totalhermione-blog

[totalhermione-blog]

Homo evolutis:  The Philosophy of Evolution, Emergence, and the Art of Becoming Gods

A still more glorious dawn awaits, not a sunrise, but a galaxy-rise a morning filled with 400 billion suns, the rising of the milky way.  Carl Sagan 

Evolution as an Algorithmic Process

           Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species (1859) is arguably the most influential publication to date despite its misunderstood meaning and misappropriation cross-disciplinarily to in attempts to provide a biological basis for appalling and evolutionarily counterproductive socio-political policies including colonialism, slavery, genocide, forced-sterilization, marginalization of persons and organisms judged less-valuable by those in positions of cultural power.  In truth, the eccentric naturalist neither conceptualized the idea of evolution in isolation or in its entirety.  As a product of evolution himself, Darwin’s work was the product of millions of years of reproductive selection coalescing in and limited by his unique time and environment.  Darwin was greatly influenced by the work of Jean Baptiste Lamarck, Thomas Malthus, and most notably Alfred Russel Wallace whose work was jointly published with that of Charles Darwin.  Still, the crux of modern Darwinism – the gene – was not theorized until the work of Gregor Mendel (and not recognized by the scientific community until 1900, well after his death).  “Darwin had no proper unit of heredity” (Dennett, 1995 p. 20).   

           Even so, what Darwin contributed in his lifetime is no less than a unified theory of everything.  To conceptualize evolution as an algorithmic process “unifies the realm of life, meaning, and purpose with the realm of space and time, cause and effect, mechanism and physical law” (Dennett, 1995 p. 21) into a simple and understandable framework both cross-culturally and cross-disciplinarily.  An algorithm is little more than a set of rules to be followed by a process.  This is typically understood best in the realm of mathematics and computer sciences, though the metaphor is just as applicable to evolutionary processes.  Three essential features of an algorithmic process are substrate neutrality, underlying mindlessness, and guaranteed results.  

1) Substrate Neutrality

           Substrate neutrality refers to the inherent irrelevance of materials to the process of the algorithm.  Dennett illustrates this through the metaphor of long division, which is the same regardless of the materials used (i.e. pens, pencils, markers, calculators, etc.) and regardless of the symbols used to convey the process:  Sixteen divided by four is four, 16 / 4 = 4, seize divisé par quatre est quatre.  The power of the algorithm is in its logical structure.  The material aspects are irrelevant so long as the process is preserved.  

2) Underlying Mindlessness 

Regardless of the degree of complexity of the algorithm’s results, each individual step - including transitional steps - must be inherently mindless (Dennett, 1995 p. 51).  Consider the problem of speciation:  Do organisms belong to different species when they cannot interbreed or only when they choose not to?  Wolves, dogs and coyotes are considered different species but regularly interbreed producing viable offspring whereas Chihuahuas and Great Danes are members of the same species (Canis lupus familiaris), but could not reproduce without substantial human intervention and are effectively reproductively isolated.    Reproductive isolation can occur with or without geographic isolation - allopatric and sympatric speciation, respectively.  A discontinuity in environments will eventually become mirrored by the useful genetic variations in two populations of a species.  These heritable differences would offer a distinct advantage in the differing environments, self-reinforcing through many generations until the two populations completely diverge into two separate species.   

This speciation event is in itself invisible due to its spatio-temporal properties.  That is to say, the gradual steps between species are so minute and gradual that a new species would be wholly unaware of its uniqueness, thusly making the speciation event identifiable only in retrospect.  Furthermore, the concept of species is an outdated linguistic construct from the Enlightenment.  Taxonomists from this era set about categorizing the natural world based on Aristotle’s theory of forms[1], establishing elaborate hierarchies detailing the grades of differences between species as major or minor, accidental or essential.  We must recognize that species exist only in the constructed nominal reality of conversation, otherwise this “essentialist urge” (Dennett, 1995, p. 39) to classify species by their form blinds us to their function:  each organism is another oblivious cog in the algorithmic machine of evolution.  “Whoever is lead to believe that species are mutable will do good service by conscientiously expressing his conviction; for only thus can the load of prejudice by which the subject is overwhelmed be removed” (Darwin, 1859, p. 482).  

3) Guaranteed Results

The tertiary algorithmic element present in the process of evolution is guaranteed results.  Think of the evolutionary algorithm as a fool-proof recipe.  If the instructions are followed and the conditions are met, a certain outcome is always assured.  It is important to remember that this algorithm does not exist innately for anything.  It is a recipe, an equation, a modality.  Much like a tournament bracket, an algorithm is applied to a set of competitors guaranteeing a single winner. 

Moreover, it is not a process for explicitly producing humans (Dennett, 1995).    Human consciousness is just one measure of evolutionary success.  Ants are superior to humans in a number of ways, dominating the planet in such a way that “makes human populations look like an evolutionary afterthought” (Johnson, 2001, p.73) with over 10, 000 known species spanning every landmass save Antarctica, Iceland, Greenland, and Polynesia. Proportionally, individual ants are significantly stronger than humans and though they lack our coveted forebrain, make use of an efficient but nuanced pheromone vocabulary as they make massive environmental impacts constructing mounds, foraging, and farming.  Ants alone compromise 30% of the Amazon’s biomass (Johnson, 2001) whose biodiversity includes a further 250, 000 known plant species and comprises only 40% of South America’s landmass (Narby, 1998).  Homo sapiens sapiens is only one, extremely ego-centric species in the eternal evolutionary tournament and there is only one rule in the biological algorithm:  Live long enough to reproduce.  

Inverting the Cosmic Pyramid

In truth, what Darwin discovered wasn’t a single algorithm but rather a series of related algorithms.  Limited by the technology and philosophies of his time, he had no real way of discerning their complex relationships to one another.  To understand how simple rules can lead to complex outcomes, programmer John Holland observed the similarities between Darwinian, DNA-based evolution and computer-programming.  A programmer establishes the parameters of an algorithm (i.e. the parameters of evolutionary fitness), usually through a series of conditional if-then-else statements.  

“The art of programming lay in figuring out how to construct the most efficient sequence of instructions, the sequence that would get the most done with the shortest amount of code – and with the least likelihood of crash.  Normally that was done using the raw intellectual firepower of the programmer’s mind” (Johnson, 2001 p.58).  

As in the previous illustration comparing DNA-based evolution to computer-programming, pre-Darwinian cosmologies assumed the existence of a prime mover, the programmer.  This model places a sentient god at the top of a cosmic pyramid of causality descending from this deity to complexity of mind, design, order, chaos, and finally entropying into nothingness.  However, advances in our understanding of molecular evolution have removed the philosophical necessity of primacy of mind, presenting a model of how complexity of design can emerge from nothingness (Dennett, 1995 p.65).  

"Once upon a time, there was no mind, and no meaning, and no error, and no function, and no reasons, and no life. Now all these wonderful things exist. It has to be possible to tell the story of how they all came to exist, and that story must pass, by subtle increments, from elements that manifestly lack the marvelous properties to elements that manifestly have them. There will have to be isthmuses of dubious or controversial or just plain unclassifiable intermediates. All these wonderful properties must have come into existence gradually by steps that are barely discernible even in retrospect" (Dennett, 1995).

The simplest observable version of the evolutionary algorithm is that of silicon based self-replicating crystals (Cairns-Smith, 1988).  

From Nothing Emerges Chaos

The prevailing cosmological model of the universe proposes that at the beginning of time, the universe and everything, there was a ‘big bang’, An initial expansion of matter and energy from nothing; the stardust of the cosmos.  

From Chaos Emerges Order

Eventually, the universe cooled enough to allow for the formation of subatomic particles, then atoms, then macromolecules.  In the same way that ultra-fine particles of clay will eventually form silicon crystals, macromolecules can be thought of as miniscule algorithms with minimal self-replicating abilities similar to a computer virus.  The macromolecules we are most familiar with are the carbon-based protein crystals of RNA and DNA.  Eventually, these chains of macromolecules will composed themselves into larger, crystalized structures through the cyclical, autocatalytic process of a hypercycle[2].  

From Order Emerges Design

From these hypercycles, single-celled organisms emerged, then multi-cellular organisms and sentient multi-cellular organisms.  Order and design differ in that order is mere regularity, the presence of patterns.  Design is the exploitation of order for a purpose.  Darwin’s theory of evolution indicates that order, given enough time, will produce design.  

From Design Emerges Mind

From this perspective, mind is an effect rather than the first cause of life, inverting the cosmic pyramid of Western intellectualism.  According to the widely accepted big-bang theory, from nothing emerged chaos, from chaos emerged order and from order, design.  This implies that from design emerged mind, but could deity emerge from our sentience?   To even begin to understand this question, we must recognize that, like Darwin, we are elevated and limited by our technological, scientific, and philosophical understanding of the universe, “abandon[ing] assumption to see the multiplicity of excellence, worth, and purpose that emerges from the mindless chaos” (Dennett, 1995 p.66). 

Emergence

The evolutionary algorithm, given enough time, produces emergent systems, defined by Steven Johnson through five fundamental principles.  1)  More is different.  2)  Ignorance is useful.  3) Encourage random encounters.  4)  Look for patterns in the signs.  5)  Pay attention to your neighbours.  

More is Different

           The principle more is different conveys a multiplicity of meaning, resonating its inherent sentiment.  Evolution, like any algorithmic process requires a “critical mass” (Johnson, 2001 p. 78) of participants –persons, ants, programs, etc. – in order to function. 3.5 billion years ago, life began and consisted of single-celled organisms.  For the next two billion years, billions upon billions of these prokaryotes reproduced in varying amalgamations, though only a fraction of these would have any lasting effect on evolutionary history.  One of these unicellular life forms would be the unsuspecting progenitor of the eukaryotic revolution (Dennett, 1995).           Emergent systems require not only a minimum quantity of participants, but a large variety of behavioural strategies.  Life as we know it and as experienced through the human condition is completely dependent on the actions of an eccentric bacterium “entering the rudimentary body of some other prokaryote” (Dennett, 1995, p.90) 1.4 billion years ago.   ­This unifying action endowed its progeny - nucleated cells - with the ability to better utilize their environments and combat entropy through physical processes including cellular respiration and photosynthesis.   This unique behavioural strategy enabled a second physical revolution in the emergence of multi-cellular organisms, approximately 700 million years ago.  From this point, the number of physical and behavioural survival strategies proliferated promptly, including the adaptation of sexual reproduction which allowed for increased flexibility in evolutionary design. The result of this is the myriad of species we coexist with today and the millions more than have extinguished in unviability.  The correlation of time and increased complexity of design indicates a strong likelihood of another biological revolution in the near future mirroring the exponential progress of human technology.

           Ecological Systems Theory.  However, viability can only be assessed within the ecological context of an organism.  This is best illustrated through ecological systems theory, pioneered by Urie Bronfenbrenner in an effort to framework human development.  This theory posits an individual interacts with their environment through five different systems:  micro, meso, exo, macro, and chrono.  

           Microsystem. The microsystem consists of interactions between the individual and their immediate surroundings including, in the case of Homo sapien, social surroundings (i.e. family, friends, peers) and cultural institutions (school, religious organisations, neighbourhood, etc.).      

           Mesosystem, Exosystem, and Macrosystem.  The mesosystem consists of interactions between microsystems.  To continue the comfortably species-centric human example, this would include interactions between an individual’s teachers, family, and peers.  While these interactions do not necessitate any action on the part of the individual, they are more likely to directly effect that particular individual’s environment.  Further, the exosystem consists of connections between mesosystems, how the choices of a banker effect the life of a baker and so on until we expand to the level of influence exerted by the macrosystem, defined loosely as the culture in which an individual lives.  These influences are pervading and long-lasting such as national identity, heritage, moral values, and cognitive techniques.  

           Chronosystem.  Finally, all these systems and the individual on which they act upon are subject to the chronosystem, the context within space-time.  This means that the viability of an organism is dependent on and subject to the sociohistorical circumstances of its environment (Bronfenbrenner, 1994).  Therefore, the diverse strategies an organism utilizes for survival and reproduction encompass divisive conflicts between short-term and long-term strategies, complex interactions between micro-motives and macro-behaviour (Johnson, 2001), and the inextricable relationship between the genome of an organism and its environment (Dennett, 1995).  

  Ignorance is Useful

           In processing this dizzying amount of information pertaining to a mere organism, it becomes swiftly self-evident the utility of ignorance.  Emergent systems become unwieldly if their individual parts become too complicated.  In the same way that the binary language of computers streamlines information processing, the simplicity of ant language enables effective communication and collaboration.  For example, the human brain is composed of approximately 100, 000, 000, 000 neurons, each relatively simple in design.  However, at any given time, the average neuron is in contacts with an estimated 1, 000 other neurons, communicating through a series of simple electrical impulses.  From these simple cells and simple behaviour emerges the vexing mystery of human consciousness (Goodenough, 1998).  In our intrinsic human hubris, we may be inclined to attribute technological innovations –artificial intelligence, genetic engineering, etc.-  to our clever consciousnesses, but we are not gods and CRISPR technology is not a miracle but rather a product of many slower, older evolutionary processes that brought our ancestors from inert matter to single celled organisms to eukaryotes to multicellular, sexually reproductive creatures conscious of their own awareness through a series of forced moves[3].  Furthermore, “individual agents capable of directly assessing the overall state of the system can be a real liability…  for the same reason that you don’t want one of the neurons in your brain to suddenly become sentient” (Johnson, 2001, p.78).

           The problem of the sentient neuron is illustrated by recent innovations in genetic engineering. We now have the power to edit our own DNA structure and therefore, the entire future of human evolution.  However, we have no ability to forecast the long term ramifications of even the most well intentioned genetic tinkering.  Prior to the invention of CRISPR technologies, the human race has committed atrocities against their own species through the deprivation, forced sterilization, and genocide of innumerable ‘sub-human’ populations since the dawning of civilization, now emboldened by the “greedy abuse of Darwinian reasoning” that allows a monolithic power to “deny the existence of real complexities, real phenomena.  By our own misguided efforts, we might indeed come to discard or destroy something valuable” (Dennett, 1995 p. 83).  Human beings are burdened with the unfortunate role of the sentient neuron by historical accident.  We are physically and mentally capable of editing, augmenting, or obliterating eons of evolutionary history from the face of the planet and in view of this daunting power, I believe it is essential to grip tightly to the utility of ignorance, articulated best by the evolutionary biologist Leslie Ogel, “Evolution is cleverer than you are” (Dennett, 1995 p. 74).  

Pay Attention to Your Neighbors

           The Subjective Scope.  Because emergent systems such as evolution function optimally with simple parts, it becomes essential to pay attention to your neighbours.  A complex system consists of multiple agents interacting dynamically in multiple ways, following local rules, and oblivious to any higher-level interactions.  A complex system is not considered emergent until local interactions result in discernible macro behaviour in space and/or time (Johnson, 2001).   For example, despite the title, the queen of an ant colony is not an authority figure but a highly specialized reproductive ant for producing larvae through asexual parthenogenesis.  Her progeny then feed and protect the queen because it is in their best evolutionary interests to do so.  The “matriarch doesn’t train her servants to protect her, evolution does” (Johnson, 2001, p. 31).  Similarly, there is no architect of the massive colonies constructed by our insectoid brethren; they are merely the result of countless local interactions just like the organic human cities of the earth like New York City or London.  And it is at the local level that we are confronted with the paradox of objectivity.  

           Paradox of Objectivity.  Anthropology is defined as the holistic study of the totality of human existence and as such, cannot be classified as a science.  This is primarily because while the anthropological sciences have adopted objective methodologies (particularly in the sub-fields of archaeology and physical anthropology), the employment of participant observation employed by cultural anthropologists is nothing less than a contradiction in terms.  A participant cannot be an objective observer and therefore, humans as members of the emergent system of evolution and endowed with human consciousness (an emergent system in-and-of itself) cannot objectively study the emergent system in which they are immersed.  The anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss acknowledged this deficit in human rationality:

“The human sciences are only sciences by way of a self-flattering imposture.  They run into an insurmountable limit, because the realities they aspire to understand are of the same order of complexity as the intellectual means they deploy.  Therefore there are incapable of mastering their object, and always will be” (Narby, 1998 p.14).  

Similar sentiments were expressed by renowned psychologist and mystic Carl Jung in his collection of observation and experimentation of psychic phenomenon, Synchronicity:  An Acausal Connecting Principle.  Jung argued that while western empiricism has benefitted the human race numerous ways, the veneration of rationality has become so engorged that the very methodology we employ to remain objective blinds us to the objective reality of the irrational processes in both our species and the world with which we interact.

           To illustrate, the natural sciences are concerned with statistical truths; that is to say, the most likely outcome of any given set of variables.  However, often the idealized concept of the normal curve overshadows the reality of outliers.  Improbability has never meant impossibility. Additionally, the experimental method relies on the observation of repeatable events.  This necessitates the exclusion of unrepeatable or unpredictable (i.e. random) events.  Furthermore, recent discoveries of quantum physics and quantum neuroscience indicate the validity of these statistical truths wanes.  “In the realm of very small quantities prediction becomes uncertain, if not impossible, because very small quantities no longer behave in accordance with the known natural laws” (Jung, 2012 p.5).  Therefore, to observe the objective reality of an emergent system, we must embrace the essentiality of the subjective interactions of the local level: the more micro the interaction, the more macro the event.

Encourage Random Encounters

           Quantum neuroscience and Agency.  Quantum neuroscience superlatively illustrates the essentiality of random[4] encounters to emergent systems such as consciousness, evolution, or artificial intelligence.  According to Newtonian physics, humans are merely mechanical automatons:  every thought, every physical action, every emotion was predetermined by your genetic code before you were born and all interactions are mindless, meaningless, and causally redundant.  However, classical physics have been proven “fundamentally false for three-quarters of a century” (Schwartz 2005) and therefore, we must look at cognitive action at the cellular level from a quantum perspective.  

           At the cellular level, neurons convey electro-chemical messages along synapses via calcium ion channels little more than a nanometre in diameter.  The release of these electro-chemical messages is dependent on the action potential of any given neuron.  Action potential is the amount of electric polarization necessary to stimulate a chemical response.

“When an action potential travelling along a never fibre reaches a nerve terminal, a host of ion channels open.  Calcium ions enter through these channels into the interior of the terminal.  These ions migrate from the channel exits to release sites or vesicles containing neurotransmitter molecules… [which are] dumped into the synaptic cleft… [influencing] the tendencies of that neighbouring neuron to fire” (Schwartz 2005).

           This means that at each of the human brain’s 100 billion neurons, there is a state of quantum-splitting between clear yes-or-no, fire-or-do-not-fire action response at each one of the trillions of axonal terminals.  The “locations and velocities of… calcium ions are simultaneously unknowable in principle” so at any point in time, the brain is in a constant state of quantum indeterminacy as described by Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle (Schwartz 2005).  Scientists have attempted to study this bifurcation point from a macroscopic perspective by studying behavioural responses with clear cut choices such as the fight-or-flight response, but such efforts invariably lead back to Heisenburg’s main contribution to physics, “replac[ing] what classic physics took to be a ‘being’ with a ‘doing’” (Schwartz 2005).  Therefore, the neurological basis of an agent consciousness remains unknown  and due to the cyclical nature of consciousness and its interacting systems, the cause of free choice and free will dissolves in an ecology of confounds, is impossible to determine, and is rationally unknowable in principle.  

           Discovery versus Creation.  Tangentially, random encounters and happy accidents are the unacknowledged basis for many of humanities greatest discoveries.  While theories are tested by empiricism, most discoveries are just that – discoveries.  Not creation. While the capricious Newton discovered gravity, it sadly unleashes its wrath on all things, sentient of its existence or not.   The empirical sciences force the question of nature, demanding definite answers to specific problems through open-source data and ethical experimentation.  There is no room for ego in science.  If you want to achieve immortality, go into the arts. “Shakespeare’s plays are Shakespeare’s plays and no one else’s.  Scientific discoveries, by contrast, belong – ultimately to no one in particular” (Dennett, 1995 p.140).  Creation and other god-like attributes of humanity belong to the arts, though ultimately the irrational, unpredictable that we attempt to sequester from science are essential.  While “genius isn’t needed to discover” (Dennett, 1995 p.141), randomness enables the essential spark of curiosity in pursuit of scientific discovery.

           In light of this, the western scientific perspective, however methodical, can never acclaim to discover a holistic Truth without overcoming their “psychologically biased partial view which misses out all those by no means unimportant aspects that cannot be grasped statistically” (Jung, 2012 p.6) including consciousness itself, dependent on improbable – i.e. random, interactions for essential functioning.  We must acknowledge the significance of both the rational and irrational aspects of existence, the “marriage of chance and necessity” (Dennett, 1995 p.129) on which our biological functioning hinges, “that mix of order and anarchy” (Johnson, 2001 p.38) which we have begun to call emergent behaviour as we become better at discerning the patterns within emergent systems.  

Look for Patterns

           This leads us to Johnson’s final tenant of emergent systems:  Look for patterns.  Despite ants’ limited vocabulary and apparent lack of syntactical structure, “they rely heavily on patterns in the semiochemicals they detect” (Johnson, 2001 p.70) similarly to how the human brain strengthens neural connections between frequently associated neurons.  Indeed, humanity’s most boastful evolutionary achievement is language, achievable via our advanced forebrain, specialized for pattern detection. In ways similar to how pattern detection allows ants to circulate metainformation through the colony mind, “signs about signs” (Johnson, 2001 p.79) humans have developed the peculiar ability of metacognition, thinking about thinking.  

           Language.  Furthering this point, some developmental psychologists are of the avid opinion that humans are not capable of true thought until they acquire language. This idea is based on the work of soviet psychologist Lev Vygotsky.  Vygotsky noticed a deep connection between speech and the development of mental concepts. For example, young children, though capable of problem-solving such a putting together a puzzle, must be verbally prompted by their caretakers to look for the next step, essentially showing the child how to think through language. With enough verbal assistance from their caretakers, children eventually develop an internalized speech to organize their thought-processes autonomously (Radiolab, 2010).  Not only is language essential to thought-as-we-know-it, but it is “the primary medium of culture”[5] (Dennett, 1995 p.338).  

           Culture.  Culture is difficult for even anthropologists to define, but essentially culture is humanity’s redefinition of the evolutionary fitness landscape.  Because various means of communication enable individuals to share information and behavioural techniques and our neural plasticity allows for the incorporation of design improvements through reinforcement learning, “cultural evolution operates orders of magnitude faster than genetic evolution” (Dennett, 1995 p.339), increasing the potential adaptability of Homo sapiens through innovation, transmission, and preservation of ideas.  While intellectuals of varying disciplines have struggled to understand and categorize patterns of self-organization in their respective fields, anthropologists’ attempts at cross-cultural analysis of the human condition has slowly accreted cross-disciplinary data converging on emergent patterns of thought and behaviours. Johnson’s final element of emergent systems is echoed in anthropologist Jeremy Narby’s ethnographic account of modern ayahuasqueros, The Cosmic Serpent:  DNA and the Origins of Knowledge, “Look at the form” (Narby, 1998 p.45).  

           A Brief Ethnography.  In 1985, Narby visited the community of Quirishari of the Peruvian Amazon’s Pichis Valley to obtain field experience for his doctorate at Standford studying Ashaninca ecology.  When asked about the local foliage, the people of this community would refer him to the ayahuasqueros, the shamans, as their source of knowledge.  After about four months, he left Quirishari for the nearby village of Cajonari, seven miles on foot into the Amazonian rainforest.  The twenty-five year old anthropologist eagerly conversed with the people about the differences between Ashaninca agricultural practices and western industrialized processes of food production.[6]  When Narby asked as to the origin of these practices, he was again referenced to the ayahuasqueros and the hallucinogenic brew from which their name is derived, ayahuasca[7].  

           Ayahuasca Experience.  His informant, Ruperto invited him to sample the ancient brew with him.  Narby and two other people took ayahuasca under Ruperto’s direction.  After injesting the bitter liquid, he was immediately nauseated and soon flooded with a series of colourful hallucinations featuring two fifty-foot boa constrictors.  In his hallucinatory experience, the massive reptiles spoke to him “without words” (Narby, 1998 p7).  Excerpts from his account of the hallucinatory experience are as follows:

They explain to me that I am just a human being. I feel my mind crack, and in the fissures, I see the bottomless arrogance of my presuppositions. It is profoundly true that I am just a human being, and, most of the time, I have the impression of understanding everything, whereas here I find myself in a more powerful reality that I do not understand at all and that, in my arrogance, I did not even suspect existed. I feel like crying in view of the enormity of these revelations. Then it dawns on me that this self-pity is a part of my arrogance. I feel so ashamed that I no longer dare feel ashamed…

I relate this experience with words on paper.  But at the time, language itself seemed inadequate.  I tried to name what I was seeing, but mostly words would not stick to images.  This was distressing, as if my last link to “reality” had been severed.  Reality itself seemed to be no more than a distant one-dimensional memory.  I managed nonetheless to understand my feelings, such as ‘poor little human being who has lost his language and feels sorry for himself (Narby, 1998 p. 7).  

After his hallucinogenic experience, Narby researched the Ashaninca cosmology which defines these massive snakes as “invisible spirits called ‘manikari,’ literally ‘those who are hidden’” (Narby, 1998 p.25). The Ashaninca consider them ancestral spirits, living outside the constraints of time.  It is from these spirits that the ayahuasqueros cite their knowledge of medicinal plants.  Ruperto reffered to ayahuasca as “the television of the forest.  You can see images and learn things” (Narby, 1998 p.4). The Ashaninca are insistent that ayahuasca told them how to make ayahuasca.  This seems counterintuitive to western logic.  How could a plant communicate with a human being?  And furthermore, how could they convey which amoungst the 80, 000 species available to the Ashaninca people would work as a momoamine oxidase inhibitor?  “Look at the form” the ayahuasqueros instructed.  As an example he indicated the nearby jargon plant.  On it, were a pair of white hooks resembling snake fangs. This plant could cure the potentially fatal bite of the fer-de-lance snake.  “We give thanks to these hooks, because it is the sign that nature gives” (Narby, 1998 p.29).  Suspending disbelief – like a good anthropologist – Narby pursued this line of questioning further by mirroring the cognitive approach of the ayahuasqueros, rationalizing “that it is useful to take people and their practices seriously” (Narby, 1998 p.17).  

           Shamanic Perspectives in Science.  The shamans could be said to see no important differences between metaphor and reality, all speaking a “secret language” learnt from the manikari through imitation, echoing Vygotsky’s theories of thought and language.  Furthermore, the speak of a “a vine, a rope, a spiral staircase, a twisted rope ladder – that connects heaven and earth” (Narby , 1998 p.17) which acts as a transit between the spiritual and physical realms and the axis of reality, connecting all the different levels of existence.  Sometimes, this axis is conveyed in the form of a tree, mirroring the Tree of Life plotting speciation across time.  Narby’s specialized pattern-detecting frontal lobe began to connect the idea of the dual cosmic serpents with the prominent symbol of western medicine - the Rod of Asclepius, with the double-helix of DNA, the twisting tower[8] comprised of the very language of life.  The motif of two entwined serpents is present cross-culturally, representing the male and female principle, twin[9] creator mythology present in many South American cultures and the infinitude of binary oppositions.  Just as the people of the Amazon acknowledge the existence of a cosmic, rainbow boa and a black anaconda, Aztec art depicts winged serpents, Aboriginal myths describe the “Rainbow Snake, whose powers were symbolized by quartz crystals” (Narby, 1998 p.64).  Narby even found in his research a Mesopotamian seal picturing a human-esque figure enthroned between double helixes dating to c. 2200 BCE.  Flying serpents – aka dragons – represent the union of opposing principles, “symbolized most clearly by Ouroboros” (Narby , 1998 p.83), the self-consuming serpent-dragon, locked in sexual union with itself.  Like DNA, the cosmic serpent creates through transformation, changing while remaining the same.  In numerous myths, a giant serpent guards the tree of knowledge or the tree of life[10].  

           More parallels were made between known western ideas and reality as experienced by the Ashanican people.  They believe that any soul, living or dead is present in the air. “That means that you do not see them, but they are there, like radiowaves.  Once you turn on the radio, you can pick them up.  It’s like that with souls[11]” (Narby, 1998 p.31).  Considering how incredibly present DNA is in our ecosystem, this becomes more likely the longer we entertain the hypothetical.  Quartz crystals are known for their particularly regular arrangement of molecules, meaning their atoms vibrate at a very stable frequency.  This makes it an excellent transmitter and receiver, which is why it is used frequently in the manufacturing of radios, watches, and electronics.  Similarly, the four DNA bases are hexagonal – like quartz.  DNA is technically a crystal.  In the early 1980’s a team of research scientists demonstrated the cells of all living things emit photons at “approximately 100 units per second and per square centimetre…  DNA was the source of this photon emission” (Narby, 1998 p.126).  While this emission is relatively weak, equivalent to the light emitted by a candle from 10 kilometers, the signal was incredibly coherent. This discovery gives weight to the many myths depicting spirits as “beings of pure light” (Narby, 1998 p.129). As we still do not understand consciousness, or agency, is it so implausible that all beings sharing DNA could communicate on some level via photon emissions?  Are there times where we must suspend our disbelief to see and understand?  “What if it were true that nature speaks in signs and that the secret to understanding its language consists in noticing similarities in shape or form” (Narby, 1998 p.45)?  This is, in fact, what the final principle of emergence indicates.  Only by looking at patterns from multiple perspectives simultaneously can we grasp the whole of an emergent system.

           Misconceptions about the Fourth Dimension.  Most emergent systems are dynamic, “rarely settling in on a single, frozen shape; they form patterns in time as well as space” (Johnson, 2001 p.20).  Homo sapien is a fourth-dimensionally challenged species. We are continuous beings experiencing time linearly, but if we were able to take an objectively non-linear perspective in the fourth dimension, it would likely appear more like a complex web or sphere.  As a consequence of this perspective, many people assume time is a strict progression of cause and effect, but this determinism has already been rejected by the findings of quantum neuroscience.  

           Conscious beings are agent, and therefore causally indeterminable.  In the western world, time is conceptualized in three states – past, present, and future - based on our ability to interact with the fourth dimension.  We know we existed in the past because we can draw on memories of experiences and emotions.  However, our ability to interact with the past is limited to reminiscence.  We cannot effect events of the past or communicate with persons in their past states.  Conversely, we can influence the future by our present actions, but we have no way of knowing for certain what the consequences of our actions may be. We are chained to NOW, all powerful and ignorant of a future in a constant state of flux.  

           Additionally, people assume generally that time is experienced the same for everyone at all times, but this is incompatible with Einstein’s theory of relativity.  Time dilation is the difference in elapsed time between two events as measured and observed by two agents moving relative to each other.  This is easily testable by the lay person.  If two persons with the same watches synchronize ­their watches and at a later time, compare watches, the times presented will be slightly different.  This is not because the watch is broken, but because time was literally experienced differently by the two persons due to differing variables in their space/time existences (Radiolab).  Time isn’t constant, but light is.

Conclusions

Entertaining the Hypothetical

The Ashaninca describe the maninkari as beings of light existing outside of time and with enough practice in the shamanic arts and cognitive techniques, humans can interact with these beings through selective altered states and pattern recognition over time.  What if fourth dimensional beings like this do exist?  From the timeless view of the fourth dimension, the accretion of thought, built from the ground up like towers in linear time, would become collapsible - telescopes of coherent pattern through a narrow disciple from an objectively timeless perspective.   Who are you to these hypothetical omniscient beings?

           Who are you?  It only takes about five years for your body to replace every since atom in your body, so physically, you are nothing more than a series of incoming atoms temporarily “making your shape and then leaving” (Stevens, 2013). Our perceptions are subject to our physical capability to perceive, varying from person to person, but these perceptions are encoded into our memories through the filters of mental heuristics biasing subjectively important information from unimportant. Furthermore, memory is subject to further cognitive editing each time we revisit a memory or idea, and therefore, our autobiographical memory is as impermanent as physical existence.  The rapidly developing field of memetics casts doubts on our thoughts being our own.    A human stripped of its body and its mind is a spirit, an agent being of pure light.  And light is a constant.

           What does that mean? The convergent patterns in various disciplines indicate that each person, each living being on earth is an aspect of one or many collective consciousnesses emergent and/or emerging in fourth dimensional timespace.  Evolution is an emergent system which has produced (among other things) the emergent system of human consciousness which in turn is in the midst of developing the emergent technology of artificial intelligence.  Matter and energy are essentially interchangeable.  Therefore, we can apply the principles of thermodynamics to the algorithm of evolution, order being measured in terms of heat differences between regions in space time, and entropy referring to the hypothesized heat death of the universe.  According to the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, the universe is exponentially unwinding out of order and into disorder.  However, after the discovery of biophotons, research indicated that life - as a result of the emergent system of evolution - “is a systematic reversal of entropy, and intelligence creates structures and energy differences against” (Dennett, 1995 p.69) the gradual heat death of the universe.  The entire process of biological evolution, when viewed from the holistic perspective of an emergent system can be seen as a fundamental defiance of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, a phenomenon running contrary to the larger trend of entropy throughout the universe (Dennett, 1995).

           Where do we go from here?  Defiance of entropy does not mean we are immune to its effects.  Earth is a closed system.  We have limited resources for nurturing life on our planet and the on-going climate crisis has been addressed apathetically by leaders either blinded by nationalistic egoism or crippled by miscommunication.  Considering that the current state of global political theatre and climate crisis is a result of capitalist driven industrialization, we are – as a species – in the midst of a Malthusian Crunch[12] and if we do not work together to find sustainable, creative solutions to our energy crises we will be unable to adapt effectively to already existing alterations in our ecosystem.  If we cannot utilize these emergent systems and work together globally as a species, it is likely that we face an impending collapse of civilization, if not the self-extermination of our entire species.  

           Conversely, if we can encourage our culture to be reflective and nurturing of emergent principles – more is different, ignorance is useful (or small is beautiful, if you are a Schumacher fan), encourage random encounters, pay attention to your neighbours, and look for patterns in the signs - our potential is literally limitless.  We can be anything we want.  

The sky calls to us.  If we do not destroy ourselves, we will one day venture to the stars.  Carl Sagan

[1] For many years, ‘species’ was the standard translation for the Greek eidos – idea, form (Dennett, 1995).  

[2] A hypercycle is a model of organization in which three or more elements are present in which aspects of “type A can enhance the prospects of hunks of B, which in turn promote the well-being of C, which, completing the loop permit the replication of more fragments of A, and so forth” (Dennett, 2001, p.160).  

[3] This is the hypothetical imperative:  If you want to live, you have to eat.  Like the structure of an if-then statement in programming, the hypothetical imperative illustrates how on the closed system of planet earth, all organisms are subject to the second law of thermodynamics whereby cost is always an object of survival.  When there is only one way to stave off disaster (particularly in chess), it is called a ‘forced move.’  

[4] The definition of ‘random’ is elusive and ever-changing.  For the purposes of this paper the essential meaning intended is the mathematical definition meaning without order, unpredictable, or chaotic.  

[5] That is not to say the only medium of culture.  Human beings are not the only organisms to display signs of culture and communication.  We are, however, the only species that has used their culture to “transform not only our planet but the very process of design development that created us” (Dennett, 1995 p.338) via genetic engineering technologies such as CRISPR.

[6] “[D]espite their apparent disorderliness, indigenous gardens were polycultural masterpieces containing up to seventy different plant species that were mixed chaotically, but never innocently” (Narby, 1998 p.4).  

[7] Ayahuasca is a brew comprised of two plants at specific preportions, boiled together for hours according to preparations handed down through generations of shamans for millennia.  The first plant’s active ingredient is dimethyltryptamine, a hallucinogenic substance found endogenously in the human brain.  This substance “has no effect when swallowed, because a stomach enzyme called monoamine oxidase blocks it” (Narby, 1998 p.10).  However, the second plant inhibits the activation of these stomach enzymes, thus allowing the hallucinogenic interaction with the brain.  

 [9] Coatl means both ‘serpent’ and ‘twin.’  

 [11] For the purpose of coherency, assume the definition of ‘soul’ to be equivalent to ‘consciousness.’

[12] A forced return to subsistent levels of existence.

References:

Bronfenbrenner, U. (1994). Ecological models of human development. Readings on the development of children, 2, 37-43.

Cairns-Smith, A. G. (1988). The chemistry of materials for artificial Darwinian systems. International Reviews in Physical Chemistry, 7(3), 209-250.

Dennett, D. C. (1995). Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks.

Goodenough, U. (1998). Sacred Depths of Nature. Oxford University Press.

Johnson, S. (2001). Emergence: The connected lives of ants, brains, cities, and software. New York: Scribner.

Jung, C. G., & Hull, R. F. (2012). Synchronicity: An Acausal Connecting Principle (From Volume 8 of the Collected Works of C.G. Jung, Bollingen Series)). Princeton University Press.

Narby, J. (1998). The cosmic serpent: DNA and the origins of knowledge. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam.

Radiolab. (2010, September 7). Voices in Your Head. Retrieved December 6, 2016, from http://www.radiolab.org/story/93554-voices-in-your-head/

Schwartz, J., Stapp, H., & Beauregard, M. (2005). Quantum physics in neuroscience and psychology: A neurophysical model of mind-brain interaction. Philosophical Transactions: Biological Sciences, 360(1458), 1309-1327. Retrieved August 24, 2015, from JSTOR.

Stevens, M. (2013). Why Do We Feel Nostalgia? Retrieved December 09, 2016, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=coGfGmOeLjE

 Further Reading:

Silberman, S. (2015). Neurotribes: The legacy of autism and the future of neurodiversity. New York: Avery, an imprint of Penguin Random House.

Vonnegut, K. (1985). Galápagos: A novel. New York, NY: Delacorte Press/Seymour Lawrence.

[totalhermione-blog]

LSD-Assisted Psychotherapy and Dissociative Disorders:  Project Proposal

           In 1943, Swiss chemist Albert Hofmann was experimenting with compounds based on the ergot fungus in an attempt to create a viable treatment for respiratory and circulatory ailments.  Hofmann accidentally inhaled an unknown amount of the twenty-fifth of these compounds and found himself subject to a dizzying array of perceptual distortions, illusions and hallucinations.  In order to confirm that these effects were the result of this accidental inhalation, Hofmann ingested 250µg of the newly synthesized lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) in his laboratory before walking home.  As the compound took effect, he began to experience fear, paranoia, visual distortions and hallucinations.  His sense of perception disintegrated with his sense of self and was “seized by a dreadful fear of going insane” (Carhart-Harris, Kaelen, Bolstridge, Williams, Williams, Underwood, & Nutt, 2016).  As unappealling as these effects sound, upon awaking the next day, Hofmann found himself possessed with heightened mental acuity, positive affect, and a general sense of well-being.

           By 1948, LSD was being distributed by Sandoz Pharmaceuticals for use in analytical psychotherapy and experimental research on psychosis (Carhart-Harries, et al. 2016).  Since this time, over one thousand studies with over forty-thousand subjects have been published with promising therapeutic effects for numerous psychiatric conditions including anxiety  disorders, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), depression, sexual dysfunction, alcohol addiction –the effect size of which was “as great as that of any other treatment of alcoholism developed since” (Nut, 2004 p.209)-, chronic migraines, and cluster headaches (Vollenweider & Kometer, 2010).  To date however, there have been no studies on the effectiveness of LSD-assisted therapy on trauma-related disorders such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and dissociative identity disorder (DID).  

Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD)

           Therapeutic dosages of LSD are between 100 – 250 µg per session with effects lasting six to nine hours (Gasser, Kirchner, & Passie, 2014). While the acute effects of LSD may include phenomenon resembling psychosis such paranoid or delusional thinking, many participants in LSD-assisted psychotherapies also report positive, even blissful experiences (Carhart-Harries, et al. 2016).  Additionally, the short-term effects of LSD mimic many of the positive symptoms of schizophrenia including illusions and hallucinations (Vollenweider & Kometer, 2010).  Less controversial are the long-term effects of LSD-assisted psychotherapy. Replicated studies have demonstrated increased trait openness and optimism in participants two weeks after LSD-assisted psychotherapy.  These effects were shown to be relatively stable in the mid-to-long term, improving clients’ psychological well-being through increased openness to experience and optimism.  “[H]igh dispositional optimism is associated with a range of positive health and socio-economic outcomes” (Carhart-Harries, et al. 2016, p.7).  

           While there are multiple working hypotheses for how these effects are achieved, all reflect the serotogenic properties of LSD, particularly affecting the fronto-limbic 5-HT receptors.  The principle function of these receptors is equally obscure, though their stimulation enhances aspects of learning and cognition including flexibility, imagination, and creative thinking.  Creative thinking is supplementarily associated with positive affect.  Stimulation of these receptors is also associated with enhanced glutamatergic transmission in the prefrontal cortex.  This results in increased neurogenesis and neuroplasticity, particularly in portions of the brain associated with personality and decision-making (Gasser et al. 2014).  Conversely, deficient stimulation of these receptors has been linked to depressive behaviours such as pessimistic or dysfunctional attitudes, neuroticism, and suicide (Carhart-Harries, et al. 2016).  Moreover, froto-limbic 5-HT receptor density is correlated with anxiety, difficulty coping with perceived stress, and increased negative response to chronic pain and short phastic pain stimuli (Vollenweider & Kometer, 2010).  These receptors have also been identified in the thalamus. It is hypothesized that hallucinogens like LSD assist the “downward regulation of prefrontal 5-HT receptor” (Gasser, et al. 2014, p.646) signals between the cortex, thalamus, and amygdala.  

           The serotogenic stimulation of these receptors facilitates glutamatergic activity resulting in reduced cognitive-emotional bias through strengthening and pruning neural pathways in the prefrontal cortex as well as re-balancing disequilibrium between the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala.  However, studies imply that 5-HT receptor stimulation may be a necessary, but not sufficient condition to elicit therapeutic effects (Gasser, et al. 2014).  Combining therapeutic, periodic dosages of LSD with empirically verified talk-therapy methods such as cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), which posses the demonstrable ability to alter neural pathways in these structures (Vollenweider & Kometer, 2010), is advised in order to maximize the benefits of LSD and minimize the acute negative effects:  fear, paranoia, impaired attention (Carhart-Harries, et al. 2016).  This reflects the neuroplasticity hypothesis of psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy, the essence of which is that drug induced experienced and its integration with the psyche are crucially dependent on the therapeutic process as the mechanism by which neuroplasticity may assist in the neural changes essential to behavioral changes (Vollenweider & Kometer, 2010).

Dissociative Symptoms in Trauma-Related Disorders

           Dissociation may be defined as an extreme form of state-dependent memory reinforced by trauma and avoidance of trauma-related stimuli. Furthermore, dissociative disorders should be conceptualized as a “spectrum of adaptations to trauma” (Van der Kolk, Pelcovitz, Roth, & Mandel, 1996), manifesting in various combinations of symptomology over the course of an individual’s life-span rather than discrete disorders (i.e. dissociative identity disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, acute stress disorder, reactive attachment disorder, derealization, etc).  These symptoms may include behavioral and subjective experiences ranging from the extreme of inter-personality amnesia observed in dissociative identity disorder (DID), to the subtle somatoform “disturbances of sensation, movement and other bodily functions” (Nijenhuis, Van Dyck, Spinhoven, van der Hart, Chatrou, Vanderlinden, & Moene, 1999), to the re-experiencing symptoms or ‘flashbacks’ associated with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Hopper, Frewen, Van der Kolk, & Lanius, 2007). Formerly known as multiple-personality disorder, the DSM-V recognizes DID as a trauma-induced disruption of autobiographical self wherein a single individual may identify as a different person or persons depending on environmental factors.  Dissociation of self is an extreme adaption to chronic, severe trauma (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).  Personality is generally conceptualized as a consistent “repertoire of behavior imparted by an organized set of contingencies” across the span of an individual’s lifespan, susceptible to change “within limits imposed by the environment” and genetic predispositions (Phelps, 2001).  

           While individual variations in patterns of activation have been documented in dissociative responses, fMRI scans have confirmed structural correlations between dissociative symptoms and increased activity in the left medial prefrontal cortex (commonly associated with personality) and right superior temporal cortex (involved in social and emotional processing between prefrontal cortex and amygdala) as well as inhibition of limbic activity (Hopper et al. 2007).  Furthermore, PET scans of dissociative individuals have confirmed the functional differences between core personality states (sometimes called neutral personality state or host self) and alters (sometimes referenced as traumatic personality states), allowing for a better understanding of how individuals with DID can experience multiple autobiographical selves while maintaining a “core self” (Reinders, Nijenhuis, Paans, Korf, Willemsen, & Den Boer, 2003).  The core self is defined as the personality consciously present in the individual for the greatest portion of an average day (Sar, Unal, & Ozturk, 2007). Research utilizing fMRI technology has shown indication of bilateral hippocampal inhibition during switches between host self and alters. These findings have been confirmed by studies utilizing regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) imaging that have observed “hypoperfusion areas in orbitofrontal regions bilaterally” in individuals with DID but not in non-psychiatric control populations (Sar, et al. 2007).  

           Additionally, volumetric studies have found diminished structural size of amydgala (relating to emotion and fight-or-flight response) and hippocampus (memory processing) in dissociative subjects (Sar, et al. 2007).  This convergent data has lead neuropsychologists to suspect the orbitofrontal cortex (responsible for protective/inhibitory behaviors, emotional regulation, development of self, and experience-dependent maturation) may be a convergent pathway for divergent variety of trauma related symptomology including trauma-related flashbacks, affect dysregulation, switching between one personality state to another, and consequential interpersonality amnesia (Sar, et al. 2007).  Interpersonality amnesia describes the phenomenon during which an individual with DID may experience events in one personality state, but memories of events in one personality state are not retrievable by their other selves (Eich, et al. 1997). “Symptoms of disruption of identity may be reported as well as observed, and that gaps in the recall of events may occur for everyday and not just traumatic events” (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). Conversely, researchers have also observed the phenomenon of interpersonality priming, defined as memory retention within, but not between personality states, suggesting the mechanisms of state-dependent memory (Eich, et al. 1997).  This is best conceptualized as the subjective difference between remembering (an associative, emotionally valance, and autobiographically contextual state of memory) and knowing (a familiarity of content without context of acquisition of knowledge) (Huntjens, Peters, Woertman, van der Hart, & Postma, 2007). Studies have only observed interpersonality priming in implicit memory tasks involving problem solving while interpersonality amnesia occurs in tasks dependent on free association such as word-stem completion.  This is likely due to the emotive associative cognitive biases present in both word connotations and personality development.    

           The current DSM designates post-traumatic stress disorder as a subtype of trauma and stressor related disorders with four symptom clusters: re-experiencing, avoidance, persistent negative alterations in cognition and mood, and arousal.  While extreme trauma is a criterion for dissociative disorders, and PTSD presents with somatic and psychological dissociation, DID is not included in the classification of trauma disorders (American Psychiatric Association, 2013),  despite data indicating that “all four of these symptom clusters were highly interrelated” and individuals may experience a “spectrum of adaptations to trauma” rather than discrete reactions to stress (Van der Kolk et al. 1996). Researchers have found that “having a dissociative episode at the moment of trauma is the most significant long-term predictor of the ultimate development of PTSD” with dissociative symptoms being highly correlated with childhood trauma (Van der Kolk, et al. 1996). Additionally, approximately 80% of abused infants and children develop disorganized and disoriented attachment patterns.   While attachment disorders are classified as a subtype of trauma-induced disorder, early and prolonged childhood trauma was also highly correlated with diminished ability to “regulate the intensity of affective responses” (associated with both dissociative and bipolar affective disorders) and the “emergence of pathological self-regulatory behaviors” (such as the state-dependent memory associated with dissociated selves and/or the dissociative symptoms of manic or depressive episodes) (Van der Kolk, et al. 1996). Studies on dissociative identity disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and somatization disorders all confirm “that early interpersonal traumatization gives rise to more complex posttraumatic psychopathology than later interpersonal victimization” and that populations most likely to meet criteria for a dissociative disorder not otherwise specified (DDNOS) were those whose stressors began before the age of 14 (Van der Kolk, et al. 2005).  This high incidence of comorbidity and overlapping symptom clusters between bipolar affective disorders, dissociative disorders, and trauma-related disorders as well as the high reports of child abuse in individuals with mental illness without dissociative symptoms indicates a high likelihood that there is a spectrum of interrelated cognitive adaptive responses triggered by traumatic and/or neglectful environments and/or events in an individual’s personal history (Nijenhuis, et al. 1999).  

LSD-Assisted Psychotherapy in Trauma-related Disorders:

           The significant psychological effects of LSD in a therapeutic context can be divided into three categories:  cognitive experiences, psychodynamic experiences, and psychedelic peak experiences.  Trauma-related symptomology can be classified into four categories:  dissociative perception of self, somatic symptoms, re-experiencing of trauma, dysregulation of affect, and anxiety.  LSD enhances the cognitive experience of psychotherapy in trauma-related cases by increasing lucidity of thought, producing altered interpretations of meaning and relationships, broadened perspectives, and increased quantity of associations.  These cognitive enhancements are accompanied by increased sensory perception such as illusionary distortions in perceived objects, hallucinations, heightened mental imagery, accelerated thoughts, and synesthesia (Gasser, et al. 2014).  Aside from the obvious benefits of the nootropic effects of LSD, the synesthesia has particular interest for the treatment of trauma-related disorders.  Because dissociative symptoms are caused and exacerbated by state dependent memory, the synesthetic effects of LSD activate multiple pathways of the brain at once, theoretically enabling neural-connections to be made between the state-dependent ‘islands’ of associative thought.  This could enable clients to maintain a more integrated sense of self for longer periods of time between therapeutic sessions.  

           The psychodynamic process is facilitated by LSD through the emergence and disclosure of previously undisclosed or unintegrated information into conscious awareness including reliving past experiences with intensified affectivity (Gasser, et al. 2014).  As the majority of traumatic disorders present with avoidance and unbidden re-experiencing of the traumatic event(s), this facilitated re-experiencing of unpleasant or even state-dependently inaccessible experiences in a safe, therapeutic environment could increase understanding on the part of both the therapist and client, especially in view of the client’s psychedelically augmented ability to view these traumatic past experiences with multiple interpretations and associations.  

           Studies have implicated the psychedelic peak experience of LSD as a kind of “super reinforcement” (Gasser, et al. 2014, p.10) for behavioral and cognitive changes.  This process has been titled depatterning of the default-mode network (DMN).  The DMN refers to the highly organized brain regions involved in normal conscious processes, essential for mood regulation and high level constructs like the subjective self.  LSD enhances and edits heuristic processes and facilitates the transformation of basic concepts of self through the paradoxical experience of ego dissolution, a “dream-like alteration of consciousness” (Gasser, et al. 2014, p.2) perceived with full awareness of self and hypernesiac consolidation.  Increased self-referential ability associated with the psychedelic peak experience would be invaluable to an individual suffering from DID.  

Method

I hypothesize that LSD-assisted psychotherapy would reduce dissociative symptoms in trauma-related disorders and increase subjective well-being in participants.  This is a single-factor, multi-level, between subjects design.  

I. Participants:  For this study, 60 participants should meet clinical criteria for dissociative identity disorder or post-traumatic stress disorder presenting with dissociative symptoms.  As combat trauma is more common in males and sexual assault trauma is more common in females, counterbalancing measures should be employed in assigning participants in equal ratios of sex to each of the three experimental conditions.  The first condition consists of a 20 person waiting-list control group.  The second condition will periodically receive a micro-dose of 50µ LSD.  The third group will periodically receive therapeutic does of 100µ.        

II. Apparatus and materials:    120 micro-doses of LSD at 50µg each.  120 therapeutic doses of LSD at 100µg each.  Environment for this study should be in a cool, comfortable room with live plants, multiple types of comfortable seating options (i.e. couches, chairs, pillows, hammock, etc.), and a table with two chairs.   Additionally, for the consolidation of media, this study will require a year’s subscription to one Spotify and one Netflix account.  Art-supplies will be shared amongst participants.  Each participant will be assigned a notebook/sketchbook for visual and verbal free-form reports.  These notebooks will be kept by the researchers.  The environment should be equipped with a small stock of filtered water to alleviate dehydrating side-effects of LSD as well as ‘serotonin-rich’ foods (pineapple, salmon, nuts, cheese, etc.) to eat during longer therapeutic sessions.  Additionally, emergency medical staff should be employed during 12-hour sessions in the unlikely event of an adverse physical reaction to LSD.  

Dissociative symptom survey.  Well-being survey.  

III. Procedure:  Prior to the commencement of the study and on the first session of each month, all participants will fill out self-report inventories for dissociative symptoms and overall well-being.  For a period of six months, all 60 participants will attend individual hourly psychotherapy sessions one per week for three weeks. On the fourth week of each month, participants will attend an individual 12-hour session.  During the weekly sessions, the primary goal of the therapist is developing rapport, assessing the subjective struggles of the client, discussing concepts of self, and preparing for the monthly extended sessions. Preparations should include discussions of media the client wishes to share with the therapist during the extended sessions.  For each monthly session, participants and therapist will agree on an hour of musical media, three hours of visual media (such as film or television), art supplies, and other sublimitive mediums of communication deemed important to the client’s sense of self.  

           During the monthly extended sessions, participants begin each session with questions or concerns with the therapist.  When an individual participant is ready they will either receive no dosage (waiting list control group), a micro-dosage (50µ), or a therapeutic dosage (100 µ).  For the first hour, participants engage in mindfulness mediation practices and deep breathing.  In the second hour, the therapist should put on the client’s selected hour of music. During this time, neither the client nor the therapist should communicate verbally, but continue mindful observation of the material presented by the participant.  In the third hour, the therapist engage in discussion with the participant as to what cognitions, memories and feeling they experienced and how the subject matter they chose relates to their sense of self.   For the next three hours, participant and therapist should engage in visual media in a causal ‘living-room’ manner. At the conclusion of this portion of the session, participants are asked to describe their subjective experience through two mediums:  an art piece and a short paragraph.  Allow an hour for this section.  During the eighth hour, therapist and participant should engage in CBT, pinpointing counterproductive behaviours and thoughts in the participant’s psyche in a collaborative effort.  

           The remaining four hours should be spent at the joint discretion of the therapist and participant engaging in further media, continuing discussion, meditating, or engaging in sublimative processes such as writing or visual art. If the participant wishes to leave at this point, they may given that they are not a threat to self and others and have a safe way to get home from the study location.  At the end of the study, participants again take a self-report inventory measuring dissociative symptoms and overall well-being in addition to a one-page free-form response on their experiences in the study.  All waiting list participants will be offered an opportunity for six months psychotherapy at either dosage.  

Data analysis

           As the population of this study consists of three dosage groups from a particular population matching to balance for type of trauma, a Friedman test is recommended, though regression analysis may also be a useful method of analysis.  Further, as we are dealing psychoactive substances, a significance level of p<.01 is preferable.    

Results

           If the data analysis allows for rejecting the null hypothesis and subjects in the LSD groups show increased well-being and a reduction in dissociative symptoms, this study will help to decrease the social stigma associated with psychedelic medicine in the Western scientific community and increase the availability of these treatments to a neglected population, particularly treatment-resistant PTSD.  Furthermore, this will add to the immense body of literature on psychedelic research established prior to the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs in 1961 at which 184 state signatories signed an international treaty prohibiting production, trade, and use of specific drugs – including LSD – without a special license. If this study fails to reject the null, it may contribute to the erroneous belief that LSD, like marijuana, has less medical value than heroin or cocaine and should be classified under the category of a Schedule I controlled substance, reinforcing the de facto ban and censorship of psychedelic research.  

           Should a Type I error be committed in this study an researchers incorrectly reject the null it could be due to participant and/or researcher bias aiming to reanimate psychedelic research.  What is more likely is a Type II error, failing to reject the null. Should this happen, it is likely due to difficulties in operationalizing subjective states such as dissociation or ‘self.’  

Discussion

           This study has a number of serious limitations. Firstly, the subject population is extremely rare.  Dissociative Identity Disorder is diagnosed in fewer than 2% of Americans and PTSD is diagnosed in only 3.5% of Americans of which only 35% could be considered severe enough to present with dissociative symptoms (NAIM, 2016).  It would be a massive undertaking to find 60 participants willing to participate in a 6 month intensive study.  Furthermore, within this population it would be difficult to test the effectiveness of this treatment across different types of trauma. The inability to control for type of trauma may present itself as a confound in executing this study.  

           Additionally, this study is incredibly expensive.  While the media accounts, supplies, and comfy room are relatively inexpensive, compensating a team of psychoanalysts for six months of therapy for sixty participants (and a further six months for the 20 waiting list participants) would be astronomical.  However, more daunting are the funds necessary to purchase enough LSD for monthly doses in the experimental groups of 50µ and 100µ.  There are almost no legal production facilities anywhere in the world because of the difficulties in obtaining manufacturing licenses for Schedule I substances.  Politicians in most countries continue to obstruct progress in psychedelic research by purporting the cyclical logic that these studies should be banned on the grounds that these substances are illegal, thus reinforcing the status quo despite the majority of empirical evidence showing no rational basis for the legal status of these substances.  Therefore, the legal obtainment of LSD will cost approximately 100 times the street prices of these substances (Nutt, 2004).  

           Finally, because of the subjective nature of both the psychedelic experience and dissociative disorders, the majority of this data is dependent on subject self-report and may be subject to participant biases.  Extensions of this study may attempt to employ neural-imaging techniques such as the fMRI to provide more objective documentation of physical changes corresponding with participant cognitive experience.  

           Despite these limitations and expenses, this study is valuable in upholding multiple tenants of the APA Code of Ethics.  In supporting this study, the scientific community can kindle a resistance to the senseless censorship of psychedelic substances with the potential to alleviate the suffering of disadvantaged populations suffering needlessly and as psychologists, we are bound to “promote accuracy, honesty and truthfulness in the science, teaching and practice of psychology” and “recognize that fairness and justice entitle all persons to access to and benefit from the contributions of psychology” (APA, 2013).  

 REFERENCES:

 American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Highlights of Changes from DSM-IV-TR to DSM-5. Retrieved March 30, 2016, from http://www.dsm5.org/documents/changes from dsm-iv-tr to dsm-5.pdf

Carhart-Harris, R. L., Kaelen, M., Bolstridge, M., Williams, T. M., Williams, L. T., Underwood, R., ... & Nutt, D. J. (2016). The paradoxical psychological effects of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD). Psychological medicine, 46(07), 1379-1390.

Carhart-Harris, R. L., Muthukumaraswamy, S., Roseman, L., Kaelen, M., Droog, W., Murphy, K., ... & Leech, R. (2016). Neural correlates of the LSD experience revealed by multimodal neuroimaging. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 201518377.

Eich, E., Macaulay, D., Loewenstein, R. J., & Dihle, P. H. (1997). Memory, amnesia, and dissociative identity disorder. Psychological Science, 417-422.

Gasser, P., Kirchner, K., & Passie, T. (2014). LSD-assisted psychotherapy for anxiety associated with a life-threatening disease: A qualitative study of acute and sustained subjective effects. Journal of Psychopharmacology, 0269881114555249.

Hopper, J. W., Frewen, P. A., Van der Kolk, B. A., & Lanius, R. A. (2007). Neural correlates of reexperiencing, avoidance, and dissociation in PTSD: Symptom dimensions and emotion dysregulation in responses to script‐driven trauma imagery. Journal of traumatic stress, 20(5), 713-725.

Huntjens, R. J., Peters, M. L., Woertman, L., van der Hart, O., & Postma, A. (2007). Memory transfer for emotionally valenced words between identities in dissociative identity disorder. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 45(4), 775-789.

Nijenhuis, E. R., Spinhoven, P., van Dyck, R., van der Hart, O., & Vanderlinden, J. (1998). Degree of somatoform and psychological dissociation in dissociative disorder is correlated with reported trauma.Journal of traumatic stress, 11(4), 711-730.

Nijenhuis, E. R., Van Dyck, R., Spinhoven, P., van der Hart, O., Chatrou, M., Vanderlinden, J., & Moene, F. (1999). Somatoform dissociation discriminates among diagnostic categories over and above general psychopathology.Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 33(4), 511-520.

Nutt, D. (2014). Mind‐altering drugs and research: from presumptive prejudice to a Neuroscientific Enlightenment?. EMBO reports, 15(3), 208-211.

Phelps, B. J. (2001). Personality, personality “theory” and dissociative identity disorder: What behavior analysis can contribute and clarify. The Behavior Analyst Today, 2(4), 325.

Reinders, A. A. T. S., Nijenhuis, E. R. S., Paans, A. M. J., Korf, J., Willemsen, A. T. M., & Den Boer, J. A. (2003). One brain, two selves.Neuroimage, 20(4), 2119-2125.

Sar, V., Unal, S. N., & Ozturk, E. (2007). Frontal and occipital perfusion changes in dissociative identity disorder. Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging,156(3), 217-223.

Sessa, B. (2012). Shaping the renaissance of psychedelic research. The Lancet, 380(9838), 200-201.

Van der Kolk, B. A., Pelcovitz, D., Roth, S., & Mandel, F. S. (1996). Dissociation, somatization, and affect dysregulation. The American journal of psychiatry, 153(7), 83.

Van der Kolk, B. A., Roth, S., Pelcovitz, D., Sunday, S., & Spinazzola, J. (2005). Disorders of extreme stress: The empirical foundation of a complex adaptation to trauma. Journal of traumatic stress, 18(5), 389-399.

Vollenweider, F. X., & Kometer, M. (2010). The neurobiology of psychedelic drugs: implications for the treatment of mood disorders. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 11(9), 642-651.

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). (n.d.). Retrieved November 19, 2016, from http://www.neighborhoodhealthcenter.org/uploads/3/9/2/4/3924297/posttraumatic_stress_disorder.pdf

 Dissociative Disorders (DID). (n.d.). Retrieved November 19, 2016, from https://www.nami.org/Learn-More/Mental-Health-Conditions/Dissociative-Disorders

#LSD psychedelicresearch dissociativedisorders DID PTSD trauma psychotherapy self

[totalhermione-blog]

Dissociation and Trauma-Related Spectrum Disorders

      Dissociation appears to be an extreme form of state-dependent memory reinforced by trauma and avoidance of trauma-related stimuli. Furthermore, dissociative disorders should be conceptualized as a “spectrum of adaptations to trauma” (Van der Kolk, Pelcovitz, Roth, & Mandel, 1996), manifesting in various combinations of symptomology over the course of an individual’s life-span rather than discrete disorders (i.e. dissociative identity disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, acute stress disorder, reactive attachment disorder, derealization, etc).  These symptoms may include behavioral and subjective experiences ranging from the extreme of inter-personality amnesia observed in dissociative identity disorder (DID), to the subtle somatoform “disturbances of sensation, movement and other bodily functions” (Nijenhuis, Van Dyck, Spinhoven, van der Hart, Chatrou, Vanderlinden, & Moene, 1999), to the re-experiencing symptoms or ‘flashbacks’ associated with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Hopper, Frewen, Van der Kolk, & Lanius, 2007). Finally, some researchers have even speculated dissociative mechanisms may play a part in personality changes observed in affective shifts between manic and depressive states associated with bipolar spectrum disorders (Eich, Macaulay, Loewenstein, & Dihle, 1997).

           Due to the extremely subjective nature of dissociation, it is inherently difficult to research and further complicated by the small population available for participation in research.  Additionally, until the innovation of technologies such as the fMRI and rACC scans, dissociation was not fully recognized as a cognitive mechanism by western medical models and was often conflated with other disorders such as schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, and sociopathy (Hopper et al. 2007).  However, while the mechanisms at play may be disputable, there is clear consensus on what causes dissociation in its multi-faceted spectrum of symptoms: trauma.

           Research on dissociation has largely been focused on the population suffering from dissociative identity disorder (DID).  Formerly known as multiple-personality disorder, the DSM-V recognizes DID as a trauma-induced disruption of autobiographical self wherein a single individual may identify as a different person or persons depending on environmental factors.  Dissociation of self is an extreme adaption to chronic, severe trauma (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).  The most intriguing theory of the causes of self-dissociation comes from the behaviorist perspective. Personality is generally conceptualized as a consistent “repertoire of behavior imparted by an organized set of contingencies” across the span of an individual’s lifespan, susceptible to change “within limits imposed by the environment” and genetic predispositions (Phelps, 2001).  From this perspective, every individual is considered to possess multiple personalities or behavioral selves associated with a set of discriminative, situational stimuli.  The diversity and volume of personalities within a particular individual is determined by their unique personal histories including the environmental stimuli responsible for shaping behaviour through “reinforcement and punishment contingencies” (Phelps, 2001).  

           Individuals with DID diagnoses report environments consistently earlier, more chronic trauma perpetrated by multiple abusers when compared to other research populations.  Emotional neglect and abuse as well as pervasive physical and sexual trauma have been proven to be significant predictors of somatoform and psychological dissociation, bodily threats being greater predictors than emotional abuse or neglect (Nijenhuis, Spinhoven, van Dyck, van der Hart, & Vanderlinden, 1998).  Persons with DID most often experienced neglect and/or abuse throughout their childhood and into adolesence.  Children naturally engage in problem solving though games and role playing, aka ‘pretending’.  This normal behavior may be pathologically reinforced in abusive and neglectful environments when it becomes adaptive to become ‘someone else.’  For instance, in an environment where abuse is unavoidable, the child learns to become ’someone else’ “who needn’t remember the trauma” (Phelps, 2001).  This allows the child to “distance” themselves from their abuse while attempting to maintain some semblance of a normative relationship with the abuser - usually a parent, relative, or caregiver the child is dependent on for survival (Phelps, 2001).  

           As this behavior is reinforced by physical, sexual, and emotional abuse/neglect in a “pathogenic family structure” (Nijenhuis, et, al. 1998), so too are the neural connections reinforced until these ‘pretending’ states develop into psychobiological state-dependent personalities. Consequentially, these individuals develop inter-personality dissociative amnesia (Phelps, 2001). While individual variations in patterns of activation have been documented in dissociative responses, fMRI scans have confirmed structural correlations between dissociative symptoms and increased activity in the left medial prefrontal cortex (commonly associated with personality) and right superior temporal cortex (involved in social and emotional processing between prefrontal cortex and amygdala) as well as inhibition of limbic activity (Hopper et al. 2007).  Furthermore, PET scans of dissociative individuals have confirmed the functional differences between core personality states (sometimes called neutral personality state or host self) and alters (sometimes referenced as traumatic personality states), allowing for a better understanding of how individuals with DID can experience multiple autobiographical selves while maintaining a “core self” (Reinders, Nijenhuis, Paans, Korf, Willemsen, & Den Boer,  2003).  

           The core self is defined as the personality consciously present in the individual for the greatest portion of an average day (Sar, Unal, & Ozturk, 2007). Research utilizing fMRI technology has shown indication of bilateral hippocampal inhibition during switches between host self and alters.  These findings have been confirmed by studies utilizing regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) imaging that have observed “hypoperfusion areas in orbitofrontal regions bilaterally” in individuals with DID but not in non-psychiatric control populations (Sar, et al. 2007).  Additionally, volumetric studies have found diminished structural size of amydgala (relating to emotion and fight-or-flight response) and hippocampus (memory processing) in dissociative subjects (Sar, et al. 2007).  This convergent data has lead neuropsychologists to suspect the orbitofrontal cortex (responsible for protective/inhibitory behaviors, emotional regulation, development of self, and experience-dependent maturation) may be a convergent pathway for divergent variety of trauma related symptomology including trauma-related flashbacks, affect dysregulation, switching between one personality state to another, and consequential interpersonality amnesia (Sar, et al. 2007).              

           Interpersonality amnesia describes the phenomenon during which an individual with DID may experience events in one personality state, but memories of events in one personality state are not retrievable by their other selves (Eich, et al. 1997). “Symptoms of disruption of identity may be reported as well as observed, and that gaps in the recall of events may occur for everyday and not just traumatic events” (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).  Conversely, researchers have also observed the phenomenon of interpersonality priming, defined as memory retention within, but not between personality states, suggesting the mechanisms of state-dependent memory (Eich, et al. 1997).  This is best conceptualized as the subjective difference between remembering (an associative, emotionally valance, and autobiographically contextual state of memory) and knowing (a familiarity of content without context of acquisition of knowledge) (Huntjens, Peters, Woertman, van der Hart, & Postma, 2007). Studies have only observed interpersonality priming in implicit memory tasks involving problem solving while interpersonality amnesia occurs in tasks dependent on free association such as word-stem completion.  This is likely due to the emotive associative biases present in both word connotations and personality development.  Therefore, the extent of interpersonality amnesia is dependent on the “extent to which encoding and retrieval processes are susceptible to personality specific factors” (Eich, et al. 1997), i.e. emotional responses to environmental stimuli. This also reinforces the idea that dissociation may occur in bipolar-spectrum disorders and other affective disturbances that may affect memory.  

           While the earliest research on dissociation started with Janet’s observations of hysterics in collaboration with Freud and Charcot, the majority of trauma research has been conducted on war-related trauma starting with the ‘shell-shocked’ veterans of WWI.  This condition was renamed ‘combat stress reaction’ in WWII, and then designated as PTSD in the DSM-III in response to the influx of veterans following the Vietnam War (Van der Kolk, Pelcovitz, Roth, & Mandel, 1996).  The current DSM designates post-traumatic stress disorder as a subtype of trauma and stressor related disorders with four symptom clusters:  re-experiencing, avoidance, persistent negative alterations in cognition and mood, and arousal.  

           While extreme trauma is a criterion for dissociative disorders and PTSD presents with somatic and psychological dissociation, dissociative identity disorder is not included in the classification of trauma disorders (American Psychiatric Association, 2013).  despite data indicating that “all four of these symptom clusters were highly interrelated” and individuals may experience a “spectrum of adaptations to trauma” rather than discrete reactions to stress (Van der Kolk et al. 1996).  Data from the DSM-IV field trials for PTSD has indicated that like DID, individuals suffering from post-traumatic stress experience less severe symptoms if the victimization occurs in adulthood than in childhood (Van der Kolk, et al. 1996).  Researchers have found that “having a dissociative episode at the moment of trauma is the most significant long-term predictor of the ultimate development of PTSD” with dissociative symptoms being highly correlated with childhood trauma (Van der Kolk, et al. 1996).  Additionally, approximately 80% of abused infants and children develop disorganized and disoriented attachment patterns.   While attachment disorders are classified as a subtype of trauma-induced disorder, early and prolonged childhood trauma was also highly correlated with diminished ability to “regulate the intensity of affective responses” (associated with both dissociative and bipolar affective disorders) and the “emergence of pathological self-regulatory behaviors” (such as the state-dependent memory associated with dissociated selves and dissociative symptoms of manic or depressive episodes) (Van der Kolk, et al. 1996).  

           Finally, somatoform dissociative symptoms including the inability to “identify emotional valence of physiological states” (often accompanied by amnesia and unexplainable somatic complaints) have been highly correlated with both affective dysregulation and dissociative symptoms (Van der Kolk, et al. 1996).  Other symptoms frequently reported by participants in the DSM-IV field trial included dysregulation of affect and impulses, attention or consciousness, self-perception, perception of perpetrator of abuse, relations with others, somatization, and cognitive schemas (Van der Kolk, Roth, Pelcovitz, Sunday, & Spinazzola, 2005). Furthermore, the avoidant and re-experiencing symptomology present in PTSD is reflected in the behaviours of individuals with DID who, experiencing issues with recall during different personality states, may be reinforced by avoidance of stimuli that may trigger a dissociative response (Phelps, 2001)

           Studies on dissociative identity disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and somatization disorders all confirm “that early interpersonal traumatization gives rise to more complex posttraumatic psychopathology than later interpersonal victimization” and that populations most likely to meet criteria for a dissociative disorder not otherwise specified (DDNOS) were those whose stressors began before the age of 14 (Van der Kolk, et al. 2005).  This high incidence of comorbidity and overlapping symptom clusters between bipolar affective disorders, dissociative disorders, and trauma-related disorders as well as the high reports of child abuse in individuals with mental illness without dissociative symptoms indicates a high likelihood that there is a spectrum of interrelated cognitive adaptive responses triggered by traumatic and/or neglectful environments and/or events in an individual’s personal history (Nijenhuis, et al. 1999).  

           Due to the essential nature of research on dissociation, particularly DID, retrospective studies are limited by the accuracy of recall of the subjects.  Numerous studies have shown that memory is unreliable in non-pathological brains and “memory disturbances and denial symptoms” that epitomize the symptomology of DID may influence studies with unique and largely unavoidable form of participant bias (Nijenhuis, et al. 1998).   However, the “corroboration or disproval of a (part of a) traumatic memory does not necessarily verify or falsify other recollections and it has become practice in the research to, whenever a participant indicated doubt in the validity of a traumatic memory, rate trauma as absent (Nijenhuis, et al. 1998).  

           Moreover, the population from which research samples are drawn are understandably (and thankfully) small (Reinders, et al. 2003).  Dissociative disorders are rarely diagnosed in the UK, France, or Russia and no cases of DID have ever been reported in Japan.  Meanwhile, reported cases of this DDNOS have “occurred almost exclusively in North America” (Phelps 2001).   Additionally, researchers hoping to do brain-imaging studies on dissociative alters are further limited to subjects with the self-discipline and ability (usually developed through years of therapeutic treatment) to preform “self-initiated and self-controlled switches between one of their neutral and one of their traumatic personality state[s]” (Reinders et al. 2003).  Most individuals suffering from dissociative spectrum disorders have little control over dissociation of self.

           In addition to sample size, the populations studied in connection to dissociative disorders are questionable.  Traditionally, trauma-related disorders have focused on combat veterans making it difficult to generalize the results of studies, and only recently has attention been paid to the traumatic experiences of women and children victimized by sexual and domestic abuse (Van der Kolk et al. 1996). Newer research has included previously marginalized or over-looked populations including rape victims, victims of childhood/spousal domestic abuse, concentration camp survivors (Van der Kolk et al. 2005), and individuals suffering from motor-accident related PTSD Hopper et al. 2007)in an attempt to get a broader understanding of dissociation and trauma-related psychopathology.

           Finally, studies on dissociation are threatened by both subject and research bias.  It is possible that disturbances in autobiographical memory associated with dissociation are the result of “disturbance in meta-memory functioning...” i.e. knowledge, belief and expectations surrounding feelings about memory and experiential retrieval (Huntjens, et al. 2007) reinforced by clinicians, partially because the disorder is only apparent when an individual with DID has presented as both the core self and at least one alter, and partially because of researchers’ archetypal enthusiasm at encountering such an exceptional presentation of abnormal behaviours may work to reinforce the psychopathology under analysis (Phelps, 2001).  

           Because research psychologist must not only be concerned with accurately describing, predicting, and explaining behavioral phenomenon, we must ask ourselves how this information may be applied to influence people’s lives in a positive­ way, encouraging agency and dignity of individuals and what direction research may take next. Forty years after the ethical quagmire that was the MK-Ultra trials and the prohibition of the psychedelic drug LSD, a recent renaissance in psychedelic research involving the Hefter Research Institute, Beckly Foundation, and John Hopkins University, among others, has yielded some promising, if surprising, data (Senesa, 2012).  

           Research from the 1940’s through the 1960’s consisted largely of self-report surveys and electroencephalographic studies.  From these studies, our limited understanding of LSD indicates that while the drug as a high affinity for a variety of neurotransmitters, it seems most psychological effects, including self-reported synesthesia and a sense of well-being or contentment, are “mediated by serotonin 2A” receptor agonsism (Carhart-Harris, Muthukumaraswamy, Roseman, Kaelen, Droog, Murphy, & Leech, 2016).  Synesthesia, a muddling of senses such as seemingly ‘tasting sound’ or ‘hearing colour,’ is frequently reported by individuals under the influence of LSD and recent innovations in technology have allowed neuropsychological researchers to better understand the mechanisms behind this ‘crossing-wires’ of sensory perceptions.  Multiple studies using multimodal neuroimaging have shown individuals under the influence of LSD have increased activation in multiple, previously compartmentalized, discretely functioning parts of the brain.  Furthermore, the drug has been shown to amplify neurogenesis as well as increase the number and strength of connections between existing neurons in healthy populations (Carhart-Harris, et al. 2016).  

           If LSD has been shown to connect discretely functioning parts of the brain, I propose it could be used in populations suffering from dissociative symptomology to help integrate their sense of self and well-being.  As synesthesia in healthy populations may produce odd sensations of mixed sensory perceptions, it seems likely that individuals suffering from a fractured sense of self may be able to use this drug to experience a more integrated sense of self and strengthen neural connections between their discreet identities, disconnections between emotion and somatic feedback, etc.  While psychological research must look to the future optimistically, we must also be cautious.  Psychedelic compounds have a convoluted history in Western research and these potent psychotropics have been shown to have the “capacity to cause harm,” particularly in populations with a predisposition to psychosis, but with more research on suitable dosages and appropriate attention to the mindset and environment of the treatment populations, I believe the therapeutic use of psychedelics, particularly LSD, could greatly help individuals suffering from dissociative/trauma-related spectrum disorders (Senesa, 2012).  

References:

American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Highlights of Changes from DSM-IV-TR to DSM-5. Retrieved March 30, 2016, from http://www.dsm5.org/documents/changes from dsm-iv-tr to dsm-5.pdf

Carhart-Harris, R. L., Muthukumaraswamy, S., Roseman, L., Kaelen, M., Droog, W., Murphy, K., ... & Leech, R. (2016). Neural correlates of the LSD experience revealed by multimodal neuroimaging. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 201518377.

Eich, E., Macaulay, D., Loewenstein, R. J., & Dihle, P. H. (1997). Memory, amnesia, and dissociative identity disorder. Psychological Science, 417-422.

Hopper, J. W., Frewen, P. A., Van der Kolk, B. A., & Lanius, R. A. (2007). Neural correlates of reexperiencing, avoidance, and dissociation in PTSD: Symptom dimensions and emotion dysregulation in responses to script‐driven trauma imagery. Journal of traumatic stress, 20(5), 713-725.

Huntjens, R. J., Peters, M. L., Woertman, L., van der Hart, O., & Postma, A. (2007). Memory transfer for emotionally valenced words between identities in dissociative identity disorder. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 45(4), 775-789.

Nijenhuis, E. R., Spinhoven, P., van Dyck, R., van der Hart, O., & Vanderlinden, J. (1998). Degree of somatoform and psychological dissociation in dissociative disorder is correlated with reported trauma.Journal of traumatic stress, 11(4), 711-730.

Nijenhuis, E. R., Van Dyck, R., Spinhoven, P., van der Hart, O., Chatrou, M., Vanderlinden, J., & Moene, F. (1999). Somatoform dissociation discriminates among diagnostic categories over and above general psychopathology.Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 33(4), 511-520.

Phelps, B. J. (2001). Personality, personality “theory” and dissociative identity disorder: What behavior analysis can contribute and clarify. The Behavior Analyst Today, 2(4), 325.

Reinders, A. A. T. S., Nijenhuis, E. R. S., Paans, A. M. J., Korf, J., Willemsen, A. T. M., & Den Boer, J. A. (2003). One brain, two selves.Neuroimage, 20(4), 2119-2125.

Sar, V., Unal, S. N., & Ozturk, E. (2007). Frontal and occipital perfusion changes in dissociative identity disorder. Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging,156(3), 217-223.

Sessa, B. (2012). Shaping the renaissance of psychedelic research. The Lancet, 380(9838), 200-201.

Van der Kolk, B. A., Pelcovitz, D., Roth, S., & Mandel, F. S. (1996). Dissociation, somatization, and affect dysregulation. The American journal of psychiatry, 153(7), 83.

Van der Kolk, B. A., Roth, S., Pelcovitz, D., Sunday, S., & Spinazzola, J. (2005). Disorders of extreme stress: The empirical foundation of a complex adaptation to trauma. Journal of traumatic stress, 18(5), 389-399.

#dissociation dissociativeidentitydisorder PTSD rape abuse trauma multiplepersonalities DSM5 LSD psychedelics statedependentmemory

[totalhermione-blog]

Book Review:  Josef Joffe’s “The Myth of America’s Decline”

     Upon my initial immersion in Josef Joffe’s The Myth of America’s Decline:  Politics, Economics and a Half Century of False Prophecies, I was appalled by the author’s blatant use of blindly patriotic, ethnocentrically patriarchal post-enlightenment language claiming America’s global supremacy both as a model of government and as the pinnacle of culture with colourful neologisms and buzzwords.  However, upon further reflection and some grievously taxing mental gymnastics, I realized that while the author’s language may reflect an abrasive, if not abusive relationship with the English language and his recklessly masculine cognitive schemas may alienate less tenacious readers, his thesis is logically sound:  Declinism is an essential mechanism to the continued functioning of human civilization. And in the brave new globalist world blearily and wearily emerging from the power struggles of the past, declinism may be the keystone to saving not simply civilization, not simply our species, but our entire ecological existence.  “The prophet wants to be wrong” (60).

     Reciting the glossy war-time propaganda like jingles, Joffe approaches American military conflicts with sickeningly pro-American bias, describing the Cuban Missile Crisis as an example of “strategic and conventional superiority” because it revealed the “true distribution of power” “without a shot being fired” (8).  While President Kennedy’s diplomacy in this situation was undeniably impressive and many American innovations have been beneficial not only to its citizens but the entire world, Joffe fails to recognize America’s influence in creating those very volatile situations he takes such pride in his countrymen’s expert diffusing.  

     Furthermore, Joffe fails to define his terms, never explicitly defining what he means by “power”, convention, or “superiority” (8).  One can assume, however, that Joseph Joffe subscribes to the realist perspective of power being largely determined by military strength, secondly by economic resourcefulness, and influenced by education. I feel comfortable making this assumption because of how voraciously he valorizes Enlightenment principles such as the free market economy, the importance of freedom of religion, and Western rationalism including an ideal “autonom[ous]” (134) self.  Further, Joffe views the United States as a “bastion” of liberal “democracy” wherein citizens are afforded “freedom of inquiry, participation” and “accountability” (134).  

     Western rationality is equated with empirical “’hard’ [phallic] science” (202), a “systematic search for knowledge” (134) that emphasizes a separation of reason and faith.  This rationalism Joffe so dogmatically dictates is not reflected in his writing.  In the section Challengers and Champions, Joffe boasts of America’s adamant avoidance of imposing a national religion.  He further claims that because of this clear distinction between faith and reason, America is, again, better than current governments as well as past civilizations such as the Roman Empire. However, the author fails to realize that because of national efforts to maintain a “dichotomy” (135) between church and state, America has, through continuous cultural and military conquest, “impose an American order” (216) on others, dismissing their systems of knowledge as lesser or inadequate in comparison to the  shoulders of western giants such as Newton, Darwin, and Oppenhiemer.

     These principles of what constitutes rational thought are generally accompanied by a heady dose of Hobbesian philosophy, viewing the natural state of humanity as inherently violent.  On an individual level, this manifests through the existential issue of differentiation between self and other and the inevitability of objectifying the ‘other.’  Western intellectual theory, through Cartesian deduction, developed an ideal sense of the rational human self as an Anglo-Saxon, masculine entity.  That which is self cannot be ‘other’ so everything that was not white, masculine, Western, or from the northern hemisphere became the ‘other’, “the four corners of the earth” became objects to be “conquer[ed]” by the imperial west (133).  

     As a consequence of this hierarchical worldview, the self-subscribed realist fears the ‘other’, anticipating “damnation” for their “hubris”(7) in attempting to impose.  Western society has approached the problem of the other largely through instituting barriers of violence.  These barriers may be literal, such the development of military technology for conquest and/or protection.  However, like his stereotypical economists, Joffe “hedge[s]” his bets, and through a series of what at first appear to be contradictions, and “bold[ly]” (130) confronts the face of a new global world both economically and through different definitions of power by investigating, if not embracing, the “other hand” (130).

     Globalism is by no means new.  The West has traded with the East for centuries.  From the seventeenth to the nineteenth century, the British Empire employed the “state capitalism” that enabled the East India Company to amass “its own army and fleet” (139).  However, the capital economic theory birthed in the Industrial Revolution is nearing its final conclusion.  The American exploitation of natural resources and objectifying persons as means of production rather than ends in themselves is, like cancer, self-defeating.  Joffe calls for a “’managed’ or ‘organized’ capitalism” like that which “has been fabulously successful in lifting East Asian nations from poverty after World War II” such as the reformed capitalism employed by Japan(139).  Unfortunately, Joffe contradicts himself once more when he addresses the economic theory of Ezra Vogel’s Japan as Number One which claimed “Japan would overtake the United States by 1990” (131).  Joffe claims, “It didn’t” (131).  If the socialist reforms applied to capitalism in Japan are necessary to an increasingly interconnected global world, why hasn’t Japan “overtake[n]” (131) the United States?  

     Again, by what standard is he claiming this?  Perhaps “America [has] grown ‘soft and complacent’” (1) if American authors cannot be bothered to say what they mean rather than blathering totalities.  The United States of America is by no means ‘number one’ but neither is it the worst country in the world.  Realists are less ‘real’ than they give themselves credit for, and reflectively idealists are equally impractical.  

     The Enlightenment and its Athenian brain-child, America have made fantastic contributions to the global community.  “[T]he United States… invented the world’s first system of universal public education” (Joffe, p.173), but just because we “invented” public education does not mean that we are still the best.  According the most recent data from the U.S. Department of Education, “[t]wenty-nine education systems” surpass the United States in mathematics including China and Japan.  “Twenty-two education systems” yield higher scientific literacy rates including China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam.  “Nineteen education systems” higher than the United States in reading proficiency including the Asian countries previously states as well as the majority of western and northern Europe.  The American military invented the internet and this invisible technology has completely changed interpersonal as well as nation-state relations by increasing connectivity and speed of communication, but according to the Akamai Q4 State of the Internet report from 2015, the United States is not even in the top ten in connectivity.  

     In my opinion, this book should be removed from the course materials.  Joffe contradicts himself too many times in too many ways to make a cognizant argument for Declinism.   For example, in attempting to acknowledge the large and lasting influences of ‘soft power’ or ‘power of the other’, Joffe states, “Economic growth could soar or falter tomorrow, but populations change slowly, because they are rooted in long-term trends and culture” (172).  However, he follows this alternative to military power with sexist bigotry, pointing to the reproductive realm of women as responsible for the “irreversible”, “steady decline in fertility” because of the recent feminine embrace of “education”, “labor”, and increasing social control over reproductive capacities (172).  He seems to imply that a [patriarchal] nation will lose power as individual women reclaim their unalienable rights denied by society.  This supposed loss of power through the subversive realm of reproduction results in a loss in “human capital” (173).  The soft power of the feminine realm is once again contorted to produce fodder for the murder-machine that is international power struggles, or as cheap labor for capitalist conquest of the bottom billion humans who fell through the cracks of swift globalization.  

     I don’t disagree that Declinism provides an essential spark, the inspiration to blaze new trails with innovative solutions to global problems such as nuclear proliferation, terrorism, global capitalism, the bottom billion, and the plethora of issues related to the internet.  Josef Joffe seems to have an entirely different idea of what constitutes a decline and cannot empirically back up his claims despite his adamant love affair with logical discourse.

#declinism patriarchy realsim idealism globalism existentialism feminism

[totalhermione-blog]

A Comparative Analysis of Libertarian and Cultural Radical Feminists: Gender, Sexuality, Porn, and BDSM

INTRODUCTION

    While liberal feminists focus on the acquisition of equal rights under law, radical feminists focus on “consciousness-raising,” increasing awareness of the patriarchal cultural constructions permeating every aspect of a women’s home, work, “sexual and reproductive lives” (Tong 1989).   Women’s “self-identity, self-respect, and self-esteem” are measured by masculine standards, reinforced by political, medical, and educational institutions (Tong 1989).  Furthermore, radical feminists believe the sexism perpetuated by patriarchal social schemas is the “most fundamental of all the oppressions human beings visit upon each other” (Tong 1989).  Historically, women were the first and largest population to be oppressed.  Sexism is the only oppression to be observed on a fundamentally global scale (Tong 1989). Radical feminists agree the imbalance of power between biological sexes is wrong, but this feminist faction schisms further between radical-libertarian feminists and radical-cultural feminists. These groups vary greatly on a number of issues, particularly those pertaining to gender, sexuality, and reproduction.  

GENDER

    Gender is defined by psychologists as the mental conception of an individual concerning social constructs of feminine and masculine.  These traits are reflected in culturally learned behaviours.  This mental schema of gender may or may not be congruent with an individual’s biological sex.  A person’s sex is their genetic make-up as male or female.  A male does not necessarily possess classically male genitals nor does a female necessarily develop traditionally female genitals, but one’s sex is determined by their sex chromosomes (XX, XY), but even something as empirically concrete as genetically based sexuality may vary in instances of intersex conditions such as Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome, Aphallia, Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia, Klinefelter Syndrome, etc.  Furthermore, one’s sexual preferences do not have to adhere to their gender, sex, or gender presentation – how feminine or masculine one behaves, dresses, and grooms oneself as compared to stereotypes perpetuated by a particular culture.  

    Considering such a varying spectrum of sexual aspects possible in an individual, it is rather unsurprising that radical-libertarian feminists encourage a strong sense of freedom in person’s expression of gender and sexuality, believing androgyny to be a state of human perfection.  Both women and men should be free to be “masculine as well as feminine… choos[ing] their gender roles and identities, mixing and matching them at will” (Tong 1989).  Gender research has shown “individuals… perform better on cognitive tasks when the masculinity and femininity in their self concepts is consistent with the gender stereotyping of the tasks,” meaning people who associate themselves with stereotypically masculine traits will perform better on stereotypically masculine tasks while stereotypically feminine individuals will perform better and culturally stereotyped feminine tasks (Signorella & Jamison 1986).  Consequentially, a psychologically androgynous person would have a more holistic worldview and a greater ability to adapt to new situations, communicate more versatilely, and solve problems more creatively and effectively than an individual with only masculine or only feminine traits, skills, and cognitive abilities.

    Conversely, radical-cultural feminists adhere to the archaic binary sexual system of male/masculinity female/femininity created and perpetuated by the patriarchy rather than psychology’s spectrum model of sexuality and gender, expressing the restrictive view that “it is better for [biological] women to be strictly female/feminine” (Tong 1989). Furthermore, some radical-cultural feminists wish to overthrow the patriarchy, replacing it with matriarchal institutions, “thereby putting themselves into opposition to… feminists advocating sexual equality” (Tong 1989).  This view seems as bigoted, short-sighted and naïve as the confining expectations of the patriarchy.  Sex and gender on a spectrum of femininity and masculinity should always be viewed as descriptive concepts rather than prescriptive rules for cognition and behavior. Human beings should embrace our similarities and celebrate our differences regardless of the spectrum of gender/sexual presentations possible by the mechanisms of evolution through the creation of an “androgynous society in which men and women are equals at every level of existence” (Tong 1989).    

 SEXUALITY

    Radical feminists differ on a number of subjects regarding sexuality including what sexual behaviours are and are not feminist, the appropriate number of sexual partners for a feminist, and the role of pornography in women’s lives.  Radical libertarians believe sexuality is a many faceted experience and that individuals should be able to engage in any sexual activity they choose with whomever they choose so long as the activities are safe (do not inflict any lasting physical or psychological damage to the parties involved), sane (sexual activity has been weighed on its benefits and drawbacks in a rational and informed manner) and consensual (all parties have communicated needs and boundaries necessary for informed sexual consent.)  This idea follows John Stuart Mill’s Pleasure Principle, maximizing pleasure for all parties and minimizing pain through “polymorphous, perverse sex” (Tong 1989). Naturally, one may refer to the mental catalogue of Utilitarianism and remember sex and other pleasures of the body are considered lesser to those of a self-actualized individual (i.e. empathy, compassion), but as Maslow demonstrated in his theory of hierarchical needs, individuals’ unique sexual, security, and belonging needs must be met before an individual may develop their mental and empathetic selves.  “Patriarchal forces [deprive] women [and men] of bona fide passions” by the instituting prescriptions for appropriate sexual behavior rather than allowing rational individuals to decide how best to meet their own needs (Tong 1989).  

    Conversely, radical-cultural feminists believe women can only reach their full sexual potential through heterosexual, vanilla sex between long-term monogamous partners, emphasizing traditionally feminine sexual traits of “intimacy” and “emotional involvement” over patriarchal sexuality concerned with “performance” “domination” or “sexual violence” (Tong 1989). Some radical-cultural feminists take this matriarchal sexual further still, claiming to be truly feminist, one must abandon heterosexual relationships entirely, becoming a “separatist” or “political” lesbian.  While these two cultural views differ dramatically, I find them equally irrational and limiting to men and women alike who should be enjoying and engaging sexually and socially with one another in safe, sane, and consensual mental, physical, and emotional levels of relationships.  

PORNOGRAPHY

    Radical-libertarian feminists view pornography as a neutral medium. Like any other tool (books, movies, social media), pornography can be used to promote healthy sexual practices, sublimate sexual fantasies, and overcome sexual inhibitions or it can be used to demoralize, denigrate, dehumanize and objectify women as sexual toys for violent male domination.  Radical-cultural feminists tend to overemphasize the negative aspects of pornography and neglect the existing and potential benefits of pornography to individuals’ sexual, emotional and mental health “insist[ing] that with rare exception, pornography harms women” (Tong 1989).  Radical cultural-feminists claim that pornography “encourages men to behave in sexually harmful ways toward women (e.g., sexual harassment, rape, domestic violence)” and “[defame] women as persons… [with] so little regard for themselves that they actively seek or passively accept sexual abuse” (Tong 1989). I believe this conception of pornography paints women as naïve, immature children unable to discern for themselves “what makes sex ‘sexy’ for her” rather than a patriarchal “object for male violence” (Tong 1989).  

    In 1967, President Lyndon Johnson funded over 80 research studies dedicated to the “scientific study of sexually explicit material” (Harris 1989).  The final consensus of the commission “recommended stronger controls on distribution to minors but an abolition of all limits on access by adults” (Harris 1989). There was no evidence that “exposure to or use of explicit sexual materials” plays a “significant role in the causation of social or individual harms such as crime, delinquency… or emotional disturbance” (Rosenbaum 1991).  However, fifteen years later, Regan implemented the formation of a second commission whose findings indicated “substantial exposure to sexually violent materials bears a causal relationship to antisocial… unlawful acts of sexual violence” (Rosenbaum 1991).  While these findings are seemingly contradictory, they merely indicate that like any other objective subject matter, what does matter is the intent of the user and the subjective interpretation of the subject material.  

BDSM

    Additionally, radical-cultural feminists seem to have little tolerance or understanding for the complex nuances in BDSM relationships. While some women “may choose vanilla sex” others, when given freedom of sexual expression may prefer “’rocky-road’ sex – encounters where pain punctuates pleasure” (Tong 1986).  Pain and pleasure activate the same neural pathways in the brain, releasing a cocktail of neurochemicals including endogenous opioids, dopamine, and serotonin.  Cultural feminists do not understand that sexual “power games” and a predilection for more intense sensation inherent in BDSM does not mean they secretly wish to be oppressed, but rather they are sublimating these fantasies and sexual needs safely with consensual, trusted partners (Tong 1986). Well-experienced BDSM practitioners attest “there are healthy, ethical ways to consensually combine sex and pain. All of them require self-knowledge, communication skills, and emotional maturity in order to make the sex safe and mutually gratifying” (Green 2015).

CONCLUSION

    The “coalition of radical-libertarian feminists… [accuse] radical cultural feminists of prudery” which they vehemently deny, claiming to be “truly free women,” able to tell the difference between “erotica” and “thanatica” (Tong 1989).  The empirical data collected by the psychological sciences favours the philosophy of radical-libertarian feminists. However, any good psychologist understands that finding will be culturally dependent.  By this logic, I must concede at least some validity to the harsh opinions of radical-cultural feminists, though I believe a “truly free woman” uses her intelligence, agency and will to determine her own worldview.

  REFERENCES:

Green, E. (2015, February 10). Consent Isn't Enough: The Troubling Sex of Fifty Shades of Grey. Retrieved February 23, 2016, from http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/02/consent-isnt-enough-in-fifty-shades-of-grey/385267/

Harris, R. J. (1989). A cognitive psychology of mass communication (6th ed.). Hillsdale, NJ: L. Erlbaum Associates.

Rosenbaum, S. E. (Ed.). (1991). Pornography: private right or public menace? (pp. 57-59). Buffalo, NY: Prometheus books.

Signorella, M. L., & Jamison, W. (1986). Masculinity, femininity, androgyny, and cognitive performance: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 100(2), 207.

Tong, R. (1989). Feminist thought: A comprehensive introduction (4th ed.). Boulder, CO: Westview Press.

#feminism gender radicalfeminism bdsm sexuality

[totalhermione-blog]

Empirical Pilgrimage

           At its core, anthropology is the study of man and the essential elements that structure his world.  It is a hybrid discipline engaged in the analysis of “bidirectional traffic” between the mind of man and the human environment (Northoff 2010).  Moreover, anthropological study is concerned with discerning universal human traits and behaviors from culturally dependent activities.  As with any other branch of anthropological study, one must take a holistic approach in the study of religion and its encompassing elements. In other words, an ability to understand the sociological and psychological implications of findings requires the maintenance of cultural, historical, semantic, and evolutionary awareness in a religious context.  

           Traditionally, the empirical research of religion employs methodological agnosticism, the mentality that religion should be scrutinized “without prejudicing one way or the other the claim that God really interacts with people during religious experiences” (Ratcliffe 2015).  Because of this perspective, most religious studies focus on specific elements of religious practice (i.e. beliefs, doctrine, ideology, ritual, prayer) rather than the religious experience in and of itself (Finglekurts 2009). This aloof analysis provides data on the multiple forms of religiosity from a multi-cultural perspective and, in a very sterile way, the functionality of these forms, but does not address the meaning of the universal religious experience (Jensen 2001).  I believe this mindset of “strict compartmentalization” is both futile and counterproductive to the true spirit of scientific research (Ratcliffe 2015).  

           A “refusal to entertain the possibility that the function of religious experience is to communicate with God is ultimately denial” of God’s existence and thus, what we first perceived to be a pure, empirical state of agnosticism is unveiled to be nothing more than “provisional atheism” (Ratcliffe 2003). Much in the way that it would be inappropriate to ignore presence of water in explaining “the development of fins” in aquatic animals (“their function being to ‘flap’ constituting a horribly uninformative explanation”), it would be fallacious not to entertain the possibility that the religious experience functions as a means of communication with unseen forces (Ratcliffe 2003).   To ensure a truly holistic examination of religion and religious experience, one should employ the use of multiple hypotheses based on divergent premises concerning the existence of supernatural beings, thus allowing for speculation on the functionality of religion under both atheistic and deistic premises.    As the existence of God can be neither proved nor disproved empirically, our scientific inquiry would be deficient if we did not explore the functional mechanisms of religion and the religious experience in the context of both possibilities, thereby applying a more accurately agnostic vantage point.

           Definitions are essential to establishing the parameters of any scientific study, regardless of discipline.  As the specificities of any particular religion could require volumes to describe in detail, my focus in this paper is the universal phenomenon of the religious experience, defined as “the very moment of experiencing [an] ultimate divine reality,” “transcendence,” and/or communion with divinity, usually accompanied by a “memorable feeling of reality” and religiously emotive thought content (Finglekurts 2009).  Cross-cultural surveys indicate global traits of the religious experience include largely numinous components such as “feelings of timelessness, divine love,” and a sense of oneness with the universe (Finglekurts 2009).  Conversely, explicit components of the religious experience (visions, voices, etc.) appear to be culturally determined in content. Finally, despite universal and cultural features of this phenomenon, the essence of the religious experience is wholly subjective.  These multiplicitious layers of synchronicity beg the question:  “Are there many variations of a single religious experience or could there be a continuum of many different religious experiences” (Finglekurts 2009)?

             In almost fifty years of electroencephalogram research, “no clear consensus about the underlying neurophysiologic substratum of religious experience has emerged,” nor has there been established any specific neural system activation or neurotransmitters that are not also associated with neurological activity in non-religious cognitive activity (Finglekurts 2009).  Therefore, we can assume there is no particular structure or chemical compound devoted explicitly to the religious experience.  Skeptics of the religious experience have postulated that religious experience may be attributed to psychopathology.  This theory has been disproven by strong evidence that religious experience is negatively correlated with mental illness and therefore, could not be due to psychosis.  Others have suggested the religious experience may attributable to phenomenon similar to the “bizarre experiences in dreams,” but not all dreams are religiously themed (Finglekurts 2009).   A “content analysis of 16,000 reported dreams” yielded only 2% of dreams containing “religious elements” (Finglekurts 2009).  Thusly, we cannot attribute the religious experience solely to the brain’s interpretation of residual electrical activity.  Many religions employ the ritual use of psychotropic drugs to induce religious experiences.  However, this method of inducing a religious experience is contributory at best. “[O]nly about a third of all” persons who consume psychotropic drugs experience feelings of divine transcendence associated with the religious experiences” engage in a religious experience (Finglekurts 2009).  

           Increased neuroelectrical activity in the left prefrontal cortex (associated with positive emotion) is present during meditation and prayer. Conversely, activity in the right prefrontal cortex (correlated with negative emotions and anxiety) is decreased during these activities.  The prefrontal cortex is most commonly associated with personality and cognitive behavior such as planning and decision making. This would seem to support the theory of lateralization of function in cerebral structures, but “stimulating a particular point in the cerebral cortex” does not consistently induce a religious response (Acharya et al. 2012). Therefore, although these cerebral structures are essential to the religious experience, it is likely a joint interaction of many systems.  This complex interaction is reflected in the curious electrical brain activity, “particularly in the prefrontal and parietal areas,” documented in neuroimaging of the religious experience (Acharya, et al. 2012).  Through meditation, Buddhist monks are capable of self-inducing and sustaining “high amplitude gamma band oscillations” in their brain waves (Acharya, et al. 2012).  These and large quantities of “high amplitude alpha and theta waves” are often documented in EEG studies of religious experience’s effect on the brain (Finglekurts 2009).    This electrical activity is associated with the neuroplastic properties of the human brain.

     Neuroplasticity describes the way in which neurons alter the organization of the central nervous system in response to environmental stimuli, cognitive processing and learning through axonal sprouting and genomic responses that result in epigenetic modifications.  Epigenetics refers to the interactions between our environments and genetics. These changes may also involve neurogenesis, the creation of new brain cells.  Both neuroplastic interactions and neurogenesis have been documented to occur in a small variety of situations.  The neurotransmitters dopamine beta-hydroxylase and oxytocin are released in meditation and sexual activity.  The former is essential to the regulation of synaptic activity and accelerates neuroplasticity while the latter facilitates neurogenesis in the pre-frontal cortex, memory consolidation, bonding, and affection (Acharya et al. 2012).  Psychedelic drugs such as LSD induce unique changes in cognition and perception by “activat[ing] intracellular mechanisms” that “promote expression of genes responsible for” the regulation of neural plasticity “particularly in the prefrontal cortex” (Acharya et al. 2012).  In conjunction, these findings indicate the religious experience, though structurally and chemically inconsistent, is a fundamentally biological, and therefore universal trait, capable of not only instill lasting physical change to structures of our brains, but fundamentally alter our DNA and therefore, the evolutionary outcome of the human species.  

     Still, a causal relationship between brain activity and religious experience has yet to be established. The available data makes it impossible to discern whether the religious experience is produced by the brain or a response to external stimuli.  “Therefore, the only conclusion from observed neuroscientific studies is that religious experience is reflected in brain activity and that the brain somehow mediates some aspects of religiosity” (Finglekurts 2009).  Environmental factors such as cultural phenomenon work epigenetically to modify the brain structurally and functionally, and consequentially influence behavior and cognition in relation to the religious experience (Acharya et al. 2012).  The religious experience occurs and is then contextualized culturally.  

     Cultural universals are primarily expressed by symbolic means, i.e. language.  “Word patterns, action sequences, social structures – all those ‘things’ that make up conventions – must meet the demands of human cognition,” for they are the symbolic standards by which individuals may establish “meaningful communication” with one another and glimpse universal Truth through the veil of subjective realities (Jensen 2001).  The term ‘universal’ is meant in a metaphysical context, referring to the “simple cognitive schemas” identified semantically (Jensen 2001).  For instance, “solid objects… have ‘solidness’, cats do have ‘cathood’ and, persons ‘personness’” regardless of being observed as such, but none of these states are defined until such human constructs such as language and culture impose these definitions on the objective world (Jensen 2001).  The issue of primacy is essential to the discussion of the religious experience.  In studies of religion, we must ask if the religious experience exists prior to the impositions of language or if it is in itself a construct of language, and therefore culture.  Considering the importance of symbolic language in the conception of cognitive schemas, one would feel inclined to suppose that “there is no [religious] experience that is prior to language” because there is no cognition prior to language, and language is dependent on the physical, cultural, and historical environment of the individual (Finglekurts 2009).  However, if the religious experience is as universal as properties of humanity like language, how do we explain atheistic outliers? Contradictory evidence has shown self-identified atheists reporting religious experiences, though they do not contextualize them religiously.  Additionally, religious experiences have been known to arise in purely secular contexts (Finglekurts 2009).  Therefore, we should explore the religious experience from an evolutionary perspective as it does not seem to serve a purely socio-cultural function.

           Available data suggests religious experiences have existed for over forty thousand years, appearing almost “simultaneously with such pre-cultural phenomenon as language, drawing and rituals,” making it less probable to occur as a by-product of culture (Finglekurts 2009).  The human animal is a “psycho-somatic entity consisting of… multiple levels and dimensions” including physical, biological, psychological, and spiritual realities (Finglekurts 2009).  Through evolution, our species has developed a brain “capable not only of reflecting on itself but of experiencing something higher than itself” through metacognition and the religious experience (Finglekurts 2009). Historically, religious communities outlasted their secular counterparts at a ratio of 4:1.  This is possibly due to the religious and moral constraints imposed through social sanctions that redirected impulsive behavior associated with the limbic system.  In this way, religiosity is clearly an adaptive trait due to the way in which it interacts between culture and biology. This is further emphasized as findings from numerous twin studies imply “genetic variation contributes up to 50% of individual variation in religiosity” and self-transcendence (Finglekurts 2009).  

           It is clear that “an appropriate biological basis is needed for the religious experience to occur” (Finglekurts 2009), this being the evolutionary emergent property of the conscious mind as a “selecting agency” (Schwartz 2005).  Because the human animal is conscious and rational, he is able to make selections in his environment.  When presented with multiple courses of action, an individual must make a choice.  Man is effacious.  Humanity is in possession of free will (Schwartz 2005).  According to the natural sciences, “man was above all an object, one of the world to which visually and physically he belongs” (Tymieniecka 1978).  Biological determinism reduces humanity to a series of biochemical causes and effects, ignoring the subjective world of choice (Tymieniecka 1978) and its “downward causal influence on brain plasticity” (Finglekurts 2009).  Our individual, subjective thoughts, feelings, beliefs, volitions, and spirituality that make up our mental processes allow us to actively choose and manipulate the environment around us, just as our environment interacts with and manipulates us.  

           Consciousness is the internal subjective world of a human being, a timeless world of “joys and sorrows, colours and sounds, thoughts and memories… a reality of lived experience and sensation.  It is a world that, at the very least, senses its own existence, though it may not understand it or have the ability to conceptualize it…” (Finglekurts 2009).  That is to say, there is a distinction between the thoughts, emotions, and cognitions and the observer, the self, the “concrete ‘I’” (Tymieniecka 1978), the “abstract ego” (Schwartz 2005).  This consciousness is psychologically described as an “observing system” in the physical “observed system” (Schwartz 2005) and is synonymous with the theological definition of the soul (Finglekurts 2009).  The soul, like consciousness is considered the “locus of human will” (Finglekurts 2009).  Cross-cultural analysis has demonstrated a universal association between concepts of soul and consciousness (Finglekurts 2009), however the concept of self is constructed differently in eastern and western cultures.  The western construction of self dictates an independent spirit with a self-focused attention while the eastern self is interdependent, with a fundamental value of social connections.  Again, we see the cyclical interactions between neuropsychological factors and environmental influence as “shifting culture-specific self-constructurals can lead to changes in… perceptual processing (Northoff 2010).  

           Because humans possess this sense of self, we possess ourselves and interact with the world as free agents, “able to freely elect to probe nature in any one of many possible ways” (Schwartz 2005).  “One of the main reasons for the existence of the religious experience is innate people’s search for causal explanations… organizing the world in a meaningful and consistent fashion”, much like any scientific endeavor to explain the physical world (Finglekurts 2009).  Therefore, as scientists, we can no longer treat humanity as a mere object, but as an active subject (Tymieniecka 1978).  Through free-choice, active participation in our environment and the innate biological ability to conceive of unknowable ideas, we can transcend our present.  We are a goal-oriented, achieving species, and while it is possible that this ability to perceive and conceive of higher existence may have co-evolved with other human structures and functions that may increase the survival of the species, it is much more likely that our brain developed the perception of the supernatural because it is an integral part of our environment.  This leads us to conclude “we live in a universe that is open to transcendence, a universe that is a product of cosmic order” (Finglekurts 2009).    

           However, our own pursuit of empirical order in the cognitive sciences has yielded data to imply that our minds, “for the sake of survival,” are inherently fallible and consequentially, the religious experience must also be accepted as essentially error-prone rather than an objective interpretation of higher Truth (Finglekurts 2009).  “Theology assumes that Spirit is not the reality of the physical universe, but rather is the reality of freedom, it is the world for itself… it is not an object” and therefore not objective, nor subject to the “reality of objects” (Finglekurts 2009).  The spirit, soul, consciousness, as previously established, is not an object, but an agency.  This may imply that questions of religiosity, spirituality and subjectivity lay outside the realm of scientific inquiry, but agency is a primary variable in modern conceptions of quantum physics.

           “[A]ccording to classical physics, you are a mechanical automaton,” every thought, every physical action, every emotion was determined by your genetic code before you were born and all interactions are mindless, meaningless, and “causally redundant” (Schwartz 2005).  However, principles of Newtonian physics have been shown to be “fundamentally false for three-quarters of a century” (Schwartz 2005).  Therefore, to be able to understand how human agency interacts with the realms of anthropology, psychology, metaphysics and theology, we must look at cognitive action at the cellular level from a quantum perspective. At the cellular level, neurons convey electro-chemical messages along synapses via calcium ion channels little more than a nanometer in diameter.  The release of these electro-chemical messages is dependent on the action potential of any given neuron.  Action potential is the amount of electric polarization necessary to stimulate a chemical response.

“When an action potential travelling along a never fibre reaches a nerve terminal, a host of ion channels open.  Calcium ions enter through these channels into the interior of the terminal.  These ions migrate from the channel exits to release sites or vesicles containing neurotransmitter molecules… [which are] dumped into the synaptic cleft… [influencing] the tendencies of that neighboring neuron to fire” (Schwartz 2005).

           This means that at each of the human brain’s 100 billion neurons, there is a state of quantum-splitting between clear yes-or-no, fire-or-do-not-fire action response at each one of the trillions of axonal terminals.  The “locations and velocities of… calcium ions are simultaneously unknowable in principle” so at any point in time, the brain is in a constant state of quantum indeterminacy as described by Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle (Schwartz 2005).  Scientists have attempted to study this bifurcation point from a macroscopic perspective by studying behavioral responses with clear cut choices such as the fight-or-flight response, but such efforts invariably lead back to Heisenburg’s main contribution to physics, “replac[ing] what classic physics took to be a ‘being’ with a ‘doing’” (Schwartz 2005).  Therefore, due to the cyclical nature of consciousness and its interacting systems, the cause of free choice and free will is impossible to determine, being unknowable in principle.  However, we can analyze the impact of intentional agency on the state of the system being acted upon, i.e. the casual effect of consciousness on our own brains (Schwartz 2005).  Neuroplastic theory implies that thinking, learning, active mediation, and religious experiences change “both the brain’s physical structure (anatomy) and functional organization (physiology) from top to bottom,” from consciousness to the physical structure of our DNA that mediates interactions between biological limitations and environmental factors (Acharya, et. al 2012).  

           “[A] mirror can not change creatively the object which it reflects, but the human mind is capable of this” (Finglekurts 2009).  Because of the mysterious nature of consciousness, we are capable of willfully altering our subjective, spiritual and mental environment, manipulate our bodily environment, and manifest our will on the external, shared world through directed mental effort.  Experiments in co-operation with the Dalai Lama (Acharya et. al 2012) have demonstrated the impact of “belief and expectation” in modulating the physical environment (Finglekurts 2009).  Buddhist monks with over 10, 000 hours of meditative experience were asked to participate in compassion mediation which entails concentrating on feelings of love and kindness for all beings.  This directed attention produced high-frequency gamma brain waves, the like “never [having] been reported before in neuroscience literature” (Acharya et. al 2012).  This implies a higher level of consciousness can be achieved through active participation and manipulation of mental processes.  Furthermore, consciousness exerts a downward force of causation wherein “higher-order and more complex” mental processes “may regulate and govern” functional mechanisms of “lower level” mental processes (Jensen 2001).  

           These findings have been applied to clinical work through cognitive reattribution therapy.  For instance, a person suffering from major-depressive disorder initially perceives the world and his place in it negatively.  With the assistance of a cognitive psychologist, this client may alter his perceptions of the world through the power of thought and simultaneously, restructure the neural connections of his brain, thereby altering any biological predisposition to depressive affective states both bodily and epigenetically.  This theory is further supported by the well-documented placebo effect which has demonstrated time and time again the power of belief on the physiological change. Both physiological and psychological doctors know that “clinical success is jeopardized by a belief on the part of either [practitioner] or patient that their mental effort is an illusion or misconception” (Schwartz 2005).  We are not mere observers; we are participants in our environments.  Our choices and beliefs have a profound effect not only on the individual, but the entire universe due to the unquantifiable number of choices made by the billions of humans inhabiting the planet, however, because of the multiplicity of agencies, “no intentional act is certain” (Schwartz 2005).  So, what does it all mean?  

           The religious experience is seemingly integral to our existence as human beings and the circularity of its causational implications dizzying at best. We understand that the mental level of religious experience is “dependent on, yet not reducible to the” biological limitations of our physical vessels and that not all mental activity could be a “direct product of physical causes” (Finglekurts 2009).  Furthermore, we have no means of identifying the starting point of consciousness or the religious experience, resulting in an unknowable fact, much like the existence of god.  Additionally, we understand the human animal is guided in his actions by more than biological mechanisms of survival and reproduction.  Our decisions are influenced by internally held “insights, goals, and beliefs” (Finglekurts 2009) that interact with the “humanly constructed worlds” of culture and language (Jensen 2001).  And finally, we understand through quantum mechanics that conscious mental effort has a physical, macroscopic impact on the very structure of the universe as we inject and impose our will on the world around us.

           The implications of these recent findings concerning human consciousness, free will, and the religious experience highlight in sharp relief the flaws in scientific doctrine over the last half a century.  “Religion is not what it used to be, nor is the universe” (Jensen 2001).  To understand the religious experience, we must view the religious experience in all of its varied forms as an agency in and of itself.  The religious experience is where metacognition, psychology, neurobiology, anthropology and quantum physics overlap (Jensen 2001).  The mental perspective of methodological agnosticism prescribes that the Truth of the universe is outside the realm of science, but the quantum approach is built on the principle of explaining both the internal subjective world and external objective world through a unified theory, abandoning the “materialistic bias stemming from” over fifty years of misinforming the public about the fundamental principles of physics and I have become convinced through the research and writing of this paper that we as a species are just a hair’s breadth away from achieving a holistic, unified theory of everything based on a “cosmos… consisted not of matter, but of actions by agents” (Schwartz 2005).  

           However, this conception may be due to the last bias of scientific doctrine I would like to address, and that is the “commonsense idea that ‘universals’ are identical things that must be discoverable all over the world” (Jensen 2001). This notion is a product of Western culture’s nagging need for “pragmatic completeness” (Schwartz 2005). This bias exposes the disciple of anthropology as ironically ethnocentric, leaving the scientific mind grasping at straws of postmodern nominalism, which claims the existence of no universals, “save perhaps the denial of universals” (Jensen 2001).  So in the end, after trudging through mounds of cross-disciplinary research I find myself trapped in the Socratic paradox, aware of how little we know about the causes or functions of the religious experience, or even the human mind.  

 References:

Acharya, S., Shukla, S., Mahajan, S., & Diwan, S. (2012). Localizationism to Neuroplasticity -- The Evolution off Metaphysical Neuroscience. Japi, 60, 38-46. Retrieved October 29, 2015, from Google Scholar.

Fingelkurts, A., & Fingelkurts, A. (2009). Is our brain hardwired to produce God, or is our brain hardwired to perceive God? A systematic review on the role of the brain in mediating religious experience. Cognitive Processing, 10(4), 293-326.

Jensen, J. (2001). Universals, General Terms And The Comparative Study Of Religion. Numen, 48(3), 238-266.

Northoff, G. (2010). Humans, Brains, and Their Environment: Marriage between Neuroscience and Anthropology? Neuron, 65, 748-751.

Schwartz, J., Stapp, H., & Beauregard, M. (2005). Quantum physics in neuroscience and psychology: A neurophysical model of mind-brain interaction. Philosophical Transactions: Biological Sciences, 360(1458), 1309-1327. Retrieved August 24, 2015, from JSTOR.

Tymieniecka, A. (1978). Subjectivity and the Irreducible in Man. In The human being in action: The irreducible element in man, part II : Investigations at the intersection of philosophy and psychiatry (Vol. VII, pp. 107 - 115). Dordrecht, Massachusetts: D. Reidel Pub.

     Further Reading:

Azari, N., Nickel, J., Wunderlich, G., Niedegen, M., Hefter, H., Tellmann, L., . . . Seitz, R. (2001). Neural correlates of religious experience. European Journal of Neuroscience, 13, 1649-1652. Retrieved August 24, 2015, from Google Scholar.

Benedetti, F. (2005). Neurobiological Mechanisms of the Placebo Effect. Journal of Neuroscience, 25(45), 10390-10402. doi:10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3458-05.2005

Grenberg, J. (1999). Anthropology From a Metaphysical Point of View. Journal of the History of Philosophy, 37(1), 91-115. doi:10.1353/hph.2008.0961

Josipovic, Z., Dinstein, I., Weber, J., & Heeger, D. (2012). Influence of meditation on anti-correlated networks in the brain. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience Front. Hum. Neurosci., 5(183), 1-11. Retrieved August 24, 2015, from Google Scholar.

Petrican, R., & Burris, C. (2012). Am I the stone? Overattribution of agency and religious orientation. Psychology of Religion and Spirituality, 4(4), 312-323. Retrieved October 28, 2015, from JSTOR.

Schjoedt, U. (2009). The Religious Brain: A General Introduction to the Experimental Neuroscience of Religion. Method & Theory in the Study of Religion, 21(3), 310-339. Retrieved August 24, 2015, from JSTOR.

#anthropology #psychology #metacognition #philosophy #quantumphysics #neurology #mindfulness #meditation #theology #religion #neurobiology #neuroscience #soul #conciousness #freewill #agency

[totalhermione-blog]

Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos:  The Fates

Clotho:  the spinner, Lachesis:  the allotter, and Atropos: the unturnable, these are the fates, the Moirai, the “three  sisters” (Ovid:  ll. 902) who “inscribed” (Ovid:  ll. 904) on “everlasting adamant” (Ovid:  ll. 908) the “account of the world” (Ovid:  ll. 903), determining “at the hour of their birth” (Theogony:  ll. 208) each mortal’s “personal rations of bad luck and good” for the allotment of their “lifetime” (Theogony:  ll. 209).  Despite their great power and incredible influence on gods and mortals alike, the mysterious Moirai are mentioned very little in the ancient works we have studied in this course.  Furthermore, discrepancy surrounds the origins of the Fates as does their relationship to Zeus, ruler of the Olympians.

           Hesiod depicts the birth of the Moirai twice in his work Theogony, with different parentage on both occasions.  First the fates are depicted as born of the goddess “Night” (Theogony:  ll. 201 & 207 - 209) who had become impregnated with a number of deities despite having “intercourse really with no one” (Theogony:  ll. 203). In the same passage, Night also bore “black Fate” (Theogony:  ll. 201), though Hesiod makes no elaboration the difference between the three Fates and this black Fate.  A few hundred lines later, Hesiod abandons the immaculate conception of the Moirai, describing their existence as the result of Zeus’s second marriage to the “goddess of law and tradition,” the “brilliant Themis” (Theogony:  ll. 856). Interestingly, in the passage describing Zeus’s first marriage to Metis, Hesiod claims “all too intelligent children were destined to come out of Metis” (Theogony:  849), yet how could destiny exist before the “eternal” (Ovid:  ll. 905) Fates?  

           Additionally, the hierarchal relationship between the Moirai and Zeus is unclear as is their occupations concerning destiny.  Father Zeus is described as paying “the greatest respect to” (Theogony:  ll. 859) the Fates  who enjoy “total imunity” (Ovid:  ll. 905) and “fear… neither conflict with heaven, nor lightning’s wrath, nor any ruin or collapse whatsoever” (Ovid:  ll. 905 – 907).  It is never explicit whether this amnesty of the Moirai is within the power of Zeus to grant or if the Moirai possess a power greater than Zeus, the power of destiny, and through fear Zeus cautions respect of the Fates.  Even by the Homeric accounts of the mighty Zeus, he dare not interfere with fate.  In the Illiad, Zeus discloses to his wife Hera “Fate has it that Sarpedon” one of his mortal sons “is to be killed by Patroclus” (Iliad – Book 16:  ll. 471 – 472) and ponders half-heartedly saving him from his “fixed” “fate” as “a mortal man” (Iliad – Book 16:  ll. 478).  However, Zeus does not interfere with fate, though so great was his grief for his son, he “shed drops of blood as rain”  “in honor of his own dear son” (Iliad – Book 16:  ll. 493 – 494).  The mighty Zeus, who boasts numerous times throughout this Homeric depiction of his awesome power, cries when faced with “insuperable” (Ovid:  ll. 901)  fate.

           Most of the discrepancy concerning Zeus’s role in destiny comes from the minds of mortals.  Helen, in discussion with her brother-in-law Hector, claims “Zeus has placed this evil fate on us” (Iliad – Book 6:  ll. 375) while Hector later attributes the Greek invasion to “the fates” (Iliad – Book 8: ll. 536).  Regardless of who controls fate, mortals are obsessed with the concept, and none more so than the protagonist Achilles.  Throughout the Homeric account of this war, Achilles grapples with the choice between “two fates” (Iliad – Book 9:  ll. 424) prophesized by his mother Thetis.      Hector acknowledges it “is fate” (Iliad – Book 22:  ll. 330) that he must perish at the hands of Achilles.  Hector’s last words are a prophesy of Achilles’s destiny to be vanquished by Paris and Apollo “in the long shadow of Troy’s Western Gate” (Iliad – Book 22:  ll. 400).  Achilles responds, “As for my fate, I’ll accept it whenever Zeus sends it” (Iliad – Book 22: ll. 405). This prophesy is echoed by the visitation of Patroclus’s ghost, claiming “The Fate I was born to has swallowed me” and describes Achilles’s “destiny” to “die beneath the wall of Troy” (Iliad – Book 23:  ll. 85 – 86).

           Fate was essential to the Greeks who craved order and feared the chaos of the void.  The likeness of the Moirai have persisted through the ages and different cultures as the Parcae of the Romans, the Sudice of Slavic tradition, the Norns of Norse mythology, the triple-goddess of pagan tradition and even the witches of Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Fate and destiny are shrouded in mystery, but inescapable, insurable, and inevitable.  May the Fates be kind, my friend.

 Works Cited:

Hesiod, and Daryl Hine. Works of Hesiod and the Homeric Hymns. Chicago: U of Chicago, 2005. Print.

Homer, and Stanley Lombardo. The Essential Homer. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2000. Print.

Ovid, and Stanley Lombardo. "The Deification of Caesar." Metamorphoses. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Pub., 2010. N. pag. Print.

#fates #moirai #parcae #sudice #norns #triple-goddess #Achillles #Homer #Hesoid #Ovid #Atropos #Clotho #Lachesis

[totalhermione-blog]

Medea’s Descent into Madness:  A Literary Analysis of Addictive Behaviors Associated with Passionate Love

The ancient Greeks recognized the devastating power of Eros, passionate love, considering it a form of madness.  Erotomania was originally the Grecian theory of erotic obsession, accepted as early as the first century AD that posed the hypothesis of “love-as-disease” (Beecher 75).  This “love-sickness” was said to be caused by the piercing arrows of Eros, which induce a pathological fixation of imagination and memory on the image of their desire (Beecher 77).  Aristotelians believed sight had the power to “infect and fascinate” the imagination with “love-sickness,” causing “alterations in the body” effecting physical and mental health (Beecher 15).  Recent neurological studies on social attachment processes and drug addiction have shown that the ancient’s hypotheses were not without merit.

            “A deep and systematic concordance exists between the brain regions and neurochemicals involved in both addiction” and passionate, romantic love (Burkett & Young 2).  Both love and addiction activate the same areas in the brain and are associated with the release of  the neurochemicals dopamine, opiods, and corticotrophin-releasing factor. Additionally, the behavioral aspects of addiction, such as “drug consumption, reinforcement learning, drug seeking, relapse, tolerance and withdrawal,” (Burkett & Young 3) share striking similarities to the behavior of those powerless to the whims of passionate love.  Using the mythical character of Medea, this paper explores the unsettling similarities between Eros, the Greek personification of passionate love, and the modern findings on addiction, love, and the social attachment process.

           Eros has been depicted dichotomously in the majority of literature and art.  The most familiar depiction of Eros is that of the golden haired cherub, commonly called by his Roman name:   Cupid.  He is a winged baby, rosy-faced with an inclination toward the mischievous.  In contrast, the “archaic and early classical” depiction of the Greek Eros is “adolescent, well-muscled, and powerfully winged” with a “dangerous compulsion toward sex,” a “winged rapist” like Boreas, the Harpies, or the Sphinx (Vermeule 157).  “Eros of Ibykos” is the black bold love” (Vermeule 157).  He was said to “shed a mist” round one’s head, “veil[ing] the wits,” “loosen[ing] legs,” “master[ing] men” (Vermeule 156) and “comes flashing in madness” (Vermeule 157) like a “predator” or “hunter,” bow in hand (Vermeule 156).  Even his mother Aphrodite feared her defiant, naughty child who had “threatened” her with his “bow and wicked arrows” (Apollonius ll. 111 – 112).

           In book three of The Voyage of the Argo, Eros arrives in Colchis “unseen and bent on mischief” (Apollonius 112).  From between Jason’s legs, Eros “shot at Medea” with an “arrow, fraught with pain” and when she looked as Jason, “her heart stood still,” Eros’ “shaft deep in [her] heart, hot as fire” (Apollonius116 – 117).  In love and addiction, the first encounters are “accompanied by a rush of euphoria” (Burkett & Young 1) as dopamine and opioids flood the brain.  In that short encounter with Jason, “time and again” Medea “darted a bright glance at Jason,” “[forgetting]” “all else” as her “heart, brimful of this new agony… overflowed with the sweetness of pain” (Apollonius 117).  In the addiction process, individuals immerse themselves in the physical sensations of the drug.  Likewise, “when we are in love, we are inundated with sensations of our beloved,” (Burkett & Young 1) memorizing and obsessing over how he “looked, the clothes he wore, the things he said, the way he sat, and how he walked to the door” (Apollonius 121).  All else other than the object of our infatuation becomes unimportant, and separation from our beloved is “filled with painful longing and desire” (Burkett & Young 1).  These “pleasurable memories” formed in passionate love “drive us to seek out more experiences with the beloved” (Burkett & Young 1) and separation from the beloved can be extremely stressful, causing “[preoccupation] with thoughts of the beloved” and “obsession with reunion” (Burkett & Young 10).  As Jason left his audience with her father, Medea watched him go, her “heart smoulder[ing] with pain as he passed from sight” before “retier[ing]” to her own chambers “a prey to all inquietude that love awakens” (Apollonius 121) such as insomnia and obsessive thoughts, common symptoms of withdrawal in the addiction process.  

           In Ovid’s account, Medea is “pull[ed]… one way” by “desire” and by “reason, another,” (Ovid ll. 23 – 27) predicting that she would “be undone… by love” (Ovid ll. 111 – 112). After much inner turmoil, Medea’s “passion… cooled” (Ovid ll. 91) by her rationality, but when she next encountered Jason, “her dormant love… good as dead, blazed up again” (Ovid ll. 98 – 100) illustrating the addictive behavior of relapse, the “reinstatement of drug seeking after extinction” (Burkett & Young 3).  In contrast, Apollonius’s account of Medea’s soliloquy is fraught with obsession, revisiting every sight and sound of her encounter with Jason, his “honey sweet words… still [ringing] in her ears” as she “mourned him as someone already dead” (Apollonius 121).  With a “lack of regard for consequences” (Burkett & Young 2), Medea eventually gives in to the “relentless archery of love” (Apollonius 120 – 130) and “impelled by the bold hand of love” (Apollonius 128) seeks audience with Jason.  

           “The lovesick girl” is “rewarded” for “her impatient watch” as her love “sprang into view” (Apollonius ll. 134).  At “the sight of Jason” the “mist” of Eros “descended on her eyes” (Apollonius 135) and “love… held her gleaming eyes” “captiv[ated]” (Apollonius 136).  As individuals create, seek out, and remember these pleasurable experiences with their beloved associated with “powerful feeling of reward and euphoria,” they reinforce these behaviors and eventually, are “willing to preform incredible acts of romance and self-sacrifice (Burkett & Young 1 – 2).  These “self-sacrificing behaviors” such as Medea’s betrayal of family and country “seen as dangerous and destructive in… [the] context of drug addiction” yet “romantic and laudable” (Burkett & Young 2) when done in the name of passionate love.  Medea’s “heart unhinged in her love for Jason” (Euripidies ll. 9 – 8) to the extent that she willingly conspired with her beloved to murder her brother.  

           Throughout art and literature, readers are privy to the devastating effects of passionate love. From the literary case study of Medea, we can see how powerful Eros is.  Once a princess and priestess of Hecate, Medea was in a position of unusual power and esteem for a woman of this period, but all was lost to the hopeless struggle against the romantic impulse.  The Greeks called love madness, and madness it is.

 Works Cited:

 Apollonius, and E. V. Rieu. The Voyage of Argo: The Argonautica. Harmondsworth, Middlesex: Penguin, 1971. Print.

Beecher, Donald, and Massimo Ciavolella. Eros and Anteros: The Medical Traditions of Love in the Renaissance. Ottawa, Canada: Dovehouse Eds., 1992. Print.

Burkett, James P., and Larry J. Young. "The Behavioral, Anatomical and Pharmacological Parallels between Social Attachment, Love and Addiction." Psychopharmacology 224.1 (2012): 1-26. Web.

Euripides, and James Morwood. Medea and Other Plays. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2008. Print.

Ovid, and Stanley Lombardo. Metamorphoses. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Pub., 2010. Print.

Vermeule, Emily. Aspects of Death in Early Greek Art and Poetry. Berkeley: U of California,

Print.

#Ovid #love addiction #greek mythology #Medea #Euripides #Argonautica #Eros

[totalhermione-blog]

A Comparative Analysis of Persistent Genital Arousal Disorder and Sex Addiction

One of the popular presentations for Disorders Week concerned two women suffering from Persistent Genital Arousal Disorder (PGAD) with two very different presentations of the disorder.  The first was a single woman, named Jeannie. Jeannie was extremely agitated by her condition and consequentially irritable with most people she encountered.  Upon arriving home, she immediately masturbated and, tension relieved, exited the bedroom cheerful and polite.  The second woman, Rachel, was married, seemingly unemployed due to the extremeness of her condition, but seemingly exuberant with her constant arousal and need for sex or masturbation.  Rachel reported experiencing approximately one hundred orgasms per day, every thirty seconds for four to eight hours at a time.  Her husband admitted to feelings of inadequacy with the initial onset of the disorder, but seems to have adjusted to his wife’s unique needs.  According to the DSM, a condition or behavior can only be considered disorderly if it causes clinically significant distress and/or serious impairment in day-to-day functioning.  While the first woman seemed both distress and impaired by PGAD, the second woman seemed impaired only and rather giddy about her voracious sexual needs.  To my untrained eye, the second woman seemed more likely to be suffering from sex addiction than PGAD and I wondered if the two disorders were linked in any way.

           As it turns out, Persistent Genital Arousal Disorder and Sexual Addictive Disorders are almost complete opposites, symptomatically.  PGAD is characterized by physiological arousal of the genitals and/or breasts persisting for an extended period of time without psychological arousal.  This arousal does not subside of its own accord, nor is it resolved by normal orgasmic experiences, often requiring numerous orgasms to remit.  The vasocongestion and genital sensitivity occur regardless of the presence of sexual stimuli and are experienced as “uninvited, intrusive, and unwanted” (Leiblum 2006).  Some women with PGAD have reported spontaneous orgasms, which they characterize as unpleasant and disruptive.  Women who suffer from PGAD often avoid sex and sexual stimuli as arousal can become extremely painful and orgasm does not relieve or reduce their symptoms (Leiblum & Nathan 2001).  While cause of PGAD is relatively unknown, “it is likely that there are at least two subtypes of persistent genital arousal:  one more related to neurovascular or neurochemical causes, the other more related to psychological causes” (Leiblum 2006).  Case studies have found seemingly spontaneous onset of this disorder, as well as a side-effect of medications such as trazodone and in tandem with the discontinuation of SSRIs. “The prevalence of PGAD is unknown.  Since it is both embarrassing and often misunderstood, women tend to be reluctant to talk with their physician” (Leiblum 2006).

           In contrast, sexual addiction is characterized by compulsive sexual behaviors and obsessive thoughts concerning sexual release.  “The common denominator in all addiction is dopamine” (Hall 2011). Dopamine is released naturally by the body by eating and engaging in sexual activity as an evolutionary mechanism to ensure survival and reproduction.  Dopamine is also integral to the social attachment process and is involved in memory processing.  Concerning addictive substances such as cigarettes, heroin, and cocaine, “with continued use, the brain requires more dopamine than it can naturally produce” and the user becomes dependent, “never actually satisfy[ing] the need” they have created (Hall 2011).  The same is true of sex addicts.  Additionally, it has been shown that sexual trauma is “overrepresented” (Hall 2011) in the population of sex addicts as well as high amounts of childhood neglect. Both abuse and neglect have been shown to produce a negative effect on the dopamine regulatory systems and are commonly found in histories of persons suffering from a variety of addictive disorders.  Some researchers postulate that compulsive sexual behaviors may be a way for trauma sufferers to numb “feelings of hyperarousal,” “alleviate feelings of disassociation,” (Hall 2011) and mitigate depression.

           While these two disorders are very different symptomatically, they share some noteworthy sociocultural implications.  Both are relatively new disorders, or at the very least “newly recognized enti[ties]” (Leiblum & Nathan 2001).  The earliest known case study of PGAD is from 1994 and was intitially diagnosed as “premenstrual hypersexuality,” though no psychological arousal was reported and “post-orgasmic reduction” of the sexual organs was not detected (Leiblum & Nathan 2001). Sexual addiction gained societal and media attention in the 1980’s, popularized by celebrity testimonies and the industry of self-help sex addiction books, sexaholic anonymous groups, and sex addiction rehab centers (Rey, Attwood, & Gooder 2013).  

           Both disorders have struggled for recognition in the medical and psychological world.  Many women with PGAD have consulted a number of physicians including gynecologists, urologists, and neurologists.  Eventually, most are referred to psychologists for counseling because physicians can find no physical cause for their disorder.  While this is not necessarily a bad thing, women have a long history of being dismissed by medical professionals because their symptoms are ‘all in their head,’ as if that makes the symptoms any less real. Illustrating the gender inequality in the medical and psychiatric professions, priapism, the male form of this disorder, was recognized in the DSM-IV while PGAD was not recognized until the DSM-V was published.  

           Similarly, sex addiction has still not received DSM recognition although terms such as hypersexuality and nymphomania have been used since the 1800s. Many in the psychological community consider sex addiction as a convenient label for “disapproved of sex” (Rey, Attwood, & Gooder 2013) allowing society to prescribe how much sex is allowed for an individual, who one is allowed to have sex with and how many partners is considered normal or healthy.  Considering the restrictive and repressive attitudes of a primarily conservative Protestant nation, these fears are not ungrounded.  Most sex addicts are self-proclaimed or labeled by spouses and partners due to undesirable sexual activity and are often shamed into treatment by loved ones.  “Sex and shame have such an enduring relationship that it was easy [for the media] to popularize the concept of sex addiction” (Rey, Attwood, & Gooder 2013).  Among the warning signs propagated by these twelve step programs and rehab centers are “using the internet to find on-line and real-life sex partners, masturbating online while engaged in erotic chat, switching gender roles, viewing pornography, sharing sexual fantasies,” “twice-daily masturbation, extramarital affairs, sadomasochism,” “resort to commercial sex, non monogamy, and fetishism” (Rey, Attwood, & Gooder 2013).  This criteria is extraordinarily sex-negative and ostracizes individuals with perfectly healthy, albeit adventurous, sexual preferences and belittles the struggle of individuals suffering from a real addiction to sex.

           While the DSM is primarily a diagnostic tool, sometimes referred to affectionately as the ‘psychiatric bible,’ it is also a social tool.  The DSM-II classified homosexual orientation as a sexual disorder.  As human rights movements for the protection of sexual minorities gained momentum, the DSM dropped this classification, recognizing the broad spectrum of human sexuality.  What the DSM includes or excludes as a disorder and the symptoms defining said disorder have a great and lasting impact on the society it diagnoses.  The addition of Persistent Genital Arousal Disorder allows distressed women to receive the comfort of a diagnosis for their symptoms and equal treatment and therapy as men diagnosed with priapism.  The addition of Sexual Addictive Disorders to the DSM would allow sex addicts to seek treatment while dispersing the popularized myths of what consists of an addictive disorder in relation to human sexuality, simultaneously recognizing distressed, dysfunctional individuals and the healthy, diverse spectrum of the human sexual experience.  

References:

Hall, P. (2011). A biopsychosocial view of sex addiction. Sexual and Relationship Therapy, 26(3), 217-228.

Leiblum, S. (2006). Persistent Gential Arousal Disorder: What It Is and What It Isn't. Contemporary Sexuality. Retrieved March 30, 2015, from PSYCHarticles.

Leiblum, S., & Nathan, S. (2001). Persistent sexual arousal syndrome in women: A not uncommon but little recognized complaint. Sexual and Relationship Therapy, 365-380. Retrieved March 30, 2015, from PSYCHarticles.

Reay, B., Attwood, N., & Gooder, C. (2013). Inventing Sex: The Short History of Sex Addiction. Sexuality & Culture, 1-19. Retrieved March 30, 2015, from PSYCHarticles.

#PGAD #addictive disorders #sex addiction #DSM #human rights #dopamine #sexual disorders

[totalhermione-blog]

Love Hotels and Sodomy Laws

           Intrigued as I always am by the inherent uniqueness of Japanese culture, I found the 2014 documentary "Love Hotel" a faucet of fascination.  After getting to know the characters of this documentary and their individual needs met by the privacy and escape provided by the fantastic atmosphere of love hotels, the viewer is introduced to the new regulations imposed by the Entertainment Laws and the eventual closure of the Angel Love Hotel in Osaka, Japan.  I was struck by the similar impacts of the Japanese Entertainment Laws and the Sodomy Laws of the United States and the intricate relationship existent between laws, social norms, and sexual practices.  

           Japanese love hotels have a long and complex history.  In the Endo Period (1600 – 1868), couples would meet in deaijayas, literally meaning “tea houses.”  These establishments traditionally contained 10 – 15 rooms of 100 square feet each.  A hostess would escort the guests to their room, serve tea and cakes, and draw a bath before leaving the couple to their own devices.  “Every town was said to have five or six” (West, 2002) of these establishments.  In the early part of the twentieth century, two kinds of sexual establishments existed, machiai, meaning “meeting places,” and noodle restaurants.  In this period, it was common knowledge that one could rent out the upper rooms in a noodle restaurant for short periods of time for sexual encounters.  However, these establishments were usually hubs of prostitution, the stigma often discouraging use by traditional couples.  Individuals not seeking encounters with prostitutes usually engaged in sexual intercourse outside, in parks and fields.  Culturally, sex indoors is a relatively new behavioral development.  Even during the U.S. occupation, outdoor sex was common.  One 1916 report detailed how young couples would flock to the grounds of the Imperial Palace and Inokashira Park in the evenings for sexual encounters. The next morning, the parks would be littered with condoms.  

           The first indoor facilities intended for amateur sex appeared in the 1930’s, called enshuku, literally “one-yen-dwelling.”  These establishments charged one yen per person, per hour to use their facilities and are the predecessor of the modern love hotel (West, 2002).  Love hotels as known today began appearing in the 1950’s, providing a “high tech wonderland” (Basil, 2008) of both sexual and non-sexual amenities including massive satellite televisions, karaoke machines, massage chairs, video games, “luxurious over-sized transparent baths” (Basil, 2008), rotating and/or vibrating king sized beds, and extensive menus of sexual equipment.   One love hotel in Osaka called Rondchamps boasts a lavish two-story room with a private glass elevator from bath to bed, and a glass slide from bedroom to bath.  In addition to creatively opulent rooms, love hotels provide exquisitely perfect privacy from discrete parking garages complete with license plate shields, well place entrances away from the public view, and almost completely automated payment and room service (Basil, 2008).  

           Japanese “couples make over half a billion trips to such establishments each year” and estimates indicate “about half of all sex in Japan occurs in love hotels” (West, 2002).  The clientele of these unique establishments can be divided into four categories: traditional dating couples, married couples, extramarital affairs, and prostitution.  Japan is a “comparatively crowded country” (West, 2002) with most apartments averaging approximately 525 square feet.  The typical space per person in Japan is “333 square feet” (West, 2002), approximately half that of citizens of the United States.  Young people in Japan typically live at home until they marry.  Love hotels provided a private space for young lovers to engage with one another. Managers of love hotels have estimated married couples constitute one-fourth of their clientele.  Married couples often share living-space with their children or elderly relatives, providing little privacy in their small apartments with notoriously poor sound-proofing.   A “love hotel is for many Japanese virtually the only haven of sexual intimacy there is” (West, 2002).  Furthermore, love hotels provide “blatantly nonessential luxuries” (West, 2002) that make love hotels more pleasant than most Japanese couple’s own homes.  In a different vein, love hotels are discrete and provide the privacy necessary to engage in extramarital affairs.  Some love hotels cater to this particular type of client, providing special phone services that play background noise of bars, offices or train stations in order to deceive spouses of their significant other’s location.  Finally, prostitution has a long history in Japan.  In the 18th and 19th centuries, prostitutes were issued licenses and often worked as indentured servants.  A 1948 survey of the Japanese people indicated “70% of respondents (78% of men and 59% of women)” considered “organized houses of prostitution to be ‘socially necessary’” (West, 2002).  As a result of this cultural acceptance of prostitution, police officers rarely enforce prostitution laws and “consider love hotels ‘off-limits’ unless something obviously amiss was observed” (West, 2002).  

           The first incarnation of the Entertainment Laws were “promulgated in 1948 under considerable influence from authorities of the American Occupation” (West, 2002) to regulate machiai.  It was later revised in 1972 to regulate motels and did not distinguish between love hotels and regular motels.  I’m curious as to when the documentary “Love Hotel” was filmed.  The American release is dated 2014, but the most recent amendments to the Entertainment Laws I could find were the 1985 revisions pushed by the Liberal Democratic Party.  The LDP voiced a number of social and moral concerns.  At this time, there were no zoning regulations of where love hotels could be placed.  Some existed just across the street from schools.  The LDP was worried about effects on children and adults of constant exposure to a sex-oriented business.  Additionally, because of the privacy afforded by love hotels, they were frequented by crime organizations for not only prostitution, but extortion, property crimes and murder.  Additionally, minors were not legally banned from love hotels at this time and rent rooms for “smoking, sniffing [paint] thinner, and illegal sexual activity” (West, 2002).  Furthermore, the LDP voiced concerns regarding practical issues such as traffic safety around love hotels, light pollution from the flamboyant neon signs, and the enormous amount of waste water generated by love hotels to provide clean linens.  

           The 1985 amendments to the Entertainment Laws instituted love hotels to be “regulated as part of comprehensive statues that govern other adult-oriented business” (West, 2002) i.e. adult bookstores, strip clubs, and escort agencies.  As a result of these amendments, the “state unwittingly legitimized the love hotel industry” (West, 2002).  To meet regulations, love hotels were cleaner, more open about their purposes, and less overtly sexual in addition to ceasing their intermediate role between customers and prostitutes.  Many Japanese citizens “interpreted [government] regulation as a latent form of approval” (West, 2002) and dismissed the old stigma associated with noodle houses.  While some love hotels (like the unfortunate Angel Love Hotel) were forced to close due to the new regulations, overall the new regulations ushered in a new era of prosperity and growth for the industry.  

           Buddhism is one of the two most popular religions in Japan and finds its roots in Hinduism, famous for its sexual writings, the Kama Sutra.  Shunga, literally “images of spring” are erotic images dating as far back as the seventeenth century.  Even today, erotic comic books and animated films known as hentai are popular in Japan.  This mass acceptance of the erotic may be a result of Japan’s religious roots and collectivist culture, endowing its citizens with the “ability to separate public and private” and embody “tolerance… about what other people choose to do” (Basil, 2008) in privacy, providing it does not affect the public negatively.   In ironic contrast, individualistic cultures of the west tend to be less concerned with their own actions than the behaviors and choices of others.  This is apparent on a global scale through the United States’ diplomatic attitudes such as the push for a Japanese Entertainment Law as previously discussed, but also within our own country, through the implementation of sodomy laws.  

           The United States were largely settled by Christians seeking religious sanctuary beginning in the 16th century.  Most Christian denominations view sexuality as an exclusively intra-marital activity, largely for reproductive purposes.  Despite the separation between church and state dictated in the 1st Amendment of the Constitution, sodomy laws were implemented in every state and violation was considered a felony, punishable by death, castration, or imprisonment.  In 1986, the case of Bowers v. Hardwick reached the Supreme Court.  The defendant Hardwick was arrested for “violating the state [of Georgia]’s 1816 statute that made oral and anal sex… punishable by a prison term of one to twenty years” (Thompson, 2010).  In a 5-4 ruling, the Supreme Court held that Georgia had a right to “regulate sexual behavior in the home and the bedroom” (Thompson, 2010).  Chief Justice Warren Burger condemned the crime of sodomy, calling it an “infamous crime against nature” and a “deeper malignity than rape” (Thompson, 2010).  Justice Byron R. White echoed these homophobic sentiments, “[making] it clear that the Court considered the act of homosexual sex itself criminal” (Thompson, 2010).  Sodomy Laws were the bedrock of discrimination against the LGBT community in the United States for decades.  An individual could be denied employment, child custody, and visitation rights based on the illegality and immorality of their sexual proclivities. Prosecution under these laws could result not only in prison time, but family disgrace and social impotence.  

     It wasn’t until the 2003 case of Lawrence v. Texas that with a 6-3 ruling, the Supreme Court determined Texas’ Homosexual Conduct law in violation of the 14th Amendment, deeming all sodomy laws unconstitutional and nullifying the discriminatory (Lawrence, 2015) “relic[s] of imported English common law” (Thompson, 2010) remaining in Texas, Alabama, Florida, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Utah, and Virginia.  Since this ruling, the people of the United States have (very) gradually begun to accept the normality of homosexual relations.  Last month, the Supreme Court announced its intent to review cases from Michigan, Ohio, Kentucky, and Tennessee and issue a ruling by the end of term in June concerning “whether the Constitution requires states to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, and whether states must recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states where they are legal” (Barnes, 2015).  

     “If laws are set forth to establish normativity in a given society… then these laws not only put limits on sexual behavior but define what behavior the society accepts as normal” (Thompson, 2010).  By imposing stricter regulations on love hotels, the Japanese government normalized the attendance of such establishments and reduced the associated stigma, making these oases of sexual freedom safer and more available to its citizens.  Similarly, the abolition of sodomy laws in the United States worked to protect its citizens from legal discrimination, and since then has increased the perceived normality of same-sex intercourse.  

 References:

Barnes, R. (2015, January 16). Supreme Court to make history by ruling on whether the constitution provides the right for gays to marry. Retrieved February 17, 2015, from http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/supreme-court-agrees-to-hear-gay-marriage-issue/2015/01/16/865149ec-9d96-11e4-a7ee-526210d665b4_story.html

Basil, M. (2008). Japanese Love Hotels: Protecting Privacy for Private Encounters. European Advances in Consumer Research, 8, 505-510.

Lawrence v. Texas 539 U.S. 558 (2003). (2015, January 1). Retrieved February 17, 2015, from https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/539/558/

Thompson, B. (2010). A Crime Unfit to Be Named. In The un-natural state: Arkansas and the queer South (pp. 75-81). Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press.

West, Mark D., Japanese Love Hotels: Legal Change, Social Change, and Industry Change (November 26, 2002). Michigan Law and Economics Research Paper No. 02-018. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=357000 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.357000

#love hotel #sodomy laws #sex #prostitution #Entertainment Law #Bower v. Hardwick #Lawrence v. Texas

[totalhermione-blog]

Oedipus:  “The Name that Echoes Through the World”

           Oedipus the King by Sophocles was first performed around the year 429 BC.  To this day, the name of Oedipus “echoes through the world” (Oediupus at Colonis, ll. 332) not only in the theatre or literary circles, but in the world of psychology.  Sigmund Freud, father of psychoanalysis, introduced the Oedipus complex in his famous work Interpretation of Dreams stating, “…we are all destined to direct our first sexual impulses towards our mothers, and our first hatred and violent wishes toward our fathers” (Freud 228).  Freud considered the resolution of the Oedipal complex essential to normal developmental processes and gleaned this psychoanalytic theory from the continued resonance of Sophocles’ tragedy of fate with a modern audience, attributing their captivation to the subject matter, specifically the incest taboo.  Freud conjectured that all individuals harbor secret feelings of patricide and maternal incest claiming, “like Oedipus, we live in ignorance of the wishes that offend morality, wishes which nature has forced upon us…” (Freud 228).  While Oedipus lives in “ignorance” it was of his actions, not his “wishes” (Freud 228). The incest taboo does contribute to the play’s lasting resonance, but because of how evolution has shaped our psychology to be naturally averse to incest in order to avoid dangerous mutations associated with it. ��In this way, “doomstruck Oedipus” (Colonis ll. 626) could not be called “guilty” “by nature” (Colonis ll. 289), but a perpetrator of “unwilling crimes” (Colonis ll. 1102), cursed with a miserable fate before he was even born.

           When Oedipus was living with his adoptive parents in Corinth, he heard rumors concerning his parentage.  Disturbed, he consulted the oracle of Apollo who told him it is his “fate” to “make love with [his] own mother” and “shed [his] father’s blood with [his] own hands” (Oedipus the King  ll. 1090 – 1092).  Distraught and horrified, Oedipus left Corinth, giving his adoptive parents a “wide berth” (King, ll. 1093) in order to avoid committing these very acts Freud claimed all humans secretly desire.  On the road away from Corinth and towards Thebes, Oedipus was accosted by his birth father, Laius, and his guards.  Oedipus acts in self-defense and in doing so murdered his father, “blind to whom [he] killed” (Colonis, ll. 1115).  This patricide fulfills the first half of the oracle’s prophecy, but unlike Freud’s Oedipal complex, Oedipus harbored feelings of hostility towards Laius, nor any knowledge that the man he killed was king of Thebes, let alone his birth father. Oedipus merely acted in self-defense; “if, here and now, a man strode up to kill you… what would you do?” (Colonis, ll. 1132 – 1134).  

           As Oedipus resumes he journey away from Corinth, he hears of a vicious Sphinx terrorizing the city of Thebes.  The Sphinx continuously abducts and devours young boys from the city of Thebes as long as no one can solve her riddle:   What is the thing that changes shape, with two feet and four feet, with a single voice, that has three feet as well?  Creon has offered to whoever can answer the riddle his sister’s hand in marriage and the throne of Thebes.  Oedipus answers the riddle “man” and in defeat, the Sphinx flies shrieking to her suicide.  At the salvation of the city, Creon makes Jocasta the “bride” of Oedipus “against [his] will” (Colonis ll. 1132 – 1142) thereby making Oedipus “at once a husband” –two feet- “of his mother, a child amongst his children” –four feet- “and the father of his father” –three feet- (Chase 63), the very disfigured monster depicted by the Sphinx and fated by Apollo. By saving the city, “Thebes married” Oedipus to “disaster” and “bound” him to a life of “misery” (Colonis ll. 1096) and exile.  His very name, Oedipus, depicts the tragic irony of his fate.  “Eidos means ‘knowing’:  oida means ‘I know.’” and the other half of his name, “pous… means ‘foot.’  As ‘Knowfoot’ he solves the riddle about feet” (Chase 61). “Oedipus the ignorant” (King ll. 397) knows the answer of the riddle while being ignorant of his fate, sealed by its decipherment.  

           Freud further claims that “King Oedipus, who has struck his father Laius dead and has married his mother Jocasta is nothing but the realized wish of our childhood” (Freud 228).  However, when Oedipus realizes the truth of his “monstrous” “marriage” (King, ll. 1342) and the “bloodshed” and “incest” (Colonis ll. 1096) he has committed, he “rip[ped]” the “brooches” from the dead Jocasta’s shoulders and “lifting them high… [dug] them down the sockets of his eyes” “blind[ing]” (King ll. 1402 – 1409) himself as he has been blind to “the worst horrors on Earth” (Colonis ll. 586) all committed unknowingly, “not a single thing self-willed” (Colonis ll. 587-588) save for this act of penance through gory self-mutilation.  This one act of the entirety of Oedipus’s “curse[d]”   life that even a “mortal enemy would pity” (King ll. 1426 – 1432) he takes full credit for, explaining, “the hand that struck my eyes was mine, mine alone –no one else” (King ll. 1469 – 1470).  Why would Oedipus willingly commit this pious act of self-mutilation if as Freud claimed he had achieved the deepest wish of his childhood rather than the “worst terror” of humanity?  At this point, the Chorus claims it would be “better to die than be alive and blind” (King ll. 1498) but Oedipus chastises them stating, “what I did was best” (King ll. 1499).  If Oedipus had merely committed suicide, he would meet his parents in the afterlife and would have to “look” them “in the eyes” fully knowing what he has “done… to the two of them” (King ll. 1500 – 1503), and that would be more unbearable than the “horrendous guilt” (King ll. 1516) he is already burdened with.  Thereby, by blinding himself, he ensures he will also be blind in the afterlife and pays penance for his “crimes too huge for hanging” (King ll. 1503) as he walks the earth in exile, blind and begging, “cast away” (King ll. 1478) from the city he once saved.

           Freud’s argument for the Oedipus complex is dizzyingly circular and illogical. He seemingly believed that the mere existence of this play “confirm[s]” the “fact” of a “deep and universal” desire for patricide and maternal incest, the “legends… only explained” by an absurd assumption of “infantile psychology” (Freud 226).  “What an [absurd] leap you made,” Dr. Freud (King ll. 1448).  Sophocles utilizes the incest taboo to “fascinate” (King ll. 1441) and forewarn the viewer of the great and magnificent power of the gods to “ordain” our “agonies” (King ll. 1469).  We mere mortals who are born but to die must resign our “vain resistance” (Freud 227) and accept the “rough” “bitterness” of “the life… thrust upon” us (King ll. 1628 – 1629) often against our wishes and ignorant of our “great and terrible” “destiny” (King ll. 1597-1598).  

 Works Cited

Chase, Cynthia. "Oedipal Textuality: Reading Freud's Reading of Oedipus."Diacritics 9.1 (1979): 53-68. Web.

Freud, Sigmund, A. A. Brill, Daniel T. O'Hara, and Gina Masucci. MacKenzie.The Interpretation of Dreams. New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2005. Print.

Sophocles, Robert Fagles, and Bernard Knox. The Three Theban Plays. Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England: Penguin, 1984. Print.

#Sophocles #Freud #Oedipus

[totalhermione-blog]

Abnormal or Eccentric?

Our first case study concerns 65-year-old Neil Cargile, millionaire, pilot, college football player, and transvestite.  He has been married and divorced twice.  One of his ex-wives demanded he consult a psychiatrist concerning his cross-dressing behavior.  “After finding out that Cargile was heterosexual, the psychiatrist confided that several of his colleges cross-dressed, too” and “Cargile got the impression that the doctor didn’t think there was much wrong with him.” Is Neil Cargile abnormal and in need of clinical attention or merely eccentric and in need of social acceptance? It is important to remember that abnormal and normal behaviors are culturally defined and as culture evolves and changes, so must clinical criteria and diagnoses.  This is apparent in the ways the DSM has revised its diagnostic criteria throughout the years concerning transsexualism, gender identity disorders, and transvestic fetishism.  

           The DSM-III, published in 1980, allowed for four different diagnoses of adult, heterosexual cross-dressing males.  Transsexualism was diagnosed if the gentleman experienced persistent discomfort with their biological male sex and a desire to replace both primary and secondary sex characteristics with more feminine aspects.  These feelings must have persisted for two years or longer to receive this diagnosis. If the former, but not the later criterion was met, the diagnosis of Gender Identity Disorder of Adolescent of Adulthood, Non-Trans would be applied.  A third diagnosis of Transvestic Fetishism was possible if the individual found themselves sexually aroused by real or imagined cross-dressing, currently exhibited said behavior, and had experienced these feelings for a period longer than six months.  A cross-dressing, male heterosexual failing to meet any of these criteria would be diagnosed with Gender Identity Disorder, Not Otherwise Specified.  By these criteria, the DSM-III considers all instances of heterosexual cross-dressing pathological (Blanchard & Clemmensen, 1998).  

           In 1994, the American Psychiatric Association published the DSM-IV.  In this edition, Gender Identity Disorder was determined two criteria, both needing to be present to receive diagnosis.  The individual must experience strong cross-gender identification and discomfort with their biological sex.  This diagnosis was not admissible if the individual had a concurrent intersex condition.  Furthermore, the cross-dressing behavior must present with impaired ability to function in everyday life or clinically significant distress (Arcelus & Bouman, 2000).  

           The DSM-V, current incarnation of the diagnostic manual published in 2013, redefines the term Gender Identity Disorder as Gender Dysmorphia.  Criteria include clinically significant distress and a marked difference between the individual’s expressed or experienced gender and the gender imposed by society lasting a period longer than six months. It is important to note that “gender nonconformity is not in itself a mental disorder” (dsm5.org).  

           Neil is not clinically distressed by his cross-dressing, rather calling it “fun.” Additionally, as “his cross-dressing doesn’t seem to have altered his social standing in Nashville, nor his capacity to make business deals” one could not say his behavior impairs his ability to function.  Additionally, individuals with the diagnosis of transvestic fetishism usually cross-dress in private only, usually accompanied by masturbation (Blanchard & Clemmensen, 1998).  Neil has no qualms cross-dressing in public, his current girlfriend even “affectionately indulg[es]” this behavior, helping him pick out feminine clothes and applying his make-up.  On these grounds, I would not consider Neil abnormal in a clinical sense.  

           Most modern clinicians would agree with me, recognizing the “spectrum of cross-gender identification” and the distinction between “clinically significant cross-gender behavior and mere statistical deviation from gender norms” (Arcelus & Bouman, 2000).  Again, abnormal conditions are defined by cultural norms.  In general, Americans consider “cross-dressing… as atypical” (Lance, 2002) and homophobia and discomfort with transvestites permeate our culture despite their value as unique aspects of human sexuality.  A distinct double standard appears in our culture concerning gender presentation.  “…cross-dressing among women is relatively [uncommon] since norms” regarding attire “are extremely less restrictive for females” (Lance, 2002). For example, it is considered acceptable for both men and women to wear jean pants, but only women are allowed access to skirts or dresses as acceptable attire.  Even our case study Neil ‘tested the waters’ with his cross-dressing by wearing a kilt (approved skirts for men) with a jacket and tie before moving on to more feminine attire.  

           The DSM determines both how mental disorders are define and diagnosed. Additionally, these distinctions impact “how people see themselves and… each other” (dsm5.org).  By changing the diagnostic criteria for gender dysphoria and similar conditions, the DSM-V de-stigmatizes non-pathological, but perhaps atypical or eccentric behavior while providing access to healthcare for those who need it.  

 References:

Gender Dysphoria. (2013, January 1). Retrieved February 16, 2015, from http://www.dsm5.org/documents/gender dysphoria fact sheet.pdf

Blanchard, R., & Clemmensen, L. (1988). A Test Of The Dsm‐III‐R'S Implicit Assumption That Fetishistic Arousal And Gender Dysphoria Are Mutually Exclusive. Journal of Sex Research,25(3), 426-432.

Arcelus, J., & Bouman, W. (2000). Case reports Gender identity disorder in a child with a family history of cross-dressing. Sexual and Relationship Therapy, 15(4), 407-411.

Lance, L. (2002). Acceptance of Diversity in Human Sexuality: Will the Strategy Reducing Homophobia Also Reduce Discomfort of Cross-Dressing? College Student Journal, 36(4), 598-602.

#transvestism #cross-dressing #DSM #gender identity disorder

[totalhermione-blog]

Masturbation = Moonlanding?

Of all the surprising, alarming, and insightful factoids found in these articles, I am most disturbed by the forced resignation of General Jocelyn Elders, U.S. Surgeon General during the Clinton administration.  She was asked to stepdown after publicly voicing her opinion that it may be beneficial to includemasturbation in the sexual education curriculum of public schools.  Because masturbation carries a distinctstigma, politicians, researchers, and medical professionals must be wary of the possible social ramifications of addressing the topic with the general public who still cling to irrational superstitions (Kaestle & Allen, 2011).  I ruminated on these thoughts for a while and wistfully dreamt of the Kennedy administration who, in the midst of the Cold War, had the ambitions to reach for the stars. I wondered what happened to the United States of America, The Great Enlightenment Experiment, to make us lose our faith in science and reason.    

           80% of scientists agree that human activity negatively impacts the environment while only 50% of the general public agreed. 88% of scientists believe that genetically modified organisms are safe to eat.  63% of American adults do not trust the safety of GMO foods (Santhanam, 2015).  For over one hundred years, doctors have encouraged immunizations against dangerous diseases such as measles, mumps, whooping cough, and various other microscopic horrors.  Small pox is largely extinct due to the efforts of scientists and medical professionals. Recently, parents have stopped vaccinating their children because of a falsified study claiming vaccinations cause autism spectrum disorders.  Subsequent to the outbreak of measles in Disneyland California, “there have been 102 reported cases of measles in 14 states” since the first of this year (Herper 2015).  Few scientists have faith that important research will affect policy. Grant-funding becomes scarcer as public opinion of the scientific community continues to drop (Santhanam, 2015). The new millennium has been dubbed The Information Age, and yet public perceptions of empirical evidence are better fit for the Dark Ages.  In light of this, it becomes less surprising that a doctor, presidentially appointed to the post of U.S. Surgeon General, should be asked to step down for voicing her professional medical opinion on masturbation.  

           Many of the myths enshrouding masturbation literally find their origins in the Dark Ages when the Church believed demons were composed of seminal fluids, thereby associating masturbation with the satanic. To the revered Catholic philosopher Augustine, “semen damned the entire human race by passing on original sin” (Friedman, 2001).  To many Christians, masturbation is viewed as a sin, referencing the Old Testament story of Onan, who during intercourse with Tamar, withdrew before ejaculation and “spill[ing] his seed on the ground.”  The Catholic Church views any act of sex without the possibility of procreation to be immoral and a betrayal of the sacrament of marriage.  This view was maintained by many of the Protestant off-shoots after the Reformation.  As a consequence, for most of its history, Americans experienced severe “masturbation phobia” (Friedman, 2001), devising anti-masturbation medical devices and procedures, perhaps more suited to a medieval torture chamber than a doctor’s office, such as the Miniere Alarm – essentially a miniaturized guillotine. Medical professionals “applied leeches to the patient’s penis,” conducted cold water enemas, applied acid to the penis shaft of patients, “plugged the urethra with electrodes,” penetrating the prostate with long needles, and “encased penises in metal cages, spiked rings, or plaster casts” (Friedman, 2001) all in an effort to prevent individuals from masturbating.  These radical procedures consisted of more than fifty percent of the “recommended therapies in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries” (Friedman, 2001).  

           Religious beliefs aside, medical professionals have been battling masturbation with an ungodly arsenal for two centuries and yet in 1994, the Surgeon General recommended it be taught in public schools. Why the disconnect?  Because of the cultural stigma, research into the subject of masturbation is fairly new and the studies are sparse.  Thus, most findings are correlational at this point, but science conveys a fairly positive opinion of masturbation thus far. Some studies have discussed masturbation as a normal part of human development wherein individuals explore their sexuality, develop a greater sense of self-knowledge, create a sense of positive well-being, “culminating in greater acquisition of the skills necessary for the establishment of intimate and fulfilling long-term relationships” (Hogarth & Ingham, 2009). Masturbation has been positively correlated with self-esteem in multiple studies.  In addition to the positive emotional and social consequences of masturbation, it “remains the safest form of sexual pleasure” (Hogarth & Ingham, 2009) and the utilization of masturbation could potentially reduce the number of teen and unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV/AIDS (Kaestle &Allen, 2011).  Despite these positive findings, masturbation is still stigmatized as a shameful, if not out-rightly called sinful behavior.  

           In his 2005 speech at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, the Dalai Lama addressed the importance of religion adapting to our scientific knowledge of the natural world:

"Today the question of science’s interface with wider humanity is no longer a matter of academic interest alone; this question must assume a sense of urgency for all those who are concerned about the fate of human existence… Because of this methodological standpoint, I have often remarked to my Buddhist colleagues that the empirically verified insights of modern cosmology and astronomy must compel us now to modify, or in some cases reject, many aspects of traditional cosmology as found in ancient Buddhist texts. From the methodological perspective, both traditions [science and Buddhism] emphasize the role of empiricism… This means that, in the Buddhist investigation of reality, at least in principle, empirical evidence should triumph over scriptural authority, no matter how deeply venerated a scripture may be… Because of this methodological standpoint, I have often remarked to my Buddhist colleagues that the empirically verified insights of modern cosmology and astronomy must compel us now to modify, or in some cases reject, many aspects of traditional cosmology as found in ancient Buddhist texts."

Tradition is a beautiful thing, but like anything else it can be corrupted.  I am not calling for a mass abandonment of faith, but a coupling of faith and reason. What is so inherently evil about masturbation that it is considered inappropriate to apply, let alone discuss, scientific findings in our daily lives?  As psychologists, we are ethically responsible for increasing people’s understandings of “themselves and others and to use such knowledge to improve the condition of individuals… and society” (Ethical).  Furthermore, we have an obligation to protect “freedom of inquiry and expression in research, teaching and publication” (Ethical).  As psychologists, as scientists, we have a duty to the public to dissolve these harmful myths and encourage, if not a public education of sex_ and _masturbation, at least the private discussion.  Parents should be persuaded to have this discourse with their children.  Most teens learn about sex and sexuality from the media or peers.  Parents are alarmingly silent and due to the associated stigma, politicians avoid implementing public programs (Kaestle & Allen, 2011).  No one expects these conversations to be pleasant, but I do believe they are necessary.  As scientists have a duty to inform the public, parents have an obligation to inform, educate, and prepare their children as much as possible for adulthood. I believe these conversations should be as open as they are uncomfortable and descriptive rather than prescriptive.  I believe the decision of a teen to be sexually active, abstinent, or merely a masturbator should be an individual, informed choice and we shouldn’t penalize public officials for trying to make that ideal a reality.

 REFERENCES

Kaestle, C., & Allen, K. (2011). The Role of Masturbation in Healthy Sexual Development: Perceptions of Young Adults. Arch Sex Behav.

Friedman, D. (2001). The Gear Shift. In A mind of its own: A cultural history of the penis (pp. 86

102). New York: Free Press.

Hogarth, H., & Ingham, R. (2009). Masturbation Among Young Women and Associations with Sexual Health: An Exploratory Study. Journal of Sex Research, 558-567.

Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct. (n.d.). Retrieved February 5, 2015, from http://www.apa.org/ethics/code/

Santhanam, L. (2015, January 29). Study reveals wide gaps in opinion between scientists and general public. Retrieved February 4, 2015, from http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/study-reveals-wide-opinion-differences-scientists-general-public/

Herper, M. (2015, February 4). Is The Disneyland Measles Outbreak A Turning Point In The Vaccine Wars? Retrieved February 4, 2015, from http://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2015/02/04/the-disneyland-measles-outbreak-is-a-turning-point-in-the-vaccine-wars/

#masturbation #stigma #Cold War #scientists #vaccines #climate change #onanism #Dark Ages #sex-ed #Dalai Lama #faith and reason

[totalhermione-blog]

Salvaging a Sense of Self: A Biopsychosocial Approach to Enhancement Technologies

            At first glance, these two social mechanisms seem oppositional, but competition and cooperation work together to shape the evolution of life on our planet.  Darwin’s theory of evolution dictates that individuals with desirable traits will reproduce more often than their peers via natural selection which functions to preserve and accumulate minor advantageous genetic mutations.  From this, one would logically assume it would be to one’s disadvantage to cooperate with one’s competitors, but mechanisms of reciprocity are embedded throughout nature.  Vampire bats illustrate direct reciprocity.  If a bat misses its chance to feed one of its roost mates may regurgitate its blood meal into the hungry bat’s mouth.  “Studies have shown that the bats remember which bats have helped them in times of need, and when the day comes that the generous bat finds itself in need of food, the bat it helped earlier is likely to return the favor.”  A second means of cooperation is the mechanism of spatial selection, meaning friends or neighbors are likely to help one another.  Additionally, cooperation is most likely among genetically related individuals through the mechanism of kin selection, meaning an individual may go so far as to risk his life on behalf of a relative in order to preserve their shared genes.  The fourth mechanism of cooperation is indirect reciprocity, wherein an individual decides to assist another based on nothing but that person’s reputation.  For example, someone who has a reputation of being kind and has offered assistance to the needy in the past will more often find themselves receiving charity from strangers when they fall on hard times.  Finally, an individual may sacrifice himself for the good of the collective by the mechanism of group selection.  In this way, “natural selection can favor cooperation to improve the reproductive potential of the group” as a whole.  All these mechanisms are magnified in the human species due to our unique development of symbolic language (Nowak 2012). 

            Because competition and cooperation work together in the development of our species, our survival has become dependent on our relationships with one.  Aristotle called humans the “social animal.”  We have a need to belong, to bond with others and engage in positive interactions.  When this need is not met, we experience ostracism, a social sanction used to regulate behavior by excluding or ignoring an individual.  This emotional isolation is has real ramifications including depression and anxiety.  Furthermore, “ostracized people exhibit heightened activity in the brain cortex area that also activates in response to physical pain.”  Conversely, studies have shown feelings of love activate the brain’s reward systems, acting as a natural pain killer.  To avoid ostracism and acquire affection, an individual must be attractive, likeable. 

            What are the components we find attractive in others?  Proximity readily predicts liking, reflecting the cooperation mechanism of spatial selection.  The smaller geographical distance between individuals the more often they are likely to interact with each other.  The mere-exposure effect describes the tendency for people to assign positive attributes to stimuli after repeated exposure.  This effect was extremely adaptive to our ancestors, allowing them to assess elements of their environment as “familiar and safe or unfamiliar and possibly dangerous.”  Perhaps most relevant to this conversation, an individual’s physical attractiveness impacts their likeability (Myers 2012).  On the biological level, we are attracted to beautiful people because their physical appearance is reflective of healthy, fertile genes. 

            This may be the origin of our bizarre belief in the “beauty is good” stereotype.  We assign positive personality traits to physically attractive individuals, assuming beauty and goodness to be synonymous (Face Research 2014).  Because beautiful people are well-liked, they tend to have higher self-esteem, higher social status, and superior socioeconomic standing.  Roszell and colleagues surveyed a sample of roughly one thousand Canadians noting their incomes and rating them on a five point scale of attractiveness, ranging from “strikingly handsome (5), good-looking…(4), average looks for age and sex (3), …below average for age and sex (2), to homely (1).”  From the results of this study, they found for each additional unit of measured attractiveness, on average an individual earned an additional $1,988 per year (Roszell et al. 1990).  The Roszell study was replicated by Irene Hanson Frieze, analyzing 737 MBA graduates after rating them on a 1-5 scale using their yearbook photos. She found that for each unit of attractiveness, men earned an additional $2,600, and women earned an additional $2,150 (Myers 2012). 

            In capitalist America, it is unsurprising that cosmetic surgery has become a “normative cultural practice” (Parens 1998).  In a 1977 study, Harvard students were asked to “rate their impressions” of pictures of eight women taken before and after cosmetic surgery.  “Not only did they judge the women as more physically attractive after the surgery but also as kinder, more sensitive, more sexually warm and responsive, more likeable and so on” (Meyers 2012).  Considering the social and economic consequences of being less than pretty, cosmetic surgery becomes more than an individual choice.  “It is a burgeoning industry… continually upping the ante on what counts as an acceptable face and body” and pressuring individuals to improve themselves physically to access the positive attributions we attribute to the beautiful people – intelligence, kindness, competence, etc. (Parens 1998).  From this example, one can begin to see the convoluted relationship between cooperation and competition in modern society.  As individuals, we compare ourselves to our peers, assessing our superior and inferior qualities and applying improvements, competing with one another for the acceptance we all crave from our social networks.  Not only do we like people who are physically attractive, we like people who like us.  Social cues such as smiling and direct eye contact increase attractiveness because we associate these signs with positive attention toward ourselves (Face Research).  In this way, our social environment favors “sociable, outgoing, positive attitude[s] and assertive characteristics” associated with the extroverted personality type (Nga & Shamuganathan 2010) and like cosmetic surgery, we have developed technologies designed to augment characteristics of favorable personality types. 

            Cosmetic psychopharmacology is an enhancement technology aimed at moving a patient from one normal psychological state to another normal psychological state that is more desirable or socially acceptable and includes the use of drugs such as fluoxetine, methylphenidate, and phenethylamines (Kramer 2000).  It is essential at this point to make a distinction between enhancement technologies and medical technologies.  Alarmingly, there is no common consensus outlining the goals of medicine, nor a universally acknowledged definition of health.  Health may be considered the absence of disease or a state of complete physical and mental well-being.  For the purposes of this discourse, we shall adhere to the normal-functioning model, determining disease and disability as “departures from species-typical” functioning and defining the purpose of health care as the maintenance, restoration, and compensation for loss of function due to disease or disability.  Similarly, the lines between enhancement and health technologies are blurred and irregular.  For instance, the same medical procedures may be used to treat degenerative muscle diseases that are used to enhance athletic ability.  Some enhancements are deemed medically necessary such as vaccines which meliorate normal immune system functioning.  Other procedures such as Botox injections do not improve functioning but rather affect appearance by reducing wrinkles and creating a youthful appearance.  These enhancements are not deemed medically necessary and are not covered by insurance companies. 

            Fluoxetine, better known by the brand name Prozac, is an anti-depressant in the class of SSRI’s, or selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.  It was first developed by the Eli Lilly Company in 1974 and approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of major depressive disorder (Kramer 1993).  Fluoxetine delays the reuptake of the neurotransmitter serotonin without any apparent effect on dopamine or norepinephrine.  Serotonin aids cognitive functions such as learning and memory and is essential in the regulation of mood, sleep, and appetite.  Because fluoxetine delays reuptake of serotonin, the neural synapses become flooded with serotonin and alleviating the symptoms of major depressive disorder such as depressed or irritable mood, weight loss or gain, insomnia and hypersomnia, fatigue, and suicidal ideation (Barlow & Durand 2001).  However, it has been impossible to empirically demonstrate fluoxetine’s effectiveness in treating classical depressive disorders.  In fact, there is some evidence that the use of Prozac may increase suicide rates (Healy 2000). If fluoxetine does not treat classic depression, why were over 24.4 million prescriptions filled in the United States in the year 2010 alone (Verispan 2011)? Off-label uses of fluoxetine include treatment of minor depression and anxiety, compulsiveness, migraines, and more interestingly, melancholic temperaments and social inhibition (Kramer 1993).  Kramer, author of the book Listening to Prozac, defines melancholy as a “personality style rather than an illness” and describes the melancholic temperament as “pessimistic, self-doubting, moralistic and obsessive” as well as artistically creative and low-energy, but productive (Kramer 2000).  These traits are associated with individuals high in neuroticism and introversion.  In medically healthy persons, fluoxetine seems to induce mild hypomania (Kramer 1993).  Mania is an affective state of abnormally extreme elation wherein and individual exacts exaggerated pleasure from normal activities.  Persons experiencing a manic episode my experience increased goal-driven activity socially, at work, or at school.  Hypomania is a less severe variety of mania, presenting without marked impairment (Barlow & Durand 2011).  In this way, one can effectively alter a personality medically from that of the socially introverted, pessimistic melancholic to that of the socially effervescent, driven extrovert.  Cosmetic “psychopharmacology [is] used not to treat disease, but [primarily to] shape personality in ‘attractive’ ways” (Parens 1998).   

            Abnormal and normal conditions are culturally defined.  A man who sees visions in one culture may be revered as a powerful spiritual leader while in another, he would be considered mentally ill.  Likewise, cultures that favor extraversion and emotional stability will be more likely to pathologize traits of introversion and neuroticism in individuals, despite these personality traits existing within a healthy range.  Just as cosmetic enhancements continually raise standards of acceptable physical appearance, cosmetic psychopharmacology encourages the medication of non-pathological conditions, thus limiting the socially acceptable emotional spectrum and pathologizing universally recognized personality traits.  In personality psychology, the classification of traits that has received the most support and attention from researchers has been the five-factor model, or the Big Five.  This model is based on a combination of the lexical approach, identifying stable trait terms from the English language, and the statistical approach which allowed researchers to find the consistency with which those traits are found in different languages and cultures.  The Big Five trait spectrums are extraversion-introversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism-emotional stability, and openness (Larsen & Buss 2008).  These personality traits contribute significantly to an individual’s perception of self; “the ways in which we are aggressive or competitive or sensitive make us who we are” (Parens 1996).  The use of enhancement technologies such as Prozac or Ritalin may come with the price of a relinquishment of self. 

              No personality style is definitively better than any other, but rather adaptive to different situations and social contexts.  Since the beginning of the modern era, we have discovered an “increased degree of differation” in the variety of human activities.  It should logically follow that a “higher degree of variability” in personality traits should be encouraged to fill these unique niches in society.  Culture is always evolving and an “arbitrary… absolute standard” will not maintain its significance when applied across a variety of situations (Boaz 1916).  It is important to note that while biological factors account for 50% of the variability in personality traits and intelligence, different people may have different levels of the same type of intelligence and/or different types of intelligence – i.e. naturalistic, musical, logical-mathematical, existential, interpersonal, bodily-kinesthetic, linguistic, intra-personal, and spatial intelligence.  While accepting the biological component to these varying intelligences in no way diminishes the moral equality of the human race, we should question why our society values only one sort of intelligence and one sort of personality (Parens 1996).  Furthermore, personality enhancements may encourage a mass abandonment of essential components of the human experience, such as vulnerability, imperfection, sadness and alienation (Parens 1998).  All of these emotional states are circumstantially appropriate and morally valuable.  The world we live in is imperfect and riddled with injustice and suffering.  “…Do we not lose sight of something essential about ourselves when we see alienation and guilt as symptoms to be treated rather than clues to our condition as human beings?”  Many psychotropic medications seek to diminish extremes of emotions in response to loss, but in some ways doesn’t this diminishment of loss or sadness also lessen the significance of joy and happiness (Kramer 2000)?  Western society’s obsession with the elimination of all suffering is to a degree, self-defeating.  Many of humanity’s greatest works were born from acute mental anguish.  “We should be poor indeed if the willingness of man to suffer should disappear” (Boaz 1916). 

            The values of American culture, like all cultures, are reflective of the values held by the elite of our society.  The wealthy 1% of our capitalist culture encourage “complicity with harmful conceptions of normality” (Parens 1998) by any means necessary in order to maintain social rank amongst an “increasing number of competing individuals” (Boaz 1916).   Considering global spending on prescription drugs is over $900 billion, the U.S. market accounting for one third of that, pharmaceutical conglomerates can maximize profits by exploiting and propagating social norms in order to increase sales and “whether a medicine helps or harms a patient has become secondary to how much it will bring shareholders in profits” (Petersen 2008). In the 1950’s, less than fifty persons per million were diagnosed with major depressive disorder.  By 2000, that statistic had skyrocketed to nearly 2000 people per million.  This emergence of mass depression coincides with the development of SSRI’s.  While many of these prescriptions may have been written for legitimate reasons, this would not be the first time the pharmaceutical industry has fabricated the existence of a disease. In the mid 1990’s pharmaceutical company Pfizer developed a drug called Detrol - or tolterodine, an antimuscarinic drug used to treat urinary incontinence.  Because the market for individuals who accidently wet themselves is so small, executives invented the disease “overactive bladder” and marketed their product to individuals annoyed by frequent urges to urinate.  Unfortunately, tolterodine has anticholinergic effects, meaning they block the action of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine.  Acetylcholine is essential both to the peripheral and central nervous systems. Damage to the acetylcholine-producing system is associated with deficits in memory associated with Alzheimer’s disease. 

            Pfizer is not the only pharmaceutical conglomerate guilty of disease mongering.  In 2000, Eli Lily repackaged their popular anti-depressant Prozac “in a lavender and pink capsule, renamed it the sweeter-sounding Sarafem, and began selling it” to treat the new disease PMDD, premenstrual dysmorphic disorder (Petersen 2008).  “If drugs are made available only for diseases, it was perhaps predictable that there would be a mass creation of disease” (Healy 2000).  Pfizer’s drug sildenafil citrate took pharmaceutical marketing to the level of a pop-culture phenomenon.  This drug, under the brand name Viagra, became as globally recognizable as McDonald’s and Coca-Cola.  Sildenafil citrate is used to treat erectile dysfunction by inhibiting an enzyme responsible for regulating blood flow to the penis and became one of the first “lifestyle drugs, those treating problems and irritations that come with age such as hair loss, wrinkles, and reduced sex drive” (Petersen 2008).  When did old age become a disease?    

            Much like the beauty-is-good stereotype, one could say that Americans have a forever-young complex.  Negative stereotypes in our culture and the mass media perpetuate ageism in our country to the degree that ageing itself has become pathological.  Adults over the age of sixty-five are the most underrepresented demographic in U.S. media.  When a character is portrayed in this age group, he is often typecast as senile, sexless, sickly, and depressed (Harris & Sandborn 1999).  Quite the contrary, with age, emotional well-being tends to increase, problem-solving tasks and social conflicts are more judiciously reasoned, and cognitive complexity tends to increase regarding language (North &Fiske 2012).  Additionally, “content analyses show this age group has the largest portion of television characters treated with disrespect” (Harris & Sanborn 1999).  The unadulterated opposite of the beauty-is-good stereotype is the negative halo effect.  This theory postulates that “because older people are perceived as generally unattractive, they are also seen as having negative traits and abilities” (North & Fiske 2012).  Ugly is bad, so old is bad.  The perpetuation of ageist myths ensures a market for enhancement technologies aimed at embodying a modern fountain of youth.  Pharmaceutical companies depend on consumers perceiving themselves as defective.  Their products promise to supplement their deficiencies, to make them normal, just like everyone else (Parens 1998).

            “Prozac induces conformity,” (Kramer 2000) a change in behavior or belief as the result of real or imagined group pressure.  Muzafer Sherif’s 1930’s conformity experiments demonstrated the power of the group to perpetuate social norms.  Three participants sat in a darkened room and were told to focus their attention on a single pinpoint of light on the wall.  In a few moments, the light would move about erratically before abruptly disappearing.  The experimenter would then ask the participants how far they believed they light had moved.  This was repeated for a number of days.  While the responses varied greatly the first few days, the more often it was repeated, the closer the estimates were to each other until the fourth day on which all participants agreed the light had moved two inches.  This consensus was incorrect; the light never moved.  It was an optical illusion call the auto-kinetic phenomenon.  Because we are social animals, we look to those around us for social cues on how to act and interpret reality.  This is known as informative influence (Myers 2011).   As previously stated, it has not been possible to prove Prozac’s effectiveness in treating classical cases of depressive disorders.  It seems Prozac treats states of alienation rather than clinical depression, “reducing obsessionality, pessimism and social anxiety, resulting in less inclination to resist social and cultural norms” (Kramer 2000).  Individuals will conform when they believe conformity will fulfill other’s expectations, gaining acceptance in a group.  Due to this normative influence (Myers 2011), in a culture where it is easier and more cost effective to relieve our suffering by medical means, individuals will be less likely to attempt to overhaul the complex, oppressive social conditions from which the suffering originates and more likely to accept the status quo and thusly, medicating their undesirable traits (Parens 1998).  Conformity is not always bad.  Conformity supports necessary social norms concerning public health, food preparation, traffic safety, and hygiene amongst other things.  The danger becomes eminent when conformity bleeds into blind obedience.

            Stanley Milgram conducted a series of obedience studies between 1965 and 1974.  In this study, volunteers of varying ages and demographics were asked to play the role of ‘teacher.’  An experimenter remained in the room and explained the parameters of the experiment.  As teacher, they would be asking a series of questions to a ‘learner’ in another room.  This learner was hooked up to an electric chair and for each incorrect answer, the teacher was to administer an electric shock.  As more incorrect answers were given, the voltages of the shocks were increased (Badhwar 2009).  The experimenter in the room wore a white lab coat and was only allowed to use four verbal prods should the ‘teacher’ wish to discontinue the experiment:  “Please continue,” “The experiment requires that you continue,” “It is absolutely essential that you continue,” and “You have no other choice; you must go on” (Myers 2011).  While the volunteers showed obvious discomfort with their actions, a pattern emerged, “protest, plead, sweat, and obey.”  65% of the participants knowingly administered shocks at lethal levels even when the student screamed in pain, begged for the teacher to stop and made it known that he had a heart condition.  The learner was, of course, a confederate to the experiment and was never in any real danger, but the implications of this study are staggering.  The largest influence on an individual’s actions seems to be the influence of authority figures.  Because the experimenter was wearing a white coat, volunteers associated attributes of authority, competence, attractiveness and responsibility associated with the white-coat phenomenon (Brase & Richmond 2004).  Milgram’s inspiration for the study came from the atrocities committed by millions of citizens in Nazi Germany during World War II (Badhwar 2009).  Much like the volunteers in Milgram’s experiments, many Germans charged with war crimes at the end of WWII claimed they were just following orders of authority-figures and couldn’t be held responsible for their actions.  Just-following-orders resulted in the genocide of approximately six million Jews in scarcely over four years.  Adolf Hitler ordered the eradication of the Jewish people because he believed them inferior human beings.  He wished to build a super-race, the epitome of human perfection for a new and improved Germany - the Aryan people.  Do not for a moment assume Adolf Hitler’s reckless pursuit of human perfection is an isolated incident.

            “Science both shapes and is shaped by social, economic, and political conditions” (Parens 1998).  Biopolitics are the convoluted strategies for the governance and administration of humans on a biological level wherein policy-makers wield the power to “foster life or disallow it to the point of death” (Bazzicalpo 2006).  An example of this is the eugenics movement in the United States, South America, and Europe during the period between World Wars I & II.  Advocates of the movement believed that humans should reproduce in accordance with scientific principles to cultivate the best possible collection of genes in their progeny.  These proponents consisted of the great scientific minds of the time, believing their efforts to better the biological future of humanity a matter of rational duty to the human race (Barrett 2004).  Positive eugenic measures were put in place by the American government such as tax breaks for individuals deemed genetically fit in an effort to encourage fertility and reproduction.  Additionally, the Eugenics Record Office compiled a marriage register listing individual’s important heritable traits, encouraging individuals to find genetically fit mates.  Negative eugenic measures were also enacted by the government in order to “weed-out” the socially undesirable such as the diseased, mentally-ill, criminal, impoverished, or otherwise “flawed human strains” like alcoholics or single-mothers.   These measures included the involuntary sterilization of persons deemed likely to produce children with genetic defects.  By 1937, involuntary sterilization programs existed in twenty-nine states and as recently as the 1990’s, Delaware and West Virginia passed laws allowing judges to order coercive sterilization of individuals prone to genetic defects (Barrett 2004).  Advancements in medical technology have the potential to demolish or reinforce current issues of social stratification (Parens 1996).  “Nature, not nurture” has become cannon in our civilization.  Environmental conditions saturated in prejudice are ignored in favor of biologically determined causes and effects, perpetuating our violent, racist society (Parens 1998).  Bizarrely, modern scientists have become obsessed with the biological influence on personality and behavior while philosophical tradition maintains “human dignity [has always been] equated with our dignity as rational beings, and not with the whole of our biological nature as homo sapiens” (Parens 1996).  The rising use of neurological and psychopharmacological methods in the manipulation and control of human behavior and emotions is a haunting reminder of how easily society may classify individuals as high risk or even non-persons, stripping them of their human rights (Bazzicalpo 2006).

            Capitalist culture is a domain wherein an individual must be faster, better, stronger than his peers.  “To err is all too human and to realize one’s highest potential demands that one be unfettered by their own biological limitations” (Cakic 2009).  This obscene distortion of competition is reflected in our failing school systems.  A child’s brain is evolutionarily wired to engage in physical play with his peers, “thereby learning the natural skills of competition and cooperation” (Panksepp 1998).  The American public school system anathematizes these fundamentally  natural urges in our children, forcing them to sit quietly in overcrowded classrooms, listening to dejected teachers in an effort to give them the best education possible (Parens 1996).  Rather than increasing the student/teacher ratio in classrooms, America’s preferential solution to our “social intolerance of normal childhood impulsivity” is medication, most notably the psychostimulants methylphenidate, more commonly known as Ritalin, and phenethylamines such as Adderall.  (Panskepp 1998).  In the year 1990 alone, American children were collectively ingesting ten tones of methylphenidate, a psychostimulant known to “aggravate mental illness, produce sleep disturbances and is associated with cerebrovascular complications” (Cakic 2009).  In lab settings, animals sensitized to psychostimulants were more prone to addictions and impulsive behaviors.  How have our priorities become so warped that we have stooped to inducing “compliance in children by pharmacologically reducing their [natural] playfulness” with dangerous and addictive psychostimulants (Panksepp 1998)?

            To some degree, psychostimulants have become almost compulsory when one observes the amount of physical and mental rigor necessary to achieve as dictated by modern standards of success in society and academia (Boaz 1916).  There is a long history of collegiate students using cognitive enhancing drugs.  In ancient Greece, students would entwine sprigs of rosemary in their hair, believing it would improve their memory.  Students have been known to use everything from caffeine, a socially sanctioned psychostimulant, to amphetamines and abuse of prescription drugs like Ritalin.  On some American college campuses, non-medical use of methylphenidate and amphetamines is as high as 25%.  Surveys indicate students are taking these drugs to enhance concentration – 58% and increase alertness – 43%, indicating these drugs are being used for their performance-enhancing properties.  Much as athletes are motivated to use dangerous performance-enhancing drugs like anabolic steroids because they believe their competitors are using, it is reasonable to fear the impact of society’s competitive parameters inadvertently coercing students to conform with a perceived norm of drug use in academia (Cakic 2009). 

                        The likelihood of conformity to drug usage is largely dependent on the cultural endorsement of a particular drug (Healy 2000).  Caffeine readily increases performance in a range of sports and enhances concentration and memory.  Despite caffeine’s use as a performance enhancing drug, it is not considered cheating in the same way that anabolic steroid use is considered cheating.  Sports officials do not drug test for caffeine because it is relatively harmless and culturally endorsed (Cakic 2009).  “Do-it-yourself pharmo ‘therapy’” has existed for centuries (Healy 2000).  During the Romantic period, opium was available as a cure-all.  Most households maintained a small supply, usually in the form of laudanum.  It possessed none of the stigma associated with opium or its derivatives today, but was largely viewed as medically neutral and at worst was considered a bad habit when used in excess, much like the contemporary view of alcohol.  Opium is referenced repeatedly in the works of both Shakespeare and Chaucer.  Authors such as Keats, Shelly, and Byron used opium to achieve states of transcendence, catalyzing their creativity through drug use (Alvarez 2001).  Transcendent states utilize common neurobiological pathways, activating hippocampal slow waves.  This brain state has been found optimal for energy and concentration levels as well as learning and memory (Winkleman 1986).  For intellectuals and creative writers across the globe, throughout various cultures and the course of history, altered states of consciousness have been sources of new inspiration (Alvarez 2001).  Transcendent states may be achieved in a number of ways, including auditory driving, sensory deprivation, mediation, sleep and dream states, excessive motor behavior, endogenous opiates, marijuana, hallucinogens, alcohol, and even tobacco (Winkleman 1986). 

            Then again, what is it about swallowing a pill in order to enhance our capabilities that offend us on such a deep level, considering the greatest thinkers in history were guilty of intellectual doping?  Sigmund Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, famously smoked twenty cigars a day and also dabbled in cocaine use.  The great American inventor Thomas Edison regularly drank cocaine-laced elixirs. Computer geniuses Bill Gates and Steve Jobs have both admitted using the hallucinogen LSD.  “Preeminent astrophysicist and cosmologist Carl Sagan not only smoked marijuana regularly, he was also a strong advocate for its use in enhancing intellectual pursuits…” Francis Crick, co-discoverer of the structure of the DNA molecule, would ingest small amounts of LSD as a “thinking tool” and claims to have “perceived the double-helix shape [of DNA] while on LSD” (Gonzalez 2013).  Vincent van Gogh’s famous work Starry Night, was greatly influenced by his used of absinthe, an alcohol distilled from the grand wormwood.  Chemicals in absinthe may cause yellow spots to appear in the user’s vision.  The great novelist Charles Dickens frequented the opium dens of Victorian England (FinerMinds 2012).   Nobel Prize winning author Ernest Hemingway drank copious amounts of alcohol as did the American Romantic, Edgar Allan Poe.  During his time as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Winston Churchill used amphetamines to aid in strategic planning during WWII (DrugAbuse 2014).  “Jean-Paul Sartre wrote his last books while on amphetamines, fully believing he was hastening his death but preferring… the short, productive life” (Kramer 1993).

            This conversation culminates at the question of what we as a species expect from mankind on an individual, national, and global scale.  “Is it physical excellence, mental ability, creativity, power, or artistic genius?”  And furthermore, do we have the right to dictate with finality which traits are valuable to human existence and which traits should be suppressed? (Boaz 1916).  Perfection is subjective.  We are all isolated from one another by our subjective perspectives of the world determined unique life experiences. While we long for group acceptance, we must ultimately accept that validation must come from within.  As individuals, we much each accept the responsibility of actively creating ourselves, striving for our distinct ideals of perfection.  Existentialists like Jean-Paul Sartre believe in absolute freedom for the individual.  We believe in a perfect version of ourselves, the masterpiece of humanity that we could be.  We all struggle and suffer when we fail to achieve the lofty goal of self-actualization, but “in creating the man that we want to be, there is not a single one of our acts which does not at the same time create an image of man as we think he ought to be” (Knoebel 1998).  If someone believes their ultimate perfection may only be achieved by biochemical means, why should they not be allowed to pursue that avenue as far as they wish?  Similarly, we should respect other perspectives of a perfect life and avoid pressuring others to assimilate to our ideal.  The libertarian perspective on drug echoes that of the existentialist, arguing that an individual, acquainted with the potential side-effects­ of a drug, should be free to make their own decisions regarding its use, so long as they do not impose on the rights of others in the process (Cakic 2009).  The Romantic m­­­ovement was founded on the concept of natural freedom, the freedom to feel and react to the world around us in a deeply personal way.  It is from this period that the modern conception of genius finds its roots.  A genius is not just a great thinker or brilliant artist, but a person who embarks on “an inner journey and makes his own rules as he goes” (Alvarez 2001).  Homo sapien, the “social animal” is an island.  It’s almost as contradictory as cooperation and competition working together in our evolution, and yet there’s something exceedingly Zen about the juxtaposition of these jarring ideas.  “There is no universe other than a human universe, the universe of human subjectivity” (Knoebel 1998).  Unleash your inner genius, by whatever means you deem necessary.  The intellectuals of medieval Europe often wore skull rings as symbols of the mantra memento mori, translated “remember you will die” or “remember you are mortal.”  It was meant to inspire the wearer to seek moralistic perfection in their daily lives because as mortals, our time on this earth is limited and precious (Ascher 2004).  As the great Carl Sagan once said, “I would love to believe that when I die I will live again, that some thinking, feeling, remembering part of me will continue. But much as I want to believe that… I know of nothing to suggest that it is more than wishful thinking…  Far better it seems to me, in our vulnerability, is to look death in the eye and to be grateful every day for the brief but magnificent opportunity that life provides.”

References

20 Genius Minds and the Drugs they were addicted to. (n.d). Retrieved November 18, 2014.

5 Famous & Iconic Drug Users That Inspired the World. (2012, May 11). Retrieved November 18, 2014, from http://www.finerminds.com/personal-growth/5-famous-iconic-drug-users-that-inspired-the-world/

Alvarez, A. (2001). Drugs and Inspiration. Social Research, 68(3), 779-793. Retrieved October 16, 2014, from JSTOR.

Ascher, Y. (2004). Manifest Humbleness: Self-Commemoration in the Time of Catholic Reform. Sixteenth Century Journal, 35(2), 329-356.

            Badhwar, Neera K. "The Milgram Experiments, Learned Helplessness, and Character Traits." The Journal of Ethics 13.2-3 (2009): 257-89. JSTOR. Web. 15 Nov. 2014.

Barrett, D., & Kurzman, C. (2004). Globalizing Social Movement Theory: The Case of Eugenics. Theory and Society, 33(5), 487-527. Retrieved October 6, 2014, from JSTOR.

Bazzicalupo, L., & Clo, C. (2006). The Ambivalences of Biopolitics. Diacritics, 36(2), 109-116. Retrieved September 3, 2014, from JSTOR.

Boas, F. (1916). Eugenics. The Scientific Monthly, 3(5), 471-478. Retrieved October 6, 2014, from JSTOR.

Brase, G. L., & Richmond, J. (2004). The White–coat effect: physician attire and perceived authority, friendliness, and attractiveness. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 34(12), 2469-2481.

Cakic, V. (2009). Smart drugs for cognitive enhancement: Ethical and pragmatic considerations in the era of cosmetic neurology. Journal of Medical Ethics, 35(10), 611-615. Retrieved September 3, 2014, from JSTOR.

Durnad, V., & Barlow, D. (2011). Mood Disorders and Suicide. In Abnormal psychology: An integrative approach (6th ed., pp. 210 - 250). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.

Gonzalez, R. (2013, August 16). 10 Famous Geniuses and their Drug of Choice. Retrieved November 18, 2014, from http://www.salon.com/2013/08/16/10_famous_geniuses_who_used_drugs_and_were_better_off_for_it_partner/

Goodenough, U. (1998). Awareness. In The Sacred Depths of Nature (pp. 89 - 100). New York: Oxford University Press.

Harris, R., & Sanborn, F. (1999). Media Portrayals of Groups. In A cognitive psychology of mass communication (6th ed., pp. 111 - 113). Mahwah, N.J.: L. Erlbaum Associates.

Healy, D. (2000). Good Science or Good Business? The Hastings Center Report, 30(2), 19-22. Retrieved September 3, 2014, from JSTOR.

Knoebel, E. (1998). Jean-Paul Sartre. In Classics of Western Thought (4th ed., Vol. 3, pp. 616 - 634). Michigan State University.

Kramer, P. (1993). Listening to Prozac. New York, N.Y., U.S.A.: Viking.

Kramer, P. (200). The Valorization of Sadness Alienation and the Melancholic Temperament. The Hastings Center Report, 30(2), 13-18. Retrieved September 3, 2014, from JSTOR.

Larsen, R., & Buss, D. (2008). Personality Assessment, Measurement, and Research Design. In Personality psychology: Domains of knowledge about human nature (3rd ed., pp. 75 - 87). Boston: McGraw Hill.

Myers, D. (2012). Attraction and Intimacy. In Social Psychology (11th ed., pp. 393 - 403). New York: McGraw-Hill.

Nowak, M. (2012, July 1). Why We Help. Scientific American, 34-39.

Panksepp, J. (1998). The Quest for Long-Term Health and Happiness: To Play or Not to Play, That Is the Question. Psychological Inquiry, 9(1), 56-66. Retrieved September 3, 2014, from JSTOR.

Parens, E. (1996). Taking Behavioral Genetics Seriously. The Hastings Center Report, 26(4), 13-18. Retrieved September 3, 2014, from JSTOR.

Parens, E. (1998). Special Supplement: Is Better Always Good? The Enhancement Project. The Hastings Center Report, 28(1), S1-S17. Retrieved September 3, 2014, from JSTOR.

Petersen, M. (2008). Creating Disease. In Our daily meds (pp. 16 - 37). New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Roszell, P., Kennedy, D., & Grabb, E. (1990). Physical Attractiveness and Income Attainment Among Canadians. The Journal of Psychology, 123(6), 547-559.

Verispan, LLC. (2011, January 1). Top 200 Generic Drugs by Units in 2010.

Winkelman, M. (1986). Trance States: A Theoretical Model and Cross-Cultural Analysis. Ethos, 14(2), 174-203. Retrieved October 16, 2014, from JSTOR.

#Prozac #biopsychosocial #Ritalin #eugenics #conformity #obedience #cosmetic surgery #enhancement #technology #social animal #Big5

[totalhermione-blog]

Themes of Mortality: A Comparative Analysis of John Donne and Robert Herrick

MEMENTO MORI

            After the growth of Christianity in Europe, the Latin expression memento mori, translated as “remember you will die,” gained popularity as a moralizing meditation.  The mortality of man and subsequent fear of death has always had an impact on religion and the religious (Ascher 331).  Of all the authors of the seventeenth century few possessed as fervent a fascination with death than John Donne.  Donne was born into a Roman Catholic family in Protestant England in 1572.  He converted to the Church of England and eventually became a theologian and court preacher.  Despite his conversion, Donne never became anti-Catholic but rather romanticized the early Christian martyr.  Historians speculate this admiration of saints and martyrs may have been a contributor to John Donne’s seemingly life-long death wish (Roberts 961).  In many private correspondences, Donne openly voiced his longing for death and the afterlife and often fought the temptation of suicide.  Conceptions of death preoccupied the poet to the extent that he wrote Bianthanos, a reasoned defense of suicide and forbade both its publication and its destruction (Roberts 969).

            With this complicated, romanticized view of death in mind, John Donne’s most quoted work, Meditation 17 from Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, may be seen in a new light.  Donne’s famous sentiment “no man is an island” reflects the religious belief of vocation.  Vocation is a consecrated calling, a purpose in life, a reason for existence determined by God.  Every person is a “piece” of the greater whole and is given a vital function in the temporal world, a niche in existence for his or her particular God-given talents.  In this way, Donne establishes the “connected[ness]” of humanity and our unity with the Divine.  He contrasts this feeling of divine duty with the inevitability of death and the promise of eternal salvation via the extended metaphor of the “tolling” “bell.”

            “Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”  The frequent tolling of the funeral bells was a constant reminder of death in seventeenth century England.  Donne uses this conceit as a reminder of the finite time humanity has to fulfill their earthly purposes before death takes us all and we must face divine judgment.  In a way, this piece may reflect Donne’s inner conflict between his longing for death and his duty to fulfill his vocation, each tolling of the bell a promise that his “misery” will soon be replaced as he gets “nearer and nearer our home, heaven” and will be “united to God.” 

  CARPE DIEM

            Carpe diem, translated “seize the day,” is also a reflection of humanity’s finitude but in contrast to memento mori, this expression encourages not contemplation of eternal salvation but rather enjoyment of our short time of this earth with definite pagan connotations.  The poet Robert Herrick in his many arduous love poems emboldens the reader to eat, drink, be merry and fornicate for the end is nigh.  In The Vine, Herrick convokes the powerful imagery of “Bacchus,” the Roman god of wine and fertility (ll. 13).  Many of Herrick’s poems reference sinful pleasures of the flesh. 

            Upon the Nipples of Julia’s Breast is a ten line poem completely dedicated to romanticizing the female anatomy.   Not only is the wanting flesh sumptuous of its own right but now emboldened by evoking our olfactory memories and associating the fragrant smell of “roses,” the sweet, juicy tang of the “cherry” and the “strawberry,” and our covetous greed for sparkling gems such as rare and precious “rubies” (ll. 2 – 7). 

            Corinna’s Going A-Maying is set on May Day, a traditionally boisterous pagan celebration of the goddess Flora.    In this work, Herrick juxtaposes “drowned,” “decaying” death (ll. 68 – 69) with the “fresh,” “green” “springtime” (ll. 16) reasserting the “delights” (ll. 37) of our “short” (ll. 61) life should be enjoyed “in our prime” (ll. 57). 

CONCLUSIONS

            Death may not be as prevalent in modern western society as it was in seventeenth century England, but it remains an inevitability.  Regardless of religion, race or gender, the reaper comes for us all.  Contemplations of death and suicide may be less socially acceptable now than they used to be, but they are no less important.  Whether one wishes to seize the day and sample as many earthly delights as possible in our terrestrial time or martyr themselves for the sake of others, it is important to acknowledge that time is short, not to be wasted.  Remember, you will die.

Works Cited

"Average Lifespan." HealthStatus. Health Status, n.d. Web. 28 Oct. 2014.

"Memento Mori." The Culture of Death and the Afterlife Exhibition. Museum of Art and Archaeology, n.d. Web. 28 Oct. 2014.

Ascher, Yoni. "Manifest Humbleness: Self-Commemoration in the Time of Catholic Reform." Sixteenth Century Journal 35.2 (2004): 329-56. Print.

Porter, Stephen. "17th Century: Plague." Free Public Lectures. Gresham College, 29 Oct. 2001. Web. 28 Oct. 2014.

Roberts, Donald R. "The Death Wish of John Donne." Modern Language Association 62.4 (1947): 958-76. JSTOR. Web. 20 Oct. 2014.

#carpe diem #memento mori #John Donne #Robert Herrick

[totalhermione-blog]

Medieval Astrology in Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

Astronomy was the earliest subject studied by the Ancient Greeks, a sea-faring people, dependent on the stars for navigational purposes.  Farmers also depended on the movements of celestial bodies for accurate predictions of seasonal changes.  The great Greek philosopher Aristotle speculated nature as possessing an underlying reason or order.  This is reflected in the ancient Greek word for universe, “kosmos,” which means “lovely arrangement whose beauty reflects order.”  This inherent order in the universe implied the possibility of celestial bodies influencing events in the human plane of existence (Bertman 128). 

            The Greeks were not the only ancient civilization enamored with the night sky.  The Babylonians kept meticulous records of celestial events and devised the twelve signs of the zodiac familiar with Westerners today – Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, Aquarius, and Pisces.  At this time, stargazers knew only of the five planets visible to the naked eye – Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.  The Egyptians are credited with the invention of the world’s first solar calendar and relied on the position of the star Sirius to predict the yearly flood of the Nile (127).  The Milesian astronomer Anaximander is recognized as the first person to conceive the concept of outer space and established the geocentric model of the solar system which remained popular into the Middle Ages (131).  Hipparchus, a Hellenistic astronomer, studied Babylonian texts and learned how to calculate the precession of equinoxes.  Additionally, he invented trigonometry, the dioptra - an optical slide rule that enabled calculations of the size and distance of celestial bodies, and the astrolabe (132).  Ptolemy, a scholar of Alexandria and the last astronomer of the ancient Greeks, left the largest body of work on astronomy/astrology.  He considered the heavens as a “manifestation of the divine,” a guide for humanity to achieve transcendence (133).  These concepts became the basic principles of astronomy taught in medieval universities.

THE MILLER’S TALE

The Miller’s Tale is set in Oxford, a prominent university town.  The protagonist Nicholas is a “poor student” there lodging with a carpenter.  Nicholas is said to study “astronomy and geomancy” (ll. 4-6).  An education of astronomy and astrology composed part of the standard curriculum that led to a bachelor’s degree in medieval Europe.  Furthermore, astrology accounted for celestial influences on health, making it essential particularly to a physician’s training (Moyer 229).  It was commonplace for doctors to delay treatments or surgeries until an astrologically auspicious date and time (Grafton 42). 

            We can assume that Nicholas is an advanced student because he was known to “forecast… the likelihood of drought” (ll. 8-10).  The ability to make precise weather predictions was highly favored by farmers.  Clergy and politicians often consulted with astrologers to determine “favourable hours” or receive warning in the form of foreboding prophecies (ll. 10).  Astrologers needed not only an understanding of the geocentric universe and the movement of the heavenly spheres, but also the complex relationships between the different planets at each interval throughout their individual orbits around earth.  Additionally, students of astrology were required to memorize the associated mythologies that assist in interpretation of genitures and other horoscopes.  Each planet, zodiac sign, and house possesses a particular character based on the ancient Greek gods and special properties that effect personality in humans, the seasons, and history (Grafton 29).  Most of this information was gained by reading “astronomic textbooks” including almanacs listing daily aspects between the planets, and manuals describing practical use of the “astrolabe” (ll. 23- 24). 

            Nicholas utilizes his reputation as an astronomer of merit to manipulate his landlord.  A serving-boy sees Nicholas sprawled on his back, melancholic, and hurriedly fetches the carpenter to attend to his lodger.  Upon hearing this, the carpenter crosses himself like a good Catholic and fears Nicholas has fallen into a state of “lunacy” (ll. 344).  The term lunacy is derived from the name of the moon, Luna.  The moon’s astrological attributions include “wandering of the wits” and “periodical insanity” (Lewis 109).  Unnerved by the serving-boy’s observations, Carpenter John unhinges the door to Nicholas’s room where he finds his young tenant “gaping” at the ceiling with a “despair[ing]” expression (ll. 366-367).  Nicholas explains to John by use of “astrology and the position of the “moon” he has determined a great and catastrophic flood comparable to Noah’s flood is due next Monday (ll. 406 – 407).    John the dim-witted drunkard falls prey to this false prophecy because as an educated astrologer, Nicholas is considered credible in this culture.

THE WIFE OF BATH’S PROLOUGE:

In this section of The Tales, the Wife of Bath describes how she met her fifth husband, a student and clerk, at the funeral of her fourth husband and engaged in sexual intercourse with him thereafter.  Lines 615 – 626 are essentially a recollection of the Wife of Bath’s geniture.  A geniture or natal horoscope is a map of the stars and other celestial bodies at the birthplace of an individual at his or her exact time of birth.  From this astronomical account of planetary influences, astrologers could make deductions about the individual’s personality and make predictions about their future (Lineman 17). 

            The Wife of Bath declares herself a “Venecian,” meaning a large amount of planetary influence on her personality is due to the position of “Venus” at the time of her birth (ll. 610).  Venus is associated with the goddess of lust and love, Aphrodite.  Its influence in humans is apparent by personality characteristics such as amorousness (Lewis 107) and “lecherousness” (ll. 618).  Instilled attributions of Venus include a receptive sex drive and feminine female expression as well as a strong drive for companionship (Lineman 46).      Additionally, she claims to be “born under Taurus,” the zodiac sign ruled by Venus (ll. 619).  Taureans are known to derive emotional security from the acquisition of money and rich possessions (Lineman 28) and have a tendency towards “stubborn[ess]” (ll. 643).  Her history serial marriage to rich, older men and accumulating their wealth and property when widowed confirms these aspects of her natal chart.  The final aspect of the Wife of Bath’s natal chart she discloses is the influence of the planet “Mars” (ll. 616).  Mars is associated with Aries, the Greek god of war and masculine sexual energy.  Personality traits influence by Mars present as individualistic drive, aggressiveness, sexual “desire” (ll. 617), and virility (Lineman 46).  

            Returning to the Aristotelean principle that all matter is interconnected, the Wife of Bath offers this geniture to explain her perceivably lewd behavior as “natural inclination” (ll. 621).    Medieval science and religion were intricately intertwined.  “Orthodox theologians could accept the theory that the planets had an effect on events and on psychology…” (Lewis 102) and believed certain compassions and hostilities were inherent in matter as influenced by the heavens (92).  In this way, the Wife of Bath argues that any sins or character flaws are God-given and divine, removing any responsibility for her actions.  This astrological determinism was discouraged by the Catholic Church because it contradicted the concept of free will, but acknowledged planetary influence on physical and personality aspects rather than reason or a person’s will (103 – 104). 

CONCLUSION

Chaucer’s scholarly knowledge of astrological systems is littered throughout The Canterbury Tales in addition to his other works and works of his contemporaries like John Gower.  These numerous astrological subtleties, while common place in medieval culture, may be lost on the modern reader without a mental heuristic for astrological archetypes and attributions and therefore are deprived of the rich symbolism throughout literature in the middle ages. 

    Works Cited

Bertman, Stephen. The Genesis of Science: The Story of Greek Imagination. Amherst, NY: Prometheus, 2010. Print.

Grafton, Anthony. Cardano's Cosmos: The Worlds and Works of a Renaissance Astrologer. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1999. Print.

Lewis, C. S. The Discarded Image; an Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature. Cambridge: U, 1964. Print.

Lineman, Rose, and Jan Popelka. The Compendium of Astrology. Gloucester, MA: Para Research, 1984. Print.

Moyer, Ann. "The Astronomers' Game: Astrology and University Culture in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries." Early Science and Medicine 4.3 (1999): 228-50. JSTOR. Web. 14 Sept. 2014.

#Chaucer #astrology #Canterbury Tales #Medieval

[totalhermione-blog]

Bipolar Spectrum Disorders

Criteria

            Additionally, to diagnose bipolar disorders, these major depressive and manic/hypomanic episodes should not be better explained by schizoaffective disorder or any other psychotic disorder.  These symptoms must cause “clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other… areas of functioning” (p.221).  Specifiers include severity, presence of psychotic features such as hallucinations or delusions, presence of catatonic, melancholic, or atypical features, and post-partum onset.  Moreover, longitudal specifiers designate the chronicity of the bi-polar disorder with or without interepisode recovery, season patterns, or rapid cycling (Barlow & Durand, 2012).

            It is important to differentiate between bipolar I and bipolar II to maximize the efficacy of treatment.  While individuals with bipolar II do not experience full manic episodes or psychosis, they have more episodes of rapid cycling and mixed mood states and a more chronic course of disease with “significant psychological impairment” and “poor health-related quality of life” (Swartz et al., 2012).

Epidemiology

            There are many discrepancies in the literature concerning the lifetime prevalence rates of bipolar spectrum disorders in the United States, but most consider these disorders to effect between 2 – 4% of the American population and is considered “one of the top 10 causes of disability worldwide” (Gershon et al, 2012).  There is no significant gender difference in persons that suffer from bipolar I disorder, but 1.1% who suffer from bipolar II disorder (Poon et al., 2012) are more likely to be female (Swartz,et al., 2012).

Course and Prognosis

            “There is mounting evidence for multiple patterns of course, comorbidity and clinical phenomenology consistent with the diagnosis of bipolar disorder” (Nwulia, et al, 2008).  Bipolar disorders are frequently chronic and throughout the course of the disease, one can expect multiple relapses causing significant impairment in functioning (Poon et al., 2012).  While there is still much research concerning bipolar disorders in children, the most common onset of adult BSD occurs between the ages of 15 and 19 with the highest risk period at age 17.  Many studies suggest after the initial onset of a bipolar spectrum disorder the disease may progress to more severe forms (Alloy et al., 2012a).  Childhood and adolescent onset of bipolar disorders predicts poor prognosis with almost a quarter of children and adolescents diagnosed with bipolar II eventually develop manic episodes, thus progressing to a diagnosis of bipolar I.  Additionally, an onset of major depressive disorder before the age of seventeen is highly associated with higher risk of experiencing manic or hypomanic episodes.  Early intervention is essential to these cases, but “retrospective studies suggest that individuals with bipolar I disorder first experience less severe symptoms… 12 years prior to being diagnosed” (Alloy et al., 2012b). 

            As bipolar spectrum disorders progress in severity, individuals may experience “rapidly switching moods” (Nwulia et al., 2008).  The DSM-IV describes rapid cycling as at least one week of manic or hypomanic symptoms and two weeks of major depressive symptoms however, there have been studies indication the presences of “fluctuating affective states too brief to warrant a DSM diagnosis” (Nwulia et al, 2008) such as ultra-rapid and ultra-radian cycling wherein and individual may experience mood swings between manic/hypomanic states and major depressive states on a daily or even hourly basis (Nwulia et al, 2008).  Also indicative of worsening course of a bipolar spectrum disorder is the presence of mixed-episodes wherein an individual experiences symptoms of manic/hypomanic episodes and major depressive episodes simultaneously (Rowe, L. S., & Morris, 2012).  Studies have shown in many cases the “persistence of interespisode symptoms and impairment” (Gershon et al., 2012) which greatly interfere with recovery.  Critical to a good prognosis of this disorder is the support of friends and family members.  “Having hostile or critical close others… is associated with more depressive symptomology, poor response to treatment and higher relapse rate” (Rowe & Morris, 2012). 

            Sadly, bipolar spectrum disorders have the highest risk of suicide attempts than any other Axis-I disorder with a lifetime risk of 25-56% for non-fatal suicide attempts (Valtonen et al., 2008) and higher rates of suicidal ideation (Rowe & Morris, 2012).  Persons with bipolar spectrum disorders are most at risk for suicide attempts during major depressive or mixed episodes.  It is prudent to note that persons with bipolar II disorders spend more time in a depressive state than individuals with bipolar I and are thusly more at risk for suicide attempts (Valtonen et al., 2008). 

Diagnostic Considerations

            Bipolar spectrum disorders are highly co-morbid with substance abuse particularly abuse of alcohol, prescription drugs, street drugs, nicotine and caffeine.  Caffeine in particular is often used to increase the effect of mania/hypomania but disturbs sleep and exacerbates anxiety (Swartz, et al., 2012).  Anxiety disorders are the most prevalent comorbid condition with bipolar spectrum disorders including OCD, GAD, panic disorders, and social phobias.  Additionally, among the bipolar population, migraine comorbidity is as high as 39% with a higher prevalence in type II bipolar disorder.  There are many similarities between chronic migraines and bipolar disorder such as their episodic course, increased vulnerability to stress, and disturbances in “serotonergic, dopaminergic, and glutamatergic systems” (Oritz, et al., 2010).   Migraines disrupt circadian rhythms and sleep efficiency further contributing to mood dysregulation in persons with bipolar disorders.  Furthermore, bipolar individuals with comorbid migraines are at higher risks for further comorbidity and experience higher rates of suicidal behavior (Oritz, et al., 2010). 

            Approximately 15% of clients with bipolar spectrum disorders suffer from comorbid ADHD.  ADHD has extremely unfavorable effects on the course of bipolar disorders including earlier age of onset, higher number of total depressive episodes and increased frequency of episodes of mania/hypomania and depression, higher rates of comorbid Axis I disorders, increased likelihood of substance abuse and an increase in the number of suicide attempts.  “ADHD symptoms like attention deficit, hyperactivity, and impulsivity can prevent bipolar patients from following their treatment regimen” (Tamam, et al., 2008).  There is a strong, but desperately under-researched association between ADHD and the manic/hypomanic phase of bipolar disorder as seen in the similar symptoms of talkativeness, distractibility and increased motor activity (Tamam, et al., 2008) which may suggest that ADHD is a “prodromal form” of bipolar disorders (Nwulia et al., 2008). 

            Bipolar spectrum disorders are one of the most commonly misdiagnosed disorders partially because the symptoms mimic other disorders such as ADHD, borderline personality disorder and major depressive disorder but also due to a “lack of clinical familiarity” (Swartz,et al., 2012) with bipolar disorders.  Additionally, individuals with bipolar II disorder do not recognize their hypomania as a problem but rather a welcome relief from depressive episodes, so if a person with bipolar disorder does seek clinical help; hypomanic/manic episodes are overlooked in the client’s history and are diagnosed with major depressive disorder.  A misdiagnosis of unipolar depression will often result in exposure to anti-depressants such as SSRIs which “accelerate mood-cycling” (Swartz,et al., 2012), triggering manic episodes.  Patients with bipolar disorder presenting with psychotic symptoms may be misdiagnosed as schizophrenic and lose access to critical treatment (Tamam, et al., 2008).  Impairments associated with bipolar disorders such as lack of empathy and negative reactivity may lead to an incorrect diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder (Rowe & Morris, 2012).

Etiology

            Like most psychiatric disorders, little is known about the causes of bipolar disorders, but it seems linked to a dysregulation of the Behavioral Approach System, a biological system comprised of a “reward sensitive neural network involving dopaminergic projections from the limbic system to the frontal cortex” (Alloy et al., 2012a).  Excessive BAS activation causes mania/hypomania as observed in increased motor behavior, excessive energy and decreased need for sleep as well as “positive goal-striving emotions” such as “optimism, grandiosity, and euphoria” (Alloy et al., 2012a).  Conversely, excessive deactivation of the Behavioral Approach System may cause depression in response to stressful life events of failure expressed through anger, irritability, decreased goal-directed activity, fatigue, anhedonia, and a sense of hopelessness.  This dysregulation has been observed by “increased activation of ventral straitum and lateral orbitofrontal cortext” (Alloy et al., 2012a) related to reward-related processing.   Persons suffering from a bipolar spectrum disorder exhibit cognitive themes of goal striving, perfectionism, and self-criticism, correlated with dysregulation of the Behavioral Approach System.

            Another hypothesis concerning the cause/causes of bipolar spectrum disorders is the social zeitgeber theory which states “individuals with bipolar disorder have a biological vulnerability” to stress which leads to a disruption of their “internal clock” responsible for regulating “circadian rhythms and the sleep-wake cycle” (Gershon et al., 2012)  Individuals with bipolar disorders experience more fragmented sleep-wake rhythms and longer sleep onset latencies than healthy individuals (Gershon et al., 2012) and “sleep that is often as disturbed as those with insomnia” (Talbot, et al., 2011).  Moreover, social rhythm disruptions trigger this inherent circadian vulnerability which leads to sleep disturbances and eventually episode relapse.  There seems to be a bidirectional relation between sleep and mood affect in bipolar individuals (Gershon et al., 2012).  Sleep disturbances contribute to negative affect which contribute to further sleep disturbance which is “associated with manic episode onset” (Talbot, et al., 2011).  Sleep deprivation in non-psychiatric populations has been known to cause “increased amygdala activity and decreased activity in the medial-prefrontal cortex” (Talbot, et al., 2011) which controls the limbic system.  This indicates the possibility that the threshold for this effect may be lower in persons with bipolar disorders. 

Treatment

            The “most important aspect of treating bipolar disorders… is to secure long term mood stabilizing effects” (Poon et al., 2012).  Lithium salts have been the ‘go-to’ treatment for bipolar disorder for years but there have been “tolerability issues” (Nierenberg, et al., 2013) at higher dosages as well incredible non-compliance.  Relatively little is known about how to treat bipolar disorders and psychosocial and rehabilitative efforts have been grossly under-researched.  Interpersonal and Social Rhythm Therapy could be an effective cognitive approach to treating bipolar disorder.  One of the goals of this therapy is to teach the client to recognize and attune themselves to the cycle of their mood states.  Being able to identify and track their mood states can be difficult task, especially if the client suffers from mixed moods, so it is encouraged to keep a separate daily average for mood and energy level respectively.  This allows the client suffering from bipolar disorder to better understand themselves and identify stressors that may cause relapse.  Another goal of this therapy is for the client to acknowledge that hypomanic/manic episodes are dangerous.  It is important to inform the client of the likelihood of depressive episodes to follow hypomanic/manic episodes and the overall goal of the therapy is to improve overall mood stability.  In this approach, clients learn to keep regular daily routines to keep moods and circadian rhythms regular.  This includes regular wake and sleep times, work schedules, meal times, etc (Swartz,et al., 2012).  “Historic disruptions in regularity in rhythms (especially sleep)… almost always precede destructive manic episodes and hospitalizations” (Swartz,et al., 2012).  Additionally, clients with bipolar disorder may benefit from breathing exercises and self-soothing techniques (Swartz, et al., 2012). 

            The “severity, persistence, and variability that are typical of bipolar disorders” result in “routine failure of available treatments to provide adequate control of its symptoms” (Poon et al., 2012) particularly long term and during depressive episodes during which the risk of suicide is at its highest.  Adjuncts to lithium treatment and cognitive therapy include lamotrigine,  second-generation anti-psychotics, dopamine antagonists, ketamine, deep brain stimulation, and sleep deprivation (Poon et al., 2012).

References

Alloy, L., Bender, R., Abramson, L., Whitehouse, W., Wagner, C., Liu, R., et al. (2012). High Behavioral Approach System (BAS) Sensitivity, Reward Responsiveness, and Goal Striving Predict First Onset of Bipolar Spectrum Disorders:  A Prospective Behavioral High-Risk Desgin. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 121(2), 339*351. Retrieved April 12, 2014, from the PsycARTICLES database.

Alloy, L. B., UroÅ¡ević, S., Abramson, L. Y., Jager-Hyman, S., Nusslock, R., Whitehouse, W. G., et al. (2012). Progression along the bipolar spectrum: A longitudinal study of predictors of conversion from bipolar spectrum conditions to bipolar I and II disorders.. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 121(1), 16-27.

Barlow, D. H., & Durand, V. M. (2012). Mood Disorders and Suicide. Abnormal Psychology: An Integrative Approach (pp. 210 - 221). Canada: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning. (Original work published 2009)

Gershon, A., Thompson, W. K., Eidelman, P., Mcglinchey, E. L., Kaplan, K. A., & Harvey, A. G. (2012). Restless pillow, ruffled mind: Sleep and affect coupling in interepisode bipolar disorder.. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 121(4), 863-873.

Nierenberg, A., Friedman, E., Pencina, M., Severe, J., Calabrese, J., Bowden, C., et al. (2013). Lithium Treatment Moderate-Dose Use Study (LiTMUS) for Bipolar Disorder:Lithium Treatment Moderate-Dose Use Study (LiTMUS)  A Randomized Comparative Effectiveness Trial of Optimized Personalized Treatment With and Without Lithium. The American Journal of Psychiatry, 170. Retrieved April 12, 2014, from http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/article.aspx?articleid=1555605

Nwulia, E. A., Zandi, P. P., Mcinnis, M. G., Jr, J. R., & Mackinnon, D. F. (2008). Rapid switching of mood in families with familial bipolar disorder. Bipolar Disorders, 10(5), 597-606.

Ortiz, A., Cervantes, P., Zlotnik, G., Velde, C. V., Slaney, C., Garnham, J., et al. (2010). Cross-prevalence of migraine and bipolar disorder. Bipolar Disorders, 12(4), 397-403.

Poon, S. H., Sim, K., Sum, M. Y., Kuswanto, C. N., & Baldessarini, R. J. (2012). Evidence-based options for treatment-resistant adult bipolar disorder patients. Bipolar Disorders, 14(6), 573-584.

Rowe, L. S., & Morris, A. M. (2012). Patient and partner correlates of couple relationship functioning in bipolar disorder.. Journal of Family Psychology, 26(3), 328-337.

Swartz, H. A., Levenson, J. C., & Frank, E. (2012). Psychotherapy for bipolar II disorder: The role of interpersonal and social rhythm therapy.. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 43(2), 145-153.

Talbot, L. S., Stone, S., Gruber, J., Hairston, I. S., Eidelman, P., & Harvey, A. G. (2011). A Test Of The Bidirectional Association Between Sleep And Mood In Bipolar Disorder And Insomnia.. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 121, 39-50.

Tamam, L., Karakus, G., & Ozpoyraz, N. (2008). Comorbidity of adult attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and bipolar disorder: prevalence and clinical correlates. European Archives of Psychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience, 258(7), 385-393.

 (1978). The 'Schizophrenics' Who Aren't. Science News, 114(14), 230.

Valtonen, H. M., Suominen, K., Haukka, J., Mantere, O., Leppmki, S., Arvilommi, P., et al. (2008). Differences in incidence of suicide attempts during phases of bipolar I and II disorders. Bipolar Disorders, 10(5), 588-596.

#DSM #bi-polar disorder #mood disorders #manic episodes #hypomania #migraines #rapid cycling #lithium #Interpersonal and Social Rhythm Therapy