The Degradation Drug
October 14, 2024 7:51 PM Subscribe
“I had no brakes, no morals, no inhibitions. There was no Jiminy Cricket sitting on my shoulder saying, ‘Vicki, no, don’t do that.’ ” A medication prescribed for Parkinson’s and other diseases can transform a patient’s personality, unleashing heroic bouts of creativity or a torrent of shocking, even criminal behavior. A look at dopamine agonists.
This is TERRIFYING.
This is literally a Jekyll and Hyde drug. I just sent this to my friend who just finished the role. I saw the musical and didn't get why Jekyll created that shit, asked the friend if the script clarified it and he didn't really get it either. The musical seems to try to imply it had something to do with Jekyll's recently dead (of what, who knows) dad and Jekyll wanting to do something.
Now, if you become a completely different person with no rules, no boundaries, no cares about anyone?!? Yikes!!!!
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:26 PM on October 14 [3 favorites]
This is literally a Jekyll and Hyde drug. I just sent this to my friend who just finished the role. I saw the musical and didn't get why Jekyll created that shit, asked the friend if the script clarified it and he didn't really get it either. The musical seems to try to imply it had something to do with Jekyll's recently dead (of what, who knows) dad and Jekyll wanting to do something.
Now, if you become a completely different person with no rules, no boundaries, no cares about anyone?!? Yikes!!!!
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:26 PM on October 14 [3 favorites]
cw: harm to a pet, mentioned very briefly (which for me was really actually not the mildest way to do it)
posted by away for regrooving at 9:38 PM on October 14 [7 favorites]
posted by away for regrooving at 9:38 PM on October 14 [7 favorites]
But why is it OK to punish people who may be impulsively committing crimes due to their natural brain chemistry?Well I mean, people would say that, wouldn't they. As in the article:
“It might seem that I’m in denial, that I want all of the recognition for the art and none of the consequences for the drugs,” she said. “But I actually do believe this: that the darkness came from the pill but that the light was always mine.”I mean, that is a very ethically, uh, convenient way to look at it.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 9:39 PM on October 14 [14 favorites]
If you don't believe in free will, then it doesn't make sense to punish, but also, we have no choice about our collective compulsion to do so.
It's waaay more uplifting to believe in free will.
posted by Western Infidels at 9:57 PM on October 14 [2 favorites]
It's waaay more uplifting to believe in free will.
posted by Western Infidels at 9:57 PM on October 14 [2 favorites]
On the other hand, if you don’t believe in free will then it can also become really easy to justify execution.
posted by aramaic at 10:11 PM on October 14 [1 favorite]
posted by aramaic at 10:11 PM on October 14 [1 favorite]
My kid is currently on a drug for a non-mental-health issue that has been known to cause extreme mental side effects in some small percentage of young patients. It's so hard making a decision about a treatment like this. On the one hand, in most cases it's well tolerated, and if there were better alternatives we wouldn't have been prescribed this one. The alternatives all have major potential drawbacks, too. On the other hand, you read the horror stories...
At least with a child, there are parents keeping an eye out. If mental side effects began, we'd hopefully recognize them quickly and help our child get off the drug. An elementary schooler can't fight me on it, or drive to the store to get more without my knowledge. But... still. The drawback of modern medical miracles is that SO often they come with considerations like these, and unclear guidance about when the risk is and isn't worth it. At the end of the day, you just have to roll the dice and hope you don't have the kind of brain that can't tolerate this medication.
posted by potrzebie at 10:16 PM on October 14 [8 favorites]
At least with a child, there are parents keeping an eye out. If mental side effects began, we'd hopefully recognize them quickly and help our child get off the drug. An elementary schooler can't fight me on it, or drive to the store to get more without my knowledge. But... still. The drawback of modern medical miracles is that SO often they come with considerations like these, and unclear guidance about when the risk is and isn't worth it. At the end of the day, you just have to roll the dice and hope you don't have the kind of brain that can't tolerate this medication.
posted by potrzebie at 10:16 PM on October 14 [8 favorites]
If you don't believe in free will, then it doesn't make sense to punish, but also, we have no choice about our collective compulsion to do so.
This is conflating two different notions of "choice". I can't "choose freely" in the sense that my decisions are fundamentally just physics. But there is something there that "looks like" and "feels like" choice (although a significant amount of that look and feel is pure illusion), and I can't help but experience my own being any other way.
On an individual level, we should act like we have choices; on a societal level, we should recognize that we do not.
posted by heraplem at 11:56 PM on October 14 [9 favorites]
This is conflating two different notions of "choice". I can't "choose freely" in the sense that my decisions are fundamentally just physics. But there is something there that "looks like" and "feels like" choice (although a significant amount of that look and feel is pure illusion), and I can't help but experience my own being any other way.
On an individual level, we should act like we have choices; on a societal level, we should recognize that we do not.
posted by heraplem at 11:56 PM on October 14 [9 favorites]
So some percentage of people who take dopamine agonists have a complete change of personality, even commit crimes they never would have before, and the argument is maybe they shouldn't be punished, it was their altered brain chemistry.
But why is it OK to punish people who may be impulsively committing crimes due to their natural brain chemistry?
(I haven't read the article, the CW about animal harm puts me off. )
We punish people who commit crimes under the influence of alcohol, meth, etc. Should this be different? Genuine, non snarky question. Is it because we expect people to know the consequences of being drunk and high, but these side effects are unexpected and not generally known?
posted by Zumbador at 12:45 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
But why is it OK to punish people who may be impulsively committing crimes due to their natural brain chemistry?
(I haven't read the article, the CW about animal harm puts me off. )
We punish people who commit crimes under the influence of alcohol, meth, etc. Should this be different? Genuine, non snarky question. Is it because we expect people to know the consequences of being drunk and high, but these side effects are unexpected and not generally known?
posted by Zumbador at 12:45 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
The reason we punish people who commit crimes is mainly to try and prevent them committing more crimes, or deter other people from committing crimes. I'd imagine that both of those factors apply a lot more to people whose crimes are alcohol/meth related than they do to people whose activities are caused unexpectedly by a prescribed medication that they then immediately stop taking.
posted by quacks like a duck at 1:29 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
posted by quacks like a duck at 1:29 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
I think the reason reports of these Parkinson-drug treatments going haywire is shocking is that it undermines one of the central tenets of our society: if I’m a good person, the reasoning goes, I can have the good rewards - health, stability, excellent medicine. Suddenly it turns out the only reason you were a good person was that you had the right mix of chemicals in your brain. Why, you could have been just like all those other people, the homeless, societies unmentionables, etc, but for a few molecules!
posted by The River Ivel at 1:38 AM on October 15 [19 favorites]
posted by The River Ivel at 1:38 AM on October 15 [19 favorites]
The reason we punish people who commit crimes is mainly to try and prevent them committing more crimes, or deter other people from committing crimes
Also simply physically preventing them from doing more crimes for some duration. The actual effectiveness of actually existing justice systems when it comes to deterrence and recidivism is a bit dubious but a case where the behavior is traceable to a clear medical cause is an outlier with respect to the nominal purposes of criminal punishment.
As far as illegal drugs, well, yeah, that’s a good argument for diversion to treatment.
posted by atoxyl at 1:38 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
Also simply physically preventing them from doing more crimes for some duration. The actual effectiveness of actually existing justice systems when it comes to deterrence and recidivism is a bit dubious but a case where the behavior is traceable to a clear medical cause is an outlier with respect to the nominal purposes of criminal punishment.
As far as illegal drugs, well, yeah, that’s a good argument for diversion to treatment.
posted by atoxyl at 1:38 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
My husband is on one of these for restless leg syndrome, but his impulse control seems intact so far (as evinced by his rigidity in sticking to his bedtime even when the last episode of the show we're watching ends on a cliffhanger and I'm like COME ON ONE MORE HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY GO TO SLEEP NOT KNOWING????)
posted by Jacqueline at 2:40 AM on October 15 [6 favorites]
posted by Jacqueline at 2:40 AM on October 15 [6 favorites]
And on a somewhat broader level than deterrence, you might also set a punishment just to set a societal standard. If you say some action is morally bad but don't impose any negative consequence for it, it wouldn't be unreasonable for people to start wondering "How bad is it, really"?
posted by ndr at 2:43 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
posted by ndr at 2:43 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
Will-Power/Choice is a variable thing. Both among people and at different times with the same person. People/Society struggle with this.
posted by aleph at 3:20 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
posted by aleph at 3:20 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
In the heyday of Facebook, someone in my friend group developed bipolar disorder and went entirely off the rails on a manic episode and documented everything. It was the most harrowing thing to watch that I have ever seen. When she finally got diagnosed some months down the line it was simultaneously such a revelation and a relief. The whole thing was very eye opening.
Years later and having read Nagarjuna (everyone should read Nagarjuna), I will just say that we live with a great deal more confidence in the sanctity and coherence of individual identity than the condition really deserves.
posted by Smedly, Butlerian jihadi at 4:39 AM on October 15 [12 favorites]
Years later and having read Nagarjuna (everyone should read Nagarjuna), I will just say that we live with a great deal more confidence in the sanctity and coherence of individual identity than the condition really deserves.
posted by Smedly, Butlerian jihadi at 4:39 AM on October 15 [12 favorites]
I hope I am not the only one experiencing two conflicting feelings at the same time when I read this: 1. Oh my God this is exactly what I need to kickstart my second career as a visual artist where do I get this stuff right now. 2. Oh my god this may actually explain Donald Trump.
posted by RandlePatrickMcMurphy at 5:08 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
posted by RandlePatrickMcMurphy at 5:08 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
See also:Brain damage.
The fact that violence can be a symptom of brain disease shows not that free will is an illusion, but that free will can be injured just like other human abilities.posted by petiteviolette at 5:50 AM on October 15 [11 favorites]
Many patients describe the problem as less a battle against their worst urges than a failure to see anything wrong with indulging them
I recall ther was a radiolab episode some years back on this featuring a woman with Parkinson’s who became hopeless addicted to gambling on this drugs. They described it as the total suppression of any feeling of negative consequences , along with a greater euphoria at the rewards. The thing is that is how gambling addiction works anyway. I think thes drugs definitely need strong warnings and a proactive ban of gambling. However as the article
Points out you might need to ban online shopping and and art while you are at it.
posted by CostcoCultist at 6:27 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
I recall ther was a radiolab episode some years back on this featuring a woman with Parkinson’s who became hopeless addicted to gambling on this drugs. They described it as the total suppression of any feeling of negative consequences , along with a greater euphoria at the rewards. The thing is that is how gambling addiction works anyway. I think thes drugs definitely need strong warnings and a proactive ban of gambling. However as the article
Points out you might need to ban online shopping and and art while you are at it.
posted by CostcoCultist at 6:27 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
Along with Mirapex, which Hannah started taking in December 2014, her psychiatrist had prescribed a cocktail of psychoactive drugs that included lithium, Lamictal (lamotrigine), Xanax (alprazolam), and Provigil (modafinil).
Maybe we can talk about free will after her psychiatrist serves a sentence in jail. Seriously, what the hell is this regimen? "What if we fucked up every neurotransmitter you have, all at the same time? Maybe THAT would help!"
posted by mittens at 6:30 AM on October 15 [8 favorites]
Maybe we can talk about free will after her psychiatrist serves a sentence in jail. Seriously, what the hell is this regimen? "What if we fucked up every neurotransmitter you have, all at the same time? Maybe THAT would help!"
posted by mittens at 6:30 AM on October 15 [8 favorites]
The dopamine agonist my late stepfather was on for Parkinson's exacerbated his gambling addiction and cost my parents all their savings. His doctor did not tell my mother that that was a possibility.
posted by Kitteh at 6:35 AM on October 15 [6 favorites]
posted by Kitteh at 6:35 AM on October 15 [6 favorites]
Fucked up neurotransmitters lead to consequences not for the person taking them, but for others.
So the free will argument only matters so much. Society demands some kind of restriction on dangerously aberrant behaviour or land minds can and will go off and hurt other people.
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:35 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
So the free will argument only matters so much. Society demands some kind of restriction on dangerously aberrant behaviour or land minds can and will go off and hurt other people.
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:35 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
Have not yet looked at TFA but after scanning the thread and seeing all kinds of talk about "free will..."
Of the various impenetrable thickets of argumentation and conceptualization that the Buddha warned against plunging into, due to the risk of never emerging, the existence or not of "free will" is one of the easiest to avoid. It is safe to be agnostic about the existence of "free will" and to quit worrying about it, while focusing on the development of your ability to exercise your free won't.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 6:36 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
Of the various impenetrable thickets of argumentation and conceptualization that the Buddha warned against plunging into, due to the risk of never emerging, the existence or not of "free will" is one of the easiest to avoid. It is safe to be agnostic about the existence of "free will" and to quit worrying about it, while focusing on the development of your ability to exercise your free won't.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 6:36 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
Until you’ve had a front row seat to Parkinson’s, it’s very hard to understand why someone would take a drug with such potentially high risks. It can be really hard to conceptualize how desperate people can be if you haven’t seen it yourself.
posted by corey flood at 6:40 AM on October 15 [15 favorites]
posted by corey flood at 6:40 AM on October 15 [15 favorites]
@ Smedly, Butlerian jihadi:
> (everyone should read Nagarjuna)
Got a recommendation for an entry point? That's been on my list.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 6:43 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
> (everyone should read Nagarjuna)
Got a recommendation for an entry point? That's been on my list.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 6:43 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
Until you’ve had a front row seat to Parkinson’s, it’s very hard to understand why someone would take a drug with such potentially high risks.
Absolutely. Watching how much Parkinson's impacted my family for nearly 20 years was a lesson in compassion, dignity, and how much easier everything might have gone if we had had any money at all.
posted by Kitteh at 6:43 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
Absolutely. Watching how much Parkinson's impacted my family for nearly 20 years was a lesson in compassion, dignity, and how much easier everything might have gone if we had had any money at all.
posted by Kitteh at 6:43 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
I have a sibling who's just been diagnosed with Parkinson's, and this thread has me wondering if the wild see-sawing that they've been doing over the last few days over a relatively simple situation (whether or not I'll be giving them a ride to a nephew's wedding) has anything to do with the meds that they're on.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:30 AM on October 15 [3 favorites]
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:30 AM on October 15 [3 favorites]
I saw the musical and didn't get why Jekyll created that shit, asked the friend if the script clarified it and he didn't really get it either.
There's a case to be made that the Jekyll/Hyde story was about Stevenson's own experiences with alcoholism.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 7:55 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
There's a case to be made that the Jekyll/Hyde story was about Stevenson's own experiences with alcoholism.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 7:55 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
OK I finally read TFA and it is one of the luckier MeFi hits of late, for me. I was prepared to be put off, just from the title, but I can see why it was chosen.
TFA focuses on dopamine receptor agonists but nods in the direction of TMS and, toward the end, the future possibility of some kind of "wireheading" technology fusing brains with programmable electronic devices. These are all things that will increasingly challenge a lot of assumptions that practically everybody takes for granted, and TFA names many of them: namely
> That our choices are truly ours, that we remain the same people over time, that the inner lives of other people are more or less like our own...
What came out hardest at me was the explicit denial of what I remarked on upthread, about "free won't." The dose-dependent and reversible nature of these compulsive transformations ought to be informing everybody's thinking about responsibility. But the key things are the challenge to essentialism (everybody is "a kind of person" and stays that "kind of person" over time, because they have some essential quality that makes them that "kind of person) and the further evidence that there is no ghost in the machine. People really do what they do as a consequence of physical processes happening in their bodies, and not by some ethereal uncaused impulse.
One other technology that could be added to the list is (currently) diagnostic or exploratory and not an intervention, but FMRI and related ways of measuring brain activity in real time. To the extent that these produce reliable findings about the physical basis of cognition and consciousness, they're a challenge to the view that we are atomic individuals with uncaused behavior.
TFA observes "It may take a while for our moral emotions to catch up with new technologies," and I hope that is not too optimistic. These topics are all hard to think about, and lots of people would rather not bother.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 8:08 AM on October 15 [4 favorites]
TFA focuses on dopamine receptor agonists but nods in the direction of TMS and, toward the end, the future possibility of some kind of "wireheading" technology fusing brains with programmable electronic devices. These are all things that will increasingly challenge a lot of assumptions that practically everybody takes for granted, and TFA names many of them: namely
> That our choices are truly ours, that we remain the same people over time, that the inner lives of other people are more or less like our own...
What came out hardest at me was the explicit denial of what I remarked on upthread, about "free won't." The dose-dependent and reversible nature of these compulsive transformations ought to be informing everybody's thinking about responsibility. But the key things are the challenge to essentialism (everybody is "a kind of person" and stays that "kind of person" over time, because they have some essential quality that makes them that "kind of person) and the further evidence that there is no ghost in the machine. People really do what they do as a consequence of physical processes happening in their bodies, and not by some ethereal uncaused impulse.
One other technology that could be added to the list is (currently) diagnostic or exploratory and not an intervention, but FMRI and related ways of measuring brain activity in real time. To the extent that these produce reliable findings about the physical basis of cognition and consciousness, they're a challenge to the view that we are atomic individuals with uncaused behavior.
TFA observes "It may take a while for our moral emotions to catch up with new technologies," and I hope that is not too optimistic. These topics are all hard to think about, and lots of people would rather not bother.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 8:08 AM on October 15 [4 favorites]
Wireheading? Don't need to be that invasive:
"Magnets used to turn specific brain circuits off and on at will"
https://newatlas.com/medical/magnetogenetics-neurons-parkinsons-symptoms/
[snip]
Researchers have developed a gene therapy technology that uses magnetic fields to switch groups of neurons on and off, controlling brain circuits affected by Parkinson’s disease. In addition to Parkinson’s, the tech could be used to treat conditions as diverse as depression, obesity, and chronic pain.
posted by aleph at 8:15 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
"Magnets used to turn specific brain circuits off and on at will"
https://newatlas.com/medical/magnetogenetics-neurons-parkinsons-symptoms/
[snip]
Researchers have developed a gene therapy technology that uses magnetic fields to switch groups of neurons on and off, controlling brain circuits affected by Parkinson’s disease. In addition to Parkinson’s, the tech could be used to treat conditions as diverse as depression, obesity, and chronic pain.
posted by aleph at 8:15 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
Was this sentence necessary?
"She bought provocative clothes at a shop that sold outfits to streetwalkers."
Sheesh. It's 2024.
posted by yellowcandy at 8:18 AM on October 15 [10 favorites]
"She bought provocative clothes at a shop that sold outfits to streetwalkers."
Sheesh. It's 2024.
posted by yellowcandy at 8:18 AM on October 15 [10 favorites]
Yeah this article felt really 1990s to me, harkening back to like a 1960s conception of the power of pharmaceuticals and brain "hacking."
As does, repeating myself because I'm not sure I'm being clear, the utter disregard for modern research on how childhood and adult trauma have measurable and lasting impacts on behavior.
If you have two people standing in front of a jury, both of them convicted of possession of child porn, both of them with other evidence of low impulse control, Adam was taking a dopamine agonists and Beth wasn't, why is it fair to have more compassion or tolerance for Adam, when Beth could point to her own causes for why her brain is the way it is.
I'm not saying this to take a position on one side or the other, I am just interested in why this question wasn't even considered by the author.
posted by muddgirl at 9:20 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
As does, repeating myself because I'm not sure I'm being clear, the utter disregard for modern research on how childhood and adult trauma have measurable and lasting impacts on behavior.
If you have two people standing in front of a jury, both of them convicted of possession of child porn, both of them with other evidence of low impulse control, Adam was taking a dopamine agonists and Beth wasn't, why is it fair to have more compassion or tolerance for Adam, when Beth could point to her own causes for why her brain is the way it is.
I'm not saying this to take a position on one side or the other, I am just interested in why this question wasn't even considered by the author.
posted by muddgirl at 9:20 AM on October 15 [5 favorites]
Presumably, Adam can go off of their drug, which will solve their low impulse control problem. How do you propose solving Beth's problem? We could lock her up in a psychiatric facility for "treatment" until she's cured, but that's often longer and worse than prison.
posted by Spike Glee at 10:12 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
posted by Spike Glee at 10:12 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
Society demands some kind of restriction on dangerously aberrant behaviour or land minds can and will go off and hurt other people.
"Land minds" couldn't be a typo. It's too perfect. Nicely done.
Suddenly it turns out the only reason you were a good person was that you had the right mix of chemicals in your brain. Why, you could have been just like all those other people, the homeless, societies unmentionables, etc, but for a few molecules!
Yeah. Pharmacology is basically The Phineas Gage Experiment featuring special guest Patented Chemicals. Whatever "you" are is very clearly malleable. It is, and should be, a terrifying prospect that a pill can flip a switch in your brain and turn you into someone else.
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 10:38 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
"Land minds" couldn't be a typo. It's too perfect. Nicely done.
Suddenly it turns out the only reason you were a good person was that you had the right mix of chemicals in your brain. Why, you could have been just like all those other people, the homeless, societies unmentionables, etc, but for a few molecules!
Yeah. Pharmacology is basically The Phineas Gage Experiment featuring special guest Patented Chemicals. Whatever "you" are is very clearly malleable. It is, and should be, a terrifying prospect that a pill can flip a switch in your brain and turn you into someone else.
posted by howbigisthistextfield at 10:38 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
Peter Watts Firefall series presents a case for societies who understand exactly how un-free will is with regards to brains that have suffered deprivation, trauma, and abuse that punishment for behavioral crimes is seen as barbaric.
In a universe of upload heavens, cybernetic brain viruses and non-conscious yet willful non human intelligences riding solar antimatter power generators to terrestrial domination the notion of nations abandoning punitive consequences for behavioral crimes is the hardest concept to buy.
We're that conditioned to credit that there's a there there with regards to our free will, no matter how much materialism creeps into the tiny spaces we quietly store our unfalsifiable beliefs.
I've experienced a dopamine agonist for treatment. When it finished treating the thing it was treating I began noticing behavior changes and happened to have the support network and ability to go talk to a professional about it who was the first to ask about the particular drug (cabergoline in this case) and I only spent a few months with increasingly risk-agnostic behavior before tapering off it. It still feels like someone else was doing the things but neurotransmitters are a helluva drug.
What we like to treat as evil boils down to chemistry around empathy, theory of mind, reality testing, and so on. It doesn't mean you didn't suffer evil and abuse, or that whoever behaved that way deserves forgiveness or any other moral calculus, only that we imagine a much more stable sense of self than can be substantiated or guaranteed.
Just like we imagine a lot more reason to persist, procreate, and survive directly in spite of evidence it's not worth it: we evolved to be delusional enough to keep going even when it's unreasonable because our reason isn't as good as it imagines it is.
posted by Lenie Clarke at 11:01 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
In a universe of upload heavens, cybernetic brain viruses and non-conscious yet willful non human intelligences riding solar antimatter power generators to terrestrial domination the notion of nations abandoning punitive consequences for behavioral crimes is the hardest concept to buy.
We're that conditioned to credit that there's a there there with regards to our free will, no matter how much materialism creeps into the tiny spaces we quietly store our unfalsifiable beliefs.
I've experienced a dopamine agonist for treatment. When it finished treating the thing it was treating I began noticing behavior changes and happened to have the support network and ability to go talk to a professional about it who was the first to ask about the particular drug (cabergoline in this case) and I only spent a few months with increasingly risk-agnostic behavior before tapering off it. It still feels like someone else was doing the things but neurotransmitters are a helluva drug.
What we like to treat as evil boils down to chemistry around empathy, theory of mind, reality testing, and so on. It doesn't mean you didn't suffer evil and abuse, or that whoever behaved that way deserves forgiveness or any other moral calculus, only that we imagine a much more stable sense of self than can be substantiated or guaranteed.
Just like we imagine a lot more reason to persist, procreate, and survive directly in spite of evidence it's not worth it: we evolved to be delusional enough to keep going even when it's unreasonable because our reason isn't as good as it imagines it is.
posted by Lenie Clarke at 11:01 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
It's a mixture I don't think we're going to sort out any time soon. "Half measures" for the foreseeable future.
When I was in the hospital the time before last I got Oxycontin for the first time. Not much for pain drugs any way, and even less after that. I had the interesting experience of having thoughts I'd never had before. And they weren't the pleasant kind.
I'd had a lot of unpleasant thoughts growing up, I was pretty familiar with those parts of me. This was remarkable for the quality of being alien/strange as well as unpleasant. First time I ever felt something trying to "program" me directly.
posted by aleph at 11:11 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
When I was in the hospital the time before last I got Oxycontin for the first time. Not much for pain drugs any way, and even less after that. I had the interesting experience of having thoughts I'd never had before. And they weren't the pleasant kind.
I'd had a lot of unpleasant thoughts growing up, I was pretty familiar with those parts of me. This was remarkable for the quality of being alien/strange as well as unpleasant. First time I ever felt something trying to "program" me directly.
posted by aleph at 11:11 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
The purpose of prison is for the societal audiences varacious thrill and fear. Thats why the guilt or innocence of the inmates is irrelevant, nor its efficacy, nor its proportinality. The SCOTUS have even said innocence is not enough to earn release from prison (Jones v Hendrix). Prison is a machine whose purpose is the effect it has on those of us outside of prison who demand the thrill of punishing others and who need to be controlled by threats and fear. The life story of the cogs of that machine are sadly just so much window dressing.
Free-will is a heuristic, its a strategy for modelling the behavior of complex systems by rationalizing an agent with perspective and goals and emotions. It works because that complex system itself is also evaluating responses by modelling an agent-as-self. Its an emergent property of organisms complexity of behavioral choices that these group and self interests become less than random and able to cohere.
Automobiles and fire are occasinally treated this way with limited success but the prinicple holds: we distinguish the living and intentional things as those where the behavior requires more modeing structure than just simple laws of motion. It applies to us as well.
The more we learn about how the brain operates, the more accurately we can model and influence and control it beyond the implications of the agent (or self-agent) heuristic. Personhood will be an anachronism of a less statistically effective model of the complex system and the features of personhood will have explanations and rules more reliable and manipulable physically and chemically than the old methods of "how to win friends and influence people" or whatever.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 11:12 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
Free-will is a heuristic, its a strategy for modelling the behavior of complex systems by rationalizing an agent with perspective and goals and emotions. It works because that complex system itself is also evaluating responses by modelling an agent-as-self. Its an emergent property of organisms complexity of behavioral choices that these group and self interests become less than random and able to cohere.
Automobiles and fire are occasinally treated this way with limited success but the prinicple holds: we distinguish the living and intentional things as those where the behavior requires more modeing structure than just simple laws of motion. It applies to us as well.
The more we learn about how the brain operates, the more accurately we can model and influence and control it beyond the implications of the agent (or self-agent) heuristic. Personhood will be an anachronism of a less statistically effective model of the complex system and the features of personhood will have explanations and rules more reliable and manipulable physically and chemically than the old methods of "how to win friends and influence people" or whatever.
posted by No Climate - No Food, No Food - No Future. at 11:12 AM on October 15 [2 favorites]
"The purpose of prison is for the societal audiences varacious thrill and fear. "
Naah. There's large parts of society that doesn't think of them at all.
posted by aleph at 11:13 AM on October 15
Naah. There's large parts of society that doesn't think of them at all.
posted by aleph at 11:13 AM on October 15
I don't propose anything for Beth because she's a hypothetical construct. But if we are talking about mind hacking, there is a lot of research on dopamine antagonists to treat addiction, aggression, and all kinds of antisocial behavior. Maybe we're not quite there yet but sure let's talk about turning off some criminal behavior with a little implant. I'm wondering why this possibility isn't part of the essay.
In reality I propose we heavily invest in childhood poverty interventions including cash payments to all childhood caregivers, investments in school interventions as well as "third places" for kids after school, etc. etc.
posted by muddgirl at 11:18 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
In reality I propose we heavily invest in childhood poverty interventions including cash payments to all childhood caregivers, investments in school interventions as well as "third places" for kids after school, etc. etc.
posted by muddgirl at 11:18 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
"...that doesn't think of them at all."
I mean, a lot think about (a lot imaginary) crime. Just once they're locked up they don't think much about them.
posted by aleph at 11:22 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
I mean, a lot think about (a lot imaginary) crime. Just once they're locked up they don't think much about them.
posted by aleph at 11:22 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
"...I'm wondering why this possibility isn't part of the essay."
Because that opens the hellscape for whoever to be on the other end of that implant.
Good uses, sure. Dominated by bad... ?
posted by aleph at 11:24 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
Because that opens the hellscape for whoever to be on the other end of that implant.
Good uses, sure. Dominated by bad... ?
posted by aleph at 11:24 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
I don't disagree aleph. But we are already talking about that hellscape when we are talking about the legal system and prison sentences. It's the same agents of force.
posted by muddgirl at 11:27 AM on October 15
posted by muddgirl at 11:27 AM on October 15
Yet some would argue that there's a level of violation involved with the implant that is not inflicted by the prison sentence.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 11:30 AM on October 15
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 11:30 AM on October 15
And I can imagine possibilities with implants *much* worse. But then that's the future we're talking about. Notoriously difficult...
posted by aleph at 11:41 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
posted by aleph at 11:41 AM on October 15 [1 favorite]
Adam could already be forced, by someone as low down in the org chart as a prison warden, to stop taking a dopamine agonist even if he thought the effects of Parkinson's were worse than the effects of the drug. But it's common to rate inaction as better and safer than action.
I don't know how more clearly to state I am not arguing we *should* treat all criminals as pharmaceutical patients against their will. But to me it was a natural consequence of some of the arguments this essay raised 🤷
posted by muddgirl at 12:00 PM on October 15 [1 favorite]
I don't know how more clearly to state I am not arguing we *should* treat all criminals as pharmaceutical patients against their will. But to me it was a natural consequence of some of the arguments this essay raised 🤷
posted by muddgirl at 12:00 PM on October 15 [1 favorite]
Since implants are probably coming, hopefully we can get them slowed down enough for some groups to take a good look, as they come. That'll cut down on the abuse but it'll depend on how easy it is to do.
The therapeutic benefits are just too big. An obvious extreme example is Locked-in syndrome.
posted by aleph at 12:04 PM on October 15
The therapeutic benefits are just too big. An obvious extreme example is Locked-in syndrome.
posted by aleph at 12:04 PM on October 15
@aleph:
> Wireheading? Don't need to be that invasive:
As I noted, "TFA nods in the direction of transcranial magnetic stimulation."
But that will turn out to be a blunt instrument compared with programmable hardware that's grown into the nervous system somehow.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 12:13 PM on October 15
> Wireheading? Don't need to be that invasive:
As I noted, "TFA nods in the direction of transcranial magnetic stimulation."
But that will turn out to be a blunt instrument compared with programmable hardware that's grown into the nervous system somehow.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 12:13 PM on October 15
I thought you were referring to the articles I've seen that use a magnetic field directly on the cranium. This work is using a nanoparticle that has to be put in the area you want to switch on/off first.
from that link:
[snip]
The researchers engineered an ion channel protein with a protein nanobody that sticks to a natural iron-trapping protein called ferritin. When the gene therapy is delivered to a particular brain region through minimally invasive surgery, a sufficiently strong magnetic field exerts enough force on the ferritin-trapped iron atoms to open or close the ion channel – switching the neuron ‘on’ or ‘off’.
posted by aleph at 12:33 PM on October 15 [2 favorites]
from that link:
[snip]
The researchers engineered an ion channel protein with a protein nanobody that sticks to a natural iron-trapping protein called ferritin. When the gene therapy is delivered to a particular brain region through minimally invasive surgery, a sufficiently strong magnetic field exerts enough force on the ferritin-trapped iron atoms to open or close the ion channel – switching the neuron ‘on’ or ‘off’.
posted by aleph at 12:33 PM on October 15 [2 favorites]
"...and didn't get why Jekyll created that shit,"
@jenfullmoon The wiki page has explanations. None of them good.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strange_Case_of_Dr_Jekyll_and_Mr_Hyde
The clearest:
[snip]
Stevenson had long been intrigued by the idea of how human personalities can reflect the interplay of good and evil.
[snip]
Inspiration may also have come from the writer's friendship with an Edinburgh-based French teacher, Eugene Chantrelle, who was convicted and executed for the murder of his wife in May 1878.[4] Chantrelle, who had appeared to lead a normal life in the city, poisoned his wife with opium. According to author Jeremy Hodges,[5] Stevenson was present throughout the trial and as "the evidence unfolded he found himself, like Dr Jekyll, 'aghast before the acts of Edward Hyde'." Moreover, it was believed that the teacher had committed other murders...
And then finally:
[snip]
Jekyll's letter explains he held himself to strict moral standards publicly, but indulged in unstated vices and struggled with shame. He found a way to transform himself and thereby indulge his vices without fear of detection. Jekyll's transformed body, Hyde, was evil, self-indulgent, and uncaring to anyone but himself. Initially, Jekyll controlled the transformations with the serum, but one night in August, he became Hyde involuntarily in his sleep.
posted by aleph at 1:30 PM on October 15
@jenfullmoon The wiki page has explanations. None of them good.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strange_Case_of_Dr_Jekyll_and_Mr_Hyde
The clearest:
[snip]
Stevenson had long been intrigued by the idea of how human personalities can reflect the interplay of good and evil.
[snip]
Inspiration may also have come from the writer's friendship with an Edinburgh-based French teacher, Eugene Chantrelle, who was convicted and executed for the murder of his wife in May 1878.[4] Chantrelle, who had appeared to lead a normal life in the city, poisoned his wife with opium. According to author Jeremy Hodges,[5] Stevenson was present throughout the trial and as "the evidence unfolded he found himself, like Dr Jekyll, 'aghast before the acts of Edward Hyde'." Moreover, it was believed that the teacher had committed other murders...
And then finally:
[snip]
Jekyll's letter explains he held himself to strict moral standards publicly, but indulged in unstated vices and struggled with shame. He found a way to transform himself and thereby indulge his vices without fear of detection. Jekyll's transformed body, Hyde, was evil, self-indulgent, and uncaring to anyone but himself. Initially, Jekyll controlled the transformations with the serum, but one night in August, he became Hyde involuntarily in his sleep.
posted by aleph at 1:30 PM on October 15
OK, so a year ago I got told I have Parkinson's. The medicine I take does not cause such extreme reactions. I read about the brain implants, and I guess they have been around for awhile. Not for me right now, but I always read any article about Parkinson's, just in case. Meantime, I'm just living my life and I know what is ahead.
Anyways, anyone know another woman besides Hannah with impulse-control with sex? ;)
posted by baegucb at 5:05 PM on October 15
Anyways, anyone know another woman besides Hannah with impulse-control with sex? ;)
posted by baegucb at 5:05 PM on October 15
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So some percentage of people who take dopamine agonists have a complete change of personality, even commit crimes they never would have before, and the argument is maybe they shouldn't be punished, it was their altered brain chemistry.
But why is it OK to punish people who may be impulsively committing crimes due to their natural brain chemistry? The author makes an analogy about free will but the professor with the lever making us go isn't a dopamine agonists, it's our own wild brain. TL;DR abolish prisons I guess.
posted by muddgirl at 9:25 PM on October 14 [23 favorites]