Depression is an outcome not a cause of Mental Illness

Copyright 2003 -  Revision Sunday April 06, 2008

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This site is about a conflict of human physiology that shaped history but was undetected  until the 1960's.

In the entire history of man on the planet Earth this phenomenon was discovered only once.

It caused mental breaks for office workers.

You will find this material hard to believe.

This phenomenon is explained in first semester psychology lectures where students don't believe it either.

For that reason I wrote a demonstration that will allow you to experience the phenomenon.

The Everquest Connection page has the explanation and assumes you have not taken basic psychology.

The solution for this problem was the office Cubicle.

This site argues that the this phenomenon causes College Suicides and Missing Students.

The phenomenon causes mental events around the world, Chaco Canyon.

If you use computers in unprotected workspace such as homes, dorms, student apartments, and small business offices read  ...Prevention... at the bottom of most pages.

Long  term exposure can cause severely altered mental states. Qi Gong  Kundalini Yoga

If you are visiting the site as part of a school project send the person responsible for controlling violence at your school to this site.

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Depression

The thesis of this page is that Depression has a physiological cause independent of brain chemistry changes.

Many sites and authors have disputed the "chemical imbalance theory" for depression and mental illness.

But no other site has supplied an answer for why depression happens.

Read the links section below. New material is parked there until integrated in the page.

Chemical imbalance is the current theory espoused by mental health professionals for the cause of depression and mental illness. But there is a logical problem with that theory. Does depression cause the changes in brain chemistry or do alterations in chemistry cause depression. The fact that the two appear together does not tell us which is the cause and which is the effect. Treating the chemistry by forcing it back to normal levels without understanding the cause is futile.

 YouTube Video

As you link to these videos remember that on this site the thesis is that no one is aware of Subliminal Distraction so that drug companies do not control for it in their testing. If SD exposure increases while taking either the drug or the placebo that increase will make symptoms worse. Likewise if SD exposure decreases in someone taking either the drug or placebo their symptoms would improve.

Drug companies have downloaded the contents of this site but there is no response from anyone who did so.

Serotonin and Depression: Fox Channel 13 Tampa Bay Digest Version (Time 9:56)

This video is an interview with two researchers who performed a study reviewing medical literature. Articles used to communicate with doctors do not support low serotonin as a cause of depression, chemical imbalance theory. Tom Cruise was right. The two medical researchers discuss the non scientific use of this information. Their position is that ads by drug companies that promote this belief should be banned. (Those ads  are prohibited in other countries.) Statements in advertising are not supported by studies communicated to mental health professionals.

Sixty percent of  those who start these drugs go off them within four weeks. Fifty percent get better on placebos. Drugs help only about 10%. Six out of ten have adverse effects.

This link has some problem. It no longer  responds. Digest 9:56.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbTqjSfMPKA&mode=related&search=

Part 1 -7:36.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWE3UGl7KFk&mode=related&search=

Audience phone calls.  Part 2 - 7:33  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzDv6Cublaw&mode=related&search=

Part 3 - 6:39  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fw0PxgTIT4k&mode=related&search=

This full text of this study is now available free from Springer. 

The Media and the Chemical Imbalance Theory of Depression
Jonathan Leo & Jeffrey R. Lacasse

"In spite of the enormous amount of money and time that has been spent in the quest to confirm the chemical imbalance
theory, direct proof has never materialized. Moreover, during the past several decades, a significant amount of evidence has
accumulated which calls the theory’s validity into question."

This study is available more than one place. This is Springer's link.  http://www.springerlink.com/content/u37j12152n826q60/fulltext.pdf

The “Chemical Imbalance” Explanation for Depression: Origins, Lay Endorsement, and Clinical Implications Christopher M. France Cleveland State University Paul H. Lysaker Roudebush Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Indianapolis, and Indiana University School of Medicine Ryan P. Robinson University of Akron

Professional Psychology: Research and Practice 2007, Vol. 38, No. 4, 411–420 Copyright 2007 by the American Psychological Association

"Also interfering with response-equals-causation logic are findings that in many clinical trials, antidepressants have exhibited
either no or very modest advantages in comparison with placebos (Kirsch, Moore, Scoboria, & Nicholls, 2002; Kirsch, Scoboria, & Moore, 2002). Such findings raise the possibility that antidepressants may often act as active placebos rather than having unique and specific antidepressant properties."

You can see that Tom Cruise is not the only source of doubt. This is part of the "literature" Cruise asked Matt Lauer to read.

http://arginine.spc.org/vaughan/France_et_al_1997_PPRP.pdf

This is the debate with Tom Cruise and Mat Lauer. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NblwE44Fbts&feature=related

Consumer Advertising of Psychiatric Medications Biases the Public Against Nonpharmacological Treatment
Jeffrey R. Lacasse, MSW Florida State University Tallahassee, FL

http://psychrights.org/Articles/LacasseonDTCAinEHPP.pdf

Book references:

Belgian Polar Expedition of 1898/99

An incident aboard the Belgica, the Belgian Polar Expedition of 1898, reveals that Subliminal Distraction can cause psychiatric symptoms similar to depression. The Belgica was a 'sealer' purchased and re-fitted for the trip to Antarctica. Space was at such a premium that each man was measured and his bunk fitted to him.

When the ship was  trapped in polar ice for almost a year the men began to go insane. The common complaint Dr. Fredric Cook records in his book, "Through the First Antarctic Night," was "polar anæmia."

 But his descriptions are of depression.

Cook thought he was dealing with Scurvy, isolation and constant darkness. But when sunlight returned the mental problems got worse. He then proposed that the constant sunlight had a similar effect to cause their mental problems.

"The curtain of blackness which has fallen over the outer world of desolation as also descended upon the inner world of our souls. Around the tables in the laboratory , and in the forecastle men are sitting about sad and dejected, lost in dreams of melancholy from which, now and then, one arouses with an attempt at enthusiasm.... Each man is intent on being left alone to take what comfort he can from memories of happier days, though such effort usually leaves him more hopelessly oppressed by the sense of utter desertion and loneliness. ..."  (p282)

"May 20 ... About half the men complain of headaches and insomnia; many are dizzy and uncomfortable about the head, and other are sleepy at all times, though they sleep nine hours. " (p292)

"August...With the coming sun we hoped to dispel our anæmia and make ourselves ready for a series of difficult tasks to be undertaken in September and October; but instead we failed more and more in strength and developed alarming mental symptoms. One man was temporarily insane, and several others were nearing a similar condition. " ( p362)

T. H. Baughman is quoted in Appendix C,  "Several men showed signs of insanity and most were incapicated in one way or another."

_________________________________________________________________

Through the First Antarctic Night." Centennial Edition Longitude Press

The men improved only when they all began to work outside to chop the Belgica out of the pack ice. Only one man was permanently insane.

Other quotes are on the Astronauts & Insanity site page.

Previous evaluations of this incident have blamed mass hysteria.

How does mass hysteria produce permanent insanity?

When you read the full text of Dr. Cook's book you see that a variety of psychiatric symptoms appear once the men were forced into the protection of the stranded ship by the Antarctic cold.  This is the seminal event to show that depression is an outcome of exposure to Subliminal Distraction.

When many men are confined in a too-small space such as barracks, large tents, lumber camp bunkhouses, or aboard small ships they will create the " special circumstances" for exposure from Subliminal Distraction. All that is necessary is for one person to work on anything requiring concentration to the point of slight dissociation while others move in their peripheral vision. Daydreaming is enough mental investment to allow exposure.

Brain scan research done in 2002 at the University of Georgia found a common defect in the M-Channel for vision for Schizophrenics and their close relatives. That defect was hyperactivity. This might be the reason that some are seriously effected while others have little reaction to exposure from Subliminal Distraction.

Aboard the Belgica every one except Dr. Cook was effected.  He was the only person with normal daily activities that did not involve "knowledge work" with other crewmembers moving nearby in peripheral vision.

There is a key piece of information previous investigators of this incident could not have known about.

In the 1960's designers, engineers, and psychologists found a previously unknown conflict of physiology. It was not called a 'conflict of physiology.' They did not give the problem a name. The design features used in Systems Furniture are called 'Cubicle Level Protection.'  They discovered it when they investigated why knowledge workers using newly designed moveable close-spaced workstations had begun to have mental breaks.

Herman Miller Inc. introduced the Action Office 1 in 1964 but modified it by 1968,  introducing the Action Office System. They had blocked peripheral vision for a concentrating worker by adding  moveable  panels between the workers creating the first cubicles. The mental breaks stopped.

They did not understand what they had found and only used the new information in the design of office workstations creating protected workspace.

The phenomenon is caused by Subliminal Distraction and that is the name used outside the United States. Here Subliminal Distraction usually refers to distracting sounds subliminally perceived while concentrating to work in a crowded office.

Online sources describing Qi Gong and Kundalini mental problems:

Depression is one of the negative mental outcomes of Qi Gong and Kundalini Yoga

For centuries users of Qi Gong and Kundalini Yoga have experienced negative mental outcomes from performing the exercises. Depression, fear, paranoia, and somatic symptoms are listed on many sites as those outcomes.

When you examine group sessions of either exercise, mental investment in the form of eyes-open meditation is used while there is repeating detectable movement in peripheral vision. That replicates the 1960's business office problem. It is Subliminal Distraction.

Kundalini and Qi Gong Psychosis by Dr. Tan Kheng Khoo  (This link, below right, is also on Qi Gong Psychosis and Kundalini Yoga  pages.)

"These novices are often ardent and they tend to overdo their meditation practice. Consequently, some of them suffer from visual and auditory hallucinations with intense fear. Shaking, convulsion and feinting do also occur. All these side effects of excessive and ill-guided meditations will disappear when they stop meditating, especially when they return to their homeland." Site Quote copy/paste

Note the highlighted reference to intense fear.  The symptoms resolve with no treatment once exposure to Subliminal Distraction through performing the exercise stops. Several cases are cited on Dr Tan Kheng Khoo's page. He claims 23 years teaching Buddhist meditation. While the connection to the exercise as the cause of  mental problems is correct, the gurus believe that incorrectly handling mystical universal life energy causes the trouble.

This is essentially a belief in magic.       See the Qi Gong and Kundalini Yoga pages for an explanation.

http://www.post1.com/home/kktanhp/kundalini.htm

Short Definitions

Conflict of Physiology refers to the fact that while you can ignore movement in peripheral vision, you can't stop seeing the movement that triggers peripheral vision reflexes including the human vision startle reflex. (This term is unique to this site.)

Cubicle Level Protection is the group of design features used in Systems Furniture and Cubicles to block side or peripheral vision for a concentrating worker. They may include privacy panels, selective seating positions, differential lighting, or enforced distance to a source of movement that would cause your brain to attempt a peripheral vision reflex.

Subliminal Distraction refers to the effect caused when neural impulses from your eyes and ears are subliminally perceived while you dissociate slightly to be able to concentrate. This happens almost automatically when you perform math calculations, read, plan, write text, or view a computer screen to perform normal business or recreational functions. If you are using media, such as reading a book, this light dissociation is called suspension of disbelief.

Subliminal Sight is a narrow wedge of  your vision field that only detects movement. Stationary items in this area of vision are invisible.

Systems Furniture is a term for the different appearance features of office workstations. Each product line has unique colors, shapes, and textures to differentiate between each style.

What constitutes exposure to Subliminal Distraction?

All humans have an evolutionarily developed warning system that will break your concentration if movement is detected approaching while you are concentrating, lost in thought, and slightly dissociating. Although the system works anytime threat movement is detected you could say that slight dissociation activates or increases the sensitivity of the system.

The event happens as a startle with the strong impulse to look in the direction of the detected movement.

To prevent repeated startle events caused by a known safe source we all have the ability to ignore movement once we identify it as harmless. Ignoring the movement does not turn the system off. It can't be stopped.

The detection of movement in peripheral vision is a primitive system that operates below thought, reason, or consciousness.  Only the completely blind are immune. The subliminal operation of this system prevents the victim becoming aware that anything is happening.

Outdoor workers do not have behaviors that will create exposure above a normal level. Only indoor workers are usually effected when they  sit in locations where others walk beside them to create the repeating attempts to cause a startle event.

Exposure to Subliminal Distraction happens as your brain attempts to create the startle event.

If your brain understands the repeating signals as reinforcement of contemporaneous thought or activity Accidental Operant Conditioning happens.

That Subliminal Accidental Operant Conditioning is the source of paranoia. The constant subliminal threat from behind eventually colors thought and reason as paranoia.

Why does exposure to SD cause mental breaks?

I don't know. But there is a reasonable working theory.

Your brain must grow connections between neurons to create memory. It reads those connections to recall events and implement your daily experience, your reality. The process and signals to cause a startle are so quick that the brain does not have to evaluate this experience. Think of the last time you were startled when someone stepped up beside you. There was no time for thinking or evaluation. Startle is a react first evaluate second system.

But when the startle is subliminally triggered unsuccessfully over and over the brain begins an attempt to understand it and assign a meaning to that subliminal vision input. In doing so it makes incorrect associations which are new synapses between neurons. If enough of these are made you brain can no longer work normally and you have a dissociative or first psychotic episode. If exposure to Subliminal Distraction stops the incorrect synapses dissolve from disuse. That is what normally happens.

If, however, your exposure is low level but persistent those incorrect connections are reinforced. Your thinking process is reprogrammed.

Users of Qi Gong and Kundalini Yoga begin to believe they have impossible powers. They may believe they can levitate, dematerialize, walk through solid objects solely through the power of the will of their minds.

Those who practice Yogic Flying in Transcendental Meditation believe they can will away gravity. (National Geographic Channel - 'Is It Real' - "Superhuman Powers").

In all three of these activities eyes open meditation is attempted while the session is performed with others. That creates movement to be detected in peripheral vision. All of the necessary elements for exposure to Subliminal Distraction are present.

__________________________________________________The material below is being edited Sunday April 06, 2008.

Quoted material and Links (Material is "parked" here until I can rewrite the page and include it. You should scan the entire section. The form of links used, the entire URL, allows the link to be retained even if the page is saved as a text document or printed. You may copy/paste small sections under the copyright permissions.)

http://assets.cambridge.org/97805218/78227/excerpt/9780521878227_excerpt.pdf

History of Depression

Although this page had a HTML problem when I visited it the material is valid. It is part of a larger project.

http://www.priory.com/homol/dephist.htm

Current Theory

In the media and among some doctors it is believed that depression is caused by chemical changes. This is shown by an interview on CBS Cares, a mental health blog from CBS News.

"CBS CARES: If depression causes chemical changes, why is there not a blood or tissue test to diagnose depression or risk of depression?

DR. GLASSMAN: There are chemical changes in depression, but they are not always the same in all individuals. On the average, many depressed patients have abnormalities in serotonin receptors, but not all patients show these abnormalities. In a similar way, many patients have increased plasma norepinephrine levels or cortisol levels, but again, these are not consistent, certainly not consistent enough to be used to establish the presence of depression. You can be severely depressed and not have any of these markers. For these reasons, there is no chemical test for depression."
 

http://www.cbs.com/cbs_cares/depression/diagnosis.shtml

My point exactly!  Even with this admission the doctor still believes the chemical change theory. Note that victims of Subliminal Distraction are unaware anything has happened to them. The brain system that detects movement in peripheral vision functions below thought, reason, and consciousness. ,,, Mike Wallace contributed to this site and was a depression sufferer.

This next link illustrates a point about delusional thinking. Depression is often found with psychotic features but it is not known why. It may be difficult for you to see the connection. This site argues that depression with deep irremediable despondency is a delusional mental state. (This quote is from my Qi Gong psychotic reaction page. Performing Qi Gong produces exposure from Subliminal Distraction.)

Yogic Flying

Flying is a type of 'cross-legged hopping' it has been featured on magazine TV programs. I remember one such program  by Geraldo. Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the Beatles Yogi, claims that he can bring world peace. If the Governments of the world give him a billion dollars he would he would end terrorism and create peace by hiring 40,000 yogic fliers to start hopping full time in 3000 places around the world. Did you laugh when you read this in the news in 2002? (Washington Post see link below right ) Did  you think at the time that he actually believes it? He was not dishonestly running a scam. He does believe this. The hopping is believed to be a stage to true levitation.

 Did it slip by you that it might be Psychotic. The DSM has a cultural acceptability test to determine if a behavior is psychotic. If the impossible beliefs fall within the acceptable beliefs of the indigenous culture they are deemed "psychotic like." But beliefs that you can levitate, dematerialize, become invisible, or walk through solid objects are psychotic because they contradict normal testable reality.

http://www.religionnewsblog.com/00000636-.html

'Psychopathology', 'Psychosis' and the Kundalini: 'postmodern' perspectives on unusual subjective experience Richard House
 

"Psychiatrist and ophthalmologist Lee Sannella, M.D. (1992) has explored at some length the existing literature and evidence on the KAE, particularly with regard to its association with so-called 'psychosis' (a term the scientific validity of which, incidentally, Sannella seems to accept quite uncritically). He points out that KAEs, with all their 'psychotic'-like symptoms, 'seem pathological only because the symptoms are not understood in relation to outcome: a psychically transformed human being' (1992: 7)."

http://www.critpsynet.freeuk.com/KUNDALIN.htm

This is an attempt to explain away the psychotic-like features of a Kundalini Awakening Experience. I argue that these experiences are actually true psychosis and are caused by exposure from Subliminal Distraction. They disappear with no treatment because the exposure was not long enough to effect permanent changes in brain pathways. Permanent changes do happen to those who seek enlightenment and this can be seen  in the beliefs of levitation and superhuman powers.

The "Chemical Imbalance" in Mental Health Problems By Joseph M. Carver, PhD
 

"For many years, mental health professionals have used the term "chemical imbalance" to explain the need for medications that are used to treat mental health conditions. This simple and commonly used explanation recognizes that the condition is a medical problem and that it can be treated with medication. The "chemical imbalance" explanation also reflects the overall theme of treatment – identifying what neurotransmitters are involved in the clinical symptom picture and with medication, attempting to return that neurotransmitter level back to the "normal range"...."
 

http://www.mental-health-matters.com/articles/article.php?artID=160

This is a text only version of a similar article. http://www.drjoecarver.com/articles_chemical.html

The argument on this site is that these chemical differences are found by statistical correlation. There are people with psychiatric disorders but no chemical differences and some with chemical differences but no psychiatric symptoms.

Depression Links  Individual page links are not the same as site links.

Site links are a "Favorites" list for the entire psychology project as well as personal links. HERE

The Pharmacologic Management of Major Depression in the Primary Care Setting

Department of Veterans Affairs Veterans Health Administration Publication No. 00-0016

PBM Publication No. 00-0016; May 2000 Updated versions can be found at www.vapbm.org

This publication contains the current standard of practice for the treatment of depression.

http://www.oqp.med.va.gov/cpg/MDD/R/PBM-Guideline.pdf

________________________________________

The links below are from the Peripheral Vision page. They are here for a planned  Subliminal Sight section.

General Vision Links

Nightwalking

"In The Book of Five Rings, Miyamoto Musashi, the legendary swordsman of 16th century Japan, implies that he fought his greatest duels with his eyes crossed, and goes into considerable detail about developing and using this strange ability."

The method suggested to engage peripheral vision is to suspend an object from the bill of a baseball cap and practice staring at it rather than looking straight ahead as we all normally do.

The site has a page on the physiology of the eye and sight. It describes the normal field of vision.

http://www.navaching.com/hawkeen/nwalk.html#Anchor-The-59125

Institute for Innovative Blind Navigation

Don't let the site name put you off. This site has several pages which explain sight and how the brain deals with two vision systems.

http://www.wayfinding.net/index.htm

This page has the vision material.    http://www.wayfinding.net/vsionsys.htm#four

Speed Reading (peripheral vision)

http://www.ababasoft.com/wider_eye_span/

Vision, is a set of brain level subsystems

This page explains the M & P pathways and vision processing.

http://www.wayfinding.net/visanal.htm

The Red Myth

Color in Vision

http://stlplaces.com/night_vision.html

University of Missouri

The first paragraph on this page refers to psychological factors effecting pupil dilation.

"Interestingly, the pupil/iris combination also changes in response to psychological factors. One sign of activation of the sympathetic nervous system, which is a system important in arousal, fight, and flight, is dilated pupils. For example, sexual interest results in pupil dilation. (This piece of information may come in handy some time.)"

http://web.umr.edu/~psyworld/eye.htm

 University of Utah

John Moran Eye Center --  Anatomy

http://webvision.med.utah.edu/

Kimball's Biology Pages 

A simple explanation of the eye and sight.

http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/V/Vision.html

Understanding Human Vision

This site deals with color.

http://www.pitir.com/pentile/Human_Vision.html

Vision and the Brain

Block diagrams of vision paths through the brain explain the M and P channels.

 http://www.thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/i/i_02/i_02_cr/i_02_cr_vis/i_02_cr_vis.html#2

Study Notes Vision

http://www.utmed.com/studynotes/neuro/VisualProcessing.pdf

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