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Q.if you are doubting that depression is physiological, I could easily prove it to you. We would put you on a tryptophan deficient diet for about 4 or 5 days. Then we would load you up on acetylcholine precursors and maintain the tryptophan deficient diet. The net effect is that you would develop the physiology of someone in a major depressive illness. You'd cry for your mommy and probably mess yourself. If you are trying to assert that depression isn't a physiological process then you really appear to the rest of us as quite an intellectual midget.
A.To say that something of a mental order is "biological" must mean that what is felt as depression or elation or whatever mental state, is CAUSED by a biological state or thing; at least if not directly seen to be caused then at least correlated. So, it is possible according to the above picture, that environment or diet or circumstances or strobe lights, or cancer for that matter can reverse a mental state or cause it; after all, unless you are dead all mental states have an underlying physical order direct or indirect. When you try to elicit or control a mental state by "modulating" a physical one -- say environment or serotonin reuptake or cation exchange, you have to rely either on experimentation with successful results or just plain experience in environmental factors known to man. I suppose the question that divides the pro versus anti psych-med camps, is -- which is more successful with less adverse effects. gee so you can invoke states utilizing substances, wow, I am quite impressed. I do not doubt that depression CAN be induced, but how can it be cured, not placed into remission, cured? its also a logical leap to infer that all those whose symptoms happen to manifest in their behavior, thoughts, and emotions, are that way becuase of 'experiences' they had. The debate isn't over whether severe depression has a physiological component. I don't think anybody here has once suggested that there aren't physiological processes at play in producing the symptoms of depression. The question is: Given that most people are not on a tryptophan deficient diet, what causes these physiological problems in the first place. Those that seem to get the label "anti-med" might be characterised as saying that "psychological phenomena are responsible for inducing the physiological phenomena". Those that like to label people as "anti-med" might be characterised as saying "fuck, who cares what caused the problems, lets just get them fixed" or something (loaded summary I know, but I honestly attribute a more reasonable stance to this position at the moment). Really there isn't much room for argument between these two positions since they don't contract each other in content, just on which part of the problem they consider to be the most important to focus on for treatment. The "correct" answer to this surely depends on personal circumstances. The argument that does occur seems to be because of extremist positions on either side that either are held or are perceived to be held: Extremist psychological position - the real problems are the psychological problems, and treating their physiological symptoms with drugs prevents people from addressing the important issues. This position is not, as far as I can tell, actually held by anybody here, though some posters come close. Extremist physiological position - suggesting that people with depression might have psychological problems is slanderous - there's nothing wrong with my personality buddy. One obvious proponent of this view here, and others that may incline towards it. I'd personally say that extremism in either direction is misguided, as it assumes that all people have exactly the same problems or are at the same stage of illness/treatment. The ironic thing about extremism is that the less reasonable the viewpoint, the more vocal people tend to be about it.
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