The people who held that the world is flat were not delusional, they just had incorrect beliefs. People who think that the VP is part of the legislative branch aren't mentally ill, they just lack political knowledge. There are religious beliefs that can be delusional, but most religious beliefs are not. Religion shouldn't get automatic exemption any more that any other type of thought - and it doesn't.
Look at it this way: all of mental illness is to do with variations for a norm that are taken to a degree that causes harm. It's normal to be sad when someone dies; if that sadness is excessive in depth or length then it might be disordered grieving. If that person becomes permanently sad and cannot raise themselves out of it then it is depression, which is mental ill health. Who gets to say what is 'normal'grieving? We can only take a societal norm.
If I met a Western person brought up with Christian beliefs who genuinely believed they were under a witch-doctor style curse I would be keen to explore whether that belief was delusional. I would not be so interested to find that in an African person. I wouldn't jump to a conclusion in either person, but I hope you can see the distinction.
By definition, they are not. If you want to invent some other word for opinions which you don't like, that's fine, but delusional they are not. Otherwise we would have to declare the entire Western world delusional every time some new discovery entails a major shift in scientific thinking. The definition of delusion is there in order that people with mental illness can be diagnosed and treated. If you abuse the term in order to denigrate ideas that you don't like then it makes it that much harder to spot someone who is actually mentally ill.
Well, religion does not fit the definition, as a matter of fact. That's the whole point of this article. If a person's beliefs are generally in line with those of a recognised culture/subculture (whether recognised to be 'scientifically' correct or not) then it is not considered to be delusion.
In fact, to have some other definition would lead to a situation where one group of people are considered to have a monopoly on the truth; in other words - who gets to decide what is right or wrong? The question ends up being very metaphysical.
The whole point of the article is that, via the internet, there are large-ish groups of people emerging with distinctive beliefs which would probably be considered delusional if they were to sit down with a psychiatrist. Certainly beliefs about being persecuted or pursued feature in many delusional belief systems, but how should one interpret the beliefs of someone who has found like-minded people via the Internet?
Well, that is one theory. In general psychiatric practice the definition of a 'fixed' belief is one which a person could not conceive might be false.
For instance, if a person believes they are being followed by the FBI, one could ask "can you imagine that it may be coincidence that you saw the same black car behind you three days in a row?" A person with delusional beliefs would dismiss that out of hand; a person who is simply misguided might answer "yes I can see that would be a reasonable alternative explanation".
They don't have to necessarily agree that the alternative is true, but if they can reasonably consider that alternative and engage in looking for evidence that would confirm or deny that hypothesis then they probably aren't delusional.
This is part of how cognitive behavioural therapy works: a person has a pessimistic world view, poor self esteem, interprets things negatively, but is not delusional. Therefore it is possible to discuss alternative interpretations of their experiences and thus gradually change their outlook.
We're not arguing about that. The discussion was about what is and is not a delusional belief, and I used the illustration of 'flat earth' beliefs to make my point. You can discuss the merits of 'eliminating' all false beliefs if you like, but that isn't the point.
You claim that flat-earth beliefs were harmful at that time but that's not true - for an average "dark" ages citizen, to agree with the orthodoxy that the earth is flat would have done them no personal harm at all. It's beyond the scope of this discussion to get onto their effect on society as a whole. These days, such a belief would certainly have an effect on the person who holds it, partly because they would be open to ridicule, but more so because such a belief - genuinely held - would most likely be an indicator of serious mental ill health. That's the point of making a distinction between simply believing something that is false and holding a delusion.
The distinction is that delusional beliefs are fixed, false beliefs that are causing mental ill-health; in other words they are having a deleterious effect on the person's life. Simply discovering that someone believes something that is false does not imply delusion.
The classical example is that the belief that the world is flat was not delusional during the dark ages. To believe such a thing now - if that belief were really fixed - would be delusional, presuming that person was of apparently normal intelligence, had a reasonable education etc.. It is arguably possible that someone could just happen to believe such a thing and it have no other effect on their life, but in practice someone who truly held that belief would most likely exhibit other signs of mental illness.
If someone were 'socialized' with a belief but otherwise of normal intelligence and education, it should be possible to convince them that their belief is false, given reasonable evidence of that - in which case the belief is not fixed, and is therefore not delusional.
Thats just moving the goalposts. The point was the claim that iTunes cannot monitor folders and automatically add their contents, which it can. You're now complaining that it doesn't automatically probe your network and find fileservers and add mp3s on those automatically to the library. For one thing, that's entirely different functionality; secondly I would find such behavior frankly sinister.
Talk about missing the point! The whole point of iTunes is to be the PC/Mac-based software counterpart for your iPod so that you manage the music library on a big screen with a mouse and it is synchronised to the small box.
Would you expect Outlook, iCal or another calendar type app to be able to add a single appointment to your PDA on any random computer?
Having said that it is entirely possible to add single tracks to an iPod, just not very straightforward.
I used it last week, I needed to change some settings on my MythTV server and couldn't be bothered to walk to the shed (!) so ran SSH -X from my laptop. Yes, I could do that with VNC or similar but it's nowhere near as neat having to run a desktop in a window on a desktop. Remote tunneled X allows me to run programmes on a remote machine seamlessly on my own desktop and is a feature that is used by thousands of people - maybe a lot more - every day. And it really doesn't slow things down at all.
Just like on OSX, you have a rootless X server that is a client (an application if you like) of the native windowing system and acts as a server for the X clients (applications) that need an X server in order to interface with the user. So it is both an application and a server.
Maybe so, but the vast majority of GPLv2 software uses the standard preamble which states "This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version."
I'll just join this little happy A&A lovin' club. No, seriously, I've been using them for seven years and never found a better ISP. So... *cough*... "me too!".
My recommendation - if you want decent broadband and don't mind paying for it, go with AAISP. These are the guys who wrote the blog entry that the article is based on. They use BT wholesale but actually know their stuff inside out, and when there's an issue they sort it out promptly and usually explain exactly what happened, hence this blog entry.
On the two occasions I've had to use their helpdesk during office hours, the phone hasn't actually rung - I've dialed the number, heard a little 'click' then speaking directly with an engineer. Scared the life out of me.
No, I don't work for them but I have been a satisfied customer for seven years. BTW they do landline+ADSL packages which can mean you have to deal with BT less because you're buying the phone line through AAISP's wholesale contract. They are expensive but you definitely get what you pay for. They even do a degree of monitoring for free - I manage a friend's small business IT and get a text message if the ADSL goes down (usually a power cut).
Well, there are a number of other Russian sites that offer essentially the same deal, with the same 'it's legal in Russia and no-one is sure whether it's legal anywhere else in the world' issues. The only thing you don't get is the rather clever options to download at your bitrate of choice. Google is your friend. The word 'royal' will help.
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The people who held that the world is flat were not delusional, they just had incorrect beliefs. People who think that the VP is part of the legislative branch aren't mentally ill, they just lack political knowledge. There are religious beliefs that can be delusional, but most religious beliefs are not. Religion shouldn't get automatic exemption any more that any other type of thought - and it doesn't.
Look at it this way: all of mental illness is to do with variations for a norm that are taken to a degree that causes harm. It's normal to be sad when someone dies; if that sadness is excessive in depth or length then it might be disordered grieving. If that person becomes permanently sad and cannot raise themselves out of it then it is depression, which is mental ill health. Who gets to say what is 'normal'grieving? We can only take a societal norm.
If I met a Western person brought up with Christian beliefs who genuinely believed they were under a witch-doctor style curse I would be keen to explore whether that belief was delusional. I would not be so interested to find that in an African person. I wouldn't jump to a conclusion in either person, but I hope you can see the distinction.
By definition, they are not. If you want to invent some other word for opinions which you don't like, that's fine, but delusional they are not. Otherwise we would have to declare the entire Western world delusional every time some new discovery entails a major shift in scientific thinking. The definition of delusion is there in order that people with mental illness can be diagnosed and treated. If you abuse the term in order to denigrate ideas that you don't like then it makes it that much harder to spot someone who is actually mentally ill.
Well, religion does not fit the definition, as a matter of fact. That's the whole point of this article. If a person's beliefs are generally in line with those of a recognised culture/subculture (whether recognised to be 'scientifically' correct or not) then it is not considered to be delusion.
In fact, to have some other definition would lead to a situation where one group of people are considered to have a monopoly on the truth; in other words - who gets to decide what is right or wrong? The question ends up being very metaphysical.
The whole point of the article is that, via the internet, there are large-ish groups of people emerging with distinctive beliefs which would probably be considered delusional if they were to sit down with a psychiatrist. Certainly beliefs about being persecuted or pursued feature in many delusional belief systems, but how should one interpret the beliefs of someone who has found like-minded people via the Internet?
Well, that is one theory. In general psychiatric practice the definition of a 'fixed' belief is one which a person could not conceive might be false.
For instance, if a person believes they are being followed by the FBI, one could ask "can you imagine that it may be coincidence that you saw the same black car behind you three days in a row?" A person with delusional beliefs would dismiss that out of hand; a person who is simply misguided might answer "yes I can see that would be a reasonable alternative explanation".
They don't have to necessarily agree that the alternative is true, but if they can reasonably consider that alternative and engage in looking for evidence that would confirm or deny that hypothesis then they probably aren't delusional.
This is part of how cognitive behavioural therapy works: a person has a pessimistic world view, poor self esteem, interprets things negatively, but is not delusional. Therefore it is possible to discuss alternative interpretations of their experiences and thus gradually change their outlook.
We're not arguing about that. The discussion was about what is and is not a delusional belief, and I used the illustration of 'flat earth' beliefs to make my point. You can discuss the merits of 'eliminating' all false beliefs if you like, but that isn't the point.
You claim that flat-earth beliefs were harmful at that time but that's not true - for an average "dark" ages citizen, to agree with the orthodoxy that the earth is flat would have done them no personal harm at all. It's beyond the scope of this discussion to get onto their effect on society as a whole. These days, such a belief would certainly have an effect on the person who holds it, partly because they would be open to ridicule, but more so because such a belief - genuinely held - would most likely be an indicator of serious mental ill health. That's the point of making a distinction between simply believing something that is false and holding a delusion.
The distinction is that delusional beliefs are fixed, false beliefs that are causing mental ill-health; in other words they are having a deleterious effect on the person's life. Simply discovering that someone believes something that is false does not imply delusion.
The classical example is that the belief that the world is flat was not delusional during the dark ages. To believe such a thing now - if that belief were really fixed - would be delusional, presuming that person was of apparently normal intelligence, had a reasonable education etc.. It is arguably possible that someone could just happen to believe such a thing and it have no other effect on their life, but in practice someone who truly held that belief would most likely exhibit other signs of mental illness.
If someone were 'socialized' with a belief but otherwise of normal intelligence and education, it should be possible to convince them that their belief is false, given reasonable evidence of that - in which case the belief is not fixed, and is therefore not delusional.
Incidentally, this new-fangled Idle thing is pretty good, don't you agree?
Thats just moving the goalposts. The point was the claim that iTunes cannot monitor folders and automatically add their contents, which it can. You're now complaining that it doesn't automatically probe your network and find fileservers and add mp3s on those automatically to the library. For one thing, that's entirely different functionality; secondly I would find such behavior frankly sinister.
Talk about missing the point! The whole point of iTunes is to be the PC/Mac-based software counterpart for your iPod so that you manage the music library on a big screen with a mouse and it is synchronised to the small box.
Would you expect Outlook, iCal or another calendar type app to be able to add a single appointment to your PDA on any random computer?
Having said that it is entirely possible to add single tracks to an iPod, just not very straightforward.
Well, if you don't want it to take up the whole screen, then... um... make the windows smaller.
Actually there are options to merge the libraries. What you can't do is easily use iTunes to add a single track to a single iPod safely.
On OSX, iTunes _does_ pick things up. It will monitor your downloads folder and add any mp3s etc. to its library.
I used it last week, I needed to change some settings on my MythTV server and couldn't be bothered to walk to the shed (!) so ran SSH -X from my laptop. Yes, I could do that with VNC or similar but it's nowhere near as neat having to run a desktop in a window on a desktop. Remote tunneled X allows me to run programmes on a remote machine seamlessly on my own desktop and is a feature that is used by thousands of people - maybe a lot more - every day. And it really doesn't slow things down at all.
Just like on OSX, you have a rootless X server that is a client (an application if you like) of the native windowing system and acts as a server for the X clients (applications) that need an X server in order to interface with the user. So it is both an application and a server.
Me too!!
"...whenever possible."
Maybe so, but the vast majority of GPLv2 software uses the standard preamble which states "This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version."
Not after you've hit it with a hammer a few times.
I just saluted, but the thought was there.
It sounds like... just maybe... you bought the wrong mac. Just a thought.
I'll just join this little happy A&A lovin' club. No, seriously, I've been using them for seven years and never found a better ISP. So... *cough*... "me too!".
Ah yes, the United States of Eastern Europe, I learnt about that country in my geography lessons.
My recommendation - if you want decent broadband and don't mind paying for it, go with AAISP. These are the guys who wrote the blog entry that the article is based on. They use BT wholesale but actually know their stuff inside out, and when there's an issue they sort it out promptly and usually explain exactly what happened, hence this blog entry.
On the two occasions I've had to use their helpdesk during office hours, the phone hasn't actually rung - I've dialed the number, heard a little 'click' then speaking directly with an engineer. Scared the life out of me.
No, I don't work for them but I have been a satisfied customer for seven years. BTW they do landline+ADSL packages which can mean you have to deal with BT less because you're buying the phone line through AAISP's wholesale contract. They are expensive but you definitely get what you pay for. They even do a degree of monitoring for free - I manage a friend's small business IT and get a text message if the ADSL goes down (usually a power cut).
Well, there are a number of other Russian sites that offer essentially the same deal, with the same 'it's legal in Russia and no-one is sure whether it's legal anywhere else in the world' issues. The only thing you don't get is the rather clever options to download at your bitrate of choice. Google is your friend. The word 'royal' will help.
...particularly when, for no apparent reason, the links to go back and forward through the article are labeled 'Previous Photo' and 'Next Photo'.