In other words, I think it's criminal to discredit the legitimacy of a depressed person's feelings to his/her environment, saying its an abnormal response - that your brain is wrong because it was born physically impaired. When there are relevant socioeconomic factors that give rise to an understandable (and we ought to do something about fixing that social environment!) feeling of hopelessness.
Ok this is a shambly mash-up of notes, but its a touchy and extolling subject; I don't have the stomach to clean this up, so wear a hat.
Neurobiology of depression. Edited by Francisco Lopez-munoz and Cecilio Alamano. ISBN 978-1-4398-3849-5.
34[1]"Depression is an affective disorder implicating disturbed processing of emotional information. For example, depressed patients show abnormal startle reflex modulation during the presentation of affective pictures (Forbes et al. 2005) and reduced facial expression (Gehricke and Shapiro 2000).
[2]From a more cognitive perspective, depressed people exhibit an attentional bias toward negative information and, as a consequence fail to avoid negative valenced information (Gotlib and Macleod 1997). Furthermore, they better recall negative events (Nitschke et al. 2004) and make more negative judgments about future and actual life events (Beck 1976).
[3]Numerous studies have shown that depressed patients exhibit less relative left and greater right anterior EEG activity (Gotlib et al. 1998; Henriques and Davidson 1990, 1991; Schaffer et al. 1983; Tomarken et al. 2004). Less left frontal activation has been interpreted as reflecting deficits in approach behavior associated with symptoms such as sadness and depression. Greater right anterior activation has been supposed to index withdrawal behavior related to fear, disgust, and anxiety (Harmon-Jones et al. 2010)."
(Digression: Yo, fast typing is so addictive. I want to time - well maybe not time myself, but at least type out a copy of a book and see how fast (many hours, days, etc) I can finish the transcription.)
specific remarks:
1) disturbed processing. Sometimes it's not the process that's disturbing, but the conclusion. You have to note that there is a distinction from a brain that's working as it should, and giving you bad news you don't want to hear and a brain that's just spouting doomsday prophesy on the street corner.
2) note: 'negative valenced information' is a psychomedicinie jargon way of saying 'disapproving body language'
of course we give attention to negatives because they are about to fuck us over, so we gotta take note. the positives avoid us entirely, so we could care less about noticing them - unless it's to agonize over our exclusion from them, which again is another negative.
3) if something is harmful, why the fuck wouldn't we refrain from approaching it and prefer to move away from it? The brain tendency is appropriately matched: a decreased in 'approach' and increased in 'withdrawal' seems evidence that everything is working in order. If it were erratically disposed, or wanting both to approach and withdraw simultaneously, or do neither - that would be fucking abnormal!
general discussion
Anyhow, this 'divination' of associations due to increased/decreased brain activity correlated to a group of individuals with a particular trait is far from explanatory or logically proved. With those caveats in mind, however, let's take note that these areas of the brain may play some role in the mind of a depressed loser.
Argument:
"Remitted [healed up] depressed patients showed the same frontal EEG asymmetry pattern as currently depressed subjects, suggesting that the observed anterior EEG asymmetry in depression represents a stable state-independent marker of depression (Henriques and Davidson 1990)."
(English translation: People who have depression show unbalanced brain activity whether they are in a depressive state or a healthy state. It is an indication that bouts of depression originate from a biological difference in the brain's behavior. So we can identify those with depression, whether or not they show symptoms.)
Counterargument:
Still, there is no evidence that the source is biological. This pattern of asymmetric brain activity can simply be due to a persistent environmental factor. As later mentioned in the publication, chronic stress due to socioeconomic poverty is a common factor.
Still, there is no evidence that the source is biological. This pattern of asymmetric brain activity can simply be due to a persistent environmental factor. As later mentioned in the publication, chronic stress due to socioeconomic poverty is a common factor.
Edit: Ok here it is, found the counterargument.
35 "Twin studies suggest that frontal EEG asymmetries linked to depression develop under environmental circumstances. Probably, an overexpression of HTR1A serotonin receptors in the right frontal cortex creates a vulnerability to develop frontal cortex activity asymmetries associated with depression in response to stressful life events.
Pscyhological speculation
The article does not raise this point I will say, it may not be because the brain is born fucked up, but the reality that your life prospects will never compare with those of your wealthier peers, your potential is stunted by inadequate nutrition, you are socially discriminated against, and the family is filled with bickering, worry, and malcontent due to your financial hardship - its these things fucking your brain 25/8 and some facts of life never go away, even if they lessen.
If this pattern is learned to heart during the formative years (early adolescence into adulthood), whether or not socioeconomic status improves, a framework of understanding what the world is and how to deal with it is built and is firmly set in the mind. Subsequently, these things are building blocks of his reality, so he picks up on these things, and doesn't really digest the 'good stuff' 'cause none of that really existed in his formative world, or at least it was there for other people but didn't apply to himself.
The brain of the socioeconomically depressed individual is trained to interpret and interact with a demeaning world. So it tends to identify these negative aspects over the positive ones, because the negative is more in line with their model of reality that they grew up learning. The positives he tends to be skeptical of, or at a loss how to enjoy, because these he was not exposed to enough during psychological development to have an internalized understanding that they are true - not having experienced them for himself, they are not part of his reality. It doesn't seem real, so his mind rejects it and tries to come up with a negative interpretation so that the world is more understandable to him.
Once a man learns of his mistreatment, he rebels. Until he tastes of the freedom and luxury withheld from him, they are not part of his world - so he has no feasibility of his exploitation. That's why old societies forbade slaves from education. They must never learn to experience the master's life for his own, so that they can no understanding of a life better than the miserable life they lead. They accept their toil and mistreatment as complete reality; there is nothing outside of their slave existence. They are taught to fear the things outside the tasks demanded of them by their masters. 'Free men can never be slaves. They must be killed. Lifelong slaves cannot function as free men - their self-sufficiency have been stunted by servitude to become reliant on their masters.' The birdman of Alcatraz in the Shawshank redemption, for example.
Stuff like 'having fun' and 'why can't I be happy like everyone else' is as incomprehensible to the socioeconomically depressed as reading and writing are to the illiterate slave. There's a feeling of everybody else has something and I don't.
It's not the external thing anymore. It's the internal memories, experiences, understanding of a good thing that makes it part of one's grasp of reality - those are missing in the socioeconomically depressed. Seeing a classmate unbrokenly happy - and not being able to do the same, having seen too many ugly things, gone through too many unpleasant things that the fortunate other has never gone through, who has memories of singing praises, presents and pleasure trips in their stead. That is the dividing psychological difference between the socioeconomically depressed and their shining mentally healthy peers.
Thoughts on social ideology
Is the 'great job, you are excellent' treatment of children superior? Hell no. It causes arrogance, entitlement, and unsympathy towards 'undesireable' peers. Some of the worst people are raised on words of superfluous praise.
In theory, each child should have a balanced raising, awareness of hardships, real problems (not self-centered ones - not 'omg i can't wear that boring shirt to school my life is over', but also not 'I can't afford new clothes so I have to wear the same outfit two days in a row') like where do we get our food from, how to prepare meals, how do our cars work, how does the country make its money, what do we need to do as members of our country and to the human race to solve the problems that defy solutions.
The real issue is disparity. In theory, if we were all of similar financial and social standing, each child's internalized concept of the world would be communicable to another. That is - the world is overall a fair one. Differences in wealth and status would be present, but of proportions that fit in the palm of your hand - not of millions and billions that defy one to comprehend exactly what it is you have, much less to physically possess it. These differences are accepted as earned, deserved, and just - and good sportsmanship on both the part of the upper and the lowers would be widespread.
That is the failure of communism. It is too ideal. Any practical social theory must tangle with the inescapable realities of human greed, corruption, and power. To expect people to behave as they should, as they ought, and have that be the bastion that holds the ideology together... that is catastrophic collapse. To expect the opposite and base your ideology off it, is more enduring, but what good is it that which does not improve the common condition, but helps the worst qualities of men gain hold!?
Of course, it is crafted in the hands of those greedy, powerful, and corrupt the ideologies that suit their motives. But a virus's downfall is its own efficacy. The most potent strains take hold and quickly die along with its host. A whole nation of cream to skim off the top is a lot of wealth for one man, yet man is not satisfied and his addiction for more drains the nation and its people. Until the powerful man realizes he is but one person against a nation of millions, whose angry starved and labor-wrought hands grasp for blood!
Greed as an altruism
So what is the right way, the dao, the path of virtue? Its that we be honest about man's greed and use it as best we can. One man's greed for himself is evil; one man's greed for his group is altruism. The just kings knew to make the people happy is to hold power, and the stores of his treasure room are safe and growing. To intentionally segregate this greed into a more and more exclusive set, ultimately attempting to refine it to one sole member - that is the demise of a nation. To hopefully grow that set to as many people as the racket scam can sustain, that is virtue.
Note: not ALL people, that pyramid scheme is unsustainable! But to as many as the scam can support! That means maybe 60% of the people are making off with the goods, and 40% of people are supplying it at a loss. Hardly an equal proposition - but an equitable one!!!! Far from 100% of the population are included in the greed; about half the people profit and the other half toil. But think about it - for everyone person who gains, how else would he have more if someone didn't have less!??
Suppose I don't labor to grow the food I eat, slaughter the meat, cook it, or drive the trucks to the supermarket, weave the nice clothes I wear, mine the coal I use to generate my electricity, warm my house. Suppose I don't clean the city streets, or fill in the potholes, or dispose of the sewage and garbage I create. Suppose when I take my vacation, I have servants entertain me and make my bed and wash my sheets and fly my airplane and drive me around town.
Now suppose every person in the country is me. How the fuck would any of that happen??
So 50-50 ratio is not a bad bet. One master, one slave. There's enough jobs to serve, and there's have-nots to fill them. Slaves don't resent each other for stealing their job, and masters don't dispose of their servants as a result of having an unlimited supply to choose from. I have no idea what the reality of the situation is. Maybe no one does. But I can speculate. I doubt it's 50-50. Far from it. Maybe 10% manufacturing goods, 3% owners, 80% service, 6% unemployed/not working.
America
noun. the wealthiest economy in the world
Alright, let's try to prove my idealism woefully ignorant of the real world by seeing what the American economy looks like.
Unemployment 5%. * but many stopped looking for jobs (yes, fuck me. I am scum)
Good, decent folk who actually do real paid work (but not housewives, fuck em)"although the unemployment rate ticked down to a seven-year low of 5.3 percent in June, that number didn't do justice to the 640,000 individuals who exited the labor market last month and the nearly 94 million people who were neither employed nor looking for work." - usnews 07/16/2015
GDP by sectorAgriculture 1.2%Industry 19%Services 80%.(source: Wikipedia)
(It adds up to 100.2% but whatever. And also, fuck Wikipedia at being bad at everything.)
Labor force by occupationFarming & food etc: 0.7%Manufacturing etc: 12%Services (Management, tech, sales, maintenance, other): 87.3%
of these comprised of
- Managerial, Professional, and Technical: 38%
- Sales and Office: 23%
(source: Wikipedia)
Those who are poor don't want to do any work...
If the rich earned all their money from personal work, they'd be dead from exhaustion and wouldn't want any of their wealth for the price they'd have to pay!"That should be obvious to anyone looking at our country's income distribution. The richest 0.01 percent of Americans -- the one percent of the one percent -- earn an average income 578 times higher than everyone else. Even if Zell thinks they work harder, does he really think that they work 578 times harder? Does anyone honestly believe that one member of the super-rich works as hard as 578 of the rest of us combined?
It wasn't always this way. A few decades ago, the income gap wasn't nearly as wide. Over the years, the income of the one percent has been growing a lot faster than everyone else's.
If you ask Sam Zell why this is happening, he'd probably say the rich are working more and everyone else is working less. But he'd be wrong. In fact, the exact opposite is happening: The poor and the middle class have taken on a lot more working hours than the rich, even as their income has grown less.
So, not only does Zell's theory fail to explain the rise of the one percent, it actually gives a reason to oppose it. If more work is a justification for more income, as Zell suggests, then the one percent should be experiencing less income growth than everyone else.
Instead, the 99 percent are finding that they're doing more of the work and receiving less of the income with each passing year." - huffingtonpost
... and the rich do nothing but steal
Let the class warfare battle on!
The wealth of the top 1% has disproportionately grown more than the majority 99% of Americans in the past twenty years. The latest period from the data (2009-2012) is staggeringly favored to the rich!
 |
| elsa.berkeley.edu/~saez/TabFig2012prel.xls |
LOL.
When Clinton was in office, everybody was making it rich off the housing bubble. The rich were making proportionally more, but 5x as much is compared to Bush's term holding the 1% in check.
Bush came into office, everyone lost money. 1% lost 5x as much as everyone else. Okay, seems fair.
But when warmongering started turning a profit, the 1% grew income 9x as much!!
THEN, when the wars petered out and money ran dry, the rich lost only 3x as much income!
Now the economy recovers under Obama, republicans successfully cockblock every Obama act on the grounds he is black and an inept president... their profits LOOK AT THAT LOL! 31.4% growth by the top 1% compared to 0.4% growth by everyone else.
Virtually NO change in our income, but the rich grow 30% their income. They took off with ALL the goods. 95% of all growth captured by top 1%. DAT IS ABSURDLY SUCCESSFUL ROBBERY LOL.
Fuck political science
All you gullible tuition payers studying political science, advocating for this and that and growing your aspirations with political protest and rally demonstrations - to you I say you're playing a child's game.
Not because I don't support your ideals, but because they are so out of context of legitimate power that has real sway. The real men come to the table with blood, oil, and gold. If you can't ante up, it doesn't matter how pretty your cards are.
Here's my explanation of politic:
"I don't get it. Politics is too hard for me.
I just know that people with more money than me are evil.
Very simple rule of thumb"
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