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Glorifying Suicide, don't do it.

Crovax said:
Look at the depression rates now over 10% and growing fast, funny how they were at about 3% in the early 90's. I am not saying that those people who really do have depression shouldn't be helped but it is clear we have severly over diagnosed depression and we need to not give into those looking for an excuse.
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Depression is definitely overdiagnosed, but patients looking for excuses are not the main cause. The main cause is pharma companies wanting to sell as many pills as they can. Just follow the money.
 
CaptainCourtesy said:
I've been very clear on how it is different.
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Yes. Yes you have. And I have been very clear that simply identifying how it is different is not sufficient to conclude what you're concluding.

Not how it is different.

How the difference warrants an exception.

I can point out that the case of a man who decides to join the priesthood who was raised by his parents to have a false belief is different (because the belief stems from his parents). By your logic, simply because I can point out that there is a difference means that it's ok to forcibly prevent this man from becoming a priest and ruining his life.

But, I hope you'll agree, the conclusion is false. It's false because the argument is invalid. It doesn't follow that simply because there exists a difference, that the difference warrants an exception.

Likewise, that the false beliefs are caused by a medical condition is a difference. But that doesn't mean that that difference warrants an exception.

CaptainCourtesy said:
Oh, and a response to your next post... yes I have.
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Not that I've seen. My apologies if I've missed where you stated it. Please, would you kindly restate it very clearly and concisely? Why does a false belief "being caused by a medical condition" mean that it's ok to forcibly prevent a person from making decisions based on that belief? Why does it warrant an exception to the rule?
 
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DifferentDrummr said:
Their claim is by their own admission based on incomplete data. Nothing to do with how they analyzed it.
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All data is incomplete. No theory is ever "proved" by data. You can only falsify a theory with data, never prove it. You can only support it. So far the data they've reported supports their theory. Maybe in the future they'll gather more data...

DifferentDrummr said:
Of the mindsets of people who have been clinically depressed, that's all.
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Right. But we were discussing suicides. Only a very tiny minority of depressed people actually commit suicide. It's the difference in the mindset of that small minority that's relevant to understanding/predicting suicide.
 
the_recruit said:
Yes. Yes you have. And I have been very clear that simply identifying how it is different is not sufficient to conclude what you're concluding.

Not how it is different.

How the difference warrants an exception.

I can point out that the case of a man who decides to join the priesthood who was raised by his parents to have a false belief is different (because the belief stems from his parents). By your logic, simply because I can point out that there is a difference means that it's ok to forcibly prevent this man from becoming a priest and ruining his life.

But, I hope you'll agree, the conclusion is false. It's false because the argument is invalid. It doesn't follow that simply because there exists a difference, that the difference warrants an exception.

Likewise, that the false beliefs are caused by a medical condition is a difference. But that doesn't mean that that difference warrants an exception.



Not that I've seen. My apologies if I've missed where you stated it. Please, would you kindly restate it very clearly and concisely? Why does a false belief "being caused by a medical condition" mean that it's ok to forcibly prevent a person from making decisions based on that belief? Why does it warrant an exception to the rule?
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I've explained it over and over. It is the medical condition that warrants the exception. The medical condition causes the invalid beliefs that lead to the action. None of the other examples you have given are consistent with that. The medical condition causes the altered state of thinking... and causes the distorted logic. Alleviate the medical condition and you restore logic.

Now, perhaps our disagreement is deeper. I do not consider one's right to self-determination to be universal. If one is mentally impaired, and proven so, their ability to make informed decision is also impaired. I have no issue with removing their rights to self-determination until such time as they are no longer impaired.
 
CaptainCourtesy said:
I've explained it over and over. It is the medical condition that warrants the exception. The medical condition causes the invalid beliefs that lead to the action. None of the other examples you have given are consistent with that.
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Again, you are just assuming what I've asked you to justify. You're just asserting that false beliefs being caused by a medical condition are grounds for an exception. That's not justification, it's just a claim on your part. Which I've pointed out over and over and over.

I could just as easily claim that we have a right to intervene with men who want to become priests because false beliefs being caused by the way their parents raised them are grounds for an exception.

But, without further justification, it remains special pleading and there is no reason to believe it.
 
the_recruit said:
Right. But we were discussing suicides. Only a very tiny minority of depressed people actually commit suicide. It's the difference in the mindset of that small minority that's relevant to understanding/predicting suicide.
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Quite a conclusion you're jumping to. People who get over their depression can still shed much more light on the type of thinking that might lead to suicide than the average Joe could.
 
the_recruit said:
Again, you are just assuming what I've asked you to justify. You're just asserting that false beliefs being caused by a medical condition are grounds for an exception. That's not justification, it's just a claim on your part. Which I've pointed out over and over and over.

I could just as easily claim that we have a right to intervene with men who want to become priests because false beliefs being caused by the way their parents raised them are grounds for an exception.

But, without further justification, it remains special pleading and there is no reason to believe it.
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No, you asked for the exception to be proven. I did so. My explanation went far further than just an assertion.
 
CaptainCourtesy said:
No, you asked for the exception to be proven. I did so. My explanation went far further than just an assertion.
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No, I asked you to justify your special pleading. That involves explaining why "false beliefs being caused by a medical condition" justify forcing a person to do something against their will. The "clear, concise" explanation you just gave was "The medical condition justifies it". Saying "the medical condition justifies it" is not explaining WHY the medical condition justifies it. Saying "the difference warrants an exception" is not explaining WHY the difference warrants an exception.

Do you truly not understand the difference between the two? Or are you just being stubborn and intellectually dishonest?
 
the_recruit said:
No, I asked you to justify your special pleading. That involves explaining why "false beliefs being caused by a medical condition" justify forcing a person to do something against their will. The "clear, concise" explanation you just gave was "The medical condition justifies it". Saying "the medical condition justifies it" is not explaining WHY the medical condition justifies it. Saying "the difference warrants an exception" is not explaining WHY the difference warrants an exception.

Do you truly not understand the difference between the two? Or are you just being stubborn and intellectually dishonest?
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I have explained this repeatedly. The medical condition causes one's thinking to be impaired. In this case, as I have EXPLAINED, this impairment causes false beliefs. This is a physical condition outside one's control. THIS justifies the exception. What I see with you is that you just disagree with the exception. That's fine, but it doesn't alter that the exception is justified.
 
Glorifying suicide is really creepy and sadistic considering we don't know what's on the other side. I had suicidal friends before I tried helping and I didn't know what to do and ended up almost dying myself from them talking about suicide all the time. Also I had anorexia nervosa and ended up almost dying from that...and it was all just insane.
 
CaptainCourtesy said:
I have explained this repeatedly. The medical condition causes one's thinking to be impaired. In this case, as I have EXPLAINED, this impairment causes false beliefs. This is a physical condition outside one's control. THIS justifies the exception. What I see with you is that you just disagree with the exception. That's fine, but it doesn't alter that the exception is justified.
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Let's make this very simple.

1) Depression is a medical condition that causes false beliefs
2) A depressed person does not have a right to make their own life choices based on said beliefs.

2 does not follow from 1 by any rule of logic.

You have to justify 2 to resolve the special pleading fallacy. 1 is true but you are just asserting 2. You are not justifying it. You are not demonstrating the chain of logic that leads from "1 is true", therefore "2 is true". You are just asserting that "1 is true" (which i accept) and then following it up by asserting "2 is true" (which I do not accept and there is no reason to accept without further justification as it is special pleading).
 
the_recruit said:
Let's make this very simple.

1) Depression is a medical condition that causes false beliefs
2) A depressed person does not have a right to make their own life choices based on said beliefs.

2 does not follow from 1 by any rule of logic.

You have to justify 2 to resolve the special pleading fallacy. 1 is true but you are just asserting 2. You are not justifying it. You are not demonstrating the chain of logic that leads from "1 is true", therefore "2 is true". You are just asserting that "1 is true" (which i accept) and then following it up by asserting "2 is true" (which I do not accept and there is no reason to accept without further justification as it is special pleading).
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The exception is the medical condition and how it impairs functioning. THAT'S the exception and the justification. We already know that brain impairments are exceptions to standard rules around rights. That exception applies here as well. The problem with your claim that this is a special pleading fallacy is that in that fallacy the characteristic would NOT be relevant in making the exception. In this instance, the characteristic IS relevant. Rights can be bypassed in special circumstances. This is one due to the impairment.
 
CaptainCourtesy said:
The exception is the medical condition and how it impairs functioning.
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Holding a false belief is not impaired functioning. Something outside your control causing you to hold a false belief is not impaired functioning. That's how every belief (both true ones and false ones) is formed. Our beliefs are caused by series of events outside out control. We do not choose our beliefs. We choose our actions according to our beliefs. When I hear a knock at my door, my mind is caused to hold a belief that there is someone at the door knocking. I didn't consciously choose to have that belief. Unconscious processes in the brain beyond my control cause me to hold that belief. I simply become consciously aware that "oh, someone is at the door!".

A non-depressed person doesn't have control over their beliefs in the way you're suggesting any more than a depressed person does. That lack of control has nothing to do with depression. In fact, there's evidence that mildly depressed people actually tend to have more realistic views than non-depressed people . And yet we don't say that happy people don't have a right to make life choices according to their beliefs on the grounds that those beliefs they're basing them on are outside of their control, that their elation is crippling their ability to choose. Because that fact is irrelevant to the matter of whether they have the right.

CaptainCourtesy said:
We already know that brain impairments are exceptions to standard rules around rights.
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Not mood disorders. Thought disorders, yes. Cognitive disorders, yes. Mood disorders no. See, we're all the way back to square one again here with me pointing out the important distinction. You've deliberately moved away from "mood disorders" to the broader term "brain impairments" in a sad attempt to try to hide that important distinction. Ask yourself this, why don't courts of law absolve depressed people of their responsibility for crimes they may commit on grounds of depression if it impairs functioning in the way you're trying to say that it does? I'll tell you why. Because it does not and no expert testifying in court would say that it does. Depression, as a mental disorder, simply does not have what it takes to undermine a person's ability to make choices. It is simply insufficient grounds to claim that a depressed person doesn't have control anymore, that they aren't responsible for their choices or that they don't have the right to.

CaptainCourtesy said:
The problem with your claim that this is a special pleading fallacy is that in that fallacy the characteristic would NOT be relevant in making the exception. In this instance, the characteristic IS relevant.
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Again, a unjustified assertion. I reject that "false beliefs being caused by a mood disorder" is more relevant to a person's right to make their own life decisions than, say, "false beliefs being caused by one's religious upbringing". You just insist that it IS more relevant. I don't see any reason for it at all. Capitalizing "is" is not a justification. WHY is it more relevant?
 
the_recruit said:
A non-depressed person doesn't have control over their beliefs in the way you're suggesting any more than a depressed person does. That lack of control has nothing to do with depression. ...
Ask yourself this, why don't courts of law absolve depressed people of their responsibility for crimes they may commit on grounds of depression if it impairs functioning in the way you're trying to say that it does? I'll tell you why. Because it does not and no expert testifying in court would say that it does. Depression, as a mental disorder, simply does not have what it takes to undermine a person's ability to make choices. It is simply insufficient grounds to claim that a depressed person doesn't have control anymore, that they aren't responsible for their choices or that they don't have the right to.
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I don't know where you're getting this misinformation, but all of it is completely wrong. Mood disorders have frequently been used - successfully - in insanity pleas, and often justifiably so.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
I don't know where you're getting this misinformation, but all of it is completely wrong. Mood disorders have frequently been used - successfully - in insanity pleas, and often justifiably so.
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Link please.

From "Thinking About the Insanity Defense" by Harvard Law lecturer and psychologist Ellsworth Fersch,

"Mood disorders, such as major depressive disorder....are generally used rarely in insanity defenses, with a few notable exceptions. The exceptions occur when an individual experiences a psychotic level of the disorder, as for instance, a person in the manic phase of bipolar disorder."

ie, A person can have a mental disorder that exhibits aspects of mood disorder and aspects of psychotic disorder. It's the features of psychotic disorder that are relevant to cognitive insanity, not the mood disorder part. No psychosis, no insanity.
 
the_recruit said:
Link please.

From "Thinking About the Insanity Defense" by Harvard Law lecturer and psychologist Ellsworth Fersch,

"Mood disorders, such as major depressive disorder....are generally used rarely in insanity defenses, with a few notable exceptions. The exceptions occur when an individual experiences a psychotic level of the disorder, as for instance, a person in the manic phase of bipolar disorder."

ie, A person can have a mental disorder that exhibits aspects of mood disorder and aspects of psychotic disorder. It's the features of psychotic disorder that are relevant to cognitive insanity, not the mood disorder part. No psychosis, no insanity.
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Um, your source actually proved my point for me. Look at the sentence mentioning "a psychotic level of the [mood] disorder..." To put it another way, psychosis is often a symptom of mood disorders, including depression. It isn't always or necessarily a separate mental disorder of its own.

But if you want another link, here's one:

Also, mood disorders like major depressive disorder and bipolar disorder can become severe enough to result in psychotic symptoms like hallucinating or having delusions, also called psychotic features.
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Psychotic Disorders: Definition and Facts About Symptoms
 
Suicide can be rational. It is not always based on a mental illness. However, because people base their reasons to die on what other people believe is irrational and thus a mental illness, their choice to die is taken from them.

An interesting question: why do people feel the need to step in and prevent the suicide of someone they likely don't know or care about on a significant level? Do they really care, or does another person's suicide destroy their own belief systems and therefore threaten their own psychological security?

Also, some people are truly alone and isolated. A basic human need has not been met. It very well could be some internal flaw or irrelevance. Perhaps death could be the answer. There are people who present their families with more of a burden than they give back. There are those who are rejected by family and friends with such frequency that an undeniable pattern can be seen. What should they do then? Deny those facts? Pick themselves up by their bootstraps and tough it out?

What if they would rather just die and get it over with? It's their life, and death is one step away beyond anyone's control Unless they choose to die.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
Um, your source actually proved my point for me. Look at the sentence mentioning "a psychotic level of the [mood] disorder..."
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I just explained this.

A person can have a disorder that exhibits features of both a mood disorder and a psychotic disorder. It's the features of the psychotic disorder, not the features of the mood disorder that are relevant to cognitive insanity.

DifferentDrummr said:
To put it another way, psychosis is often a symptom of mood disorders, including depression.
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No, major depressive disorder with psychotic features is actually quite rare. There usually isn't any psychosis present in cases of depression.

DifferentDrummr said:
It isn't always or necessarily a separate mental disorder of its own.
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The meaning of the two are distinct and well-defined, and psychologists differentiate them on purpose. That an individual can have symptoms of both doesn't change this. I mean, that's why psychologists distinguish it as "major depressive disorder with psychotic features" instead of just calling it "major depressive disorder". Because it's different than major depressive disorder. It's not just a mood disorder anymore. There's an additional ingredient involved - psychosis.

And that additional ingredient is the key. A disorder without psychotic features is not relevant to establishing insanity. It's the defining features of psychosis, not the defining features of depression, that are grounds for insanity.
 
The meaning of the two are distinct and well-defined, and psychologists differentiate them on purpose. That an individual can have symptoms of both doesn't change this. I mean, that's why psychologists distinguish it as "major depressive disorder with psychotic features" instead of just calling it "major depressive disorder". Because it's different than major depressive disorder. It's not just a mood disorder anymore. There's an additional ingredient involved - psychosis.
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At this point I'd say you're splitting hairs to the point that it doesn't add much if any value to the thesis of the discussion.

You asserted earlier that depressed individuals were every bit as much as "in control" of their behavior as non-depressed ones and, while that can be true, I've proved (and you've tacitly agreed) that this is not always the case when it comes to clinical depression.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
At this point I'd say you're splitting hairs to the point that it doesn't add much if any value to the thesis of the discussion.

You asserted earlier that depressed individuals were every bit as much as "in control" of their behavior as non-depressed ones and, while that can be true, I've proved (and you've tacitly agreed) that this is not always the case when it comes to clinical depression.
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Bi-polar people are the ones I am leery of, because you never know what kind of a mood there going to be in. My aunt employed one as a house cleaner, and she was a bitch. I would have fired her a**! Are bi-polar people considered clinical depressed?
 
leoborn said:
Bi-polar people are the ones I am leery of, because you never know what kind of a mood there going to be in. My aunt employed one as a house cleaner, and she was a bitch. I would have fired her a**! Are bi-polar people considered clinical depressed?
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Bipolar disorder comes in lots of different flavors. Some of them include clinical depression; others don't.
 
DifferentDrummr said:
At this point I'd say you're splitting hairs to the point that it doesn't add much if any value to the thesis of the discussion.

You asserted earlier that depressed individuals were every bit as much as "in control" of their behavior as non-depressed ones and, while that can be true, I've proved (and you've tacitly agreed) that this is not always the case when it comes to clinical depression.
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It's not splitting hairs. There's a huge difference. Whether a person is "in control" is not a question of whether they are depressed. It's a question of whether they are psychotic. The distinction is incredibly important.
 
I don't agree that suicide is usually rational. Most people are in such extreme mental or physical pain, over such long periods, that they can't think clearly anymore, and require supportive intervention. If you hear the individual stories behind suicides while looking beyond the mere statistics, you can usually sympathize with why people did what they did. Therefore, your disrespect is irrelevant. It's not much different than saying you disrespect someone with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, cancer, or diabetes. Being suicidally depressed is just as emergent of a condition as being terminally ill. Your life is in jeopardy. That it's at your own hand makes no difference.

There's not much point in hating people who commit suicide, or say that you have no respect for them. Are you aware that there might be some people reading that who are suicidal, and they might not break their silence and confide in someone because you've shamed them? In the United States, suicide is in the top ten list for the ways people die. And no one wants to talk about it.

Talking about suicide isn't sensationalizing it, it's bringing it out in the open. Most people die because they become cut off from support and because twisted institutions like the Church have spread the false notion that suicide is sinful. So people don't want to talk about it because it's a dark, evil subject. The reality is that thousands of people off themselves every year worldwide.

To put it another way... just imagine the depth of shame a person must feel in order to want to override their own survival instincts. They must feel pretty worthless. What they need is love, understanding, and support... not your disrespect. Seriously, check yourselves.
 
I'm still unsure why people even feel the need to react. It's not as if they care for the individual (unless they are personally involved), so imo it's about their own ego. Another person's actions invalidate their own world view so they have a negative opinion of people who commit suicide, and they feel the need to intervene. It's not so much about "helping" a suicidal person as it is protecting one's own world view.

Many times, when a person is suicidal, either they have support and they cannot see it (which is distorted thinking) OR they truly DO NOT have support and are fully aware of it. However, even those who have support quickly lose it as people grow tired of dealing with them. Then there are physical illnesses and disabilities- why not allow someone like that to decide to die? Imo, it is a rational decision. What if someone is very active and they become disabled? What about chronic pain? My point: society shouldn't be involved with personal decisions. No legislation is needed. It is a personal issue only.
 
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