Today's Headline: Revised definitions of mental illness

While checking out the headlines on Google this morning, I ran across an excellent and thought provoking article from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.It was first published in November 30, 2001 but has a "substantive revision this past Feb. 22, 2010. I printed out all twenty-one pages of it to have it on hand as a general guide toward further research.

The second paragraph caught my attention: "The central philosophical debate over mental illness is not about its existence, but rather over how to define it, and whether it can be given a scientific or objective definition, or whether normative and subjective elements are essential to our concept of mental illness. . . "

Naturally, when dealing with philosophical subject matter, most of what is written is rhetoric saying nothing. But while sounding profound and educated, at least this academic article does get around to saying that mental illness is as baffling as it has always been. Once it thought mental illness was caused by demons, but then a later enlightened public thought that statement cruel and untrue. Now honesty about health in general dictates that mental illness is as illusive as ever, and just as tormenting to those with it and those trying to make sense of it.

What do I think? I definitely think evil worsens mental illness by focusing attention not on its cure but on how to get even with those who cause the mentally disturbed distress. It is certainly not a secret that good and evil live side by side in a sort of tug of war. When one is mentally ill and all his faculties are not in good working order, then the sufferers are not responsive to whatever help comes their way. And too, they may not be capable of discovering their own abnormal vs. normal behavior simply because their mental capacities are not in good working order.

In other words, some things are not worth fighting over, but tell that to those with mood disorders. They may agree with you, but often it is after an explosive incident, and not before it happens. The treatment option is to get to these individuals before they go haywire and do what they will come to regret when they finally do come to their senses. How to do that is the sixty-five dollar question facing medical scientists today.

PS: The image is a favorite. It was an a fun thing I happened to do one afternoon when I was sitting on my front porch in Eastern Kentucky. A bit of elm bark shaped this bit of nostalgia and it has remained my favorite. The frame was made from purchased raffia. It actually is not much larger than it is shown here.