Are we more depressed because we're getting smarter?

[The Good Reverend Roger]

QG, when this shit is over, thread will be split.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Honestly, this thread was kinda crap from the start. Everyone has dumb ideas from time to time.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Honestly, this thread was kinda crap from the start. Everyone has dumb ideas from time to time.

I don't.  I am a font of amazingly useful advice.

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

Honestly, this thread was kinda crap from the start. Everyone has dumb ideas from time to time.

I don't.  I am a font of amazingly useful advice.

But you're a lizard person, it's different.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Honestly, this thread was kinda crap from the start. Everyone has dumb ideas from time to time.

I don't.  I am a font of amazingly useful advice.

But you're a lizard person, it's different.

DEAD Lizard person.  More of a disembodied & malignant spirit.

Fleshy ones must pay.

[nurbldoff]

I'm intrigued why it's such a common idea that being smarter would make you more sad. Maybe I'm too dumb to see the connection, or just too happy to care.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I'm intrigued why it's such a common idea that being smarter would make you more sad. Maybe I'm too dumb to see the connection, or just too happy to care.

Maybe because there's a significant statistical correlation between intelligence and depression, suicide, and alcoholism.

I don't know, call me an empiricist.

[Reginald Ret]

I'm intrigued why it's such a common idea that being smarter would make you more sad. Maybe I'm too dumb to see the connection, or just too happy to care.

Maybe because there's a significant statistical correlation between intelligence and depression, suicide, and alcoholism.

I don't know, call me an empiricist.

I realised an upside to this correlation.
My constant depression and alcoholism implies that i actually was intelligent, instead of extremely deluded. i was starting to think that.
Then again, I may just be one of the other datapoints and actually am dumb and delusional.

(I'm fishing for compliments here, please compliment my intelligence, lie if you have to.)

[The Good Reverend Roger]

I'm intrigued why it's such a common idea that being smarter would make you more sad. Maybe I'm too dumb to see the connection, or just too happy to care.

Maybe because there's a significant statistical correlation between intelligence and depression, suicide, and alcoholism.

I don't know, call me an empiricist.

You and your "science".

[UB]

I'm intrigued why it's such a common idea that being smarter would make you more sad. Maybe I'm too dumb to see the connection, or just too happy to care.

Maybe because there's a significant statistical correlation between intelligence and depression, suicide, and alcoholism.

I don't know, call me an empiricist.

I realised an upside to this correlation.
My constant depression and alcoholism implies that i actually was intelligent, instead of extremely deluded. i was starting to think that.
Then again, I may just be one of the other datapoints and actually am dumb and delusional.

(I'm fishing for compliments here, please compliment my intelligence, lie if you have to.)

Instead of draggin you up from a way you may need to gain the experience of dwelling within, I'll simply share: 
 
http://youtu.be/TyjFvMJF_Lg 

Currently my favorite.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I'm intrigued why it's such a common idea that being smarter would make you more sad. Maybe I'm too dumb to see the connection, or just too happy to care.

Maybe because there's a significant statistical correlation between intelligence and depression, suicide, and alcoholism.

I don't know, call me an empiricist.

You and your "science".

I GOTTA BE ME

[zackli]

Actually, I did a presentation on the Self-Esteem movement for a sociology of deviance class and one particularly terrifying remark I read in one of the papers was that there is no objective measure of self esteem. This, on its face, is not necessarily a bad thing but it DOES call into question any and all past studies of the phenomena that did not maintain any timidity in its conclusion.

On to my point, the lack of objectivity in determining a person's "self esteem" is bad for several reasons. It means that over time, there may be a shift in how much self esteem is needed in order to be classified as having a "normal" level of self esteem. As some people who were raised on the ideas within the self esteem movement choose to go into the field of psychology, they will invariably be biased in determining who has a "high" level of self esteem.

Also connected to this idea is that average self esteem lies above the midpoint of the scale used to measure it. The idea for most scales is that they fall on a standard normal model (bell curve), but for self esteem the majority of the population, including those with "low" self esteem, are above five on a scale of 1-10.

Also disturbing was the lack of evidence cited in the 1986 California paper leading to the "self esteem task force" that, while not inherently a bad thing, gave governmental legitimization to the idea that self esteem caused bad things to happen, but that's altogether an unrelated and even stupider idea like suggesting that shoe size is a causal factor in determining intelligence.

"Self-esteem" is correlated with depression, and while I know that means it is not necessarily caused by it, I can see how there could be a connection IF there is merit to the idea presented originally. It would just be another thing that needs to be taken into consideration.

EDIT: For those who want to know the name of the paper, it is "Does self esteem cause better performance, interpersonal success, happiness or healthier lifestyles?"

[Chelagoras The Boulder]

What does "less happy than generations past" mean? The average happiness level in the 50s was higher? Because if all that repression and homogenization, maybe? The 60s, with Vietnam? The 70s, with OPEC and Iran? The 80s, with AIDS?

When was this happier time?

http://www.everydayhealth.com/health-report/major-depression/depression-statistics.aspx

The Rising Rate of Depression

Statistical trends related to depression are hard to come by, but most experts agree that depression rates in the United States and worldwide are increasing. Studies show that rates of depression for Americans have risen dramatically in the past 50 years. Research published in The American Journal of Psychiatry found that major depression rates for American adults increased from 3.33 percent to 7.06 percent from 1991 through 2002. Depression is also considered a worldwide epidemic, with 5 percent of the global population suffering from the condition, according to the World Health Organization.

Please note that I am not taking the position that things were better at any other point in history, just looking at the fact that we seem to be responding to stress with depression more now than we used to.

I think the shift has more to do with how we talk about it. The 'suck it up and soldier on in silence' thing seems to be losing hold in favor of spilling your guts about every single bad thing ever on Tumblr/Facebook/etc.

One thing i would like to toss into the debate is the growing field of Positive psychology which.... posits that a lot of things that determine our level of satisfaction and contentment with our lives has very little to do with our circumstances. You can be a multibillionaire with a supermodel trophy wife and three sons who are astronauts and still want to drink yourself to death. Of the things that are supposed to help maintain "positive affect" (general goodfeels about life) the one that the above posts brought to my mind is internal locus of control, the belief that what happens to oneself is within ones control, and that one can improve ones lot through their own efforts. I think one big difference is that a lot of the ways we used to try to improve ourselves are out of our control.
Want to get a better job? good luck in this economy.
Wanna go back to school? Have fun with all that debt, cuz a degree costs more than a car now.
Wanna take a moment to at least appreciate the things you have right now? Better make it quick, office monkey, those phones aren't gonna answer themselves, and also we're gonna need you to work overtime before you head to the second job you need to support your family, which you wont get to see, because you're too busy supporting them.

It's getting to the point where the only smart moves we have left involve shutting up and being a good little cog and praying to a SMILING GOD that one day we'll retire before we die of stress.That's where the depression comes from.

[minuspace]

I'm jumping in here, please don't misanthropically misappropriate misa me.

I think the OT correlation makes a point to question the causal direction b/t depression & intelligence, more pointed than obverse "ignorance is bliss".

Depression: 1st Order - causal inefficacy w.r.t. "locus of control" - general
                 2nd ||.    -            ||.         ||.       Depression itself - specific

As the disease turns against itself, it seems intelligence grows at the expense of praxis.  So for as smart as we get, it does not really end up doing anything, other than fortifying the illness.

At it's source, I think depression is actually caused by a tantalizing misconception of what it means to be having the human experience.  As long as we continue to force the idea that making a difference involves the causal efficacy to perform a specific task, we lose the deeper connection to the involvement in experience that occurs before any specific intention is even determinately known, let alone completed.

Our experience of freedom has been masked and concealed to only reveal what our "masters" allow us to consider.  Then we take it personally when we do not perform according to our now internalized limitations.   Has me banging my head against the wall sometimes.  It's like a paradox in which I resign myself to getting out of my own way in order to actually approach myself.

[zackli]

Our experience of freedom has been masked and concealed to only reveal what our "masters" allow us to consider.  Then we take it personally when we do not perform according to our now internalized limitations.   Has me banging my head against the wall sometimes.  It's like a paradox in which I resign myself to getting out of my own way in order to actually approach myself.

An interesting documentary about that was made by a guy named Adam Curtis called "The Trap". It has three parts, with each one around an hour a piece but I would say it's worth a watch. Basically, it suggests in the first two parts that people have had limited conceptions of each other as simply "rational" beings, (which I would go so far as to say is hilariously misguided) that was caused in part due to game theory as an academic/economic discipline. I'm probably botching the synopsis, but the third part goes on to say that there is a split between "positive" and "negative" liberty. Positive liberty is the right to do things and "live up to your full potential" garbage while negative liberty is the freedom to NOT be restrained or constrained by the government. It goes on to suggest that positive liberty HAS to be suppressed because it inevitably leads to a revolution. I don't like his conclusion, because he says that it DOESN'T have to lead to revolution. I don't see why it shouldn't lead to a revolution, because "f**k the system!" and all dat jazz.

What I said in my other post, however, may very well negate any kind of depression "epidemic". Depression is just as subjective a phenomena as is self esteem, based on how a person says he or she feels most or all of the time. It's easy to see everyone on Facebook having a bias towards posting positive things that they don't hear about how sh*tty the rest of the other users' lives are.