[OwlsParliament]

Do you also advocate stopping cancer treatments? Stopping vaccinations, because not getting smallpox is interfering with evolution?

Evolution doesn't happen for a reason. The whole point of evolution is that our biology and the way our brains work is bafflingly random at times. Depression is a crippling mental illness, it doesn't happen for a reason.

[_ywdj]

Hi there. I'm sure you're well-intentioned, but this isn't a very charitable or productive response, and it contains at least 3 argumentative fallacies.

Responding to your points...

Do you also advocate stopping cancer treatments?

No and that's a misrepresentation of what I said.

I didn't say we shouldn't treat mental illness.

I said we can do better than giving amphetamines to children as a way of dealing with aberrant behavior, and that perhaps the key to finding the best treatment is likely to be found by understanding (not denying) its evolutionary origins.

I believe this to be true as I've seen this approach work on myself and others.

Stopping vaccinations, because not getting smallpox is interfering with evolution?

Again, I didn't say we shouldn't treat. And I'm not antivax, no.

When done right, vaccination enhances evolution. (FWIW I'm less convinced about giving flu shots to people with healthy immune systems for the same reason most sensible people are concerned about over-prescription of antibiotics).

In short, I'm fine with any medical intervention that steers the world further down the right path (I.e., enhances evolution).

I'm very confident that the widespread prescription of amphetamines to children will one day be shown not to be good for the world.

Evolution doesn't happen for a reason. The whole point of evolution is that our biology and the way our brains work is bafflingly random at times.

This not a statement of established fact; it is a statement of your understanding of evolution, which may or may not be complete or correct.

But natural selection is not a random process. It is a very deliberate process of adoption and distribution of traits that benefit the species.

So the fact that depressive and ADHD-like behaviours exist in so many people across many different regions and cultures, indicates that they have been positively selected and reinforced over many generations.

Another commenter in this subthread has offered a very plausible explanation as to why this may be.

Depression is a crippling mental illness

Trust me, I know, I've had it for much of my life and have witnessed many other lives be destroyed by it.

it doesn't happen for a reason.

Well for me the key to overcoming depression was discovering that it does have a reason, then addressing that reason at the most fundamental level (genetic expression).

And now I plan to devote as much of the rest of my life and available resources as I can spare, to researching the topic so more people have the chance to be saved from this menace.

Assuming that what you want is a complete end to mental illness - for everybody, regardless of their genetic predisposition - we both want the same thing.

[DanBC]

Is this a cultural thing?

In England the recommended treatment for ADD / ADHD isn't amphetamine as a first response.

Here's what NICE say: http://pathways.nice.org.uk/pathways/attention-deficit-hyper...

http://pathways.nice.org.uk/pathways/attention-deficit-hyper...

> Drug treatment is not indicated as first-line treatment for moderate ADHD.

> Offer parents or carers referral to a group parent-training/education programme on its own or with other group treatment (CBT and/or social skills training) for the child or young person.

> Consider individual psychological interventions (such as CBT or social skills training) for older adolescents.

> Where ADHD is present with a learning disability, offer referral to an individual or group parent training/education programme according to the preference of the child or young person and the parents or carers.

In England children should only be getting medication if they've been through a rigorous assessment and are seen as needing those meds.

[_ywdj]

Yeah I think it's particularly bad in the US, where society has "advanced" to the point where the attitude of "there's a pill for that" seems to apply to pretty much any life setback.

Of course I oversimplify; I know not all people/doctors/regions are like that.

And I do see some of that kind of attitude among some in Australia too, but societal attitudes and the government controls on pharmaceuticals that exist here and the U.K. keep things more moderate.