Something troubling me from the first link:

Studies of depression in rats show that the 5HT1A receptor is involved in supplying neurons with the fuel they need to fire, as well as preventing them from breaking down. These important processes allow depressive rumination to continue uninterrupted with minimal neuronal damage, which may explain why the 5HT1A receptor is so evolutionarily important.

So, could targeting the 5HT1A receptor directly, given its protective role, lead to a permanent degredation of critical thinking ability over the long term?

Yeah, I guess I'm using my 5HT1A's a bit too much right now. I can't wait to sign up for clinical trials.

speaking from experience i would say the findings are pretty spot on and ring true very much.

good thread

Interesting stuff. I have maintained for quite some time - maybe there is a legitimate reason why they are depressed, and maybe it's a sign that society is a bit screwed up. Seems like treating the depression and making it "go away" is just a way of making the screwed up things "ok".

It's like the old saying - "Insanity - a perfectly rational adjustment to an insane world.", or "Sanity in a world of insanity is insane". Seems depression would really even fit that bill even more.

Of course, someone can always come along and post a picture of the African kid and the vulture saying "get over yourself", and there is some truth in that. But it's really more a function of the world around that person, rather than the world around someone else. At best, it can just kind of be a reminder that things could be worse.

So I guess it's really about a balance and being well grounded. Politics and such is depressing for me, I think there is a good reason for it. But if I'm depressed because I ordered a cheeseburger and got a hamburger, then maybe I should take a look at that picture again and get some relevancy.

Plus, the low points make the high points seem that much higher.

So I've kinda felt that way for different reasons. If we don't get sad or depressed by things, we have little reason/motivation to change them or make them better.

Could the loss of intelligent and critical thinking be more of a result of apathy and just not really caring? "I have become comfortably numb".

I usually like to think that some depression can come from large amounts of empathy. For example..I have a sister who always seems depressed, sad all the time and everytime I ask her why she just shrugs and tells me that she just is. She is also the sort of person that dosent have a mean bone in her body, dosent hate anyone that I know of and really, she seems to care more about others then herself.

So is it possible that someones deep empathy can lead to depression? I will admit I'm not an expert but I just feel like that makes sence.

Yeah, I think most people who are depressed are depressed because they know that they deserve to be. They feel bad because they know inwardly that they are not doing anything particularly good (by whatever inward standard makes their heart sing), they have let themselves down, they are not trying...they have adopted an ironic attitude towards their heart's desire...they have allowed themselves to be taken prisoner by circumstance...they have let their horse take the rider just any ol' place...they have encountered the spikes of SEVERE TIRE DAMAGE because they are not driving in the direction of their true will.

But the good news is, this is not a permanent condition...you can have an entire previous life filled with self-betrayal and a panoramic life review of sad evil memories that disgust you...and...if you figure out what it is you think you should be doing, and you break that far goal into bitesize doable chunks, that you can accomplish today (and score as done/undone), and you do three four five of them a day ... (and as some get too old and easy to count no more, you increase the weight and the reps)...Well at this point you are no longer depressed, you are happy.

That's what I think, really I do.

Happiness is not something you should seek or enjoy particularly, like some consumer product. Happiness is best when it occurs as a byproduct of brutal efficiency.
Happiness is not some comfy pillow you can buy in the store and rest your head on and sleep real good if only you can shop around and buy the right one, try them all but none are quite right (oh poor me)...happiness is the sleep that's better than any pillow when you have walked thirty miles and you lie down and rest your head in the grass.

There is one problem with depression, and that it keeps one unemployed. I don't clinical depression, as I mean major depression. It's the difference between where one can say 'just get over it'... and where one find themselves a zombie all day because they can't function no matter what they are in thought about. I find most people don't understand this difference. I didn't understand it until I was diagnosed myself. Anti-depressants don't work.

Wish jobs would adapt/evolve along with this evolution!

Note that I've read some responses above and, sadly, they assume clinical or lesser depression.

I've seen the article the OP posted in other forums... I was like YES! finally some scientific proof of not being able to function and why. To me its like the body just can't handle the speed of thought I have. It gets overloaded and becomes depressed -- goes zombie -- doesn't function -- yet I'm still alive inside -- lost. This is a physical thing, it isn't some simple emotion that can be work over and done away with. It's disabled me for the past few years now.

[edit on 27-8-2009 by dzonatas]

Sigh .. just don't know, any more

My son was literally as happy as a lark. He was the 'perfect boy'. Popular with everyone, adults included. Uncomplicated, positive, active -- he just saw through/cut through the swill. A golden boy, honestly -- when he walked into the room, it lit up.

Then, he started puberty late. His face changed. Sure, it changed physically in the transition from boy to man. But it was more than that. School photos show a swift and disturbing change. It's almost as if the 'after' photos have a grey pall. You see the photos and you can almost touch the sadness in his face

He retreated to his room. Didn't want to leave it. Lay there all day. No reason. Wouldn't answer the phone when his mates rang.

Do you imagine we tried everything at our disposal to help? If you said 'yes', you'd be correct.

Nearly 20 years later and the sun still hasn't come out again. He's a lovely man, kind, honest, decent, sensitive, career's going well. He has talents pouring out of his fingertips, yet he leaves them under that bushell.

There was no definitive moment, nothing he or anyone else can point to and say, 'This .. this was the event, the conversation, the accident etc' that triggered the depression. He used Prozac for 3 days before tossing them away. He said he knew if he used any more he'd kill himself or someone else.

The self-absorption is all consuming, yet it has no results. How long can someone 'think about themselves and their life' ? Forever? It's like a perpetual loop. When I visualise it, I see it coming out of his mind, around and up through his colon, into his mind, round and up his colon, etc. It reminds me of dogs who get their own tail in the mouths and run in circles. Outsiders who try to break the cycle and focus the energy on something else, are unsuccessful.

And there's a lot of anger there. Expectations of others and himself which have obviously been disappointed. But, the adult world is not Disneyland. There's no one person or event which has even half-catastrophically let him down. He used to love this world. The world didn't change. He did

If I were my father, my son would have been put to a lot of hard physical work, out in the sun, to 'take his mind off himself '. Sweat, toil, laughter, dealing with things, taking a hands-on approach. Make it. Fix it. Cheer up that guy over there. Another joke. Taking the world head-on. Laughing at disaster, at oneself. Coming out a survivor at the close of every day, brick by brick. That's how my father dealt with his own depression .. laughed in its face and slapped it around (hit it with half a bottle of scotch)

My father would have taken my son to boxing lessons twenty years ago, to the bar, hunting, etc.

I'm not my father. Don't like to push against someone's natural grain. But my methods have failed, or at least 'didn't work'.

My son's father's family told me they have a lot of family members 'like that' (like my son). They revealed this 25 years after my son's conception. And (they told me) several of their family members who were 'like that', killed themselves. No reason, they say .. just walked out one day or night and hanged themselves.

My son's father's father went home to his mothers each evening for about a week after he got married, apparently. It's one of their family jokes. He just forgot he was married. Creature of habit. Followed his feet home to his mother's place each night. My son exhibits the same vagueness quite often. Dreamy. ' Not with it '.

I love him. It's painful. I'm scared to die because I'm afraid to leave him to his own devices. Years ago, the mother of a man I knew said the same thing. I never expected I would.

At this point, people will say, 'Oh, your son's depression is clinical .. it's endogenous .. it's caused by his own brain's chemicals. You should use a man-made chemical to balance it out '. But neither he nor I want to go that route.

I'd love something to come along and like magic, 'snap him out of it'. I pray for that. But do I believe he's is the process of evolution ? Wish I could say 'yes', but no, instead I think he inherited unfortunate genes with respect to depression. And they've pretty much wasted his life.

Have a flag! Have a star!

Very interesting and thought-provoking thread. I'm still adjusting to life without anti-depressants, it's not the best thing in the world. But whenever I have an argument with somebody, it does seem like I always consider multiple outcomes, I think about problems, I consider many facets of things, and it's not easy for me to just blow something off or "calm down" when I know I'm facing some struggles.

Anti-depressants made me happy but they made me fake. I'd rather see the world for what it is, personally.