Posted by Tom Grimes on March 21, 2004, at 14:03:33
In reply to Life imitating art imitating life » Dr. Bob, posted by DSCH on March 21, 2004, at 9:28:20
Sorry. Didn't mean to bring up any scary graduate school memories. The book didn't start out with any particular intent. I was just trying to make sense of my own loss of self. To me, Prozac seemed at the time to be just more information, more of the world's unorganized, or barely organized, chaos.
And I don't think psycopharmacology has answered this question of the self. If anything, it may have confused it. For eg, look in any pill book and for any drug like Prozac or Trileptal or Lamictaal the phrase "exact mechanism unknown." There are, say, eight to ten mood stabilizers currently on the market. It's guess work to say which one will work best for your if your BP. And then, if one works, exactly how it works is unknown.
So, the book came out of my thinking about the self. Am I more me before the pill, or after the pill? More me without it, or with it?
And I saw this, and felt it, as another aspect of information sickness, the melancholia that comes of having too many choices. No necessity, no truth.
PS: Phil, if you're reading this, I did send a long response to your post. Not sure why it didn't go through, and I didn't notice until some time afterward.
I'm happy to answer any posts that continue to come through.
Best, TG
poster:Tom Grimes
thread:316365
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/books/20040211/msgs/326719.html