[UA] Schizophrenia

[Chad Underkoffler]

> Date: Wed, 16 May 2001 21:59:13 -0500
> From: Greg Stolze <holycrow at mindspring.com>
> 
> Of course, a schizophrenic demon could be very, VERY 
> dangerous because it has no grasp of the usual limitations 
> on humanity and reality.  

Actually, that's the way I've been running/thinking of your
basic demons. No glands, secrets of the Veil, different
perspective, you know.

> On the other hand, once the spirit was severed from the body,
> any chemical imbalances creating the schizophrenia would 
> presumably be gone.  Not exactly the "easy cure," but
> interesting.

And weird brain structures would be gone, too. Could lead to
interesting discussions of the nature of the soul, good, and
evil, no?

> You could springboard this to another idea, too.  Suppose 
> you've got someone who's been struggling with schizophrenia 
> off and on his whole life. He's managed to get by, more or 
> less -- he's stable enough to work some menial job, maybe 
> lives in a group home -- until, for whatever plot
> contrived reason, an epideromancer blows a major charge on
> fixing the broken valves in his brain.  (Or some other effect
> -- major unnatural phenomenon? -- either repairs the damage 
> or moves his spirit and memories into a new body.)  What's 
> the effect when you've gone through your life with your 
> personality broken... and suddenly it's whole?

I'd say they'd be scary effective-- some of the the coping
mechanisms for a high-functioning schizophrenic or
schizophreniform sufferer would probably help a highly-motivated
person make some changes, both in their lives and in the world.

Of course, this is all purely from my personal experience with
sufferers of these diseases.

An interesting take that I think I read in Torrey (or possibly
Sagan's DRAGONS OF EDEN) is that brain communication between the
lobes may be a step "off" or "delayed" in schizophrenics. That
the voices and thought interruption that they suffer may be
because their left brain is commenting/criticizing on the
processes in their right brain.

Which might lead to an UAble idea: demons that only posses a
single lobe-- perhaps the Ghost Writer only takes up space in
the right brain?



=====
Chad Underkoffler [chadu at yahoo.com]
http://www.geocities.com/chadu/index.html
God isn't silent, he just speaks very softly. In Etruscan.

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