Showing posts with label psychology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label psychology. Show all posts

Sunday, July 03, 2016

VIRTUAL REALITY DANGERS

We all know that virtual reality is just around the corner. The day's coming when men with goggles will be able to enjoy the company of  a beautiful virtual woman right in their own living room. 


It's a computer thing. 


Of course the kind of classy men who frequent Theory Corner want something more than just beauty. They'll want a sweet, intelligent girl... a girl who'll listen to all their problems and...yes...agree with them on just about everything.  Ahhh, that'll be nice, but....

....but one day it's bound to occur, even to the elevated men who come here, that three girls (above) listening to their problems would be better than one. 


And a dozen would be better than three! Yikes! You'll hock everything you've got to buy more RAM!


The day will come when you'll have a house full of virtual women. They'll all be glad to see you and they'll all laugh at your jokes, but don't try to touch them...they don't really exist.


Wait'll you try to use your car.


Or brush your teeth.

How much flossing do you think you'll get done?


 Of course other men will have virtual companions, too. You'll find yourself wondering,  is the male doctor who's operating on me...really paying attention?


Maybe. You'll never know.

We have to face the fact the entire male gender might become hopelessly addicted to the presence of virtual women. Civilization could fall apart.

But let's not be pessimistic. Science has a cure, if we have the courage to apply it. B. F. Skinner said that the only way to extinguish conditioning is by counter-conditioning. Alright then,  let's do that.


Goggles will have to programmed for the extreme opposite type of female...the kind that would discourage virtual addiction. 


Only great mental pain will be able to override great mental pleasure.


Good Luck!

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Oh, yes...on another subject...a word about the Fourth of July:





Wednesday, November 18, 2015

DEPRESSION

It seems to me that psychology has long overlooked the "Gorilla in the Living Room," the fundamental mental disorder on which so many other disorders rest.




Haw! That's (above) a caricature Mike did of me, showing me in one of my cheery moods, oblivious to anything depressing. Haw! Maybe he's right. For all I know, I might have a mountain of psychological disorders, but I don't think Depression is one of them. Even so I can't help but feel sorry for the people who do have it, a sympathy made deeper by a reading of William Styron's book on the subject, "Darkness Visible."


I think the image most people have of a depressive is that of a lethargic person (above) who spends hours looking wistfully out the window at grey, overcast skies. I don't think that's always correct. My own belief is that depressives are sometimes the most active people you know, the people who are least likely to waste time staring out of windows.

It's true that they're all vulnerable to funks of frightening intensity, but it's also true that lots of them have developed strategies to deflect those funks....I mean, apart from the medication they take. Those strategies frequently include alcohol or drugs...



...but they also might include hypochondria, hoarding, workaholism, over-achievement or sex obsession.

Even crime, even philanthropy!  What all these strategies have in common is that they allow the sufferer to get out of his own problems and focus on something outside of himself.



I find this fascinating, especially the workaholic part (above). I used to regard workaholics as possible candidates for what's called "Obsessive-Compulsive Behavior Disorder, but now I'm not so sure. If a person deliberately cultivates compulsion just to deflect depression, is he really clinically compulsive? Wouldn't it be more accurate to say that he simply has a compulsive "problem?" Surely the stronger term "disorder" should be reserved for the the depression he's trying to avoid.

Okay, I've probably bored everybody to death with all this fuss about naming things. I'll end with this thought: if lesser disorders are dropped from the official list...if vulnerability to depression is recognized as being far and away the central problem...



...the "Gorilla in the Living Room"...

....then psychiatry and treatment is simplified. Whatever drug lessens the frequency of depression will lessen lots of other problems too. In fact, in a general way, I think that's already known to be the case.

My own guess is that if depression were easier to recognize, we'd discover that 1/2  or more of all people have it. Something that widespread might have come about because it's benign or useful in some way. Maybe the deflection strategies it engenders are an essential part of creative thinking or getting things done. Who knows?

Thursday, October 08, 2015

CHRONIC DEPRESSION


Recently I watched a couple of Youtube videos on the subject of Depression. Holy Mackerel! I realised that I know next to nothing about the subject. How many of us do?

Apparently the sexy subject these days is Manic Depression. Plain old run-of-the-mill Depression now appears so...yesterday. Maybe that's because the treatment for Depression is so standard now: anti-depressant pills plus maybe two years of therapy. The therapy is just to make sure you get in the habit of taking the pills. If you have Manic Depression add lithium to the list.

Anyway, through the videos I discovered that I'm in danger of getting some sort of depressive disorder.


 I'm moving to a part of the country where I'll likely have no cartoonist friends and where I'll probably have drastically reduced face-to-face contact. Recent studies show that this will put me in a high risk category for Depression.


Geez, I better enjoy Los Angeles while I still can.


People say that Skype is the remedy for isolation, but is it?  It's a futuristic technology and I love the idea, but it hasn't worked well for me in the past. I always run out of things to say, something that seldom happens when I'm face to face.



You could argue that the kind of depression you get from isolation is really just plain old everyday sadness. If my sad-inducing circumstances improved then my illness would vanish and with it my claim to a serious problem. That's a comforting thought if true, but the behaviorist in me can't help but wonder if the negative habits acquired in isolation can be shed so easily. I don't think they can.


Manic depression certainly is a lot more fun to think about. At least the manic people have times when they think they can do anything and are positively euphoric. The problem is that, according to one video, for some people it doesn't lead to anything positive at all. The ideas they get look silly the next day. They're just spinning their wheels. And besides, the depressive episodes of the disease last longer, and are more severe, than the manic ones.

That's all I have to say about this subject. I really don't know much about it. If I made a mistake I hope someone who knows better will correct it.



BTW: I noticed something called Borderline Personality Disorder on the sidebars of depression sites. BPDs are said to be impulsive, prone to mood swings, and lack empathy and a clear identity. Yikes! I've read that there's 140 kinds of personality disorder. That means an awful lot of us probably have a screw loose somewhere. It's scary!


Saturday, April 11, 2015

SUPPORT GROUPS

HORACE: "As the group leader I'd like to welcome you all to the first session of the Extremophile Support Group. Daisy, maybe you'd like to start."


DAISY: "Sure, I'll start. What are we all doing here? I look around the room and I don't see anybody who looks offensive. I don't even know what an 'extremophile' is."


MARIGOLD: "I'm only here because my mother said there'd be food."


TULIP: "I don't know about the others here, but I'm offended by the woman sitting beside me." 


IRIS: "Yeah, what's with her? Why is she...well, you know..."



DANDELION: "If you're referring to me, then the proper term is 'undraped.' That's my extreme. I simply prefer to live the way nature intended, the way birds live."


HOLLYHOCK: "You want to wear... feathers?"


VIOLET: "I think she's saying she wants to be buck naked."


MAGNOLIA:"Well, I think Dandelion has the right to dress whatever way she wants. This was a free country the last time I looked."


PETUNIA: "Yeah...free to be WEIRD!"


GERANIUM: "Well then I'm free to take my extremophile fist and..."

HORACE (VO): "Now, now, Ladies...we're all extremophiles here and we need to show sisterly solidarity. "

GERANIUM: "Haw! Look who's talking...from a guy, no less!"


HORACE: "Maybe we need to cool down for a few minutes. Let's take a muffin break.  I made them myself, but I have to warn you...they're for eating only on the right side of the mouth."


Tuesday, January 14, 2014

"CONFESSIONS OF A SOCIOPATH"



Here's  what I've been reading lately..."Confessions of a Sociopath," by M. E. Thomas, a clinically diagnosed sociopath. The book cast a pall over my holiday because it was so interesting that I couldn't put it down, even when I was forced to read by the light of the Christmas tree. It wasn't exactly holiday reading. My family must have thought I was nuts.



The author is unusual in that she actually likes being a sociopath. She says it confers advantages. She says her inability to experience emotional attachment allows her to be objective, to consider things on their own merit without emotional bias. She thinks the world wouldn't work without people like that. And besides, given the choice of being a wolf or a sheep who wouldn't prefer to be a wolf?



That's not to say that this condition doesn't have big disadvantages. Sociopaths get bored easy and will turn to mischief just for something to do. In Thomas's case she hinted that she filed sexual harassment complaints against innocent men she didn't like, just to watch them squirm. As a consequence she had to change jobs every two or three years because she'd get a reputation as a troublemaker. I get the feeling that sociopaths are frequent job changers.

BTW: bored easy can be a surprisingly dangerous trait. Lots of us fill in the gaps during the day with random thoughts about social relationships. Sociopaths aren't interested in things like that and the void that results sometimes drives them to do wild things to fill it. Geez, maybe thinking of social trivia keeps normal people sane. But I digress....



Another disadvantage is that sociopaths never seem to learn from bad experiences. They're driven to do what they do, sometimes with slight regard to consequences.

They're also born manipulators. They can be good listeners, but that's because they hope to discover your vulnerabilities. Sociopaths are users. Someone on the net said their true goal is to make their acquaintances into zombie slaves. They don't believe that harms us much because in their eyes the rest of us aren't fully human anyway. We're just... goldfish. It's not like they were hurting a real human being...like themselves.



Sociopaths are said to be more likely than normals to be drug abusers. Maybe that comes from being bored easy. They also have violent tendencies but many manage to keep them in check, largely by avoiding situations where they'd lose control. One commenter on Thomas' blog "Psychopath World" says he steers clear of prostitutes because their high risk life style makes them perfect victims, and he'd rather not be tempted.


Lots of psychologists subscribe to the famous list of seven sociopathic attributes found below. You can have only five and still be diagnosed as a socio, but four or less apparently disqualifies you.


Thomas says she'd add one more attribute: a lack of a sense of self. Socios are shape shifters who tailor their personality to fit the unique need of each person they're trying to manipulate. The downside of all that role playing is that sociopaths may not have a default personality. They don't have a clear idea of who they really are.



How do you spot a sociopath? Thomas offers her own list of twelve relatively minor behaviors that might serve as a tipoff (below).



It's kind of funny that sociopaths are appalled when they're confused with psychopaths. In their eyes psychopaths are just plain crazy.  Psychopaths hear voices or see visions...they're delusional. Sociopaths aren't delusional at all. They take in information the same way the rest of us do, they just have different values, or at least that's how they see it. Haw! It's funny to think that in the world of psychological disorders each group has its own niche, which is strenuously defended. 



What's my take on all this?  I think Thomas may be right about the benefits to society of certain disorders, provided the sufferer has some self restraint. At the top of the heap are the obsessive compulsives. We all benefit from what those guys do, though they don't seem very happy and I wouldn't want to trade places with them. Sociopaths are scary because at the extreme end they can lapse into absolute evil, but a mild case...mmmm, maybe there's some benefit there, I'm not sure.



I do think that too many normal people cheerfully identify themselves as sociopaths based on the fact that they have disdain for the people they meet. That doesn't sound right. Disdain alone isn't sociopathy, it's just...I don't know...misanthropy. If the book is right, sociopaths aren't just down on people; they have no personality, are chronic manipulators and shape-shifters, are potentially violent, and never learn from experience. It's a whole package.

BTW: A commenter doesn't agree that there's a difference between psychopaths and sociopaths. I've read differently, but he cites a reputable source. Read what he says and judge for yourself.