> researchers presented both depressed and non-depressed participants with a button and a green light. They then asked the participants to figure out to what degree their responses (pushing the button) controlled that light. Depressed participants were much better at judging the degree of their control, while participants who weren't depressed tended to assume that they had more control over the light than they actually did.
so they gave a depressing scenario to people and the depressives were quicker to identify that it was, in fact, a depressing situation.
however, put depressives into a fun party where people are open and accepting and the depressives will often instead focus on a negative, antisocial view that is manufactured by their mood disorder and takes them out of this very welcoming and positive situation.
As a lifelong depressive I've struggled to see reality for what it is and not as what my depression is constantly misrepresenting. I of course also have the experience where I can see an actually depressing situation for what it is more readily than others, but I think the premise of the article is still generally absurd. The world seems like a very hostile and dangerous place to me, and while you can of course find limitless examples of this being completely true, it nonetheless it prevents me from doing things that other people do quite safely and successfully all the time and for which this dark perspective is completely exaggerative and distorting.
Your assessment resonates with me (someone who has depressive and hypomanic episodes). I've always conceptualized hypomania as having a much higher rate of false positives (in such a way that e.g. every attractive woman in sight seems to be heavily flirting with me), but false positives cut in both directions: when depressed, I will e.g. notice and lament minor aches (as representative of an enduring state of physical pain) in excess of what "balanced me" would.
You have given me new perspective on my wobbly biases. Thanks a lot!
The study wasn’t there to have participants judge whether the scenario was “depressing” or not, it was to evaluate the participant’s ability to accurately assess how much objective control over a light they had. This implies that depressed individuals in the study also had to accurately judge when the lights were directly correlated with the button press, and were actually under the control of the depressed participant (so what could be considered a “non-depressing” scenario by some).
That’s not to say that negative delusion doesn’t affect people with depression, but the article does lean closer to the theory that most of the fringe observations attributed to a negative outlook may in fact be closer to reality than a normal individuals.
you can't observe solely that depressed individuals are more thoughtful or methodical when approached with a technical puzzle, and then jump to the headline, "Depressed People See the World More Realistically". It's like saying people who are very good at chess, video games, or engineering see the world more realistically. What does "more realistically" mean? What kind of "things" are we referring towards, how a bridge is built, if a certain person is a good person or not, what kind of politicians should be elected, if their artistic creations are worthwhile, is this plane is going to crash, is this current situation not so bad or not ? It's ridiculous to make such a sweeping statement, and especially regarding depressives, who almost by definition have a distorted view of reality.
Neutrally overstimmed and negatively stimmed are different though! If you’re just neutrally overstimmed you can find a quiet corner, another room with less noise and fewer people, or hang out on the porch. Negatively stimmed you won’t be able to be in or around the place at all. Depression or anxiety is a “general” upset, whereas overstimmed is a “local” upset.
That really makes no sense to me. Let me explain. Certain types of places / events are extremely distressing to me because of sensory factors. Now, when I have to attend a conference for work, I have extreme anxiety - the anxiety is caused because of the sensory distress I know I'll be facing. "Local" vs "general" doesn't seem to be a useful distinction for me. I could be misunderstanding you.
The anxiety is what I mean by general stress. I'd bet you probably suffer more from the anxiety about the sensory distress more than you do the sensory distress! I had a problem with this as well - the anxiety totally took over, and was much worse. Over time, I managed to keep the distress local to when I was actually feeling overwhelmed, and then could start to work to mitigate the sensory overload, by taking frequent breaks outside, wearing noise cancelling headphones, sunglasses, or finding quiet corners with fewer people.
Its not much of a problem for me anymore, and over time my senses have become a bit more fine tuned and won't be piqued by much more than very loud/unexpected sounds.
Yeah sucks doesn't it. I'm a friendly out going person. But I just can't do pubs or bars or clubs because the noise just overwhelms me and I become a jibbering idiot. Sad times
I'm having exactly this problem at the moment. Been isolated far too long, not used to noise now, stir in some buggery of mental problems... But I' forcing myself out right now to the pub. I won't enjoy it now nor for weeks yet, but going through that is necessary if I'm going to recover.
Sometimes it's just down to repeated practice, same as anything else.
I'm not so depressed these days (thankfully) but this "realism" does tend to manifest is different ways. I'm very self-conscious about not dragging people down because some thoughts that I think daily that are normal for me, seem to be absolutely psychologically crippling for people who previously hadn't, or didn't want to think such things.
Usually when I do express these thoughts they're in the form of semi-dark humor ("You don't like the boss? Don't worry, you'll only have to deal with him for a couple more years (because you won't quit) and then the company will go under and you'll have to work somewhere else with a similar boss"). The humor is to mostly try to diffuse how harsh these statements can seem to others, and because I find them legitimately morosely funny, but for some reason I tend not to get laughter when I say them... So I try to keep this "depressive realism" to myself most of the time.
I promise I have social skills. That's probably my biggest consistent faux pas. But sometimes I wonder why I can lose friends so fast by just saying things that are true or are very likely to be true. I guess a lot of people don't like to see that clearly? I don't know.
I've found a lot of correlation between this sort of sense of humour and the type of place I enjoy working at.
Me and straight laced folk just don't get on. It doesn't work. There's an impedance mismatch whereby there are all of these invisible lines that I cross without even realising.
Like yeah, dude, your job is bullshit. So is mine. Life is, and then you die. If you're not fucking around and having (harmless) fun, what are you doing?
Those sorts of people need to exist - society would fall apart if everyone were so freewheeling - but I definitely seem to self select out of those groups.
This isn't a direct response to you, but moreso to this thread. There are some who are in on the joke and have even found quite a bit of humor in it, but no longer find that humor useful. It's like an old joke which was hilarious and insightful at one point but has been told too many times to remain interesting.
I for one tend to envy those who either don't know or don't care. Being cynical seemed cool and somehow "smarter" for some time, and then eventually it can, for some, seem just as naive.
I'd rather look at life earnestly. Yes, it's all fucked and we've no control over it. Society is a fiction, etc. But I'd rather love my wife, do work I enjoy, and not point out the absurdity all day every day to myself and others, because it's just an old stupid joke to which we _all_ happen to be the punchline.
I've found that I need the humor more when I'm doing less/less well.
When I'm doing/doing well, I don't need the humor as the crushing weight of of existential dread and absurdity is drowned out by my involvement in life.
It doesn't need to be pointed out, sure, but it's useful every day to keep in mind, I think, because it allows you to think about what really matters (as you say, your wife, for example).
It's that kind of 'realistic' mindset that lets you look through a situation in which you're playing a role, and someone else is playing a role, and just be people.
I don't know that it makes me cynical. For me it's more akin to a reminder to not sweat the small stuff too much (and it's pretty much all small stuff).
I tried to comfort a co-worker who was lamenting a low productivity quarter by explaining on a long enough timescale all human productivity will likely be lost. So 90 days isn't really a big deal. She didn't see the humor in my observation.
This kind of black humor is very present in the military (at least the branch I was in). I quickly found that I no longer fit in when I came back to the civilian world.
keeping my realist comments to myself took me more than two decades to become competent at. it'll take me another two decades to master.
the trick is to understand that all people live in a marginal headspace where engagement with the nature of the world is heavily filtered and limited so that their psychology can continue to mostly function on a day to day basis. this is true whether you are a "realist" or "pessimist" or "optimist".
piercing the veil is uncomfortable and unwanted for most people, and it doesn't necessarily provide them with any value to have their comforting or familiar illusions destroyed. in a sense, it's rude if you pop their bubble. in other words, some people don't see the humor in dark humor because they are unfamiliar with darkness, and it scares them.
for me, graveyard humor is the best way to tolerate things. but it's important to know your audience.
> some people don't see the humor in dark humor because they are unfamiliar with darkness
Other people (like me) don't see the humor in dark humor because we live in a form of darkness all the time. My partner is bipolar, and I spend a several weeks a year literally talking her off the ledge. So if some edgy cynic makes a "joke" about suicide at work, I've probably already heard the punchline. And it dredges up a reminder of the biggest ongoing challenge in my life. Not finding that funny doesn't make me naive.
I think you still live in the case that he’s describing. I have someone similarly close to me who’s bipolar and both him and I still enjoy black humor. We learn to laugh at our past situations regardless (near-death encounters included).
It doesn’t make you more naive but it might be an indicator that you’re not able to cope with all the realities faced in your life all the time.
Both of these are just coping methods to either have the situation not exist or be trivialized for a period of time as to make living with it easier.
I don't know of any evidence to say either method is objectively better. By removing the situation from their thoughts/avoiding the topic they may be able to cope for just as long or longer than someone who addresses the situation through comedy.
Piercing the veil... what an appropriate turn of phrase. I resonate a lot with your third paragraph. I also think it can be rude and unnecessary to expose people to this paradigm if they're not ready. It's a bad analogy, but it's almost like poison. If you're used to some types of poison, they wont cause injury, but if you're not... it could kill you. Trouble is, in my mind life is filled with these poisons and people often only narrowly avoid them-- if they do at all.
As another depressive person, I have lost most of my social circle because I consider my thoughts dangerous for others, don't lose touch with people around you because you try to hard to insulate them from your thoughts that might damage them.
If you work hard to make your gallows humor actually funny, you can turn things around. No one really knows the person who is too quiet, no one really likes the bitter person who always complains about everything, but the depressed dark humor guy can be the life of the party.
Robbin Williams, Ricky Gervais, and Jim Carrey, and Allan Watts all operate in the "realist" branch of thought. But the way you share those thoughts really matters.
> As another depressive person, I have lost most of my social circle because I consider my thoughts dangerous for others, don't lose touch with people around you because you try to hard to insulate them from your thoughts that might damage them.
So far this conversation has been around dark pessimistic takes on life, death, and work. I'd like to throw out that there are some descriptive things I believe about the world that I have no desire to spread, because I think that people will generally treat each other worse if they accept the ideas. Because of the very nature of such ideas I hesitate to provide any real examples, but as an absurd and (hopefully) harmless illustration we could use Roko's basilisk. If you believed such a thing, and you weren't trying to spread it for selfish reasons, wouldn't you just not talk about it? I've made the mistake of arguing horrible things which I myself didn't want to believe to close friends and actually changing their minds in ways I wish I could take back... but can't. It's ugly, and I try to avoid it these days, but I do also feel somewhat disingenuous because of that -- I think that's just something I have to bottle up and accept.
>If you work hard to make your gallows humor actually funny, you can turn things around. No one really knows the person who is too quiet, no one really likes the bitter person who always complains about everything, but the depressed dark humor guy can be the life of the party.
I've been this person, and still am in some social circles. I appreciated working in environments that can tolerate dark humor. On a visceral level I really don't understand the other poster who brought up the mental anguish of hearing suicide jokes, despite having dealt with suicidal friends in the past. I don't understand what it's like to get triggered by a suicide joke, but that doesn't mean the experience is invalid, or that the benefits of me being able to make suicide jokes in the workplace outweigh the detriments of other people being sent into dark rumination cycles because of them. It seems presumptuous to assume that somebody else getting upset at a joke is necessarily a result of the joke not being funny enough, they might be in a vastly different headspace that is hard to understand from the perspective of somebody who relishes in dark humor.
I recommend the following book under a few caveats the first one being no one without their highschool diploma or G.E.D. (General Education Diploma) should read it.
The Underachiever's Manifesto: The Guide to Accomplishing Little and Feeling Great (Funny Self-Help Book, Guide to Lowering Stress and Dealing with Perfectionism)
Okay, the age at which somebody is exposed to certain media seems like a potentially valid concern. I thought you were making a statement about adults who hadn't obtained those credentials, which would be a whole other bag of worms; it's possible to attend college without a highschool diploma or equivalent, and it's also possible to achieve difficult things without either of those pieces of paper in hand.
Interesting and WTF for sure. Must have rubbed some people the wrong way...
Reading it can be frightening for overachievers and people whose world view and beliefs (the upper class who need servants) requires we have people working for them otherwise their materialist and GDP/economy driven world views might cease to exist...
What if it's an easter egg / joke facilitated by Amazon employees... making their calculator [perhaps only for this book] perform incorrectly... hence underachieving?
re: poisons, it isn't a bad analogy because you're referencing the dose-response curve.
many of our medicines are "poisons" in the sense that if you take them in a large enough dose, they will kill you. but a small dose can be therapeutic, in the right context.
likewise, a dose of reality-groundedness is a necessity to navigate life correctly. some people can tolerate the side effects of higher doses better than others, however.
The other day someone was remarking how quickly one's luck can change (for the better). I don't disagree but for whatever reason my response was, "yah, life is full of ups and downs, the trick is to die on one of the upticks". I thought it was hilarious. They thought I was morbid and cynical. Go figure!
A saying I used at my old job was, "It could be worse, you could be face-down in a ditch somewhere." I thought it was funny and meant to improve people's perspective. Most people thought it was morbid too, so I had to stop.
Personally, I think a little dark humor helps people get by but that's just me. :)
Be careful with that one, if they where older they could have found it offensive. Ira Hayes an American War hero of WW2 died drunk in a ditch and if IRCC "dead in a ditch" was coined as morbid reference to that event, and was not always used in the best light when referring to American Indians. It can evoke stereotypes of American Indians and alcohol abuse as he was more remembered at the time for his death, rather than for being one of the few Marines that survived to raise the flag at Iwo Jima.
Oh for crying out loud, can we not do this for once?
No one, literally no one, using the incredibly common idiom of "dead in a ditch" is thinking of or referencing anything to do with Native Americans, alcohol or this person you've just referenced who I've never heard of before.
There is roughly a 0% chance that someone saying that phrase means it, or has ever even heard of it as, the weird imaginary negative stereotype usage you've claiming here.
Don't know how old you are but, I was born in the early 70's and it was pretty common slang around my region and most knew the reference. I don't know what we are doing for once, I was just giving some guidance on why someone of an older generation or of a certain ancestor could be offended by the comment. In all honesty I could not care less if he uses it, as it has pretty much fallen out of colloquialism and I am not the type to get offended, but the parent poster genuinely seemed unaware of what offence they did, so I offered one of many possible explanations. I get it, people are too sensitive now days and you have an axe to grid about it, fair enough, but I personally don't think I was doing anything other than providing a possible explanation.
Oh man, I can totally relate to that. I was working as a line-cook, and my direct manager was talking to me in private about how proud he was of progressing to management in a short period of time. I said something like, "yeah, but at the end of the day you're a manager at a shitty taco place." I meant it in a dark, lighthearted, joking-not-joking sort of way. He brought that interaction up for months, saying that I gave him an existential crisis. He actually thanked me for the "wake up call" and started saving some money as a result of it, but I still felt bad.
This made me smile. You sound like a really empathetic less-empathetic person..! And I mean that in a grateful way. (By "less-empathetic" I just mean it sounds like you don't spend a ton of energy constantly doing social navigation of the mental spaces of others, like an empath such as myself might.)
I feel that not many people walk the line you're walking, and so I feel like you're prob bridging the "pessimistic realism" chasm for others, and helping them derive the value of seeing it (but you're recognizing that it can hurt others to be presented it too clearly).
I'm actually not prone to depression, but I am prone to the kinds of observations you describe. It gets me a lot of hatred and I've worked at finding acceptable outlets.
Not only am I not prone to depression, my mother called me Shirley Temple when I was little (in part because of my sunny disposition). I can kind of relate to Sara from Jake Long, American Dragon. She's a Seer or Oracle who only sees all the bad outcomes. Her twin sister, Kara, only sees good outcomes.
Sara is always in a good mood because all of her surprises in life are pleasant surprises. Kara is always in a bad mood because life is a huge disappointment that never lives up to her rosy visions of the future.
Conclusion: One's own attitude -- whether it is positive or negative -- is not the issue per se. Overly accurate observations about how life works socially are simply unwelcome by most people for reasons unrelated to that metric.
>But sometimes I wonder why I can lose friends so fast by just saying things that are true or are very likely to be true.
I am like you. However, I hold the old quote to be true: "People may not remember exactly what you did, or what you said, but they will always remember how you made them feel." It doesn't matter if the things are true or not. You stating those things makes people feel scared, worried, and/or defeated. If you had those feelings when another person was around, how often would you want them around? This is not a criticism but simply another viewpoint.
"If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh. Otherwise, they will kill you." Not sure who this is attributed to but I remember it not infrequently.
> Do you ever start to feel alone, isolated, and mis- or not understood too?
Reading literature helps. It largely deals with the big, sad themes & topics of life and existence. Yes, the "stuffy" "canon" stuff. At least you know all these famous (or famous among lit-reading folks, anyway) authors saw the same things you do, then, which is a kind of camaraderie. Hell, Gilgamesh is about this stuff, very directly. Egyptian didactic literature treats of it. The Bible. Homer and the Greek tragedians. It's been around as long as we've had written culture, basically. You Are Not Alone (aside from how you totally, completely are, naturally! hahaha).
Then find other people who read that stuff and talk with them about it and set up dinner & wine parties to talk about it and hey you guys wanna go see the latest Lars Von Trier film and congratulations, you've distracted yourself from the fundamental horror at the center of existence by way of engaging with it, mission accomplished.
Nah, I used to, but then I realized that I DO have things in common with people. Just because I don't have everything in common doesn't mean I have to isolate myself from them. It just means that some parts of my life are more applicable to certain relationships then others. I'm not a social butterfly by any means and spend a lot of my time semi-alone, but I don't feel alone or isolated. Misunderstood? Sometimes. But I make a conscious effort to BE understood when I feel it's important.
I had a small application that was going to debut for the higher ups. It pulled in data from multiple sources. Somebody asked me if I was nervous because the head of the organization was going to see it.
I told him "We're all going to be dead in 50 or so years and none of this will have mattered. So, not really."
The response was "Holy shit, that's dark".
But I think I do use nihilism to cope with potentially anxious thoughts. I know that I can't make any meaningful contributions to the universe on any sort of scale that would be noticeable. So making a mistake isn't the worst thing in the world.
I have given up on understanding it. I will say something that I think is a straightforward observation, or serious advice, and people will chuckle and laugh and say, "yeah, good joke," or "that's funny." If I ask to be taken seriously, then people are suddenly horrified, mortified, or freaked out.
Nothing’s wrong with some dark humor but careful not to also deliver the joke wit too much conviction. If everyone is kind of in on it or the observation can be substantiated then go for it, but the article also shouldn’t underplay the “shit-colored” glasses that some people with depression have (that may or may not color the perspective of the depressed as much as the delusions of the optimistic).
I say this because I have met people with depression who definitely do distort things constantly with no logical basis, and try and slip in their viewpoints as jokes. I’ve typically found these depressed individuals to be especially unpalatable when they stop making sense.
I have had various friends over the years who were clever and funny but relentlessly cynical. I found spending time with them to be quite enjoyable and amusing, but only for limited amounts of time, occasionally.
With too much exposure their cynicism just got tedious. The edgy jokes lost their edge. The worldview seemed more defeatist-for-its-own-sake than inherently more perceptive than alternatives. Making fun of all the clueless optimistic imbeciles out there started to seem pointlessly mean. The conversations started to get boring and repetitive.
I don't think it's the case that all depressed people are realists, but that realists in general may be more predisposed to depression or being depressed.
It seems likely some people suffering from depression have real mental illness, and a much much smaller number of people are ultra realists and get depressed over real negative events and facts.
I know there have been times in my life where I have suffered from depression because of my realism. On occasion bad things have happened to me and I've found people will try to comfort me by saying things like, "everything happens for a reason", "it will all work out in the end", etc, but being a realist, I know there often isn't a reason and it won't work out. At best I can only hope that I find it in me to continue through the rest of my life with the regret or loss that I'm experiencing. And even then, even if I make it to the end of my life, what's the point? Our lives and suffering is all pointless in the grand scheme of things.
Most people rely on some amount of self-delusion to cope with tough things. I've witnessed this tendency, and in reaction I sometimes swing too far in the opposite direction and end up with my own cynical delusions.
When I get things right, and achieve somewhat of a stoic realism, I find there is a lot of benefit in accepting the world as it is, but it is lonely.
On a more personal note, I probably can't say anything to ease the loss of your cat, but forgive me for making an attempt: Your love for your cat and the memories you have are real, as real as anything else in this world. Even if there's no grand story that this is all a part of, the feeling of loss you have now is evidence that you found a source of joy and meaning on a personal level. Loss will always hurt, but the fact that something is finite does not prevent it from being good.
I'm really sorry to hear your cat died. From one cat lover to another - it's awful. It doesn't "happen for a reason".
But please do remember all the good times you had, too. Being a realist also means acknowledging how much joy you had together, how much unconditional love you got.
Sorry for your loss, I've lost cats in the past and it sucks badly. If I may be of advice, don't let the loss put you down ("I'll never get a cat again because losing it is too much of a pain", been in the same situation) and when you feel ready get a new one. No, it won't take away the suffering of the loss, but you will slowly start to love the new one and find more motivation.
About 16 years ago we lost a small kitten and were devastated to the point we arranged a sort of viking funeral on a river; initially I didn't want to get a new cat but my girlfriend convinced me and in a few days we had a wonderful new kitten. It lived 13 years before cancer took it away, but it became part of the family and brought happiness to the house. When it died I got a new one, and this one is growing an attachment to us just like the old one: I can't go out if I don't spend a good 10 minutes cuddling it, and have almost succeeded in "teaching" it to shake hands (search "rainman the handshaking cat", mine is just like that one:).
My point, so we can sorta get back to the topic, is that when something bad happens, it is possible that it could trigger a series of events that might end up producing something positive. If I didn't lose the first cat I'd never have got the second and the third. I'm not being religiously optimist here, just pointing out that moving forward after a loss can be of help.
I relate a lot to what you said about not wanting to own another pet to avoid loss. I love rodents but I won't own them anymore for that reason - they don't live that long and I hate losing them. I'm also on the spectrum which I think might make it a little more difficult for me. I know I stereotypically love animals, and I tend to get really attached to people and pets then struggle when I have to say goodbye.
I had my cat for 19 years so I knew it was coming for a while. I was really hoping he might make it to Christmas, but unfortunately not. He was one of the sweetest cats I've ever known and although it will take a bit of time, I know at some point I'll be ready for another cat, and I'm looking forward to that.
When something bad happens I often find myself going back to Carl Sagan's words on the Pale Blue Dot [0]. Puts everything in perspective, and makes everything feel insignificant, when compared with the vastness of what lies out there.
I am sorry to hear of your loss - losing a cat is losing a member of your family.
It is difficult to explain to others how much an animal means to your life. I have been far more distraught about a pet dying than human relations passing away!
Please be gentle on yourself and let yourself grieve. And reflect on the wonderful life your cat was able to live in your company.
Everything does happen for a reason but we don't always know it or like it. Your cat died so other things will start to exist from its atomes/molecules.
>it's most likely to occur in mildly depressed people—those suffering from major depression, by contrast, are more likely to suffer from larger distortions in their thinking.
I wonder if we have overly-pathologized the regular melancholy that comes with every day life? If mildly depressed people actually see the world realistically, maybe nothing is actually wrong with them? Should we call them depressed or should we just call them human?
I think we need to recognize the constant striving for happiness, and the inevitable disappointment when we don't reach it, as the unhealthy behavior that it is. It's okay, normal, even necessary to feel sad and pissed off at the world sometimes. It doesn't automatically mean something is wrong with you.
Of course, it would be absolutely unacceptable for the makers of Prozac to lose half of their customers, so it is a major thoughtcrime in many circles to even suggest the possibility.
If people have "mild depression", maybe sometimes it's okay to tell them to toughen up, put their head down and keep grinding because that's what life consists of. If you are not mildly depressed then you are an idiot - it shouldn't be called mild depression, it should just be called "existing as a human being". You grind and suffer and struggle through life, because you were born into a broken world and have no other choice. Sometimes all the struggle gets you good things to be proud of and appreciate. And sometimes all the suffering doesn't amount to anything of worth at all. That's life, not a pathology. It's amazingly beautiful if you can learn to come at it from the right angle, but that doesn't mean it will ever hurt any less.
> I think we need to recognize the constant striving for happiness, and the inevitable disappointment when we don't reach it, as the unhealthy behavior that it is. It's okay, normal, even necessary to feel sad and pissed off at the world sometimes. It doesn't automatically mean something is wrong with you.
No, it doesn't mean something is wrong with you. But repeating that vicious cycle over and over and over and over again is a problem. I had a conversation with my wife the other night about seemingly inane and harmless complaining. "If we counted the number of these kinds of complaints coming from our mouths daily it would be in the dozens, perhaps more." This is death (via discontentment) by a thousand self-administered cuts. Once you see this clearly, when the veil is pulled back, you can't unsee it. It's an epidemic. The fact that it's unrecognizable to most and it is considered "natural" is guaranteeing the problem will never be solved.
"It's okay, normal, even necessary to feel sad and pissed off at the world sometimes. It doesn't automatically mean something is wrong with you."
But this is not what mild depression is like. It is when feeling sad and pissed off at the world is the baseline. It is OK to feel sad, but I kinda wish I felt something else a bit more often.
I completely agree. Then of course, when I point out that it means that suicide is a totally valid and perhaps good option, people tell me I'm seriously depressed, not mildly.
Maybe there's not such a big difference between the two, mild and debilitating depression, just the amount of energy you're willing to put into living your life.
The way this is framed, an underlying question is whether medicine should make normal lives better, or just treat disease. I would definitely say yes to making normal lives better in addition to treating disease.
I agree with this. At some point during my "struggle" with depression, I realized it's just who I am. Severe depression should be treated, sure. But this "mild depression" in my mind is more of a personality trait than a clinical disorder.
It took me 8 years of coping with "depression" and earning an undergraduate degree in neuroscience to realize this. At this point I actually wouldn't give up this personality trait even if I had the option to. It's become an asset rather than a liability.
I used to feel this way, then I discovered meditation and now I am almost always in a positive state of mind. In my experience, it is depressed people who are not seeing realistically, and they are caught in cycles of mental delusion. Happiness achieved in this way is just about truly accepting the "depressing" realities and being okay with it all including your own depressing reactions to the realities, and then not identifying with these mental processes, not letting them define, own or move you as a conscious being. After some practice, a person can cope with life's unending, unexpected, negative surprises by processing the negative event in a single moment and then returning the mind to a calm and positive state. For some reason, in our society, we are not taught that it is possible (and in fact imperative) to observe, guide and ultimately control one own mind and thought stream. This has been practiced in other societies for thousands of years, and even in our own society mindfulness/meditation is steadily becoming a mainstream fixture.
You can practice mindfulness and meditate daily and still be depressed about the state of the world you live in. You can recognize negative experiences, embrace them, and still feel empty afterwards. You can see yourself as a bristle on the brushstroke of the universe and still feel insignificant. You can see that life is just a game and not want to play.
In a world with 7 billion people all playing their own game, there's bound to be some people who don't want to play. Calling their game "delusional" is hilarious because reality is an abstraction. Saying you can "control" your thoughts is also ridiculous. You can't control your thoughts, Buddhism, Taoism, etc will tell you that. Your thoughts are you. You can only change how you react to them. No matter how many Alan Watts books people read, acid trips they take, hours they spend meditating, etc some people aren't going to think the game is worth playing. That's okay. No amount of telling them to go to the gym, eat better, and meditate is ever going to change their game.
To take it further, for some people meditation can crystalize beyond all doubt that they don't want to play the game. The only thing that appears to possibly change such people is massive life upheavels.
I had a very different and difficult experience with depression and meditation. Meditation highlighted the depression / anxiety and made me very aware of it, which made me feel the pain very clearly and deeply. It was like watching my brain stab itself repeatedly for hours on end. Meditation + SSRI is a great combination for me.
The numbers are better than ECT which was alway considered to be the baseline as it is very effective but used as a last line due to some of the negative effects of treatment.
As for me, SSRI's did not work, I have co-morbid ADD as well. So the ADD meds do a really good job of papering over the really bad parts of depression and keeping me functioning until I come out of a down spell. That being said, I plan to try ketamine therapy now that it has been approved.
Meditation can be a double-edge sword because it's an attention training practice. You can think of it as a torchlight - you learn to regulate the torchlight, but what comes in focus is still controlled by something else.
The process relies on a circle of attention-interpretation and so on and so forth. So merely training attention without changing associations and interpretations may not be very helpful for some people.
Is this akin to or different from dissociation and/or depersonalization? Because I don't want that coping mechanism, feeling and experiencing things is better.
How did you overcome the depersonalization? I've had similar feelings since April. I'm an irregular meditator, probably 3-5 times a week.
I thought it was drinking and sleep deprivation, but cut out drinking completely and have been averaging 8-9 hours a night. this helps a little but I still feel very disconnected in a way I know I didn't always feel. I don't think it's permanent, but I really want to find a solution.
This. There are lots of bad things in the world that do happen. Maybe more bad then good. You have one life to live and sitting around being depressed or angry about them is just a waste of time.
Depression is more about a loss of vitality than it is about 'being sad', although it manifests with lots of negative thoughts. You can't just suddenly become more alive or have tons more energy, although drugs and therapy can help. And telling people to 'snap out of it' does not help someone who is depressed.
It's like if you're really, really, really sleepy. You can't just suddenly be super awake. You can take pills or try to push through it, but you just want to sleep - you can't help it.
Depression is crippling just like having a broken leg, it's just that it cripples your mind.
I'm not prescribing a cure for depression. However, for people who are angry or sad about macro atrocities in teh world, it is good advice to rationally know that focusing on it is a waste of time.
The trick is to recognize the things that are wrong, decide what (if any) course of action you can/will take to address them, then focus on that path. The rest you have to keep at arms' length. There are so many things wrong (and so many things that are so very, very wrong) that it should be overwhelming to a reasonable mind to try to "feel" them all.
My therapist said to me once: "I really like pessimistic patients a lot more than overly optimistic ones. A depressed, pessimistic person is judging the world very accurately and is not crushed by a negative outcome, as they have already thought about exactly that. They might even completely circumvent the negative outcome, because they thought about every possibility beforehand. Optimists on the other hand can be crushed and become very depressed when the positive outcome is not the result they are presented with."
>A depressed, pessimistic person is judging the world very accurately.
Absolutely not. I've dealt with a lot of pessimistic, depressed people--I've been clinically depressed, as well, in the past--, and we can be the most closed-minded, whiny, oblivious people out there. I think that's exactly how depression actually works: one is enslaved, kept away from experiencing the world as it is, by their extraordinarily reduced perspective, which is seemingly unescapable to the depressed individual.
I don't think it's reasonable to conflate negativity--which leads to bad outcomes--with a realistic mindset--which takes into account potential bad outcomes. I find the opposite to be true, in my experience: the more positive and proactive a person is, the stronger they can become--and not crushed by a negative turn of events.
This is absolutely true in my experience. Going to my therapist I realized that I spent all my time focusing on negative outcomes for a given life problem of mine. So much so that the failure to imagine a more optimistic outcome left me paralyzed to act. This paralysis left me feeling hopeless and depressed. As I talked things over I realized that:
1) We have a perverse tendency to reinforce our existing views in new experiences. For example, if one believes he/she is not a very charming and likable persom, every opportunity to make a new friend may thrown away because the person doesn't have confidence to present themselves in an interesting way or the person may misinterpret another's neutral body language as a negative signal during a conversation.
2) Experience is the best teacher. Experience etches things into our subconscious. If negativity is etched in our brains then it takes a strong conscious effort to over turn it. This can potentially scary because the effort to experience a positive outcome may result is us being beat down further. But we have to see it for what it is, one experience, the next may end differently. Overcoming depression requires concious effort, hope and resiliencey. This is not something that happens overnight.
I can confirm. There are simply different ways how you can view life; positive, negative and probably many more. And all of those see only a projection of reality.
I have been mildly depressed in the past and sometimes it struck me how narrow my view of the world was in those days. Sometimes literally, it seemed as if I was looking through a tunnel and that I was more busy with all the negative thoughts that were going on in my head than with what was really happening around me.
There is a difference between predicting the odds of good and bad stuff accurately. If you take someone like Warren Buffett, he's known as a cheerful optimist and focuses on stuff like the economy making everyone richer over time but he's in the insurance business and better at figuring the risks of death, illness or a nuke taking out NYC more than most.
I find people who look at the world thru "shit colored goggles" tend to be self defeating and will often convince themselves it won't work before starting.
Exactly; take every thing good or bad as a life challenge or experience to be fully engaged with and do not give up! Learnt the not giving up as a teen while race sailing; not giving up ever, resulted in a stack of trophies - but also a few submerged boats - in retrospect the submerged boats were more interesting. Winding years forward and experiencing many "challenges" I now have cancer that I am told cannot be cured - but its just another life challenge that I am experiencing and is quite interesting - like boats sinking, and I carry on doing what I like to do...
From what I have seen, it seems that the pessimistic person is likely to stay depressed even despite unexpected positive outcomes. It's easy for them to dismiss good things as a fluke. Meamwhile a truly optimistic person can rationalize any event as being for the best somehow and stay positive even if something negative happens unexpectedly.
My (very personal) differentiation of pessimism and depression - pessimism is focusing on anticipating potential negatives (what you described) and depression - is where one would get into the endless loop thinking over particular set of negative outcomes. First one can be practical, although tough. Second one is just harmfull, sorta like personal mini-hell. Would not wish it to even my enemies to get in such state ever.
That seems reasonable to me. I've often found optimism in others to be foolish. And for bipolar me, extreme optimism is a sign of hypomania.
But there's a lot more to depression than seeing the world realistically. There's a tendency to feel inadequate, hopeless and disempowered. And there's more to that than seeing oneself and ones capabilities realistically.
One aspect is failing to break out huge problems into manageable pieces.
I'm reminded of the 'ultimate perspective vortex' from the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a terrifying execution device that showed people exactly how significant they were in the grande scheme of things for an instant. Sounds a bit similar to what you're describing.
That’s exactly it and I imagine a big piece of what actually makes a depressed person more tuned to reality. I’m not sure which is the cause exactly, but I could imagine a person depressed spending more time ruminating about their place and deferring to the external for answers versus trusting one’s own feelings or perspectives by default.
One aspect is failing to break out huge problems into manageable pieces.
This is the main problem I have had with depression. Beeing overwhelmed by the smallest problem because the consecquences of all actions that has to be taken to solve it.
Nah. I’ve had trouble convincing myself that doing dishes wasn’t an insurmountable task. Depression messes with your perspective. Basic, easy tasks seem impossible.
But I've learned that dirty dishes stabilize if you let them air dry. They don't even smell bad. Or get moldy. And after soaking an hour or two in hot water with detergent, they're easy to wash.
So then I just need to wash whatever I need for the next meal. And of course, leave enough clean for my wife to use.
BTDT and I'd say no, it's a psychological effect of being overwhelmed mentally, even if you could handle it in better circumstances. Even the most trivial problems become crushing. Even imagined problems.
My basic understanding is that Steve Jobs was a manipulative, mentally ill child abuser who gets a pass because he made the iPod. Everyone has their own perspective, but I’d rather not be those things than do them and make a difference by manufacturing popular consumer goods. But this is of course not an argument for depression.
I think you're missing the point, it is foolish, it doesn't map to reality, but that doesn't make it maladaptive. The point here is that the maladaptive group, depressed people, see the world closer to its real state, clearly it is advantageous for humans to see the world through rose colored glasses to some degree.
From my own experience I'd agree with this - I can feel down, certainly, but I'm nowhere near the non-functioning, clinically depressed state I was in for 4 years a few years back.
I don't think the "realistic" vision I had of "the world" has really changed, just the attitude: I'm still "stupid as f*ck" and observing "person X I knew in high school totally has such a better life than I do" - but now, it's about interpreting it as a reason that things should probably change, whether it's the perspective ("So what?") or the action ("Are you not even going to try doing something about it?").
OTOH, it really doesn't help that there are so many more things to be depressed about pretty much all the time - abuses of social media, pornography, addiction, fracturing social structures. I ask, incredulously, how can anyone read this [1] and NOT want to die, or at least profoundly sympathize? People haven't evolved "rosy enough glasses" to mask these symptoms of modernity - of course there are problems, both with "the world" and our abilities to get by.
"How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us?"
This statement is way too sweeping... Some forms of pessimism probably reflect that, I'm an optimistic, not-depressed person who sees things that way - but I know plenty of often-depressed people who fail to see their circumstances clearly, and spiral because as a result of it.
Friend: "I'm such a failure and my future is definitely going to be horrible!"
Me: "So, who's judging you as a failure, why does such judgments even matter, and how exactly do you have no options or influence over your future?"
I've had this dialog plenty, and it has little to do with realism.
Or they realistically assume that they have average ability but they have above average expectations. Most people will have to face the reality that they will never be special in some way, so if you aren't fine with just being another face among the masses you will be depressed. Or someone they care about just died, their expectations was that they would have this person for most of their life is now broken and nothing they can do can fix this, unless they believe in spirits and ghosts and ouija boards of course.
It's my operating hypothesis that people's abilities are generally limited mainly by their ways of being. Except for the few with physical and biochemical disabilities. And with general human limitations.
I mean, we're all familiar with "math anxiety". And the argument that women have generally been conditioned to think that they're bad at math. Or bad at spatial reasoning. Or that men are less empathetic, or better with tools, or whatever.
Consider scientific thinking. Based on my admittedly limited experience with young children, I believe that they're all scientists. For children in the "why phase", when I've actually taken time to help them consider how one might answer their questions, I've consistently been impressed.
Also, it's clearly not so much about having answers. Indeed, focusing too much on answers tends to stifle creativity.
> The people most likely to experience depressive realism? Introverts, males, and people with high IQs
I cringe every time I see Vice on the front page. To be "depressively realistic", I think they care less about scientific accuracy, and more about making their introverted, male, mildly-depressed audience feel smart.
I had hoped to see a comment like this about Vice higher up. I find that their content is usually insubstantial, and when it is otherwise, facts are presented or omitted staggeringly skewed fashion for maximum emotional engagement. In short, if you want to feel strongly about misinformation and partial-truths, Vice is the outlet for you.
There's a little more on the subject of realists vs non-realists in the book "Thinking Fast and Slow" if the topic interests you. He doesn't link it to depression, but it's still quite an interesting read.
I see this as sort of the main riddle (or catch-22 if you're the pessimistic type) of life. The semi-unrealistic hope of optimism is what motivates us to get things done.
For the HN crowd, consider startup founders. The vast majority of startups fail, yet virtually all founders go into it overestimating their chances of success. After all, if they were realistic about their chances, they'd find the whole business too crazy to begin with.
I am pessimistic by nature + I've seen and experienced a lot of failures. I still go into startups, but I account for likely failures by allocating resources in a way where I will not be wiped out in case of likely failure.
I guess such optimism/pessimism can be different on different levels? I.e. "Chances of that idea to work out are nearly nil, but if I allocate a non-critical amount of resources it is worth a try as if it will work out - it will be great"? Basically I am pessimistic about the chances of a startup working out, but I am very optimistic about upside if, in a very unlikely event, the idea does work. Optimistic - because idea can work, but still be a crappy result, which honestly, did happen. I.e. it sorta works, but not quite big enough payoff, requiring me to maintain it without a clear path forward. In such scenarios, I usually just slowly cut resources to it as my interest wanes over time, but I still have quite a few websites/domains from 10+ years ago which I can't push myself just to not renew one day...
EDIT: and as another person mentioned, as I accumulate more wealth, I try out more ideas indeed. But honestly, I am no more optimistic about these. Just the ability to invest allows me to try more things without jeopardizing future of my family. The toughest limit is time, unfortunatelly I still clueless how to leverage wealth to acquire time resources (so far I am very bad at hiring, no matter if it is helping to clean the house or to write code).
There are lots of ways to decrease risk in a startup, and if the founder is not seeing this realistically, s/he can get caught up in the details of the startup instead of looking at the fastest way to decrease the risk of failing.
Most startup founders are rich, they are just gambling with some money they have. Akin to a salaried worker gambling a small amount of their salary in a night at the casino.
Do you have any references for most startup founders being rich? Qualitatively this does not align with my experiences at all with almost any founder of a company I’ve ever met. Almost all of them risked everything.
I didn´t meant Gates or Jobs rich but wealthier than average. For them an startup is just a gamble they can afford to do comfortably.
For example: a couple of months ago I talked to a guy that was trying to decide between founding an startup or going to India to study yoga/meditation for a year (and he was not going to travel on the cheap, believe me). For him failing meant going back to work in his fathers company for a while until he gets motivated to start some other company again (or quit an go to India).
Having a house and a car, or even retirement savings, that can be risked on a startup makes you rich.
Even if that is everything you have, you are still rich.
Find me the startup founder who has less than $100 in savings, no car, no house, no retirement funds, less than $1k in total assets, and whom is the richest persons in their family and network of friends.
Let's be realistic: there are only humans with subjective narrow view of the world out there. And whoever will tell you that you are more/less realistic than some other category of people are judging you by their own narrow opinion of what is the ultimate-true-real-reality™.
The problem is that knowledge at foundation is axiomatic and circular. When we discuss science, we agree to do it in the good faith and subscribe to certain undefined concepts and (unproven by definition) axioms: what it means to know, what are basic established facts, scientific method, logical reasoning, Occam's razor, 1 + 1 = 2, and countless others.
Flat-earthers are just biological computers like the rest of us. But there is no path to reconciliation because they were not imprinted with our axiomatic system early enough. They happily do their computing (aka thinking) like the rest of us, but their world view is wrong in our perspective, only because we subscribe to different axiomatic system.
Yep. Our cognitive deficits and delusions are just normalized in society EG; "Meritocracy" and the American Dream. Theirs are sensationalized and mocked not because it's wrong but because it's not normalized.
I use their model of reality all the time when arranging things in my house. Like Newton's formulae it works well in certain contexts, even though Einstein proved Newton wrong.
This is a bad analogy that makes it sound like you're defending flat-earthers.
It's like saying you use Hermeticism's Principle of Rhythm to build a pendulum-powered clock...
And unlike both Flat-Earth theory and Hermetics, Newton was actually demonstrably right. Flat-earthers and Hermeticists spin their theories out of whole cloth.
The shape of the Earth is just a model [1] - an approximation. All models have margins of error. All models are wrong, some are useful [2]. The map is not the territory [3]. All scientific models are scale variant [4] e.g contextual.
Scientific models are pragmatic at best. Useful for a particular purpose within some domain of applicability
When last did you take the curvature of the Earth into account when arranging your furniture?
Of course, you can always dismiss my perspective as "Just another nihilistic, depressed anti-realist"
The curvature of the Earth is already accounted for; my house sits upon a foundation of poured concrete which is leveled off and flattened locally. In this way, we also accounted for the gravitational geoid variation around the house. Honestly, I have to compensate more for the curvature of the floorboards!
> When last did you take the curvature of the Earth into account when arranging your furniture?
I don't do that, but neither do I assume that the entire earth is flat just because my living room is. Saying that all theories are born equal is nonsense, some things are more correct than others.
It doesn't matter what we SAY about the shape of the Earth though, does it?
It only matters how we use/apply those theories in practice.
Practical errors have consequences.
Theoretical errors don't. It's just lip service without follow-through.
I can SAY that the Earth is triangular and nothing will happen. Q.E.D If you insist that it is in (some way) wrong or incorrect for me to say that the Earth is triangular. Well. The best I can do is to tell you to mind your own business.
I can't remember the last time the Earth's shape mattered to my practical, decision-making process.
>Neither party seems to want to acknowledge that the other party's model works just fine within its domain of applicability.
There are two very different points here.
Yes you can make most of your daily actions with a "flat earth" model. Actually, this is even an overkill model for most daily actions. A first person video game generally don't include such a model, so you can extrapolate that a "sight sized box model" is enough, and that any concept of earth is superfluous.
Then you have the part of you that seek to find a model of the world through concordant items of evidence, be it for practical reasons or simply for the matter of trying to make sense out of them.
You can use a GPS without any specific opinion on physical models. But you won't even send a satellite in space with an attitude stuck into a "my flat earth model is true" belief. That doesn't mean physical models that are used to put satellite on orbits are true, but at least they proved accurate enough to lead to that kind of exploits.
Not necessarily. David Deutche argues that theories can be argued as having merit based upon if they are good or bad explanations, regardless of application. A good explanation is one that fits the data and is hard to vary. The flat earth theory fails on both.
Given a finite data set, an infinite number of functions/curves can explain it. This is curve-fitting 101 stuff.
All explanatory models are either an over-fit or an under-fit to the data. With the fine print being "acceptable error rate". "The Earth is flat" may be wrong, but it could be acceptably wrong to me.
Your false dichotomy is that sure, your flat-earth approximation is fine, but only on basically personal scales (up to a few miles or so).
You can't charactierize your loacl approximation as a general theory because it will fail as soon as you scale up to horizon effects, and breaks completely when reaching planetary scale.
If you want to keep your flat theory in its applicable scale, fine. Just don't expect to project it outside of its useful scale.
Just like the Newtonian model works well until you reach the scales where relativistic effects demand the shift to relativity.
You seem to be agreeing with me in a disagreeable tone. Instrumentalism [1] is precisely what I am rooting for.
That's exactly what I said in my OP: "All scientific models are scale variant e.g contextual."
>You can't charactierize your loacl approximation as a general theory
The exact same criticism can be laid upon your local approximation.
You have chosen precisely the scale at which your 'general model' works.
And you have ignored all other scales at which your 'general model' doesn't work.
You are chery-picking your scale - the domain of applicability of your model.
>Just like the Newtonian model works well until you reach the scales where relativistic effects demand the shift to relativity.
And what if you go the other way? At quantum scale neither Newton nor Einstein works.
>Just don't expect to project it outside of its useful scale
That's exactly what I said also: "Scientific models are pragmatic at best. Useful for a particular purpose within some domain of applicability."
So I don't see how you could possibly be appealing to any notion of a 'general theory' without also coming up with a 'general and objective utility function'.
What may be a useful to a Quantum Physicist needs not be useful to a Cosmologist.
The only hope for a 'general theory' is the Theory of Everything. We don't have one of those. Well, physicists don't - theists do.
But when you go out and try to spread your gospel that the earth is triangular then people will correctly tell you to shut up and read some books before arguing further.
To be clear, the flat earth theory is wrong, I don't subscribe to it, and yes I'm defending flat-earthers. I reserve the right to defend people I disagree with, and to point out ways that wrong ideas can occasionally translate into useful interactions with reality.
I am depressed by objective things like the die off of birds and bees and acidification of the oceans and temperature rises. I am depressed by the state of humans and their behaviors which are observable if harder to quantify.
And as I've gotten older I realize I have a pretty solid grasp on things and the sort of woo-woo model of reality you propose "everything is relative" is eminently ignoreable.
> Could it be that people who see the world Realistically, get depressed?
This fits my experience quite well.
To give a software development analogy:
The more you learn about deep, esoteric details of various parts of computers (i.e. you get to see computers more realistically than idealized), the more depressed you get about the current state of software development. And yes, late at night, I often work privately on how to improve this situation - but I talk to a brick wall.
> esoteric details of various parts of computers (i.e. you get to see computers more realistically than idealized), the more depressed you get about the current state of software development.
Honestly the most depressing part is hearing all these older guys talk about the really cool problems they worked on during the dawn of modern computing, knowing I'm just gonna be writing shitty business apps till I retire
> Honestly the most depressing part is hearing all these older guys talk about the really cool problems they worked on during the dawn of modern computing, knowing I'm just gonna be writing shitty business apps till I retire
You can do this cool stuff at night and weekends (I do!).
> What's depressing about the current world of software?
For example the insanity that it is impossible to understand what actually happens below the surface. The ideal that I have in the back of my mind is that a highly gifted person who can afford to spend a few years of intensive study can really understand each individual line/byte of code that gets executed on the computer (i.e. all of the software that runs on it) completely.
---
An interesting lecture by Jonathan Blow:
Jonathan Blow - Preventing the Collapse of Civilization
I had this sentiment quit often in the beginning of my career. Now, I simply realize that my lack of understanding crosses every single piece of technology there is. Fridge? No idea. Cars? Well, I can drive it almost as well as I can open a fridge, everything else is magic. How about bicycle? That's easy, right? Well, I challenge you to just now sit down and write a detailed schematic, describing everything that is needed to make a bicycle what it is. Extra points if you can explain why driving on two wheels actually works out.
I know nothing about anything and almost don´t care anymore. The last bit of wanting to understand is bathed the absurdity of it all.
Fridge - well, the standard compressor powered refrigeration system is essentially a heat moving system. What we are doing is moving heat from the inside of the system (which is insulated and mostly "isolated" from the outside of the system) to the outside of the system. This is why you can't cool your house by opening your refrigerator's door, because the heat from the inside of the fridge is moved to the "outside" (the room it is in) - eventually, it would reach equilibrium (and the compressor would probably be overheated). So anyhow, how does this work?
Well - basically by compression and expansion.
A working fluid (the refrigerant - usually a gas in the low-pressure state, and a fluid in the high pressure state) is compressed using a compressor. This turns the gas into its fluid state, and also heats up the gas. It is moved (via the compressor) thru coils on the inside (insulated) of the system, where it is allowed to expand.
Note that in this system there is also a series of check valves and such to prevent the fluid and gas from "moving backwards" in the system; there are also stages where the gas and fluid exist at the same time (like a fizzy drink if you could see it).
During this expansion, it absorbs heat and it also gains volume (turns from a fluid back into a gas). It continues to move (with it's heat content) from the insulated side of the system (inside) to the outside of the system, where it goes thru other coils (radiator), usually with a fan or other cooling system blowing over them to remove the excess heat from them, before the gas goes back to the compressor to be compressed and turned into a fluid again - to begin the cycle anew.
That's the basics of how a refrigerator work. Now - usually, if there's a freezer section, the freezer is where the heat exchange really happens, and cold air from the freezer is periodically circulated from the freezer to the refrigerator portion to keep that side at a cooler temperature.
Air conditioners work the same way - except the "inside" is the house and the outside is...the outdoors. Heat pumps can run in reverse, so to warm your house, heat is moved from the "outside" to the inside of the house, by the very same process (even when it is "freezing" outside - there is still a ton of heat energy available).
This cycle can also be done with heat alone, provided you have a working fluid (refrigerant) which is liquid at the "outside" temperature (under whatever pressure the liquid is at); add a check valve, heat the liquid up, it will expand and turn into a gas, feed it into the insulated part of the system to absorb more heat and then into some outside coils to be cooled down and turned back into a liquid. You can make a fridge where the refrigerant is gasoline (petrol) if you so wanted to. Ammonia is another alternative. LPG can also be used like this, too.
That's basically how a propane or solar powered refrigerator works (I won't go into how dark-sky refrigeration works, suffice to say it is another form of "solar" refrigeration, more of a "backwards" method).
Car? Well - a four-cycle engine is basically this: suck (intake), squeeze (compression), bang (ignition/power), blow (exhaust). Also, for an engine to run, you need fuel, spark, and air - miss any of those (or wrong timing or proportions) things won't work. I won't go into further detail - I really could, I'm sure you can see.
Suffice to say - I could also describe that bicycle very exactly, how it works, how it is steered (the whole "turn in the opposite direction of the lean" thing...), etc.
I've got a ton of this crap shoved into my head; I relish learning new stuff all the time, no matter what it is. Sometimes (most of the time) I don't absorb it all in one shot. But I usually retain enough of it to be able to understand more a second and third time around. Some things I will probably never fully understand (higher math is my bane, though I try - also, I'll probably never understand chemistry or biology on anything more than a superficial level), but that doesn't keep them from my interest.
Why am I like this? Not sure, I've always been a very curious and inquisitive person since I was a child. I've found that having these tidbits and more of knowledge and such socked away has helped me make connections and analogies in other areas, to solve problems - and sometimes raise other questions, which just leads me down another rabbit hole at times.
As you can tell - take me to a library and I could easily get lost for hours. Don't get me started on any of the warrens available on the internet (or the internet itself for that matter)...
Just finished the Youtube talk on degrading technology / knowledge. Really liked that perspective, although I disagree with quit a bit of Jonathan Blows points.
About the challenge: I had the feeling, that you and a good chunk of readers here could go explain good deal of it all. But my point goes further: We all hit the wall of understanding sooner or later and all what is truly required is to know how use the technology. And that's exactly the same in information technology. I use databases daily. Do I know how they work? A bit, just enough for work and that is all what is needed. That's why I like to disagree with Jonathan Blow. Some people abstracted a great deal of complexity away, because it's simply irrelevant. As a result, we've seen an explosion in tech, just not in the nieces where he's looking. The modern ecosystem in tech is the normal way of economics, where everyone specializes him or herself further and further, understanding the specific domain better at the cost of everything else. Today, the average Joe can code as a result of all this simplifications. But Jonathan Blow compares the elites of coding, people who build engines, with Joe. That's misunderstanding what has happened, the level of analysis is wrong. Also, people like John Carmack are not gone, they simply work on new problems.
And as you mentioned yourself, there is so much technology surrounding you that you have no idea of how it works, like chemistry. Still, you use it to your benefit because other people who know this stuff simplified its use. And not just for you and me, also for other chemist, like coder for other coders.
Now a bit of a rand, skip it if you like: The school system, including university, killed so much of my curiosity, it's insane. I had to learn so much bullshit that I'm almost glad for one of my least great attributes, my bad memory. Because there was really no point remembering most of it. It's just too bad that I can't control my own garbage collector. Last year, I learned a great deal about machine learning (again, as I did it in college, too) and now can remember almost nothing. Despite really enjoying the course and throwing myself into it. What I don't use, I forget and of course I use only a tiny bit of skills and knowledge at work. I'm not happy with the way it is, but it simply is. I also learned so much about databases and liked that subject, but the only thing I really retain is what I use in my work.
That brings me to my final thought tidbit: My brain obsesses with ideas that you would put more in the category of philosophy. It's what you think about when you have nothing to do or start daydreaming that's probably where your brain is best at. I never asked people in tech what they think about in those moments. I'm really, really curious about the answer.
> My brain obsesses with ideas that you would put more in the category of philosophy. It's what you think about when you have nothing to do or start daydreaming that's probably where your brain is best at. I never asked people in tech what they think about in those moments. I'm really, really curious about the answer.
My experience with these is: I often think that I have some deep mathematical insight. The problem with these insights is that they "partly right" - they are often based on a good mathematical intuition of mine. But unluckily the mathematical research typically has come a lot farther than my insight - i.e. my insight is actually a really old hat in mathematical research.
So instead of daydreaming about some clever mathematical insight of yours, better cram advanced math textbooks - they will teach you a lot more than what you will ever come up with by daydreaming.
For sure. Study the literature of your subject. The point is, what do you think about automatically when you don't focus on a specific task? My expectation is, that people who are great at what they do continue to think and daydream about their work. When I read about philosophy (or related subjects), I'm continuing to think about it for days or weeks. That doesn't happen with tech, although that's my daily business.
I wouldn’t call it depressing but I think for example, when you look at even the most fundamental types, for example in c#, they have difficult problems.
For me it's the amount of bloat and too many levels of not so good abstraction. It's not really depressing yet, but more irritating to me. And I take it as an opportunity.
1. The world is, in fact, pretty messed up a lot of the time.
2. There are different ways to deal with it:
2a. Don't deal well with it; get depressed
2b. Denial: Refuse to face up to how messed up the world is.
2c. Deal with the world in some other way that is neither denial nor depression.
Presumably in their study 2a and 2c would both score more "realistic" and 2b would score less "realistic"; but 2b and 2c would be grouped together in the study, causing the "not depressed" group as a whole to score lower on the "realistic" axis.
IOW, the simplistic conclusion of this study would be, "The only way to avoid being depressed is to go into denial"; but the study may also be consistent with, "One way people avoid being depressed is to go into denial; but there may be ways to avoid depression other than denial".
The two (realism/knowledge and depression) seem to be in a feedback loop. Probably children are happier because they dont know enough yet. And fools/ignoramuses - that conventional wisdom has some merit. It's a question though why humans would evolve to become inert in the face of knowledge. Who knows, it may be an advantage.
Isn’t it the other way around? The OP is making a causal claim (“depression causes realistic world view”). The parent is merely pointing out the room for selection bias. Burden of proof should be on the OP IMHO.
I just learned about King Leopold and what he did to the people of Congo [1]. How anyone can be at all educated about the world and not be depressed is beyond me.
It's not "dying out" -- people are working very hard to reduce it.
Sometimes we say things like "the world has changed" but the truth is that people have changed the world, through tremendous efforts.
It's easy for a bystander to say "the problem just seemed to go away!" when the people who are doing the work can stare at them and say, "Ahem... it didn't just go away."
I don't deny that. Atrocities have reduced partly because people have worked hard to reduce them. Also technology has helped - you do bad stuff now and someone will film it on their phone, upload to youtube and the whole world can see and make a fuss.
Being drunk is to be intoxicated by alcohol to such an extent as to be unable to perceive the world clearly through the senses.
Being sober is to be able to perceive the world clearly through the senses, yet humans are quite capable of giving themselves illusions and little stories to make life more bearable.
Being knurd is to be (un)intoxicated with Klatchian Coffee to such an extent that all such comfort stories are stripped away from the mind.
This makes you see the world in a way 'nobody ever should', in all its harsh reality.
People generally find being knurd excruciating, as their comfortable illusions are stripped away and all of life's terrors are exposed.
The Buddhists certainly wouldn't agree that enlightenment is "excruciating." To the contrary, that's what a mind experiences when it's on the brink of awakening but can't let go of the fundamental illusion of 'self.'
The world is really going down right now and just following news what's going on is reason enough to cry like a baby or lose it completely.
That's one of the main reasons why many people take drugs - it helps to forget what's happening around us and it makes us numb enough to stop feeling the constant pain when we think about the things happening to our brothers and sisters who aren't lucky enough to be born in the right place, to have the right parents or live in the "right" place etc.
Too much information on how the people are screwed every minute may be reason enough to be depressed if you don't shut those thoughts out in the long run.
I hate to break it to you, but if the news is affecting your mental health you should realize that that is by design. The world may or may not be in a good state of affairs in an absolute sense, but it is better than it has ever been, and insofar as the news seems worse now than in the past, that has more to do with those in charge of the news media and their incentives and biases than actual changes in the state of the world getting worse.
Ok I will stop it right here but of course there are many more tendencies that would speak against a too optimistic view on the world at the moment in my opinion.
Of course there is enough media, drugs and be-happy-every-day-mantras etc. to disturb your thoughts and allow to ignore all this.
I don't see how he arrives at the conclusion there would be less pollution. Compared to when? What exactly would he define as such?
I could counter all the stuff he proposes now with bringing in more of the bad news but I've already done that in another answer if you are interested.
He can be optimistic as he is a white male with prosperity. This group is the one with the best conditions on earth - it's easy to enjoy life if you can be a part of that.
The people who suffer the most don't even have the luxury to think about global concerns and inequality. They have to fight to survive every day and they have to feed their families and escape the next war to finally arrive in the West where he will be treated worse than a dog.
Please ask these people how they cannot share his positive view on our planet.
The non white third world has been on a roll the last 30 years - China is way richer like 10x and even Africa is growing quickly now. Life expectancy way up.
Re pollution I imagine he's referring to urban air pollution which has got better since coal burning days. Not quite sure on that one.
Organisms that perceive only "fitness" drive to extinction all organisms that perceive reality as it is. (in model systems simulating environments and creatures navigating them)
My take: at every level, it would seem, perceiving true reality is not favoured. Nevermind cognitive biases, that's just one level. Literally the fabric of the universe: spacetime, matter, language, etc. It means nothing that it might feel comfortable or intuitive -- we should question it all.
Take a moment and consider this quote by the late Amos Tversky about his view on pessimism:
"When you are a pessimist and the bad thing happens, you live it twice,' Amos liked to say. 'Once when you worry about it, and the second time when it happens."
This is a rational explanation for why anyone ought not succumb to pessimism.
This is not black and white. Often we are optimist and we ignore the suffering of the ones closest to us because we simply don't believe they are suffering.
That doesn't have anything to do with being optimistic, as far as I can tell. Dismissing others' suffering is caused by a lack of empathy or by selfishness--the two go hand in hand. It can certainly seem to a depressed person that an optimistic one is oblivious to their suffering, but it is not always the case. I think the best you can do with negative people is make it absolutely clear that you acknowledge their pain while getting them to progressively come out of it.
If another person's internal mental state isn't visible, so we have to work it out from things that are visible, there might be a wide range of possible guesses and so being optimistic or pessimistic might produce very different results.
Has my friend Joe stopped coming out with us because he's busy with a great new girlfriend he just hasn't told us about yet - or because depression means he can barely get out of bed in the morning let alone leave the house?
> 'Once when you worry about it, and the second time when it happens."
I have solve that long ago. Something bad will happen. If I can prevent it, I will and only live it once. If I can't prevent it, why should I be worried ? I make preparation for after it happen.
Tversky was big on measuring things, and I wonder if he ever measured this theory. Measuring happiness is difficult, but I don't necessarily buy the idea presented here that it's simply a matter of totting up the number of negative events.
I have arrived at what I consider a rational level of pessimism about some things. When they occur, it bothers me, but not for very long. I shrug and don't dwell because for me, it was just what I expected. Sometimes good things happen, and I can't quantify that those outcomes are "better" for being unexpected, but I wonder if Tversky would.
This is incorrect. When you take realistic (some people call it pessimistic) view on situation, you are disappointed initially, but when it finally happens, you are already fine - "told ya so!" and move on.
> In fact, "some psychologists concede that an element of self-deception may be necessary for well-being," Feltham says.
I think about this every day, I thought it was an established fact for some reason. Perhaps I thought it was established since I know the saying "ignorance is bliss"
I'm not sure if self-deception is the correct word. People cannot fit much in their heads. There is too much good and too much evil in the world for a single person to truly percieve. I don't think it's self deception if one tries to focus on good things. It becomes self deception if a person thinks the world is completely good because all they see are good things, though.
Most drivers rate themselves as above average, when in reality only about half are.
I'm sure most people view themselves as nice, reasonable people. The presence of idiots should indicate they aren't all correct.
I know that I'm an attractive guy, who makes extremely well reasoned arguments on the internet, unfortunately it's everyone else that isn't enlightened enough to appreciate my true genius.
I suppose you could file it under cognitive dissonance, self deception seems reasonable too.
Illusion in the spirit is as nothing,
behold a world that runs on illusions!
Their war and peace are made upon illusion,
their glory and their shame are from illusion.
Just beautiful. We have our Baudrillard and The Matrix and think we are so different, modern, cutting edge, living in a 21st century hyperreality. Rumi saw it 800 years ago!
How do you guys think this relates to Cognitive Therapy? What I mean is:
My father was a therapist and a big advocate of the idea that people can be happy regardless of their circumstances and that emotion comes primarily from what someone thinks. There's a lot of truth in that, and it seems clear that Cognitive Therapy is an important treatment for depression.
However, he sometimes seemed to de-emphasize the importance of circumstances. For example, he was opposed to the idea that moving to a different part of the country could make someone happier. However, doesn't that ignore that fact that different places have different rates of depression and suicide?
People may think I'm depressed, but I'm the polar opposite.
I'm always discussing what it means to be depressed, only in an effort to find what is the will to live. I find it interesting.
"When driving on the interstate, each driver has the power, with the flick of a wrist, to end it all. But they don't. Why not? What prevents people from flicking? What's worth living for?"
My wife wants me to stop talking like that, because she fears I will be vacaracted.
I feel like you can always get a better perspective on things by swimming in the deep end. It's always good to stir your inner stew.
There's a comic somewhere depicting the two views of nihilism.
One frame is all dreary and dark with the caption "Nothing really matters" over a sad character. The other is happy and upbeat with flowers and rainbows over the same, much happier character with the same caption.
It sounds like you lean more toward the latter and choose to make your own meaning rather than embrace one of the common sources of meaning.
That's how I try to see the world. I don't understand how people find meaning in traditional sources like religion, family, or work, so I set out to find my own. Nonjudgmentally, of course. I respect the classics even if I favor avant-garde purposecraft.
"Terror Management suggests that human nature is actually wired towards self-deception: In order to avoid facing terrifying concepts like death, most of us live in a state of self-delusion." I very early on in life recognized this as a primary principle of human psychology. As soon as we begin to understand the concept of death, we unconsciously develop this as our primary defense mechanism. It's what all religious and spiritual belief systems are founded on.
I think the mind is constantly trying to avoid death, and when we learn death cannot be avoided we come up with "solutions" like an afterlife, reincarnation...
Define "Realistically". Also define "desirability". You could make equally strong arguments both ways.
Example: If you are depressed you are more likely to focus on input data that is 'negative' and overlook the 'positive' data. For instance if your depressed, instead of focusing on the different ways people are trying to improve the conditions of existence, you could focus on "the shitty conditions in india/africa/china/etc.) You could say this is more "realistic".
Example: If you are optimistic on the other hand, you could say to yourself, I have no control over those variables that make the world 'shitty', let me try and focus on the variables that make the world 'positive' and see if I can affect them, so that the world as a whole can be more "positive". Some could say this is "unrealistic".
Which is more "desirable" I would argue the latter, but I hope the argument has shown that these are value judgements subjective to the individual.
> It may be tied to certain other psychological theories, like the terror management theory, Feltham says. Terror Management suggests that human nature is actually wired towards self-deception: In order to avoid facing terrifying concepts like death, most of us live in a state of self-delusion. And maybe, when we're depressed, we're just less likely to be deceived.
For what it's worth, Terror Management Theory has pretty much failed to replicate:
https://psyarxiv.com/dkg53/ ("Failed pre-registered replication of mortality salience effects in traditional and novel measures")
Just one study, whole theory doesn't depend on one replication attempt, etc. -- but the baseline rate for a set of social psych findings being legit should probably be <50% at the outset.
It's important to understand that realism is an "interpretation" stage. Before we get there, we selectively _attend_ to and process stimuli. It is at this attention stage, and usually for (personally) emotional stimuli that depression can affect the things which we "see" (attend to).
What most people describe as "realism" is often just a depressive view. There's always two sides of a coin, realistic or not. What seems "real" to you depends on which side you spend most of your time.
Correlation is not necessarily causation. Unless they have scienced the causation it might be quite possible for people who see the world more realistically to be at greater risk for depression.
"The chapter opens by mentioning that Kathy doesn't like you, and that you are the stupidest person she doesn't know. She also thinks you are the ugliest person she doesn't know, and she doesn't know a lot of people. Even the people she does know she doesn't like. She thinks D.J. smiles too much and hates John because he can't stand on his head.
After the introduction, the chapter talks about a time Kathy had a pet cat named Skunks. She was afraid he would run away, but Mrs. Jewls told her that he would stay as long as Kathy took good care of him, and remembered to give him plenty of food and water. However, Kathy thought Mrs. Jewls was wrong, and to keep Skunks around, locked him in a closet, sometimes even forgetting to take care of him. One day when Kathy was looking for her other shoe, Skunks ran out and never came back. Kathy bragged to Mrs. Jewls, claiming that she was right all along, and tells her that next time she gets a cat, she'll kill him so he never runs away.
Afterwards it talks about a time Dameon was trying to teach Kathy how to play catch. Kathy complains that she'll just get hurt, but Dameon states that as long as she keeps her eyes on the ball, everything will be okay. However, worrying that she'll be hurt in advance, she closes her eyes and the ball lands in her face. She claims that Dameon was wrong and she was right as she runs away sobbing.
Allison thinks that if she is nice to Kathy, Kathy might be nice to her in return, so she bakes her a cookie. Kathy however, thinks it will taste terrible because Allison made it, so she keeps the cookie in her desk. Three weeks later, she decides to eat the cookie, which is now stale and dusty, and as expected, hates it. Kathy says that she was right about Allison's cookie, then the chapter cuts back to narration, explaining that Kathy thought she had very good reasons for hating everyone in Mrs. Jewls's class, alongside a very good reason for hating you. She knows that if you met her, you would hate her too, and already knows she's right. The chapter ends by saying it's weird how someone can always be right and still be wrong."
As someone with depression, this has been my experience as well. When I'm depressed I feel like I'm seeing the world for what it really is, and that the times when I was happy was when I was deluded. When I started antidepressants, I was frustrated that they noticeably made me less lucid and totally unable to introspect. Even now that I've found what I consider to be a good combination and dosage of medications that's letting me be happy and function well, I fully admit that the mechanism by which they're affective is that they make me less aware, slightly more forgetful, and therefore less able to ruminate on all the "truths" that would make me depressed. I'm not thrilled about that but I chalk it up as a worthwhile compromise for being able to live well.
Real_ism_ can mean passivity, and a lack of creation. If seeing things as they are means paralysis, how does it help us? Not being realistic can help make things happen.
I think it can be valuable to see things realistically, and then rejecting what you see.
Not being realistic can also mean that you are creative on false premises, and that the result might fail because of it. By being realistic about the world and the environment surrounding you be it work-, political-, economical- or otherwise you can see actual problems plaguing others, and _maybe_ you can generate something that solves a tiny part of what people struggle with.
How can you go from "we set up a very simple experiment that shows that depressed people can tell more if someone is controlling a light" to "depressed people see the world more realistically?"
> If you set up a circumstance where there's no relationship between the button and the light, depressed patients might be able to better pick that out, because that set of circumstances happens to conform to their somewhat biased view of the universe, that bad things happen for no reason," Moore explains. "That doesn't necessarily mean that they're more accurate broadly, but under that very narrow set of stimulus conditions, they come out looking more accurate.
Adding some context that came from living with a person who suffered from depression. I am not sure if they see the world more realistically or more negatively. They are generally stuck in a cycle and need to get out of the cycle of feelings influencing actions and reverse this cycle by CBT. The negative cycle creates delusion which is exactly the opposite of reality. They view the world in a very cynical way and won't let go of past.
To my mind, depression is basically a feeling of being powerless. When lab researchers want to see if a mouse is depressed, they pick it up by the tail. The normal mice struggle, however uselessly, the depressed ones just hang there.
In my experience though, The worst is being powerless and not knowing why. If you can gain understanding of the world, even though your situation might not change right away, it still helps.
Yeah when you're depressed you definitely are more realistic about the challenges you/the world faces.
But, you are in a state of fear where you are over-exagerrating the things you could lose.
In a happy state or happy manic state, you don't overvalue these things. You accept the fleeting nature of moments moving on, and this frees you up to make bolder choices.
It's all a spectrum of how bold you want to be in your life and day to day.
One can see the world more realistically without being depressed. Depression IMHO isn't necessarily a byproduct of a pessimistic worldview. If anything, nihilism (if we consider it a pessimistic worldview) had helped me to be more realistic. To accept that there is no intrinsic meaning in my life. If anything, it has brought me down to earth.
Not every form of depression is pathological. I think our current culture doesn't really provide many avenues to express sadness, so people probably don't tell the truth when they have doubt. And doubt is an uninvited guest for business.
Not directly applicable to the article though, that is probably a completely different effect.
The depressive episode I suffered and recovered from was not me thinking realistically. With the way the world is at the minute, if you're not angry then you haven't been paying attention. But anger and realism are not the same as clinical, psychological, physically unexplained depression.
That's right, because when you are depressed,you will be aware to make new friends, you will judge them by reality, and any situation you will face, you will judge it by reality. Emotion doesn't work that much for depressed people.
It depends on whether you're talking about actually depressed people, or people just "feeling a bit down". It seems like you're referring to the latter.
Depression is a very serious medical condition, often leading to suicide, and involves mostly just sleeping, crying in bed, and not wanting to do or see anything.
As a former sufferer, the headline is pretty dangerous, IMO. It'd be more correct to say that such people see _some aspects_ of the world more realistically, while others are totally bent out of shape. E.g. anything related to optimism and self-worth is totally out of whack: even if the person can _logically_ conclude there are reasons for optimism and non-zero self-worth, they still don't _feel_ like it's true.
So it's dangerous to suggest that their lack of optimism and self-worth is "realistic" in any way, because it never is.
A lot of people in this thread are justifying their own pathologies with the title. Nothing more powerful than a story that soothes the ego.
Maybe there is some truth to the idea. I wouldn't be surprised, although we probably can't make that general of a statement.
Either way, don't let something like this article stop you from improving your life. One thing is for sure, we can't accurately predict all of the possibilities for ourselves. Might as well aim for a few improvements, eh?
For what it's worth, I'm currently dealing with mild / moderate depression and anxiety. In my opinion, it's a shit way to be and I aspire to experience less of it in the future.
From the text of the article, the title ought to be "Although the idea is 40 years old, there is no conclusive proof that depressive realism exists and the evidence suggesting that it does may be an artifact of experimental design."
I'm not actually sure what to make of this article, to be honest. The two sources interviewed are very clear that 'depressive realism' is a poorly supported and not particularly useful concept, but the inertia of the article leads in the opposite direction.
Making anything negative part of your identity is a dangerous thing to do, because if you make something part of your identity, it's much harder to give it up.
Perhaps if so many of us are depressed then that is the natural reaction to the environment we have been placed in, which is why it takes some level of delusion to be happy.
so they gave a depressing scenario to people and the depressives were quicker to identify that it was, in fact, a depressing situation.
however, put depressives into a fun party where people are open and accepting and the depressives will often instead focus on a negative, antisocial view that is manufactured by their mood disorder and takes them out of this very welcoming and positive situation.
As a lifelong depressive I've struggled to see reality for what it is and not as what my depression is constantly misrepresenting. I of course also have the experience where I can see an actually depressing situation for what it is more readily than others, but I think the premise of the article is still generally absurd. The world seems like a very hostile and dangerous place to me, and while you can of course find limitless examples of this being completely true, it nonetheless it prevents me from doing things that other people do quite safely and successfully all the time and for which this dark perspective is completely exaggerative and distorting.