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Tannin 
Can't remember
Joined: 06 Aug 2006
Location: Huon Valley Tasmania
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(Not really)
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�Let's eat Grandma.� Commas save lives! |
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think positive 
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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| Tannin wrote: | | (Not really) |
TFLDFR 
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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| think positive wrote: | Navy SEALs are always taught
1) Keep your priorities in order and
2) Know when to act without hesitation.
A Navy SEAL was attending some college courses between assignments. He had completed missions in Iraq and Afghanistan. One of the courses had a professor who was an avowed atheist and a member of the ACLU. One day he shocked the class when he came in, looked to the ceiling, and flatly stated, "God, if you are real, then I want you to knock me off this platform. I'll give you exactly 15 minutes."
The lecture room fell silent. You could hear a pin drop. Ten minutes went by and the professor proclaimed, "Here I am God. I'm still waiting."
It got down to the last couple of minutes when the SEAL got out of his chair, went up to the professor, and cold-cocked him; knocking him off the platform. The professor was out cold. The SEAL went back to his seat and sat there, silently. The other students were shocked and stunned and sat there looking on in silence.
The professor eventually came to, noticeably shaken, looked at the SEAL and asked, "What the hell is the matter with you? Why did you do that?"
The SEAL calmly replied, "God was too busy today protecting America's soldiers who are protecting your right to say stupid shit and act like an asshole. So He sent me."
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/religion/einstein.asp#GTdZ9OSMw5aFdwyZ.99 |
That's the most ridiculous story I've ever read. Although this:
| think positive wrote: | A college class was led by an atheist professor, and every day he'd stand in front of his class and say, "Have you ever seen God?" to which nobody would answer. Then he'd ask, "Have you ever felt God?" and nobody would answer. Finally he'd ask, "Have you ever heard God?" and, like the other times, nobody would answer. He then would say, "It is obvious that there is no God."
One day a Christian student had been having an extremely bad day; her car broke down, her mother was sick, her boyfriend was out of town, and she'd gotten a bad grade on one of her exams. She had been fed up with her professor's little act every morning, so she decided to do something about it.
While the professor stood up at the beginning of class and did his thing, the student had an idea. She got up and said, "Professor, would you mind if I said something?" He said, "Of course not. This is an expressive classroom, and I think it would be fine if you spoke your mind."
The girl said to the class, "Have you ever seen our professor's brain?" and nobody answered. Then she asked, "Have you ever felt our professor's brain?" and nobody answered. Finally she asked, "Have you ever heard our professor's brain?" and, like the other times, nobody answered.
She then said, "It is quite obvious that our professor has no brain."
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/religion/einstein.asp#GTdZ9OSMw5aFdwyZ.99 |
comes pretty close.
And I'm not sure what any of the above have to do with the topic at hand. 
(By the way, I didn't say that "belief in a higher being" may be symptomatic of mental disorder; I said that "religious belief" may be. There's a difference. But even then, I was being a bit facetious; the likelihood is that only fundamentalist religious belief, undoubtedly shared by the authors of the 'parables' above, is symptomatic of serious dysfunction.)
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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pietillidie
Joined: 07 Jan 2005
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On the OP, much of the problem is due to the gross ignorance of and sheer mysticism surrounding the brain. The ghost in the machine hasn't been exorcised yet.
Moreover, even when the ghost in the machine has been removed, general knowledge of the brain and complexity of human behaviour and its causes is so poor people are still guaranteed to misuse any knowledge of the mental illness of others.
Part of the problem is that psychology itself has traditionally paid insufficient attention to the physical brain, giving people abstract metaphors in lieu of hard science without explaining to people that while "x diagnosis" is simply a metaphor for some phenomenon we don't have a great handle on yet, it's the best metaphor we have for now.
Ironically, psychology and psychiatry have been too "paranoid" about their status to be sufficiently open and honest about where they're at.
The cognitive sciences should eventually clear a lot of that mysticism up, though the related disciplines are in such a state of flux and development that could take a while yet.
Prior to that, the ideal is for people to understand (a) we're all nutty at some level, such is the plasticity of the brain, diversity of behaviour, and the relative nature of "normality"; (b) the brain is extraordinarily complex, so we can never be too sure about diagnoses except in extremely obvious cases, not to mention we ought to expect diagnoses to change as we learn more; (c) as a physical entity a brain can in theory be fixed as completely as any other part of the body, so don't give up on people with mental illness or behavioural issues; (d) it is very difficult to map behaviour back to the brain, with any number of conditions or differences within the brain giving rise to the same surface behaviour; and (e) major behavioural change is extremely difficult to engineer and takes a long time to play out (except in cases of traumatic events and mental illnesses which trigger sudden change, most of which is negative), so be extremely patient with people going through that process.
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In the end the rain comes down, washes clean the streets of a blue sky town.
Help Nick's: http://www.magpies.net/nick/bb/fundraising.htm |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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| think positive wrote: | | David wrote: | | Tannin wrote: | | So how would you distinguish between that woman and, say, the woman standing outside the sexual health clinic holding a "contraception is murder, come to Jesus" sign? Which one is more deluded? Which one is more likely to seek help or get help? Which one is more dangerous, to herself, to her friends and family, and to society as a whole? |
Yeah, that's a tough one. I guess I won't make a lot of friends if I cautiously suggest that religious beliefwell, ok, fundamentalist religious belief, at leastis probably more often than not evidence of mental disorder of some kind. That's my suspicion, though I can immediately see that it's problematicis mere gullibility really enough to start sending people along to mental health clinics? But I'd say that there's something a little more serious than gullibility going on in the example you raise.
By the way, agreed on the necessity to read more on this sort of stuff. Just going on the article I read, I couldn't find any immediately obvious arguments against his (summarised) positions. It seems that his was a complex and challenging view and one very much worthy of further exploration.
(By the way, it beats me why anyone would want to boast about not having the thoughtfulness or attention span to read a long post. Is it really something that you'd want to advertise? I'll be the first to admit I sometimes struggle with the length and complexity of PTID's posts, but that's my problem, not his!) |
Haha lucky I'm not easily offended.
Belief in some kind of higher being means you have a mental illness, and not reading the entirety of long, boring, padded out, puffed up, unintersting, self absorbed, self congratulatory, poopsterbating, obscure posts that could have been pared down to a paragraph, means I'm thoughtless or I have a limited attention span!
Gees get a life! |
U missed this 1 david!
_________________
You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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sixpoints
Joined: 27 Sep 2010
Location: Lulie Street
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^
I gave it a shot, but you lost me with the line "God was too busy today protecting America's soldiers".
Once I read that, I gave up. |
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watt price tully 
Joined: 15 May 2007
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| Tannin wrote: | I have difficulties with the whole notion of mental illness.
Decades ago, the great iconoclast Thomas Szasz wrote a series of powerful works to debunk the whole myth of mental illness as a convient fiction invented by the orthodox and powerful to stigmatise, debase, and control those without power, particularly those who challenged their safe, clean orthodoxy and rebelled against the dead hand of social control. Szasz peppered his works with explosive true-life examples of obviously sane people crucified by the mental health industry, and labelled as "insane" or "mentally ill".
........ |
I used to subscribe to Szaz's works & the school of anti psychiatry including the works of RD Laing amongst others. Right into it.
Also was against the provision of depot provera as well.
Now I know better 
There's a lot to like about Szaz & RD Laing, David Cooper, Juliet Mitchell & the humanist approach to mental health & that health is not merely seen as an absence of illness or the ability to return to the workforce etc.
However in much of the western world these days we have an instrumentalist medical model dominate psychiatry & health that has a tendency to pathologise behaviours & conditions that ought not be pathologised.
When the police bring in folk under the current wide definition of section 10 of the Victorian Mental Health Act & "we" assess these folk as not having a mental illness: for example the person assessed as exhibiting "bad behaviour" but needing to be discharged from an ED by security because they are making threats. They then get discharged & immediately throw themselves near a slow moving vehicle able to break a mirror, lay all over the car, frightening the driver & passenger in a wilfull act - not to suicide, causing mayhem, enlisting the assistance of passers by who take them back to the ED & we say no they are free to go & advise the police to arrest them not bring them in for another assessment given there is no overt evidence of an acute mental illness rather wilfull behaviours designed to say obtain accommodation (mental health admission) or drugs (.... I've got adult ADHD & lost my script can you get me some dexamphatamines & some xanax ...etc) otherwise known in the field as secondary gain behaviours.
There is mental illness, there is ECT which I was also against & which is a game changer for say intractible otherwise untreatable depression where for example a person can't get out of bed because they are that depressed or that they are so "psychomotor retarded" they can sit over a bowl of cereal (prepared by others) in the morning & not manage to get the spoon from the bowl to their mouth for ? a day ? 2 days.....
There is mental illness no doubt, however it's defintion & treatment is the concern. Notwithstanding this, the work of Szaz is an important contribution to our collective knowledge
Section 10 of the Mental Health Act (in part) where Police can bring folk to the ED for Ax
[b][b]MENTAL HEALTH ACT 1986 - SECT 10
Apprehension of mentally ill persons in certain circumstances
(1) A member of the police force, or a protective services officer on duty at a designated place, may apprehend a person who appears to be mentally ill if the member or officer has reasonable grounds for believing that
(a) the person has recently attempted suicide or attempted to cause serious bodily harm to herself or himself or to some other person; or
(b) the person is likely by act or neglect to attempt suicide or to cause serious bodily harm to herself or himself or to some other person.
(1A) A member of the police force or a protective services officer is not required for the purposes of subsection (1) to exercise any clinical judgment as to whether a person is mentally ill but may exercise the powers conferred by this section if, having regard to the behaviour and appearance of the person, the person appears to the member or officer to be mentally ill.
(2) For the purpose of apprehending a person under subsection (1) a member of the police force may with such assistance as is required
(a) enter any premises; and
(b) use such force as may be reasonably necessary.
(2A) For the purposes of apprehending a person under subsection (1) a protective services officer may with such assistance as is required use such force as may be reasonably necessary.
(3) A member of the police force exercising the powers conferred by this section may be accompanied by a registered medical practitioner or a mental health practitioner.
(3A) A protective services officer must, as soon as practicable after apprehending a person under subsection (1), hand the person into the custody of
(a) a member of the police force; or
(b) a mental health practitioner.
(4) A member of the police force must, as soon as practicable after apprehending a person under subsection (1) or being handed a person apprehended by a protective services officer under subsection (3A)(a), arrange for
(a) an examination of the person by a registered medical practitioner; or
(b) an assessment of the person by a mental health practitioner.
(5) The mental health practitioner may assess the person, having regard to the criteria in section 8(1) and
(a) advise the member of the police force to
(i) arrange for an examination of the person by a registered medical practitioner; or
(ii) release the person from apprehension under this section;[/b] [/b]
_________________
“I even went as far as becoming a Southern Baptist until I realised they didn’t keep ‘em under long enough” Kinky Friedman
Last edited by watt price tully on Tue Apr 08, 2014 10:20 pm; edited 5 times in total |
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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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| Oops. Too much data. |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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| sixpoints wrote: | ^
I gave it a shot, but you lost me with the line "God was too busy today protecting America's soldiers".
Once I read that, I gave up. |
It's ok, I was just being a dick posting a bunch of stuff from the internet no one wants to read, -ie like a lot of the long boring posts in the tavern lately
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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But it's a really important conversation, I think, and surely one that you like everyone have an interest in. We all know people with mental illness issues, and the way that society treats them is a major issue. I understand if some of the posting can get long-winded and wordy, but that shouldn't stop you from offering your opinion.
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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Tannin
Can't remember
Joined: 06 Aug 2006
Location: Huon Valley Tasmania
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| think positive wrote: | | It's ok, I was just being a dick posting a bunch of stuff from the internet no one wants to read, -ie like a lot of the long boring posts in the tavern lately |
Oh? I must have missed that thread. Do tell .... 
_________________
�Let's eat Grandma.� Commas save lives! |
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laird
Joined: 10 Oct 2009
Location: Perth
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| Tannin wrote: | | So how would you distinguish between that woman and, say, the woman standing outside the sexual health clinic holding a "contraception is murder, come to Jesus" sign? Which one is more deluded? Which one is more likely to seek help or get help? Which one is more dangerous, to herself, to her friends and family, and to society as a whole? |
Good and fair questions Tannin.
However " contraception is murder, come to Jesus" is a contradiction.
Not sure how much clearer it needs to be but - Jesus accepts and loves all. I will say it one more time - Jesus loves and accepts ALL.
There is nothing, I repeat, nothing that Jesus does not love about any person.
To answer your question regarding the sign holder - they probably should just go home and let others be. Let others deal with their lives in their own way. We all have enough problems without people thinking that holding up such a sign would make anything better.
A christian understands that Jesus can change the heart of anyone ( if He chooses to) - yep, even you mate. He does not require a person standing with a sign that will only hurt another person.
Truth is, Jesus would be with the lady entering the clinic ( regardless of her decision), so much more than the clown holding a sign, ranting, judging another of His children that He was nailed to a cross for.
Who is more dangerous? Good question.
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" Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye" ? |
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Tannin
Can't remember
Joined: 06 Aug 2006
Location: Huon Valley Tasmania
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Brother Laird, on this occasion you and I are in complete agreement. And as you suggest, it is difficult (and more than likely in any case pointless) to say which of the two is a bigger menace.
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�Let's eat Grandma.� Commas save lives! |
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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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| Enough about me, let's talk about the Pies. Do you mind if I tell other people. |
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1061
Joined: 06 Sep 2013
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| think positive wrote: | | sixpoints wrote: | ^
I gave it a shot, but you lost me with the line "God was too busy today protecting America's soldiers".
Once I read that, I gave up. |
It's ok, I was just being a dick posting a bunch of stuff from the internet no one wants to read, -ie like a lot of the long boring posts in the tavern lately |
Maybe it's a mental illness? |
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