I believe they wrong as well, but they are in a lot of positions of power and influence the way we live.
So we need to prove things one way or another.
Psychology has been influenced way too much by religious types.
Apart from the scientific method almost everything in the world is under the stifling influence of organised religion.
Just look at America - thanks to the right wing of the Bible Belt a member of ISIS would have more chance of becoming president than an openly atheist politician.
Apart from the scientific method almost everything in the world is under the stifling influence of organised religion.
Just look at America - thanks to the right wing of the Bible Belt a member of ISIS would have more chance of becoming president than an openly atheist politician.
Western Europe is the exception.
Lets face it, if the Theory of Evolution can be banned from schools then it shows how psychology can be influenced too.
I would spend every waking moment trying to figure out what is going on in the brain (and mind) if I could get into doing something practical.
It's an interesting question. Are people with dementia mentally ill? Are evil people mentally ill? What about people who've had strokes - their physical disabilities are a direct consequence of brain damage. Does mental illness always need to have physical signs?
Dementia is a physical illness, as is a stroke. Not mental illness, which involve no physical causes.
Evil is a useless concept. Calling someone like Hitler evil simply makes him less responsible for what he did. The devil didn't make him do it.
You have to be mentally ill to go round killing people in cold blood.
If that was the case anyone guilty of murder would be deemed mentally ill and therefore not responsible for their actions. Most people who kill, even in cold blood, are not mentally ill.
A psychiatrist treating a close relative of mine once explained to me that mental illness is an exaggerated version of normal behaviour. It's a loss of control of thoughts and mood. In severe cases this leads people to lose contact with external reality, resulting in halucinations or delusions. You can trigger such effects temporarily by taking psychodelic drugs. Similarly medication can often control the symptoms and allow a sufferer to have at least a reasonably normal life.
Very distressing to see in someone you are close to but people can and do recover to varying degrees.
We have astronauts to explore outer space, but we don't really have anyone who is exploring inner space, e.g. the mind.
I'd be willing to spend the rest of my life in an MRI machine or in experiments to find out something as relatively simple as 'What is a thought?', let alone trying to find out 'What is you?'
Depends what you mean by the rest of your life. I wouldn't mind being MRI scanned once every six months (until I got sick of it) as part of a 'finding out how the mind works' program, but not every week or less though. You must be very into how the mind works/psychology.
Evil is a useless concept. Calling someone like Hitler evil simply makes him less responsible for what he did. The devil didn't make him do it.
I don't think of the devil/Lucifer/Satan when evil gets mentioned. I think of evil as the wicked act that someone committed. Reading about Lucifer a bit online, I didn't come across anything that he did that could be classed as evil. Lucifer gets called evil and yet god doesn't for all the things he did in the Bible? Hmm... Anyway, yeah, the devil doesn't even enter my thoughts when people commit evil acts.
Comments
I believe they wrong as well, but they are in a lot of positions of power and influence the way we live.
So we need to prove things one way or another.
Psychology has been influenced way too much by religious types.
Apart from the scientific method almost everything in the world is under the stifling influence of organised religion.
Just look at America - thanks to the right wing of the Bible Belt a member of ISIS would have more chance of becoming president than an openly atheist politician.
Western Europe is the exception.
Lets face it, if the Theory of Evolution can be banned from schools then it shows how psychology can be influenced too.
I would spend every waking moment trying to figure out what is going on in the brain (and mind) if I could get into doing something practical.
Evil is a useless concept. Calling someone like Hitler evil simply makes him less responsible for what he did. The devil didn't make him do it.
If that was the case anyone guilty of murder would be deemed mentally ill and therefore not responsible for their actions. Most people who kill, even in cold blood, are not mentally ill.
A psychiatrist treating a close relative of mine once explained to me that mental illness is an exaggerated version of normal behaviour. It's a loss of control of thoughts and mood. In severe cases this leads people to lose contact with external reality, resulting in halucinations or delusions. You can trigger such effects temporarily by taking psychodelic drugs. Similarly medication can often control the symptoms and allow a sufferer to have at least a reasonably normal life.
Very distressing to see in someone you are close to but people can and do recover to varying degrees.
Depends what you mean by the rest of your life. I wouldn't mind being MRI scanned once every six months (until I got sick of it) as part of a 'finding out how the mind works' program, but not every week or less though. You must be very into how the mind works/psychology.
I don't think of the devil/Lucifer/Satan when evil gets mentioned. I think of evil as the wicked act that someone committed. Reading about Lucifer a bit online, I didn't come across anything that he did that could be classed as evil. Lucifer gets called evil and yet god doesn't for all the things he did in the Bible? Hmm... Anyway, yeah, the devil doesn't even enter my thoughts when people commit evil acts.