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I believe it. The smartest, most creative people I know also tend to suffer from crushing emotional problems -- depression, anxiety, loneliness. In a similar l

I believe it. The smartest, most creative people I know also tend to suffer from crushing emotional problems -- depression, anxiety, loneliness. In a similar line of thinking, there's a book called "A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness" that was a fascinating read. The gist of the book is that our best leaders' mental illnesses had something to do with them being great. Abraham Lincoln for example, suffered from depression. This fact may have given him special insight into the suffering of others -- a kind of empathy. This empathy was invaluable, says the author, to the decisions he made. Anyway, yeah. I like this idea. Maybe suffering from mental illness isn't ALL bad. Maybe it has some valuable upsides.

Kenji 11y ago
Maybe suffering from mental illness isn't ALL bad. Maybe it has some valuable upsides. Careful with statements like that. I've pondered quite a bit about this. Of course I too would like to think that such suffering isn't entirely pointless. But mental illness can be so incredibly devastating, no amount of gained wisdom will compensate for that. Especially if self-harm or suicide is involved, it's even harder to see any potential upsides.
diminishedprime 11y ago
As someone that suffers from mental illness (depression), it's not completely off to mark to say that it isn't all bad--I seem to do better than peers in many creative endeavors--but I would immediately give up the benefit it gives for the freedom of a more stable mind. I wouldn't have a second thought.
thewarrior 11y ago
I suffer from depressive episodes and perform better on the verbal sections of any aptitude test. There is a grain of truth to this but I think this article implies causation when it's merely a correlation. My own view is that some people are acutely sensitive to everything that happens around them. Even minor things like unexpected rain on the way to work can turn into an epiphany or a minor tragedy depending on your mood. You're constantly ruminating and over analyzing everything and so its possible that you're good at translating feelings into words. It gels with my personal experience.
- jerf 11y ago
  "There is a grain of truth to this but I think this article implies causation when it's merely a correlation." Even a correlation is very interesting! In fact I tend to disagree, I don't think anyone is proposing that the causation must be direct, because there are still intelligent people who are not bipolar or depressive and there are bipolar and depressed people who are not intelligent. But the correlation, which I think everybody assuming is some third factor behind the mental illness and intelligence/creativity, is still interesting. ... of course, it's an interesting correlation in a sea of interesting correlations, and it's hard to tell which of them are genuinely interesting and which are just "throw enough variables together and you'll get all sorts of spurious correlations". But I'd submit that this is an unusally strong signal, as evidenced by the fact that humans have been making this observation for centuries now. Even if it is spurious, I suspect the proof of that would itself have something interesting in it.
- thewarrior 11y ago
  Replying as I can't edit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Plath_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Plath_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Poets_who_committed_suicide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Poets_who_committed_s...
throwaway383 11y ago
> Maybe suffering from mental illness isn't ALL bad. Maybe it has some valuable upsides Perhaps. I would trade my intelligence and creativity for a happy life and popularity in a heartbeat. Without question.
prodmerc 11y ago
I read Ulysses S. Grant was depressed and frequently drank a lot of alcohol when he was not on active duty. He was brilliant in the field, but quickly fell apart without cannons firing all around. Pretty interesting...
madaxe_again 11y ago
I could write so much on this topic, but generally avoid doing so, as in written form it comes across as bragging. Therefore I'll keep it short. I'm cyclothymic (like mild bipolar), anxious far more often than not, and creating is the only thing which does anything for me, and even then, it doesn't do much. I have the fortune of knowing a fair bit about my neurochemistry, having sequenced my genome and spent more time than is healthy in SNPedia, and my dopamine and serotonin systems are all kinds of screwed - low output, low uptake. My oxycontin system is amped up to the point that I should be schizophrenic. Perhaps I am. Either way, the upshot is that I'm always empty. Always worthless. Always feeling like I haven't achieved a damned thing - and this drives me to be better, to create, to make, be that code, music, art, making random crap out of junk, or reading something, learning, aiming to have more knowledge that I can do things with. Finally, from an objective standpoint, I have an IQ that caused my school to make me re-sit the IQ test with two people watching me, and still believe I had somehow cheated, and am diagnosed with cyclothymia. I choose to be unmedicated, as I'd far rather be sad and mad and have a drive to create and do, than be a happy docile blob.
- yongelee 11y ago
  While the idea of being a happy docile blob isn't something that most 'intelligent' people want, it is possible to be a happy intelligent person as well
  - madaxe_again 11y ago
    As odd as it sounds, I'm happy with my unhappiness. I've learned to manage myself and channel my darker tendencies productively.
- 7An2ieoW 11y ago
  I recognize myself a fair bit in this, though I probably tend to overdiagnose myself. But now I've got questions! How did you learn so much about your neurochemistry, especially your neurotransmitter levels? Any past experiences with medication? And how do you deal with creative downtime, or relaxing?

Kenji 11y ago

Maybe suffering from mental illness isn't ALL bad. Maybe it has some valuable upsides. Careful with statements like that. I've pondered quite a bit about this. Of course I too would like to think that such suffering isn't entirely pointless. But mental illness can be so incredibly devastating, no amount of gained wisdom will compensate for that. Especially if self-harm or suicide is involved, it's even harder to see any potential upsides.

diminishedprime 11y ago

As someone that suffers from mental illness (depression), it's not completely off to mark to say that it isn't all bad--I seem to do better than peers in many creative endeavors--but I would immediately give up the benefit it gives for the freedom of a more stable mind. I wouldn't have a second thought.

thewarrior 11y ago

I suffer from depressive episodes and perform better on the verbal sections of any aptitude test. There is a grain of truth to this but I think this article implies causation when it's merely a correlation. My own view is that some people are acutely sensitive to everything that happens around them. Even minor things like unexpected rain on the way to work can turn into an epiphany or a minor tragedy depending on your mood. You're constantly ruminating and over analyzing everything and so its possible that you're good at translating feelings into words. It gels with my personal experience.

jerf 11y ago
"There is a grain of truth to this but I think this article implies causation when it's merely a correlation." Even a correlation is very interesting! In fact I tend to disagree, I don't think anyone is proposing that the causation must be direct, because there are still intelligent people who are not bipolar or depressive and there are bipolar and depressed people who are not intelligent. But the correlation, which I think everybody assuming is some third factor behind the mental illness and intelligence/creativity, is still interesting. ... of course, it's an interesting correlation in a sea of interesting correlations, and it's hard to tell which of them are genuinely interesting and which are just "throw enough variables together and you'll get all sorts of spurious correlations". But I'd submit that this is an unusally strong signal, as evidenced by the fact that humans have been making this observation for centuries now. Even if it is spurious, I suspect the proof of that would itself have something interesting in it.
thewarrior 11y ago
Replying as I can't edit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Plath_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Plath_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Poets_who_committed_suicide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Poets_who_committed_s...

throwaway383 11y ago

> Maybe suffering from mental illness isn't ALL bad. Maybe it has some valuable upsides Perhaps. I would trade my intelligence and creativity for a happy life and popularity in a heartbeat. Without question.

prodmerc 11y ago

I read Ulysses S. Grant was depressed and frequently drank a lot of alcohol when he was not on active duty. He was brilliant in the field, but quickly fell apart without cannons firing all around. Pretty interesting...

madaxe_again 11y ago

I could write so much on this topic, but generally avoid doing so, as in written form it comes across as bragging. Therefore I'll keep it short. I'm cyclothymic (like mild bipolar), anxious far more often than not, and creating is the only thing which does anything for me, and even then, it doesn't do much. I have the fortune of knowing a fair bit about my neurochemistry, having sequenced my genome and spent more time than is healthy in SNPedia, and my dopamine and serotonin systems are all kinds of screwed - low output, low uptake. My oxycontin system is amped up to the point that I should be schizophrenic. Perhaps I am. Either way, the upshot is that I'm always empty. Always worthless. Always feeling like I haven't achieved a damned thing - and this drives me to be better, to create, to make, be that code, music, art, making random crap out of junk, or reading something, learning, aiming to have more knowledge that I can do things with. Finally, from an objective standpoint, I have an IQ that caused my school to make me re-sit the IQ test with two people watching me, and still believe I had somehow cheated, and am diagnosed with cyclothymia. I choose to be unmedicated, as I'd far rather be sad and mad and have a drive to create and do, than be a happy docile blob.

yongelee 11y ago
While the idea of being a happy docile blob isn't something that most 'intelligent' people want, it is possible to be a happy intelligent person as well
- madaxe_again 11y ago
  As odd as it sounds, I'm happy with my unhappiness. I've learned to manage myself and channel my darker tendencies productively.
7An2ieoW 11y ago
I recognize myself a fair bit in this, though I probably tend to overdiagnose myself. But now I've got questions! How did you learn so much about your neurochemistry, especially your neurotransmitter levels? Any past experiences with medication? And how do you deal with creative downtime, or relaxing?