Eliezer S Yudkowsky wrote:
> Eirikur Hallgrimsson wrote:
> >
> > On Sat, 15 Jul 2000, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote:
> > > Besides, severe depression is good for you.
> >
> > I'm pretty sure you're kidding Eliezer. I hope so.
> > Severe depression kills at about a 20% lifetime rate, from what I've
> > read. It tries to kill me when it gets a chance.
It is my opinion that depression never killed anybody. In general,
suicide is the treatment of choice for those who are afraid to
openly express intense rage and whose self-pity motivates a
desire to inflict the punishment of guilt on selected survivors.
While clinical depression can be the result of a variety of initial
conditions, both Freud and Jung at least in this area agreed --
Freud called it "regression in the service of the ego" and Jung,
in his esoteric way, called it "negredo" or "decensus" -- the
"Dark Night of the Soul" sort of thing.
At any rate, we may suppose that at least some exogenous
depressions are a phase in a process of psychic reconstruction.
=======================
Robert M. Owen
Director
The Orion Institute
57 W. Morgan Street
Brevard, NC 28712-3659 USA
=======================
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