From: Spike Jones (spike66@ibm.net)
Date: Mon Oct 12 1998 - 21:42:52 MDT
> >spike wrote: there are a lot of different mental conditions that are grouped
> together
> >under the name clinical depression. seems to me it can be either
> >positive or negative. i decided, during a case of clinical depression
> >at age 20, to deeply investigate my fundamentalist christian belief...
>
> Scott Badger wrote: More severe levels of depression have been shown to
> actually disrupt
> and distort normal cognitive processes, sapping mental energy. I'm
> surprised Spike had the energy to deeply investigate...
scott, i certainly agree that an episode of depression saps ones mental
energy. during my investigation, that was the *only* thing i could
do. i was in a physics seminar, watching a video tape of carl sagan's
excellent "cosmos" series. i was enjoying the show, life was good,
etc, then suddenly: that short blurb about evolution. it may serve as
a sad commentary on the condition of the u.s. education system that i managed
to go thru 14 years of it, including 2 biology classes, and had *never*
heard, there or elsewhere, a decent explanation of the theory of
evolution. sagans five minute presentation hit me like a bolt of lightning
on a clear day.
ignoring my engineering studies, i immersed myself in the task of investigating
the idea. i made a poor showing on the finals two weeks later, but the
real problem started the next quarter. i was so focussed on that issue,
i found myself unable to study, unable to maintain normal human relations,
unable do *one damn thing* other than investigate evolution and it
implications.
(i blush to admit this, but i have gone on at length about openness, so...)
i failed *all* my classes, every one. i nearly had to drop out of school.
that
quarter, i dont think i ever opened an engineering book, and im almost
certain i failed to turn in a single homework assignment. my friends thought
i was on drugs, my significant other thought i must be seeing someone else,
strangers thought i must be dissipating violently in masturbation and daytime
tv,
(innocent on all counts), teachers noticed my mind was waaay elsewhere
(guilty).
but, i solved it. life on earth evolved. humans evolved. religion evolved.
the only other idea that hit me with anything like as much impact is...
nanotechnology. but thats another story. i wonder if drexler realizes
he is being mentioned in the same sentence with charles darwin. {8^D spike
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