Poll: Mind Over Matter

[Princess Tzelda]

It's a common phrase, one heard more often than we think of. There might be a grain of truth to the phrase.

In the scientific community there is a great deal of evidence that the human mind is capable of much more than we use it for. It is capable of storing everything everywhere at once and, when it is needed, that information can be called on at any time. All this space, however, means that there is room for amazing feats of the mind.

When a person is dangerously ill or badly injured that we say they are fighting for their life. why is it that these people who fight and cling to life in desperate situations are the ones who, usually, survive and come back stronger than ever? How can my grandmother, who had lost both knee caps, can walk better than my grandmother who has had both knees replaced? It's because my grandmother fought for her ability to walk again. She wanted to be able to continue to live her life as she had before she lost her knee caps.

Why do some cancer patients come through chemo and surgery and still smile and go about their lives and live better than ever before when some give up and die? They fight to live. They fight to hold everything they hold dear.

The human mind has many mysteries but one of the largest is how the Will to Live is more than an idea, it is an actual state of mind. the big question is how can this Will be the one thing that that tips the scale one way or the other in a matter of life or death?

 

[Arakasi]

The brain works in ways we don't entirely understand, but it's not magic. Mind is made of matter.
Though there could be an element of psychology which allows diseases to be better fought off in the right moods, or states, that goes beyond simply when the parasympathetic nervous system kicks in.

 

[ClockworkPenguin]

Given that not only can we make ourselves better faster via the placebo effect, healthy people can make themselves ill because they believe they are ill (the 'nocebo' effect) then I do believe that the mind plays an important role in all round health.

I have no idea how, but the evidence sure suggests that there is one.

 

[Ragsnstitches]

The human mind does not have infinite storage. Its a physical thing with finite space. There only so many neural networks that can be formed before shit starts getting overwritten.

No amount of training or conditioning can affect that cap. Do people reach that cap in their lifespans? I don't know... but considering how rapidly and frequently our brains dump information it deems unnecessary I'd say that we might or at least some of us might. Heck, look at how people with various forms of congenital mental handicaps results in them being unable to efficiently dump junk information, and how drastically it affects their ability to develop and learn.

Not to mention, over our lives, our brain degenerates, meaning whatever cap we once had is much smaller in the last few decades.

However, there is strong evidence that our "moods" have some link to recovery rates from damage of various forms.

But then again, we're not sure in which order is it affected. Does moods affect our recovery or does our rate/success of recovery affect our moods?

 

[Lynx]

There's an opposite situation that I find just as fascinating; body over mind!

In my deepest bouts of depression or anxiety (when all sorts of nearly uncontrollable thoughts are racing in your mind non-stop), mundane physical activities such as exercising, washing the dishes, cleaning the house et cetera, would distract my mind from going into overdrive. Quite the powerful tool to battle mind ghosts, if one does it properly.

 

[TheVampwizimp_v1legacy]

There's an opposite situation that I find just as fascinating; body over mind!

In my deepest bouts of depression or anxiety (when all sorts of nearly uncontrollable thoughts are racing in your mind non-stop), mundane physical activities such as exercising, washing the dishes, cleaning the house et cetera, would distract my mind from going into overdrive. Quite the powerful tool to battle mind ghosts, if one does it properly.

Mind over body does have some merit to it; see, placebo effect. But this is also totally true, that your physical actions affect your mental state. As you say, exercise has been proven to help with depression. I remember a study that showed if you smile more you will feel happier.

All that this means is that the mind-body connection is tighter than we usually think. Most people consider them pretty separate, but our minds come from our brains, and whatever affects our brains affects our minds. And everything affects our brains.

 

[Lynx]

There's an opposite situation that I find just as fascinating; body over mind!

In my deepest bouts of depression or anxiety (when all sorts of nearly uncontrollable thoughts are racing in your mind non-stop), mundane physical activities such as exercising, washing the dishes, cleaning the house et cetera, would distract my mind from going into overdrive. Quite the powerful tool to battle mind ghosts, if one does it properly.

Mind over body does have some merit to it; see, placebo effect. But this is also totally true, that your physical actions affect your mental state. As you say, exercise has been proven to help with depression. I remember a study that showed if you smile more you will feel happier.

All that this means is that the mind-body connection is tighter than we usually think. Most people consider them pretty separate, but our minds come from our brains, and whatever affects our brains affects our minds. And everything affects our brains.

Oh, absolutely. The two are dependent on each other and if one is affected positively or negatively, the other will almost always follow the same pattern.


Patients who have a positive outlook, motivation and overall a "happy" mental state will generally heal much quicker and more effectively than had they been overwhelmed with despair about their situation. This is one of the reasons it can be very important to have family and friends around for the whole process, to keep you feeling safe and loved and motivated.

 

[spartan231490]

I think you're ascribing quite a bit more to the mind over matter phenomena then is wise, but there is certainly some power of the mind involved in things. The placebo effect is proof enough, and anyone claiming there is no truth to the idiom is being dangerously ignorant.

 

[Princess Tzelda]

In the scientific community there is a great deal of evidence that the human mind is capable of much more than we use it for. It is capable of storing everything everywhere at once and, when it is needed, that information can be called on at any time. All this space, however, means that there is room for amazing feats of the mind.

Citation needed.

When a person is dangerously ill or badly injured that we say they are fighting for their life. why is it that these people who fight and cling to life in desperate situations are the ones who, usually, survive and come back stronger than ever?

Citation needed.

The human mind has many mysteries but one of the largest is how the Will to Live is more than an idea, it is an actual state of mind.

Citation needed.

While it doesn't seem controversial to suggest that one's mental state can be a factor in health and healing, one can't just claim that this is a "usually" sort of scenario without evidence to back it up. Because that leads to a contemptible fallacy, the assumption that people who die just didn't want to live badly enough.

ok, I just decided to put this out there as a thought provoker. I'm not trying to write a thesis or do a study, if I was there would be citations. these are just my thoughts on the idea of mind over matter and if you want to share your thoughts fine but understand that I'm only in 10th grade, not college at any level so ease up buddy.

 

[The White Hunter]

To a degree. If someone stabs you through the heart, you're pretty likely to die, sorry, too bad.

But there are ways to manage pain and such. I can tolerate a lot of discomfort and pain. I can take blunt force up to and including hockey stick to the balls (no, I am not joking, it happened, my reaction was to pull a 180 and break my hockey stick across the offenders face [sub]Ahh, high school, memories...[/sub]) and react only with white-hot fury for a good five minutes or so before I can feel it.

There are psychological benefits to be positive but some of that is that positive outlooks are accompanied by positive behaviours.

I'd like to put forth enduring through spite. That's what I do, not a whole lot to be happy about but you can bet your ass I'm not giving any of my various foes the satisfaction of me giving in to anything any time soon.

 

[socialmenace42]

The brain works in ways we don't entirely understand, but it's not magic. Mind is made of matter.
Though there could be an element of psychology which allows diseases to be better fought off in the right moods, or states, that goes beyond simply when the parasympathetic nervous system kicks in.

I'm inclined to agree, the mind is clearly capable of fantastic feats but some things we attribute to the supernatural are more the product of positive or negative perception. While an optimistic state of mind certainly can be helpfull to treatment for example, still can't change the fact that most factors are bound up in details over which we have no or at least very little controll.

 

[The Wykydtron]

To be fair I have made myself REALLY badly ill before when there was nothing wrong with me. I was fine really but I was so worked up over something my body was like NO! STOP! PICK A DIFFERENT CAREER YOU TARD!

That's how my attempted career in nursing died in under 2 months. Thank fucking god. The moment I quit that job you would not believe how much better I was feeling, physically as well as mentally I mean. I was practically skipping on my last walk back.

So that would be what, a case of my body punching my mind in the face for even considering this career I knew for a fact I never really wanted to begin with? Sounds pretty hilarious.

Oh wait is this degenerating into a Flame War already? Oh Christ, douse the flames! WITH LOVE!

Spoiler

[sub]CELESTIAL IMPACT![/sub]

I've done all I can. Hopefully this thread can be saved.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

The brain works in ways we don't entirely understand, but it's not magic. Mind is made of matter.

And yet it is the mind which determines what is and what is not. The "magic" will always be our primary experience - it was so before we invented logic and will be so after mankind learns to think better. Note this does not mean "use logic" logically. It might even mean rejecting logic entirely.

 

[Arakasi]

The brain works in ways we don't entirely understand, but it's not magic. Mind is made of matter.

And yet it is the mind which determines what is and what is not.

No, there are still things in reality, it's just the brain determines what a person percieves.

The "magic" will always be our primary experience

What magic? What?

- it was so before we invented logic and will be so after mankind learns to think better. Note this does not mean "use logic" logically. It might even mean rejecting logic entirely.

I have no idea what you're talking about. What magic? What's wrong with logic?

 

[Ranorak]

Why do some cancer patients come through chemo and surgery and still smile and go about their lives and live better than ever before when some give up and die? They fight to live. They fight to hold everything they hold dear.

Careful now, you don't want to sound like you're saying that those that did not make it simply didn't fight hard enough.

Cancer is a tricky thing, It's, as we probably all know, a malfunction of our normal cells. Chemo and surgery are far more successful depending on the type of cancer.

Chemo works by targeting fast growing cells, such as cancer cells and hair. But if the primary cell that first started the tumour, is not a fast growing cell, like in some forms of colon cancer, it's very hard to remove the source. These people will often need additional help, when they might have fought just as hard.

Or maybe the tumour has invaded other tissue and cannot safely be removed..

Or maybe I just read too much into that sentence and I'm giving you a hard time for something you didn't even mean.

But to answer your question, A healthy outlook and determination are said to have positive effects on recovery, and depression a negative.
And the placebo effect cannot possibly be denied.
However, I doubt we'll ever reach a point where we can will ourselves well again.

 

[josemlopes]

From what I saw in some documentaries its that the brain just goes overdrive and puts all its resources in one unique task, usually not healthy for a long time or due to the damage that it may cause later on so its just like a temporary boost.

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

I think we're in danger of overstating its importance, but yeah, it definitely has an effect. I remember reading (don't ask me to back this up) that thinking more about muscles and exercise has a small effect on muscle growth. There are a lot of stories about old couples, where one dies swiftly after the other (my dad's parents, and Johnny Cash are two that I can think of). I'm sure there's something to it, but there's definitely a lot more research that needs doing. It seems to be exaggerated a lot by some people, wanting to get better is certainly no substitute for modern medicine.

 

[Blood Brain Barrier]

The brain works in ways we don't entirely understand, but it's not magic. Mind is made of matter.

And yet it is the mind which determines what is and what is not.

No, there are still things in reality, it's just the brain determines what a person percieves.

There would be no things at all if they weren't apprehended as things. The grounds for what qualifies as a thing in "reality" are prior to experience. For us that ground is the material, substantiality.

The "magic" will always be our primary experience

What magic? What?

The opening within felt experience which brings Being to light. It always comes before science, before logic, and is the necessary basis for it. It can't be pinned down as an object of experience so 'magic' is quite appropriate to describe it.

- it was so before we invented logic and will be so after mankind learns to think better. Note this does not mean "use logic" logically. It might even mean rejecting logic entirely.

I have no idea what you're talking about. What magic? What's wrong with logic?

Nothing, until it becomes the sole determinant of truth.