Re: paranoia

Caliban (caliban@gate.net)
Wed, 10 Sep 1997 08:32:13 -0400 (EDT)

Anders Sandberg wrote:
>
> dasher@netcom.com (Anton Sherwood) writes:
>
> > I've been wondering whether paranoia can be defined, at least
> > in part, as abnormally high sensitivity of the pattern-detecting
> > faculty; and if so, whether it can be detected by asking the
> > subject to find patterns in random dots.
>
> I think this is reasonable. I seem to recall that schizophrenia is
> correlated with/cause by (pick your favorite) excess levels of
> dopamine. It doesn't appear that unlikely that the paranoid symptoms
> are caused by pattern-detection running wild, and the inhibition
> which usually removes unfit patterns like "The British royal family
> lives next door and plots against my life" isn't effective enough.

Anxiety stimulates excessive transmission of amines,
it makes sense that it would be correlated with
schizophrenia.

Paranoia is common with bipolar affective disorder
as well as schizophrenia. What are the amine
levels associated with that disorder?

The inhibition you speak of sounds like self-reflective
awareness, or self-monitoring, or self-consciousness, or
self-observation -- all names for the same phenomenon.
>
> I think pattern finding in random dots likely would correlate to
> paranoia, but also to hallucinations. Paranoia seems to involve
> an emotional component, likely a limbic fear program that makes
> us more attentive to perceived threats.
>
And keeps the aminergic system excessively high? 

--
Caliban
caliban@gate.net
ENTJ/6w5
"My limbic system is out to get me."