Is insanity unique to humans?

Discussion in 'Human Science' started by Xerxes, Feb 1, 2006.

  1. Xerxes asdfghjkl Valued Senior Member

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    Aside from brain damage/disease in animals, is insanity unique to our species?
     
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  3. duendy Registered Senior Member

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    your question is absurd, in that it shows no awareness of the difference between REAl brain damage and 'insanity' , which is called 'mental illness'. mentalillness is NOT a proven disease, tpough the mental health movement tries to pretend it is.
     
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  5. Xerxes asdfghjkl Valued Senior Member

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    I'm talking about syphillis type diseases.

    I personally think 'chemical imabalances' are part of a wider pathology in humans. The effect instead of the cause...
     
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  7. guthrie paradox generator Registered Senior Member

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    Well, taking "insanity" to mean innapropriate and delusional behaviour, I think dogs can get it. If you mistreat them, confuse them, and generally mes them about, they will start doing strange things.
     
  8. domesticated om Stickler for details Valued Senior Member

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    Rabies? Mad cow? Ant colony OCD?
     
  9. devils_reject Registered Senior Member

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    Insanity- Syn. Anybody that has a job
     
  10. allisone417 i'll be in my room Registered Senior Member

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    Guthrie is right. If you subject a dog or a dolphin, or some kind of higher animal (one that exhibits emotion over survival instincts), to the equivilant of what drives humans insane (not a lot of difference here), they will show similar behavior.

    PETA will be happy to tell you all about it, and flood your mailbox with pamphlets and drop leaflets over your house/area if you ask.
     
  11. Well no duendy, indeed, mental illness is not actually a disease full stop - it's a generic term encompassing a wide range of persistent, disabling and often times chronic disorders which commonly present symptoms generally termed as "Mental Illness."

    Generally it's considered preferable to terms such as Loony, Nut Job, Fruit Cake, Basket Case, etc.

    Kinder, more clinical.
     
  12. Firefly Registered Senior Member

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    What's Ant colony OCD?
     
  13. Looking at it in context - Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.
     
  14. mars13 give me liberty Registered Senior Member

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    monkeys eat there own poop,ive seen it.

    it was rather funny,and the monkey just pooped in his hand and stuck it straight in his mouth,i always thought people were joking about monkeys and poo.

    they wernt.
     
  15. duendy Registered Senior Member

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    where did monkey eat it? was it in the wilds or in captivity?
     
  16. Firefly Registered Senior Member

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    What do ants do that is OCD? Their whole controlled way of life?
     
  17. Slacker47 Paint it Black Registered Senior Member

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    To broaden the scope: insanity is a term created by society (or the majority or whatever you call it) to term those who dont conform to social norms. Stick Tarzan in NYC and see what happens.

    From Guthrie
    "Well, taking "insanity" to mean innapropriate and delusional behaviour, I think dogs can get it. If you mistreat them, confuse them, and generally mes them about, they will start doing strange things. "

    Thier mind has been wired to work in this fashion. In the infiniteness that encompasses life, a brain could be wired thusly:_______. Take a dog off the street that has spent years scrounging for food and put him in your house. You'd think he was insane too. So my point is that one can get lost in the vastness of thier mind if they go so far that they cant see backwards: that would be insanity in my definition.
     
  18. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    You say that like it's something strange.
     
  19. Xylene Valued Senior Member

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    Stick an animal in a zoo, and watch them go crazy--when I was a kid (40-50 years ago) there was a polar bear in Auckland Zoo that used to just pace up and down in his enclosure all day, back and forth back and forth back and forth, just so effing bored he'd gone out of his tree.

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    Poor bastard.
    Sort of makes you wonder about Humans in cities, doesn't it--we stick ourselves inside cages, and then we wonder why we go crazy. We might live longer because we provide ourselves with a physically comfortable environment, but we drive ourselves insane by the boredom of our lives.

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    ... Basically, yes. It's kind of a joke of sorts - ants fundamentally display behaviours which, in humans, would be considered extremely OCD however, for an ant, it's perfectly natural, so basically they're not OCD at all.

    Discover an ant obsessively filing his or her own tax returns, on the other hand, that's not OCD behaviour either - that's just regular plain nuts....

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  21. River Ape Valued Senior Member

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    Is insanity unique to humans? No! Ask any vet!
    But I like to think that humans are capable of a higher form of insanity than most other creatures.

    River Ape (retired, Psychology Department, University College London)
     
  22. river-wind Valued Senior Member

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    I've seen video of a mother koala bear carrying her dead baby around for a few hours, refusing to eat for a few days after that. She finally wandered out into a road, and proceeded to walk in a small circle for roughly a hour.

    I vote yes.
     
  23. Aivar A.R. Registered Senior Member

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    hm, well, humans have more advanced nervous systems, more capable brains... so while I'm sure anything with a nervous system can go insane, no doubt noone goes quite as insane as humans.

    But that's for actual insanity, not animals-people who act weird because they feel like it or are used to it (acting in old ways in new enviornment). A human can walk on his hands instead of feet for no reason, and not be called insane - he just has to call it sport.
     

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