And Now It Is Pre-cradle To The Grave, And, Beyond?


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Greg,

Antibiotics, when used correctly, kill the direct cause of a disease, the bacteria.

That's for starters.

As to psychotropics, I would have to dig. In general I am against them because of so much abuse by the Prozac Nation Syndrome (my own cute designation--with hat-tip to Elizabeth Wurtzel--for our current Brave New World and its sundry somas), but my stepson took a few for a few extended periods when he was younger. He has a high-functioning autistic-spectrum disorder. I was always bugging the psychiatrist to keep the dosages low, but I have to admit, they helped with his behavior, which could be really erratic at times without them, while he grew and learned how to deal with his condition. Now he no longer needs them.

That's not curing, but it's not attacking only symptoms, either. Used in this manner, they were a tool to modify uncontrolled behavior that could have resulted in serious injury and damage until his mind was strong enough to take over, sort of like training wheels on a bicycle.

But I suspect the pharmaceutical companies did not invest in cures with psychotropics so much as drugs that would need to be used over and over.

Viagra is a good example of this thinking, albeit that's not exactly a psychotropic. :)

Michael

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Viagra is a good example of this thinking, albeit that's not exactly a psychotropic. :smile:

It might be for his partner...

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When a person's inability to "gain mastery over [his] own thoughts and emotions" has a biological component (even if that component is not completely understood), then psychotropic drugs is an acceptable treatment. Especially in cases where one of the symptoms of that inability could result in the initation of force against another individual.

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When a person's inability to "gain mastery over [his] own thoughts and emotions" has a biological component (even if that component is not completely understood), then psychotropic drugs is an acceptable treatment. Especially in cases where one of the symptoms of that inability could result in the initation of force against another individual.

Excellenr and nails it with the "especially" statement.

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When a person's inability to "gain mastery over [his] own thoughts and emotions" has a biological component (even if that component is not completely understood), then psychotropic drugs is an acceptable treatment.

Of course. That's an article of faith in the narcoculture religion. Blaming biology for evil is such an elegant solution. It completely absolves individuals of any personal responsibility for their own behavior. Then dope is worshipped as the only god who can save you from yourself.

Especially in cases where one of the symptoms of that inability could result in the initation of force against another individual.

Yeah, that's just dandy. You just keep stretching a rubber band with chemicals until it snaps and you get mass murders. Do you realize just how many of those slaughters are related to drugs?

There's a rot in American society... and even saturating the whole nation with drugs hasn't cured it... and it never will.

Greg

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When a person's inability to "gain mastery over [his] own thoughts and emotions" has a biological component (even if that component is not completely understood), then psychotropic drugs is an acceptable treatment.

Of course. That's an article of faith in the narcoculture religion. Blaming biology for evil is such an elegant solution. It completely absolves individuals of any personal responsibility for their own behavior. Then dope is worshipped as the only god who can save you from yourself.

Especially in cases where one of the symptoms of that inability could result in the initation of force against another individual.

Yeah, that's just dandy. You just keep stretching a rubber band with chemicals until it snaps and you get mass murders. Do you realize just how many of those slaughters are related to drugs?

There's a rot in American society... and even saturating the whole nation with drugs hasn't cured it... and it never will.

Greg

The "rot" is not from drugs but from Government plus drugs. Thus the "war on drugs." So horrible drugs like methampetamine don't have alternatives that don't make the user bat-shit crazy. Pain pills cost an arm and a leg. Etc. Crime to pay for illegal drugs equals bigger budgets for the war on drugs equals more money for drug pushers and an ever expanding prison population. All only just another facet of the fascism that more and more defines society generally. And let us not forget public schools filling their little male, if not female, charges up with Ritalan to make them good little boys not giving teach any trouble and putting even more tax money into the school system.

--Brant

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Greg,

Antibiotics, when used correctly, kill the direct cause of a disease, the bacteria.

That's a valid point, Michael. Antibiotics do some good. But realize that the direct cause of disease is not bacteria, but the failure of an unhealthy body to fight it. Antibiotics are also completely different from psychotropic drugs which are only external compensations for the internal failure of people to exercise proper control over their own thoughts and emotions.

And just like any other external compensation that comes at a price, antibiotics also has its downside. Have you read how the use of antibiotics has been backfiring by creating super strong evolving strains of bacteria. It's turned hospitals into toxic infectious incubators.

Greg

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A distinction, Brant - without contradicting your main thrust.

ADD, ADHD indeed exists, while I won't argue that it has become over-diagnosed/misdiagnosed.

An effective drug like Ritalin et al that eases a young person's passage through socialization and education - and the later, long-term problems - has to have merits.

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The "rot" is not from drugs but from Government plus drugs.

But isn't that exactly what people have demanded? For it is they who created the government to save them from their failure to master their own thoughts and emotions. Every societal problem can be traced to the personal failure to deal with evil.

It all boils down to this:

Who's the boss?

You?

Or your thoughts and emotions?

Greg

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But realize that the direct cause of disease is not bacteria, but the failure of an unhealthy body to fight it.

Greg,

I disagree.

That's like saying a tiger who bites your arm off is not really the cause of your missing arm, but instead the failure of an unhealthy skin and bones to resist the bite. A gun would do the job nicely. :wink:

:smile:

Michael

Going with your example. The tiger biting your arm off would due to a failure to physically defend yourself from the attack, and not unhealthy skin or bones, even though they might contribute to that failure.

Even right now your body is fighting a constant war against microscopic invaders. Health is the ability to prevail in that war. Sickness is the lack of that ability. Since we're all going to eventually die from something, that's just part of life.

Our technology has created all kinds of wondrous miraculous external compensatory mechanisms to make up for internal deficits. And there is a difference between externally compensating for an internal physical deficit, and externally compensating for an internal moral deficit. I was addressing the latter as it applies to how we choose to relate to our thoughts and emotions.

Greg

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It all boils down to this:

Who's the boss?

You?

Or your thoughts and emotions?

Greg

Not catching this. Is there a "Super You" transcending thought and emotion? I know the mind/body (false) dichotomy, now a mind/mind dichotomy?

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It all boils down to this:

Who's the boss?

You?

Or your thoughts and emotions?

Greg

Not catching this. Is there a "Super You" transcending thought and emotion? I know the mind/body (false) dichotomy, now a mind/mind dichotomy?

Beat me to it Tony!

Is there any way that your country can keep President Incompetano for 27 years when he visits next week?

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It all boils down to this:

Who's the boss?

You?

Or your thoughts and emotions?

Greg

Not catching this. Is there a "Super You" transcending thought and emotion? I know the mind/body (false) dichotomy, now a mind/mind dichotomy?

Yes. But it's not a "super you"...

...it's the real you who objectively observes your thoughts and emotions and decides upon which ones to act and which to just let go by unresponded.

This ability even shows up in our speech idioms. "So I said to myself." or "I'm just talking to myself." This implies both a speaker AND a listener. And that calm silent objective listener is the real you.

Humans are unique in this self reflective ability to observe our own minds. This capability is what makes us personally morally responsible for our behavior. Whereas amoral animals lack this ability and can only act indiscriminately on every instinct, impulse, and environmental stimulous.

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Even right now your body is fighting a constant war against microscopic invaders. Health is the ability to prevail in that war. Sickness is the lack of that ability. Since we're all going to eventually die from something, that's just part of life.

Greg,

In other words, the real cause of all disease is being alive?

:smile:

In that case, I still disagree with you. There are lots of drugs that deal with that cause, and do so effectively. Arsenic. Cyanide. Etc...

They totally cure the disease. You kinda die for the cure to take place, but the disease definitely is stopped in its tracks for good by the drug.

:smile:

Michael

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Greg:

You well described 'self-awareness', the adjunct to man's consciousness. One being conscious of one's consciousness, I think of it. It's not 'apart' from one - as with consciousness, it is an existent with identity.

"A man's self is his mind - the faculty that perceives reality, forms judgments, chooses values." [AR]

Introspection: "a process of cognition turned inward..."

"The field of extrospection is based upon two cardinal questions: What do I know? - and, How do I know it? Introspection is based upon: What do I feel?- and, Why do I feel it?"[AR]

I think I know what you mean though. My father used to tell me "Listen to your conscience, lad."

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A distinction, Brant - without contradicting your main thrust.

ADD, ADHD indeed exists, while I won't argue that it has become over-diagnosed/misdiagnosed.

An effective drug like Ritalin et al that eases a young person's passage through socialization and education - and the later, long-term problems - has to have merits.

Eases him through public education in public schools.

--Brant

a laxative?

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Hah, put it that way, my whole post looks suspiciously Freudian.

It does sound close to a super-ego/conscience and that also seems to be where Greg appears to be.

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Even right now your body is fighting a constant war against microscopic invaders. Health is the ability to prevail in that war. Sickness is the lack of that ability. Since we're all going to eventually die from something, that's just part of life.

Greg,

In other words, the real cause of all disease is being alive?

No.

The real cause of all disease is how we live. And it is how we live that gives rise to all of the external compensations to eliminate symptoms... but not their causes.

Greg

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Hah, put it that way, my whole post looks suspiciously Freudian.

It does sound close to a super-ego/conscience and that also seems to be where Greg appears to be.

It is not super ego nor is it Conscience. It's much more mundane than that. However, it is by the light of Conscience that we are able to see the moral implications if we were to act on our thoughts and emotions. We are the one who chooses whether or not to act on each thought and emotion.

For example: Close your eyes and think of a tree. You are the one who sees the tree. You are not the thought of the tree... you are the observer of that thought. If you were not the observer of your own mind and emotions, you would act upon every thought and emotion that passes through your head. And if you were only your thoughts and emotions, you would be devoid of any moral discrimination like the animals...

...and you would either end up in jail, or in the morgue.

Greg

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Greg:

You well described 'self-awareness', the adjunct to man's consciousness. One being conscious of one's consciousness

That's close but not quite there, Tony.

As I see it, we can choose either to be a conscious observer of our thoughts and emotions... or to be immersed in them as if they were us.

I think of it. It's not 'apart' from one - as with consciousness, it is an existent with identity.

"A man's self is his mind - the faculty that perceives reality, forms judgments, chooses values." [AR]

Here's where we differ slightly:

A man's self is what calmly and sliently observes his mind.

I think I know what you mean though. My father used to tell me "Listen to your conscience, lad."

That's good advice.

I'd add "Be still long enough to become aware of your Conscience, lad." ...as it's a silent wordless objective light that reveals right from wrong.

Greg

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Even right now your body is fighting a constant war against microscopic invaders. Health is the ability to prevail in that war. Sickness is the lack of that ability. Since we're all going to eventually die from something, that's just part of life.

Greg,

In other words, the real cause of all disease is being alive?

No.

The real cause of all disease is how we live. And it is how we live that gives rise to all of the external compensations to eliminate symptoms... but not their causes.

Greg

Like the little boy with cancer?

--Brant

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It does sound close to a super-ego/conscience and that also seems to be where Greg appears to be.

It is not super ego nor is it Conscience. It's much more mundane than that. However, it is by the light of Conscience that we are able to see the moral implications if we were to act on our thoughts and emotions. We are the one who chooses whether or not to act on each thought and emotion.

For example: Close your eyes and think of a tree. You are the one who sees the tree. You are not the thought of the tree... you are the observer of that thought. If you were not the observer of your own mind and emotions, you would act upon every thought and emotion that passes through your head. And if you were only your thoughts and emotions, you would be devoid of any moral discrimination like the animals...

...and you would either end up in jail, or in the morgue.

Greg

Greg, I must reiterate: all you speak of is part of one's self - i.e. it has IDENTITY.

You talk now, and have previously, of cognition and emotion as something divorced from the reality of you, happening of their own accord, to be severely controlled by some kind of 'moral overseer'.

"Thought about thought" and "thought about emotions" (way I see it) is an invaluable, volitional exercise.

However, both thought and emotion have their referents in existence. e.g. An emotion is a consequence of *something*- it's always an occurrence in reality, which you considered, then acted upon, and experienced an emotion according to how well you acted. "How well" being the automatic emotional judgement of the effectiveness of your moral code relating to reality, and how truly you acted on that code.

'The better self' as it is called metaphorically, is exactly that - a meaningless metaphor. You are all self, and your self is all you.

Our thoughts and emotions are ours, not happenstances, and they need to be taken ownership of, and taken responsibility for.

"From primordial mysticism to this, its climax, the attack on man's consciousness and particularly on his conceptual faculty has rested on the unchallenged premise that any knowledge [including morality] acquired by a PROCESS of consciousness is necessarily subjective and cannot correspond to the facts of reality, since it is "PROCESSED knowledge".

...

"The hallmark of a mystic is the savagely stubborn refusal to accept the fact that consciousness, like any other existent, possesses identity, that it is a faculty of a specific nature, functioning through specific means."

[AR-Consciousness and Identity]

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