Suicide

[Socrates]

[quote name='Don John of Austria' date='Jun 21 2005, 06:35 PM']You said:
That is what you said.

Well a chemical imbalance cannot effect you soul so therefore you must belive that the Mind and the Brain are one. That is the Materialist position and is iminical to Catholicism.

Now to be fair I don't think all psychology is horrid quackary  but I think true psychology is essintially dead  as it has become dominated by the organic materialist to the point where it just another facet of the Materialist medical establisment. Mental problems cannot be caused by an organic unbalance, organic unbalances may infact be a result of mental imbalances butthat is an entirely differant thing.

Now as for the effect of Chemicals on ones emotions, I would contend that the emotions are much more organicly linked than the Will,  not because they are a faculty of the Body but because they are dependent on the senses for stimulous.  As that stimulous is unbalanced so can the emotions become unbalanced but that is not the same as being insane because one always chooses how to react to those emotions, an insane person, a crazy person is someone who's soul itself is unbalanced and is no longer capable of  making such choices.
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Physical/chemical malfunctions in or damage to the brain can indeed create mental disorders. This is a well-established fact.

The mind is not a "purely" spiritual thing, but is dependent on input and proper function of the brain. The soul is the "form" of the body - we are not Cartesian "ghosts in the machine" operating entirely independantly of the body.

Drugs can obviously chemically disrupt the proper functioning of the mind. Symptoms of some mental illnesses such as schizophrenia are similar to those of someone on an acid trip. Obviously someone on LSD or other mind-altering drugs is not able to mentally function properly.
If chemicals had no effect on the mind, they would have no effect on mental function.

Physical damage to the brain can also disrupt proper mental function.

Physcial deterioration of the brain as a result of old age causes senile dementia. My aged grandmother has started doing some pretty crazy things. This is due to the physical deterioration of her brain, not to some disorder of the soul.

And how do you even explain sleep if the brain has no effect on the mind? Does the soul just shut down or wander around some mystical dream-world when you're sleeping?

Don't get me wrong - I have problems with totally materialistic psychology myself, but to say mental illness cannot be caused by physical/chemical problems with the brain is just absurd and contrary to all evidence.

Edited June 22, 2005 by Socrates

[Don John of Austria]

[QUOTE][quote name='Socrates' date='Jun 21 2005, 07:30 PM']
Physical/chemical malfunctions in or damage to the brain can indeed create mental disorders. This is a well-established fact.

The mind is not a "purely" spiritual thing, but is dependent on input and proper function of the brain. The soul is the "form" of the body - we are not Cartesian "ghosts in the machine" operating entirely independantly of the body.

Drugs can obviously chemically disrupt the proper functioning of the mind. Symptoms of some mental illnesses such as schizophrenia are similar to those of someone on an acid trip. Obviously someone on LSD or other mind-altering drugs is not able to mentally function properly.
If chemicals had no effect on the mind, they would have no effect on mental function.

Physical damage to the brain can also disrupt proper mental function.

Physcial deterioration of the brain as a result of old age causes senile dementia. My aged grandmother has started doing some pretty crazy things. This is due to the physical deterioration of her brain, not to some disorder of the soul.

And how do you even explain sleep if the brain has no effect on the mind? Does the soul just shut down or wander around some mystical dream-world when you're sleeping?

Don't get me wrong - I have problems with totally materialistic psychology myself, but to say mental illness cannot be caused by physical/chemical problems with the brain is just absurd and contrary to all evidence.
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[QUOTE]Physical/chemical malfunctions in or damage to the brain can indeed create mental disorders. This is a well-established fact.[/QUOTE]


No it is not. Please do not make claims like that as there is absolutly no way you can justify it. There is no way to imperically test if the brain affects the mind or if the Brain effects the mind, certianly an intact brain is needed to express the facualties onf the soul in a physical manner but the body cannot affect it.


[QUOTE]The mind is not a "purely" spiritual thing, but is dependent on input and proper function of the brain. The soul is the "form" of the body - we are not Cartesian "ghosts in the machine" operating entirely independantly of the body.[/QUOTE]

You are absolutly not ghost in the machine, what I find amusing is that I brought this up not 3 hours ago when having a verbal discussion on this same thing, we are not Ghost in the Machine our soul is not seperate thing set aside from us. It was Decarte where this garbage began, it was the duelist view that the Sould just inhabites our body which allows people to think of the soul as nothing more than a score card on which checks and minuses are kept, All of your personality and personhood is in your soul that is why when you die you don't lose that personhood to the germs that eat your body. No Our sold permeates us like water does a wet spunge can you wring out a spunge sure butthen its not a wet spunge anymore is it. You sould is not somthing seperate from you in a Cartesian sense, it is part of you it is what animates you and it is the part of you which houses your mind.

[QUOTE]Drugs can obviously chemically disrupt the proper functioning of the mind. Symptoms of some mental illnesses such as schizophrenia are similar to those of someone on an acid trip. Obviously someone on LSD or other mind-altering drugs is not able to mentally function properly.
If chemicals had no effect on the mind, they would have no effect on mental function.[/QUOTE]

And theydon't have any effect on mental function, they have a great deal of effect on sensory imput, but not on the Will, drugs do not inhibit your ability to choose, they simply confuse your input enough that poor choices seem like good choices.

[QUOTE]Physical damage to the brain can also disrupt proper mental function.[/QUOTE]

really and how can you possibly know that, it can disrupt the physical expression of mental function but you cannot know if it does or does not affect the mental function of a person, unless of course you have telepathic powers?
[QUOTE]Physcial deterioration of the brain as a result of old age causes senile dementia. My aged grandmother has started doing some pretty crazy things. This is due to the physical deterioration of her brain, not to some disorder of the soul[/QUOTE]

No it is because aof a disorder of the soul, the mind, which is a faculty of the Soul is ill and the brain distorts as a result, this doesn't mean she did anything wrong the soul as I said is not some Cartesian Ghost but a part of our imperfect selves, why would it shock you that it has imperfections as well.
That being said I think doing evil things often leads to insanity precisely because the Mind is a Faculty of the Soul and as sin corrupts it, it becomes more vulnerable in other areas as well.
[QUOTE]And how do you even explain sleep if the brain has no effect on the mind? Does the soul just shut down or wander around some mystical dream-world when you're sleeping?[/QUOTE]

This doesn't even make since, your mind sleeping has nothing to do with your soul leaving your body or shuting down, you mind is a faculty of the soul, my heart beating is faculty of the body, it doesn't stop beating when I sleep, what does this have to do with anything?


[QUOTE]Don't get me wrong - I have problems with totally materialistic psychology myself, but to say mental illness cannot be caused by physical/chemical problems with the brain is just absurd and contrary to all evidence.[/QUOTE]
What evidence such a thing cannot be checked imperically, there is no way that one can determine scientificly that the brain alters the mind or that the Mind atlers the Brain. It is a philosphical postition which must be taken before scientific inquiry can even begin. The Materialist position is evilamd I would argue Heretical, not because of science but because if your mind and your brian are one then you cannot truly have free will, buecause socrates you are only an organic machine, and machines can only do what they are programed ( even a lever is programed by the way) to do. If the Mind is a faculty of the body then we are just animals. Further the Mind must be a Faculty of the Soul and notthe Body because sin corrupts the Mind, it corrupts the Will, that is how ewe can be slaves to sin, if the Mind is a faculty of the Brain then sin would not be enslaving machines are not enslaved to whatthey have done, the fact that the last 20 times my car turned right does not make it turn right agian, but sin works exactly in this way. No, The mind MUST be a faculty of the soul or the Chruch is wrong about a great many things, the latter is impossable so the former must be the case.

[Aloysius]

[quote name='philothea' date='Jun 21 2005, 08:06 PM']Sorry to pick out a single phrase like this, but it's really making me think.

So would said chemical imbalance be equivalent to another bodily injury?  It might hinder your ability to act, but it doesn't change your being -- as you said,  your soul?

Hmm.    Nice thought.  (Not saying I don't agree, I just never thought that way before.)
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that's the thing I was trying to get accross in my posts as well.

[Don John of Austria]

[quote name='philothea' date='Jun 21 2005, 07:06 PM']Sorry to pick out a single phrase like this, but it's really making me think.

So would said chemical imbalance be equivalent to another bodily injury?  It might hinder your ability to act, but it doesn't change your being -- as you said,  your soul?

Hmm.    Nice thought.  (Not saying I don't agree, I just never thought that way before.)
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yeas that is what I'm saying.

[Carrie]

[quote name='Don John of Austria' date='Jun 21 2005, 08:35 PM']You said:
That is what you said.

Well a chemical imbalance cannot effect you soul so therefore you must belive that the Mind and the Brain are one. That is the Materialist position and is iminical to Catholicism.

Now to be fair I don't think all psychology is horrid quackary  but I think true psychology is essintially dead  as it has become dominated by the organic materialist to the point where it just another facet of the Materialist medical establisment. Mental problems cannot be caused by an organic unbalance, organic unbalances may infact be a result of mental imbalances butthat is an entirely differant thing.

Now as for the effect of Chemicals on ones emotions, I would contend that the emotions are much more organicly linked than the Will,  not because they are a faculty of the Body but because they are dependent on the senses for stimulous.  As that stimulous is unbalanced so can the emotions become unbalanced but that is not the same as being insane because one always chooses how to react to those emotions, an insane person, a crazy person is someone who's soul itself is unbalanced and is no longer capable of  making such choices.
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I do so enjoy how you qouted part of my post, rather than the whole thing, leaving out the part where I said it was a factor.


Socrates brought up valid points which you should think about before just saying "no".

If you so choose to judge me and claim that I am of the materialist mindframe and therefore iminical to Catholicism, I have nothing more to say to you.

[Socrates]

[quote name='Don John of Austria' date='Jun 21 2005, 08:41 PM']No it is not. Please do not make claims like that as there is absolutly no way you can justify it. There is no way to imperically test if the brain affects the mind or if the Brain effects the mind, certianly an intact brain is needed to express the facualties onf the soul in a physical manner but the body cannot affect it.
You are absolutly not ghost in the machine, what I find amusing is that I brought this up not 3 hours ago when having a verbal discussion on this same thing, we are not Ghost in the Machine our soul is not seperate thing set aside from us. It was Decarte where this garbage began, it was the duelist view that the Sould just inhabites our body which allows people to think of the soul as nothing more than a score card on which checks and minuses are kept, All of your personality and personhood is in your soul that is why when you die you don't lose that personhood to the germs that eat your body. No Our sold permeates us like water does a wet spunge can you wring out a spunge sure butthen its not a wet spunge anymore is it. You sould is not somthing seperate from you in a Cartesian sense, it is part of you it is what animates you and it is the part of you which houses your mind. 
And theydon't have any effect on mental function, they have a great deal of effect on sensory imput, but not on the Will, drugs do not inhibit your ability to choose, they simply confuse your input enough that poor choices seem like good choices.
really and how can you possibly know that, it can disrupt the physical expression of mental function but you cannot know if it does or does not affect the mental function of a person, unless of course you have telepathic powers?
No it is because aof a disorder of the soul, the mind, which is a faculty of the Soul is ill and the brain distorts as a result, this doesn't mean she did anything wrong the soul as I said is not some Cartesian Ghost but a part of our imperfect selves, why would it shock you that it has imperfections as well.
That being said I think doing evil things often leads to insanity precisely because the Mind is a Faculty of the Soul and as sin corrupts it, it becomes more vulnerable in other areas as well.
This doesn't even make since, your mind sleeping has nothing to do with  your soul leaving your body or shuting down, you mind is a faculty of the soul, my heart beating is  faculty of the body, it doesn't stop beating when I sleep, what does this have to do with anything?
What evidence such a thing cannot be checked imperically, there is no way that one can determine scientificly that the brain alters the mind or that the Mind atlers the Brain. It is a philosphical postition which must be taken before scientific inquiry can even begin. The  Materialist  position is evilamd I would argue Heretical, not because of science but because if your mind and your brian are one then you cannot truly have free will, buecause socrates you are only an organic machine, and machines can only do what they are programed ( even a lever is programed by the way) to do. If the Mind is a faculty of the body then we are just animals. Further the Mind must be a Faculty of the Soul and notthe Body because sin corrupts the Mind, it corrupts the Will, that is how ewe can be slaves to sin, if the Mind is a faculty of the Brain then sin would not be enslaving machines are not enslaved to whatthey have done,  the fact that the last 20 times my car turned right does not make it turn right agian, but sin works exactly in this way. No, The mind MUST be a faculty of the soul or the Chruch is wrong about a great many things, the latter is impossable so the former must be the case.
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Id on't currently have time to refute all this in detail, but my points are quite valid, and are confirmed by common experience and science.

Read St. Thomas Aquinas. The agent intellect (the spiritual mind) relies on phantasms produced by the senses (the brain). If the chemical and physical hardware of the brain is damaged (through chemicals, injury, or old age), the phantasms of the brain which the spiritual intellect and will act upon will be distorted.

As you acknowledge:
[quote]And theydon't have any effect on mental function, they have a great deal of effect on sensory imput, but not on the Will, drugs do not inhibit your ability to choose, they simply confuse your input enough that poor choices seem like good choices[/quote]

This is what I am talking about. Some mental disorders are of this nature, though not caused by drugs. These same disorders can be chemically controlled or reduced by drugs.

Edited June 22, 2005 by Socrates

[Semperviva]

Don John,
I just thought I'd mention that if Fulton Sheen (and JP2) can reconcile Modern Psychology or at least some of it (and its foundational "false premise") to Catholicism, so can we . For example, in the book "Peace of Soul" Sheen discussed The Psychology of Conversion and then The Theology of Conversion in the subsequent chapter. (And points out the flaws of modern psychology along the way!)

[Don John of Austria]

[quote name='Carrie' date='Jun 22 2005, 08:23 AM']I do so enjoy how you qouted part of my post, rather than the whole thing, leaving out the part where I said it was a factor.
Socrates brought up valid points which you should think about before just saying "no".

If you so choose to judge me and claim that I am of the materialist mindframe and therefore iminical to Catholicism, I have nothing more to say to you.
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Quoted the part that was cogent to the discussion.

I am not Judging you, I am judging modern Psycology

[Semperviva]

Yes... DonJohn...I agree! You should judge modern psychology-but don't stop there! find the good in it like the above mentioned blokes who are up for canonization
Instaraure omnia....

[Don John of Austria]

[quote]Read St. Thomas Aquinas. The agent intellect (the spiritual mind) relies on phantasms produced by the senses (the brain). If the chemical and physical hardware of the brain is damaged (through chemicals, injury, or old age), the phantasms of the brain which the spiritual intellect and will act upon will be distorted.[/quote]


I have read St. Thomas, and Aristotle ( from whom he got this Idea) I think they would agree almost completly with me. That the Mind requires information from the senses is obvious and exactly what I said. But the affect on the senses does not actually affect the mind. There fore psycological problems are actually deffects of the soul.

Edited June 22, 2005 by Don John of Austria

[cmotherofpirl]

Please cite a church document that says psychological problems are a defect of the soul.

[Don John of Austria]

[quote name='cmotherofpirl' date='Jun 23 2005, 02:57 PM']Please cite a church document that says psychological problems are a defect of the soul.
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Cmom the entire tradition f the Church is that the Mind is a faculty of the Soul, certianly the entire scholastic tradition contends that. If the mind is a faculty of the soul then mental problems must be a defect there, not organic, An organic mind is not in keeping with tradition at all.

[Don John of Austria]

I recomend reading the following article of the faculties of the soul.
[url="http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05749a.htm"]http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05749a.htm[/url]

[Semperviva]

Does anyonethink there is a definate reason why artists, poets and such have a higher risk, lol, of suicide then say car mechanics, lawyers, etc. its quite a strange phenoma/trend through history...maybe this is irrelevent, but i wonder... and another thought...martin Luther and HItler probably had the potential to become the most influential people for the RC church/maybe doctors of the church intheir particular time- but Satan saw that and woulden't let it get by...

[philothea]

As a writer who hangs around with a lot of neurotic, depressed writers (who mostly started out as normal people!) I believe it's because creating art takes a great investment of self, and that investment is never reciprocated by the audience. You put your heart out there, and.... nothing.

After a while this takes its toll. Even artists who are monetarily successful -- money isn't what your innermost self wants. It wants validation and approval. That hardly ever happens.

I've watched the process eat people up.

Edited June 25, 2005 by philothea

[Semperviva]

...do you think its nature or nurture?.....i think its both probly...

[Socrates]

[quote name='philothea' date='Jun 24 2005, 07:00 PM']As a writer who hangs around with a lot of neurotic, depressed writers (who mostly started out as normal people!) I believe it's because creating art takes a great investment of self, and that investment is never reciprocated by the audience.  You put your heart out there, and.... nothing.

After a while this takes its toll.  Even artists who are monetarily successful -- money isn't what your innermost self wants.  It wants validation and approval.  That hardly ever happens.

I've watched the process eat people up.
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I don't think the art itself makes artists/writers, etc. depressed or neurotic. It's the "artistic temperament" itself. There has been an established link between creativity and mental instability/madness (particularly bi-polar disorder). The same mental/emotional energy and sensitivity that can inspire creative genius can also cause mood swings and craziness.)
As a sometimes writer, I find writing and art is cathartic and can improve my temperament, so I don't think it's the art itself (though certain artists can adopt self-destructive lifestyles and philosphies which contribute to mental problems, or use their "artisticness" as an excuse to indulge in craziness that would not be tolerated in most other professions.

[Semperviva]

[quote name='Socrates' date='Jun 24 2005, 07:20 PM']I don't think the art itself makes artists/writers, etc. depressed or neurotic.  It's the "artistic temperament" itself.  There has been an established link between creativity and mental instability/madness (particularly bi-polar disorder).  The same mental/emotional energy and sensitivity that can inspire creative genius can also cause mood swings and craziness.)
As a sometimes writer, I find writing and art is cathartic and can improve my temperament, so I don't think it's the art itself  (though certain artists can adopt self-destructive lifestyles and  philosphies which contribute to mental problems, or use their "artisticness" as an excuse to indulge in craziness that would not be tolerated in most other professions.
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It seems the sensitivity and depth of the artist makes him more prone to depression. So if this is the artistic temperment, what does that say for his spiritually? Are their any saints who were artists, or were bi-polar, that we are aware of I mean? it seems such a temperment could make for either an amazing saint, ( Jp and BenXVI= very artistic) or a suicide.

(or a powerful evil force, like martin luther had lots of issues but was supposedly an enthraliing speaker- i still think he was meant to be a doctor of the church...and hitler a great saint...)

[infinitelord1]

My opinion on this topic.........suicide is wrong. For those who commit suicide they are going straight to hell. I dont mean to sound cruel....this does not mean that god doesnt love them or have compassion for them. Im sure god loves satan. No difference. I think they go to hell because god is objective. You cant say something is ok in certain instances. That would be subjective (the opposite of god). I would like to mention one thing though.......jesus will return to judge the living and the dead. This could possibly give people in hell another opportunity to reach heaven.

I think this also applies to someone who had never heard of the son of god. They will go to hell also, but i believe jesus will set them free when he returns.

[Aloysius]

hell is eternal, you cannot be "set free" from hell

now if you speak of a type of limbo, this is a possibility of theological speculation