What is sanity?

[Psychoid]

What does it mean to be sane?
What does it mean to be insane?
What makes someone mentally sane, and the other insane?
What would make you consider someone as mentally unstable/insane?
How would a perfectly sane person be like?
Would that be an ideal mental state?

 

[Psyolopher]

My idea of sanity is a stable mind which is programmed by culture and soceity!
A mind that is capable of doing everyday tasks and to not get out of track!
Sanity is a little world, but insanity is a universe!

 

[Oknayd]

this is what wikipedia has to say:

"Sanity considered as a legal term denotes that an individual is of sound mind and therefore can bear legal responsibility for his or her actions"

"It is not the same concept as mental illness. One can be acting under profound mental illness and yet be sane, and one can also be ruled insane without an underlying mental illness."

"Sanity outside of legal definitions has been little explored by science and medicine, as the concentration has been on illness."

"A theory of sanity was proposed by Alfred Korzybski in his general semantics. He believed that sanity was tied to the structural fit or lack of it between our reactions to the world and what is actually going on in the world. He expressed this notion in a map-territory analogy: "A map is not the territory it represents, but, if correct, it has a similar structure to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness." Given that science continually seeks to adjust its theories structurally to fit the facts, i.e., adjusts its maps to fit the territory, and thus advances more rapidly than any other field, he believed that the key to understanding sanity would be found in the study of the methods of science (and the study of structure as revealed by science). The adoption of a scientific outlook and attitude of continual adjustment by the individual toward his or her assumptions was the way, so he claimed. In other words, there were "factors of sanity to be found in the physico-mathematical methods of science."


I think the first one is the most logical to me, i would change it into

"A sound mind that knows and is willing to take responsibility for his or her actions"

but yes, it basically has a lot to do with the culture/society you live in and what is considered 'normal' or 'abnormal' behaviour. It depends on what is considered higher, 'religion', 'art', 'science' or 'magic' (read magical thinking)

 

[Psychoid]

My idea of sanity is a stable mind which is programmed by culture and soceity!

Really? I think exactly the opposite! I think that to really be sane you have to get over the "programming" of culture and society, and learn to think by yourself and see for yourself what is good.

I'm not saying that culture and society are all bad, just parts of it, and it's those parts you have to get rid of by critical thinking!

BTW I'm asking for YOUR opinion, what YOU think.

 

[Oknayd]

BTW I'm asking for YOUR opinion, what YOU think.

About the sanity of the other or of you'r own?

Can someone judge over his own sanity? how about judging another being's sanity? What are the criteria? i'm no shrink :shock:

 

[GOD]

I am the PERFECT example of a sane person and everyone else is totaly nuts . Please give me money , your girlfriends fon number , give me a golden throne to sit on , buy me 78 roles royces and aproach me on your knees . A - A - MEN.....

 

[Oknayd]

I am the PERFECT example of a sane person and everyone else is totaly nuts . Please give me money , your girlfriends fon number , give me a golden throne to sit on , buy me 78 roles royces and aproach me on your knees . A - A - MEN.....

Don't listen to him, obviously I am the only one classified for such role-model but i'm lazy and i don't like rolls royces anyway... just give me a thai massage by a beautiful girl please, thats all thank you

 

[GOD]

1:- Not to be insane .
2:- Not to be sane .
3:- In/sane is he who says and does in/sane . ( A la Forrest Gump )
4:- Their behaviour . Its not so much what you believe but what you say and do about what you believe . Believing you are an angel is OK , but telling people you are , and/or jumping out of windows to prove it is not .
5:- Me .
6:- Sanity .


How big is a hole ?

 

[Psychoid]

About the sanity of the other or of you'r own?

No one in particular.

Can someone judge over his own sanity? how about judging another being's sanity? What are the criteria?

That's exactly what I'm asking, you just asked better than me

 

[Nomada]

The sanity/insanity bipolar hallucination is the alienation mechanism par excellence. Its a linguistic commodity of the dominator paradigm to de-legitimize the discourse of a person, either individual or collective. The fabrication of an Other, muted and constrained, for power purposes. If anything, insanity should denote the person who, like a virus, spreads this memetic emanation of the Dominator, anyone who claims existence of sane and insane persons, differentiated and construed in idealistic hierarchy; but I wouldn't denote.

The historical construction of the insanity/sanity boundary is also many things, often used to get out of jail.
In my country suicide is illegal. If you fail you end up in jail or in a mental institution. This boils my blood.

Other similar fabrications of the Other, differentiated from fully "productive", "integrated" and "pragmatic" "responsible" "ethical" ADULTS: "women", "children", "elders", "masochists", "communists", "anarchists", "terrorists", "Latinos", "barbarians", "primitives", "irrational human being", "HIV+'s","homosexuals","pansexuals", "sick","freak", "drug adict", "looney", "suicides", "genocides", "racists".
What can I say? relativity is anathema for Dominator.

"A barbarian is who, about first instance, believes in the existence of barbarians" Lévi-Strauss.

 

[Psychoid]

So if I understand well, you think that there's no such thing as insanity?

So schizophrenic people are mentally sane?

Then why are they often saying nonsense and completely out of reality? You consider this a "normal" state of mind?

Someone who is having a psychose is still mentally sane?

GOD... you often talk about mentally ill people and even created a thread on this subject (which inspired me in creating this one), I was expecting you to give some serious answers...

 

[Nomada]

So if I understand well, you think that there's no such thing as insanity?

You didn't. How can there be no "insanity" if we're talking about it? The following is no comprehensive but sufficient I believe:
[too high for another "coherent" answer]

Socially there is insanity, that's what I was talking about: alienation mechanism and the rest of the mumbled smart ass jargon. Psychological, psychiatric pathology might, under certain scientific parameters, be defined. I don't know them though.
Conditions in which things happen are studied and offered the status of causality, this must be extensively developed.

So schizophrenic people are mentally sane?...Someone who is having a psychose is still mentally sane?

Under this context the question does not apply.

Then why are they often saying nonsense and completely out of reality? You consider this a "normal" state of mind?

Who is they ? I see lots of people saying nonsense and completely out of reality everyday: "lawers", "psychologists", "doctors", "myself". There is no "normal" state of mind, every moment is unique.

We're all mad here, in this wet hole.

EDIT: there is a dangerous thing we often do: we project imaginary [imaginary theories in that they are virtual, a language construct] theories, ideas, definitions, truths onto real space [right here, right now] and think everyone responds to it. Things like "nature", "Moises stones", "God's will","truth" are weapons of mass destruction.

 

[Psychoid]

Ive never seen a thread where no one understands each other as much lol.

I'm not talking about what you talked about (social insanity)
Forget what society considers sanity to be.

Psychoid wrote:
So schizophrenic people are mentally sane?...Someone who is having a psychose is still mentally sane?


Under this context the question does not apply.

Why?



"They" referred to schizophrenic and psychotic people.

Damn I'm confused and I'm sober :S

Why don't you all speak french so I can explain better what I mean lol XD

 

[Nomada]

there is correspondence between the two: "social" insanity, "psychological" insanity. There are no pure forms, anywhere.

Why is the question out of the context of my answer?
Because you're ascribing a language construct to a real person.

"They" referred to schizophrenic and psychotic people.

They as in other besides yourself? If we are all, at some point or another leave alone constantly, talking nonsense and completely out of "reality", then what is the difference between us and they?

My job is to throw incendiary bombs about this solar room.

Forget what society considers sanity to be.

Why?

 

[magickmumu]

When talking about sanity and insanity we talk about mental health right???

From Wikipedia
The World Health Organization states that there is no one "official" definition of mental health. Cultural differences, subjective assessments, and competing professional theories all affect how "mental health" is defined.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_health

I think you're considered mentally unstable, when you can't function normally within society because of your psychological problems.

 

[Forkbender]

Sanity would ideally be not living in your own world, seeing the mental constructs you have made out of fear and anger for what they are and acting out of love.











There are very few sane people around.

 

[Malaeus]

meh. sanity is overrated, insanity is bullshit. we are all insane, there is not one example of a sane person on this planet. everyone in this plane of existance is insane in one way or another. granted some worse than others.

 

[Psychoid]

Nomada, it's hard for me to answer you post, as I don't understand it perfectly.<

They as in other besides yourself?

Are you implying that I am schizophrenic or psychotic?

If we are all, at some point or another leave alone constantly, talking nonsense and completely out of "reality", then what is the difference between us and they?

Why do you think we are all constantly talking nonsense and completely out of reality? Why did you put reality between ""'s?

My job is to throw incendiary bombs about this solar room.

What do you mean?

Psychoid wrote:
Forget what society considers sanity to be.


Why?

BTW I'm asking for YOUR opinion, what YOU think.

I think you're considered mentally unstable, when you can't function normally within society because of your psychological problems.

I think that is a good definition of a mentally ill person; someone who can't function properly because of his mental problems
But it can't be limited to this. People that GOD talks about in his thread "One flew over the psychonaut nest", at ayahuasca sessions, who try to push their bullshit fairy-tales on other people, I think they can be considered mentally ill, as though they seem to still able to function properly.

Sanity would ideally be not living in your own world, seeing the mental constructs you have made out of fear and anger for what they are and acting out of love.

Very interesting

 

[magickmumu]

If you include these people (who try to push there own ideas)
You can also include a lot of other people as well, Christians, Hara Krishna, politicians ect.

I have known people who suffer from mental instability, Psychosis and schizophrenia.
I don't think we do justice to the people who suffer from these diseases, if we lump them together with these other people (people who try to push there ideas on to you)

 

[tryptonaut]

I think there is no straight line between sane and insane.A lot of people show "irrational" and "insane" behaviour of some kind from time to time. I also see it in myself sometimes (and then it scares me). However there are mildly insane people who are very successful and effective, maybe because they are a little insane. I don't only see that in artists, but also in higher ranking executives and managers (they tend to be a little delusional and believe in their own egocentric realities - but it seems to be working...)