to use the word psycho in the
sense the public use it. It does mean an abbreviation of psychopath. It
means a crazy person. A person who is severely mentally ill.
The stories of Muhammed receiving the text of the Quran is an experience
that would be pathologised today. He couldn't write much of what he
spouted. It was his wide Sara who recorded what god told him while he
entered states of communication. In these states he'd go pale and sweat.
He'd lose contact with reality in his meetings with god.
Jesus's and Moses and Abraham's lives are harder to accurately determine
if they were psychos. Jesus spoke to god just as Jean D'Arc did. The
voice in their heads. The auditory hallucination which was pathologised
by psychiatry in the 20th century. Moses spoke to a burning bush.
Abraham heard god telling him to kill his son.
I don't know enough about Buddha. He went from being a prince to a life
without the trappings of wealth, a life of contemplation and simplicity
where he rejected the values of the 'normal' world. I assume this comes
about through a change process and these change processes are
pathologised by psychiatry.
It may just have been depression rather than psychosis.
In the Bharva Gita the Hindu demi-god - a man born to the world
therefore not a true god, because anything that is born must die - is
about to war but he wars against his brothers, the Pandavas. As a child
he was so dedicated to archery he decided on his own to try to learn to
shoot arrows in the dark. He is the greatest warrior in the land but he
doesn't want to fight. Before the battle he has a vision and
communicates with a proper god. This god persuades him to fight. This
delusion and the conversation is one of the most significant texts in
the Hindu religion.
It's just a short list of the religious psychos. Any theist is probably
going to hate me by this point. I delibately chose the most stigmatised
word for the concept of severe mental illness. I then applied it to
people who it's heresy to apply any label of mental illness. I've had
the audacity to apply psychiatric concepts to religious heroes. (I'm
aware that in the subtly of psychiatric theory there are certain
exclusions (in DSM at least) for religious or cultural stuff, however I
think it's fair to say that any of these individuals, were they born
today in the UK, would be get a diagnosis from a psychiatrist at some
point and most, without the religious explanation, would suffer the
occupational and social outcomes that form the prognosis of schizophrenia.
It's a bit of a stretch of thinking. The point is about the stigma. I've
attempted to polarise the issue by using the most pejorative word on the
most sanctified people. Many people would be angry at me for calling
Jesus a psycho or severely mentally ill. I'm sure many Muslims wouldn't
be happy with me contemplating a diagnosis of schizophrenia for Muhammed
nor would Jews be happy with the same diagnosis applied to Moses.
Why can't people admit that maybe I'm right? The stigma of madness isn't
true. It's prejudice and ignorance. It forgets that religious heroes,
were they to come in contact with psychiatry, wouldn't be religious
heroes. The prophets, saints and sages would be labelled, drugged and
even hospitalised. There's a quote by a notable psychiatrist from the
1970s that says something along the lines of "had Jesus been born when
psychiatry was around he'd have gone back to carpentry."
It seems almost as if people don't want to believe that severe mental
illness can also be a good thing. "Psycho" conjures up mental visions of
violence and Jack Nicholson's character in One Flew Over the Cuckoos
Nest rather than a guy who gave up his material life to lead a spiritual
life, forgoing the status and security of his royal lineage to do what
Buddha did with his life. Psychiatry in the books and the papers I read
doesn't understand life change through life crisis. It's too complex.
The positivistic scientific framework doesn't understand it.
The stigma of severe mental illness is so strong that I'd be vilified
for attempting to change the root concept by making people understand
that their heroes were also severely mentally ill. The same phenotypes
that are feared as killers (the schizos rather than the psychos, but
they're all the mad) were also people like Gandhi, Marley and Churchill.
The stigma of certain words used by people every day to describe
everyone from the eccentric to real psychopaths could easily be applied
to people that are also held in esteem. The language is different but
the concept they describe is the same, and the words lose their badness
when you realign the underlying concept. It's ok to be a psycho because
it means nothing about an individual. Either positive or negative
interpretations can be made, and the use of language biases the
interpretation of the concept. The concept just is. It's a phenotype.
Circumstances and perceptions mean people make judgements about good and
bad, but these judgements are subjective. No matter how much science is
applied it is just used to justify the pathologisation rather than seek
any truth about the human condition.
The truth is there are a lot of psychos who have done a lot of good for
humanity. And there are a lot of automotons that have done terrible
things. And vice versa.
Friday, 29 October 2010
arsehole social anxiety, bad me paranoia or truth?
I have few social skills at the moment. I'm scared I'm offending people
when I don't mean to. I'm worried I'm bad company, a bad friend and a
boring person who people would rather not be around.
when I don't mean to. I'm worried I'm bad company, a bad friend and a
boring person who people would rather not be around.
Mind's paranoia publication might consider I am experiencing bad me
paranoia. I wonder if it's a self-esteem problem related to the cyclical
low I'm going through. Or a form of anxiety not based in fact.
Or am I accurate? Am I at a stage in my cycle where I'm an arsehole? Is
my perception real or delusional?
Research on the mental health of the UK armed forces on deployment which doesn't really say a lot because of serious methological flaws but is interesting anyway
There's a new paper on the armed forces and mental health.
Mental health of UK military personnel while on deployment in Iraq
Mulligan, K et al. 2010, BJPsych (to be published on Monday but the
embargo's been lifted).
Here's the interesting thing. Their levels of distress, according to
this study, is barely above the level of the general population. The
Adult Psychiatric MorbidtySurvey uses GHQ-12 as well if I remember
right. It comes up with a figure of about 17% of people suffering
signifcant distress. In this study personnel on deployment had a level
lof 21%.
I'm just flicking through the paper. It says a score of 4 or more on
GHQ-12 represented a case to be counted. My memory isn't great but I
thought it was scores of 8 or more that represented a proper case. I
think that's what's used in the APMS but I really can't remember. If
it's true then this would inflate the effects.
The subjects weren't random. Reasons are given however my concern is
base commanders selected the subject group. Their selection could have
been biased.
But the biggest problem I feel is attributional style and the prevailing
feminist epistomology of mental health which means measures of
self-reported pschological distress may be biased. Most of the subjects
will be of the traditional male psychological stereotype (irrespective
of gender). Their self-report of distress just like physical pain will
be much lower. The authors note the stigma in the armed forces but
there's also the problem of recognition of distress and resilience to
distress. While there are objective measures of physical pain there are
no objective measures of psychological pain.
This makes the results questionable. The results are still interesting
though.
"
Those who scored above the cut-off on the GHQ–12 were more
likely to be younger, female, in the army and of junior rather than
of senior or officer rank (online Table DS1). Stronger unit
cohesion, better perceived leadership and receipt of a predeployment
stress brief were associated with a lower likelihood
of scoring above the GHQ–12 cut-off. There was no relationship
between GHQ–12 outcome and reservist status or deployment
factors such as location in theatre or combat exposure.
"
And
"
Although there are reasons for hypothesising that, on the one
hand deployed service personnel might experience better mental
health than those not deployed, for example due to the 'healthy
worker effect' but on the other hand worse mental health due
to increased exposure to stressors, this survey found that in
practice, there seemed to be little overall effect of deployment
on mental health. It may be that the positive and negative
aspects of deployment are equally balanced. Another possible
explanation is that Operation TELIC 13 was a low operational
intensity environment, which is often characteristic of a military
operation coming towards its end. This explanation is supported
by the most recent annual US survey of personnel deployed to
Iraq, the Mental Health Advisory Team (MHAT) VI, which has
reported the lowest rate of psychological problems since 2004.
"
Addition to post below
Big Society also is an opportunity for charities to shift their
fundraising model to providing services for the NHS and local
government, capitalising on their expertise in the area and generating
funds for the objectives of the charity.
fundraising model to providing services for the NHS and local
government, capitalising on their expertise in the area and generating
funds for the objectives of the charity.
Liberating the NHS idea: challenge to opportunity for charities
There are many small and large chairites already providing services
funded through local PCTs. The proposals are for more of this. This can
be a great opportunity for charities who will be starved of public
donations. Providing services for the new NHS will be a revenue
generation channel which can raise money for campaigns and other work.
The model of charity fundraising is already shifting towards prociding
products, for example the RSPCA has a credit card that donates a small
amount to the cause with every purchase.
funded through local PCTs. The proposals are for more of this. This can
be a great opportunity for charities who will be starved of public
donations. Providing services for the new NHS will be a revenue
generation channel which can raise money for campaigns and other work.
The model of charity fundraising is already shifting towards prociding
products, for example the RSPCA has a credit card that donates a small
amount to the cause with every purchase.
CSR idea: considering flourishing as a mental health definition and how to gt the most out of the meat of the UK
In the New Horizons strategy Dr Jo Nurse came up with a new word for
positive mental health: flourishing. I think it's similar to the World
Health Organisation definition. In simplicity I take it to mean either
getting the most for the individual or the most for society out of the
individual. It's about people flourish in life and achieving their
potential and their potential for society.
positive mental health: flourishing. I think it's similar to the World
Health Organisation definition. In simplicity I take it to mean either
getting the most for the individual or the most for society out of the
individual. It's about people flourish in life and achieving their
potential and their potential for society.
I know more than a few mentally ill people who have had significantly
worst employment outcomes in life because of their illness. The reasons
are numerous. It can be the depressed person who has low self-esteem and
applies for low level jobs. After my first psychiatric crisis I didn't
work for a year and lived off a loan I took while I was hypermanic and
the money I made doing a graduate job. The first job I took as I started
my recovery was putting leaflets through people's letter boxes telling
them when their rubbish would be collected over the Christmas break. I
then worked as an internal postie sorting through the mail for the
accounts payable department at a local council. I'd been recruited from
4000 applicants to 10 places at the corporation I worked for before my
first psychiatric hospitalisation and diagnosis of madness.
The negative outcomes can also be because of the root stigma in society
of the symptoms of madness, a stigma so prevalent in the UK that only 5%
of people with a diagnosis of schizophrenia are in employment and education.
The loss of capital caused by the stigma is a great cost to the nation.
The loss of the life and life opportunities for the individual is even
more significant. It's one of the reasons why schizophrenics kill
themselves in later life.
The government cuts will devastate the lives of those with severe mental
disabilities. Their lives are pretty shit already. It just doesn't have
to be this way.
I haven't worked through this idea fully yet but to me the future means
more people will be unemployed and this is the root problem of any
economic recession: productivity falls.
The way the cuts have been set up many will be forced into poverty.
Those who can get jobs and who have had prolonged mental illness will
only be able to get the most menial roles. They'll be lucky to be
administrative staff or call centre operators. They'll be reduced to
doing jobs that machines can do, that require little brain power and
suck the soul dry of life.
Why not think different? Training, education and support can help
slingshot a person into a role where they can flourish. This is
expensive and there is little money on to spend. This is where this idea
is flawed. The money may be spent better on job creation programs which,
as far as I am aware, is the tried and tested method to get a nation out
of an economic recession.
I perceive the mentally ill like a goldmine that is just waiting for the
technology to come about so it can be tapped. In these dark economic
times there's a need for a goldmine but it's staring everyone in the
face. The mad are the geniuses without opportunity, the heroes without
recognition, the brightest minds of the future living in a world where
their light can't be understood. The gold is all around but people only
see the gold ore. They can't see the shine. They're used to slabs of
concrete, the dull automotons who are incapable of original thought or
passion.
All but a few lucky ones are below their potential be it mad man or
automoton. The mad are most disadvantaged but the loss to society is
significant. The mad would never have let the banking crisis happen
because they'd be the ones ready to criticise. Automotons are hired
because they don't speak out nor challenge the hierarchy. They are
docile. Sheep in a world that fears shepherds and calls them ill.
Creation of appropriate jobs for the mad is the opportunity in these
dark times. Supporting them through their return to productivity
benefits the individual and the nation. It is my hope that if there are
more mad people in workplaces and at FTSE 100 companies then perhaps the
nation wouldn't be in this crisis.
Murder for unwanted behaviour
From what little I know of legal theory the difference between
manslaughter and murder is knowledge or intent.
manslaughter and murder is knowledge or intent.
Chemical restraint gave society a powerful new tool and the
antipsychotic has become very popular. They account for the highest
sales of any psychiatric drug worldwide.
The Wiki page elucidates ont he early history.
"
The first, chlorpromazine, was developed as a surgical anesthetic. It
was first used on psychiatric patients because of its powerful calming
effect; at the time it was regarded as a "chemical lobotomy". Lobotomy
at the time was used to treat many behavioral disorders, including
psychosis, although its effect was to markedly reduce behavior and
mental functioning of all types.
"
With the licensing of chloropromazine the medical profession quickly
became the biggest drug dealers in the world, but most of their drugs
weren't much fun. They also allowed for the gradual dissolution of the
asylum system.
I have not reached a conclusion on whether they treat psychosis or
simply mask the symptoms. I know one or two people who take
antipsychotics and still experience a delusional state. They remain calm
and sedate though, their volition impeded and their minds turned to a
sticky mush. The most dangerous and supposedly effective chemical cosh,
clozapine, still doesn't stop the delusions. I clearly need to read more.
There's no argument that the chemical cosh was used to treat behaviour
in Alzheimers patients in the community. This is a progressive brain
disease with no known cure. Antipsychotics serve the function of a
straitjacket and gag. The demented elderly could be 'treated' so they
were less...mad. Their behaviour could be treated just like a
straitjacket treats behaviour.
I believe this use of chemical restraint is as immoral as sticking the
elderly in straitjackets and gagging them. Other people don't see it
that way though. Cleraly the Alzheimer's Society was happy to let
doctors work out a solution, felt no need to instigate legal action and
were happy simply to comment in the media rather than do anything to
stop their stake holders being killed.
This is the problem. The evidfence shows the use of chemical restraint
in the community reduces life expectancy by 50% (in very old people) and
killed 1,800 people in the UK every year in the 21st millenium. The
chemical cosh is not used to treat any aspect of the true illness but it
treats social ugliness in a society that can't bear to see that human
beings go a bit mad when they're really old.
The great problem is the prvilege of medicine which blinds people to
what's happening. Psychiatric disorders are know to the profession as b
ehavioural and emotional disorders. The nuance is important. It
disguises the truth. I repeatedly have to make points such as
homosexuaity was a mental illness to make people understand what's
happening. It's just treatment of behaviour and use of science to
enforce social norms outside the law.
THe aim of therapy and of drugs is to change people. At least the former
doesn't kill them, just like a straitjacket wouldn't kill an old person
like antipsytchotic do.
The medical profession has denied the danger of the chemical cosh. It is
most commonly used to treat schizophrenia and is justified because the
reduction in life expectancy is caused by lifestyle factors rather than
the toxic chemicals used to treat behaviour and emotions. The single
observational study that promoted the review of the government's
dementia strategy was the first to unequivocally show that
antipsychotics do reduce life expectancy. The effect was magnified of
course because the people were pretty close to death already, but the
effect was significant nonetheless. It was impossible to do a controlled
trial in the past because they only used antispychotics to treat people
with psychotic disorders but doctors found they could use the chemical
cosh for just about anything. The stydy offered the unique opportunity
to compare quasi-scientifically the life expectancy for those taking and
not taking antiosychotics for the same conditon whereas previously this
was impossible because no one (who remains in treatment) could chose to
survive without antpsychotics.
They put schizophrenic kids on antipsychotics and expect them to be on
them for life. Why? Their behaviour is intolerable to society at the
time. They're too socially ugly.
The voice inside your head: what is it?
You may have a voice in your head, an internal conversation, a committee
in your head or a stream of consciousness. The admission of having a
voice in your head would have got you sectioned in America 40 years ago.
Today people are more willing to accept that they have a voice in their
head.
in your head or a stream of consciousness. The admission of having a
voice in your head would have got you sectioned in America 40 years ago.
Today people are more willing to accept that they have a voice in their
head.
And then they leave it like that. They stop the thought process there.
It's enough to observe this fact which half a century ago might have
meant your liberty would be threatened.
Speak to a mental health professional and they might say, oh that's just
your .....and then insert all the different secular interpretations.
I might have agreed with their opinion but I went through a process that
also has many names and this taught me a different interpretation.
Our brains are either so over-engineered that they are capable of
producing not just one consciousness but two or three or more, or the
voice inside your head is not coming from your organic brain matter. It
may exist there, i.e. whatever happens within a brain to create the
stream of consciousness might be affected such that measurement would
perceive the effect to come from the brain (once brain science is up to
this). It's a little bit like wireless networking and having an on-line
chat. It looks like everything is happening on screen if I was sitting
in the room with the person on the computer and I didn't understand that
there's a wireless internet connection.
Most people are willing to admit to a duologue yet never consider they
may be speaking to someone or something else. A duologe is a
conversation between two consciousnesses. A dialogue is a conversation
with two or more. I've generally found that conversations are done with
two consciousnesses. An "I" and the others.
I cheat somewhat and use the term "god" to describe what is this other
force or entity I'm chatting to in my head just like you may find
happens to you. It isn't god out of the religious texts. Most of that's
bullshit lost in translation and time, e.g. heaven and hell may simply
be states of mind rather than the after life but people couldn't
understand that so they just said oh yeah. He's chatting about the
afterlife.
There are many alternate theories as to what this other consciousness
is. I am usually careful to call it a non-corporeal entity/ies. It is
not a physical force but I have fel tit's influence (in small ways) in
he physical world. Most of the time it's strange bits of communication
through little tweaks of my fingers as well as the direct stuff in my
head. In this horrible period that others would call psychosis I became
acutely aware that this force or entity had power over me, my body, my
thoughts, my speech and other people and events in the real world. In a
way it feels something like Wittgenstein's evil genius.
Yes. What I'm saying is that the voice in your head may not be yours.
You are told that it is and you are responsible for it. But it may not
be your "I". Psychologists would try to complicate this issue but I find
it simple. Just think about it...or ask the voice in your head what it
thinks.
Thursday, 28 October 2010
More on assisted suicide and legal theory
From
http://www.dignitas.ch/WeitereTexte/Kommentar_CPS-Richtlinien.pdf
http://www.dignitas.ch/WeitereTexte/Kommentar_CPS-Richtlinien.pdf
"
Factor 2A
This factor would need a lot of specification: what are mental illnesses and
learning difficulties? Furthermore, this factor oversees the fact that
victims with
a diagnosis of mental illness generally do have sufficient capacity of
discernment
to decide about whether they would want to live or bring a self-determined
end to their life. The Swiss Federal Court acknowledged this aspect in
its 2006
decision, when it stated:
"It cannot be denied that an incurable, long-lasting, severe mental
impairment similar to a somatic one can create a suffering out of which a
patient would find his/her life in the long run not worth living anymore.
Based on more recent ethical, juridical and medical statements, a possible
prescription of Sodium Pentobarbital is not necessarily contraindicated and
thus is no longer generally a violation of medical duty of care…"7
Even more important, as already mentioned above, in the very same
decision the
Court recognized that someone's decision to determine the way of ending
his/her life is part of the right to self-determination protected by
article 8 § 1 of
the European Convention on Human Rights.
"
A couple of useful links for Dignitas
Contact information
http://assistedsuicide.org/blog/2006/02/06/how-to-contact-dignitas-in-switzerland/
http://assistedsuicide.org/blog/2006/02/06/how-to-contact-dignitas-in-switzerland/
Information on their website in English.
http://www.dignitas.ch/index.php?id=117&Itemid=166&option=com_content&task=view
This document has some useful information about the legal aspects and
how the Human Rights Act relates.
http://www.dignitas.ch/WeitereTexte/Kommentar_CPS-Richtlinien.pdf
There's a bit I really like.
"
Everyone should be able to discuss the issue of suicide openly with
their GP's,
psychiatrists, carers, etc. The taboo which covers the topic must be lifted.
"
The taboo about speaking about suicide is another malformation of
society and it's assumed the suicide rate will go up rather than down if
people can safely talk about it. Assumptions and reality are two
different things.
How many attempted suicides are there in England and Wales
In the year 2007, the U.K. counted 5'377 registered suicides;3 in
England and
Wales this number counts to 4'301.4 Given the results of the scientific
research
mentioned before, the suicide attempts in England and Wales must be
estimated
to be up to 215'050 per year.
England and
Wales this number counts to 4'301.4 Given the results of the scientific
research
mentioned before, the suicide attempts in England and Wales must be
estimated
to be up to 215'050 per year.
This is the text from a Dignitas document.
http://www.dignitas.ch/WeitereTexte/Kommentar_CPS-Richtlinien.pdf
They've estimated the figure from a figure establised in the US that
approximately 50 times as many attempted suicides happen as completed
ones. I wonder where the data is collected for this?
In the UK people focus on the suicde rate rather than the attempted
suicide rate. It's one of the ways the gender prejudice about men's help
seeking behaviour is promoted by propaganda organisations. Men
successfully kill themselves more but women attempt suicide more. The
completed suicide rate is used to suggest that men don't seek help
however according to the attempted suicide rate and the figures from the
Samaritans (that show men contact them ever so slightly more
consistnetly for over a decade) it's women who have the problem with
help seeking.
The double effect and murdering by doctors
Last year I heard a senior lecturer speak about medical ethics. I called
him an idiot. I was somewhat wrong perhaps but perhaps not. He spoke at
length about biomedical ethics yet never touched upon mental health. He
considered money represented an unlimited pool of resource and this is
at the point I called him an idiot.
him an idiot. I was somewhat wrong perhaps but perhaps not. He spoke at
length about biomedical ethics yet never touched upon mental health. He
considered money represented an unlimited pool of resource and this is
at the point I called him an idiot.
He spoke of the Double Effect. This is how medicine justifies abortion.
It's something the Church came up with and is often linked to Thomas
Aquinas.
http://www.saintmarys.edu/~incandel/doubleeffect.html
An unwanted foetus is not an illness. Doctors still treat it though.
It's an illness of a dysfunctional society. I'm trying to understand if
the double effect would apply to the continued use of antipsychotics in
the elderly with dementia.
The good is it keeps the crazy elderly sedate and makes it easier for
people who employed to continue producing towards GDP It makes them
easier to deal with like a straitjacket and a tape across their mouth
might. This is the sole action of the treatment.
Doctors now know that they're risking life. The deaths are intended
insomuch as the medical professionn is now aware of the significant risk
but the intention isn't to kill the paitent (no matter how I've twisted
the situation). Primary care physicians may not know the research
however they're made aware through finding out why they're suddenly
being measured on how few antipsychotics they prescribe for people with
dementia. The Royal Colleges are aware and it was the RCPsych that
published the 1,800 deaths a year figure in a reasonably recent report
that was covered by the media.
The reduced life expectancy is not a desired result but it is now well
established. The alternative of a strait jacket is safer however less
socially acceptable. People would not stand to see their elders in
shackles and gagged. It is what is achieved without the sight or
perception of shackling and gagging. This is the desired result from the
use of anitpsychotics..
There is no suicide risk which the drug treating nor a homicide risk as
far as I am aware. There may be a risk of unintended violence however
the repercussions of this do not weigh in favour of murdering the
elderly by using the chemical cosh. The elderly are frail when they get
to this stage in their life and are really no risk, not like a scary
black man. The key thing is make old people are quiet and submissive so
their last years are easier to deal with. It is to turn them into
statues so they are remembered as they were perhaps and not how they
were when they deteriorated through what seems to be a natural process
in aging..
On at least one of the principles of the double effect isn't met in the
use of antipsychotics in the 'treatment' of dementia and therefore they
should be banned. But they're not. I think it is also against the
Hippocratic Oath. Even the bastardised modern one.
Who's the biggest mass murderer in the UK over the next decade?
George Osbourne has ensured the early deaths of many people. Taking
money from the poor ensures they'll die quicker while the rich prosper.
Someone smart can probably do the sort of analysis that adds up all the
life years that will be lost by the most disadvantaged people in society
because of the heavy cuts in the benefits system.
money from the poor ensures they'll die quicker while the rich prosper.
Someone smart can probably do the sort of analysis that adds up all the
life years that will be lost by the most disadvantaged people in society
because of the heavy cuts in the benefits system.
How many will die while the bankers still buy champagne to impress the
girls? The Robin Hood Tax is just the start of what's really needed to
keep people alive over the next decade.
The people must save the people. Politicians aren't going to help us.
Charities are so far up their own arses they can't even see what's
happening. Doctors are too busy killing the elderly.
The provision of food and heat will keep people alive. The current
measures ensure this won't happen as much as it does now, and the most
disadvantaged are already dying quicker than the wealthy. This great
evil in society, this great inequality advanced societies work to
improve, will roam this land freely as long as the cuts stay in place.
Why send soldiers to Afghanistan to die when people are dying here? Al
Qaeda have killed fewer people than will die because of the government's
cuts.
This can not prevail. No matter how bad things are for the economy we
have to make sure that people don't die. The sick irony is this is
coming from soneone whose happiest moment recently is finding out he can
go to the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland and be assisted in killing
himself. I may be a hypocrite for that but there are worse hypocracies.
I'd willingly trade my life for the lives of those that will die in the
coming future. I'd do it right now.
No one needs to fucking die because bankers can't gamble safely. No one
needs to die.
The correct motto of the Royal College of Psychiatry
The motto of the Royal College of Psychiatry is Let wisdom guide.
It really should be something along the lines of
Permissum nos iuguolo vetus populus
It's Latin for Let us kill old people. It what they allow doctors to do.
The RCPsych published a report confirming docotrs had killed 1,800
people a year when they started to use antipsychotics in the community
for the treatment of undesrieable behaviours in the very elderly. They
used drugs for psychosis on people who didn't have psychosis. They used
the chemical cosh.
This is the power and privilege of medicine. A doctor tells someone it's
an illness and they take the pill to treat illness. Dementia is a true
organic illness involving deterioration of the brain. As a person gets
older their brain starts to fall apart. When this happens old people can
be annoying or even aggressive. I think many people would like to use a
strait jacket in their hearts but they know it would be immoral to stick
the elderly in straitjackets.
Thankfully it's 2010 and thee is an excellent alternative. The
antipsychotics. Modern families are too busy to deal with the elderly
and their difficulty. It would reduce productivity if people had to care
for their elders. Psychiatry offered a solution: the chemical cosh. It
wasn't as obviously inhumane as a straitjacket. And it has the economics
rationale for reducing the cost of looking after the elderly.
Psychiatrists and doctors didn't really mean to kill all those people.
In one year they killed almost as many people as have been victims of
homicide by a mentally disorder person. It was a mistake. A huge one
that meant many died needlessly because society was malformed and didn't
want crazy old people being annoying.
What would a wise doctor do upon realising that they'd been killing
patients unnecessarily? They'd stop killing and hang their head in shame
at the horror perpetrated in the name of medicine. They'd sit at home
and think: did I really break the Hippocratic Oath? Am I really fit to
be a doctor?
What has happened is the chemical cosh is still continuing to be used in
the community. GPs can murder just like Harold Shipman did but they're
now evaluated on how few old people they kill. Well, technically it's
how few antipsychotics they prescribe to patients with dementia in the
community. The end result though is they're still continuing to murder
people (because now it is murder) because the use of antipsychotics in
the very elderly with demetia reduces their life expectancy by 50
fucking percent. 50%! 1,800 already dead. A straitjacket would be a
better 'treatment' but the public uproar would be too much for the
RCPsych press department to deal with so they stick with the pill that
kills and calms.
Let wisdom guide? Let them suck my balls. Fucking murders. There is no
wisdom nor healthcare in what they're dong to the elderly. It's just
murder for nothing related to healthcare. The drugs don't even fucking
treat dementia. Every doctor knows that. Every doctor that prescribes a
drug for behaviour know to reduce life expectancy is a murder.
Let wisdom guide. What the fuck.
Permissum sapiens interficio Let the wise murder. That's what medicine
represents today.
A really useful paper onh treatment resistant schizophrenoa
This Hong Kong psych has summaries some of the stuff going on for
treatment resistant schizophrenia. References are well worth checking out.
treatment resistant schizophrenia. References are well worth checking out.
http://www.fmshk.org/database/articles/03mb4_1.pdf
Surprisingly EPA fish oils might work. They're good for everything.
Thinking puzzles
Originally posted in the MENTAL CARE Facebook group.
"
If you get
6/6 - you are good at lateral thinking
3/6 - you are somewhat there
0 - you need to be more imaginative !!!
1. There is a man who lives on the top
floor of a very tall building. Everyday he gets the
elevator down to the ground floor to leave the
building to go to work.. Upon returning from work
though, he can only travel half way up in the lift
and has to walk the rest of the way unless it's
raining! Why?
(This is probably the best known and most
celebrated of all lateral thinking puzzles. It is a
true classic. Although there are many possible
solutions which fit the initial conditions, only the
canonical answer is truly satisfying.
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
2. A man and his son are in a car accident.
The father dies on the scene, but the child is rushed
to the hospital. When he arrives the surgeon says, "I
can't operate on this boy, he is my son!" How can
this be?
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
3. A man is wearing black. Black shoes,
socks, trousers, lumper, gloves and balaclava. He is
walking down a black street with all the street lamps
off. A black car is coming towards him with its lights
off but somehow manages to stop in time. How did the
driver see the man?
^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
4. Why is it better to have round manhole
covers than square ones?
(This is logical rather than lateral, but
it is a good puzzle that can be solved by lateral
thinking techniques. It is supposedly used by a very
well-known software company as an interview question
for prospective employees. )
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
5. A man went to a party and drank some
of the punch. He then left early. Everyone else at
the party who drank the punch subsequently died of
poisoning. Why did the man not die?
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
6. A man walks into a bar and asks the
barman for a glass of water. The barman pulls out a
gun and points it at the man. The man says 'Thank
you' and walks out.
(This puzzle claims to be the best of the
genre. It is simple in its statement, absolutely
baffling and yet with a completely satisfying
solution. Most people struggle very hard to solve
this one yet they like the answer when they hear it
or have the satisfaction of figuring it out.)
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
SOLUTIONS
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
1. The man is very, very short and can
only reach halfway up the elevator buttons. However,
if it is raining then he will have his umbrella with
him and can press the higher buttons with it.
( I would carry a stick everyday rather than walk, unless I need the
exercise.)
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
2. The surgeon was his mother.
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
3. It was day time.
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
4. A square manhole cover can be turned
and dropped down the diagonal of the manhole. A round
manhole cannot be dropped down the manhole. So for
safety and practicality, all manhole covers should be
round.
*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
5. The poison in the punch came from the
ice cubes. When the man drank the punch, the ice was
fully frozen. Gradually it melted, poisoning the
punch.
( I thought he poisoned the drink!)
^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*^*
6. The man had hiccups. The barman
recognized this from his speech and drew the gun in
order to give him a shock. It worked and cured the
hiccups-so the man no longer needed the water.
(This is a simple puzzle to state but a
difficult one to solve. It is a perfect example of a
seemingly irrational and incongruous situation having
a simple and complete explanation. Amazingly this
classic puzzle seems to work in different cultures and
languages. )
"
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