Ketamine and Depression

The American Spectator ^ | 8/15/2006 | Michael Fumento

[betty boop]

Hi grey_whiskers!

Just in case, here’s the reference to a great translation of Heraclitus’ fragments, to compare with what you might get on-line, say at Wikipedia:

Cornelius Loew, Myth, Sacred History, and Philosophy: The Pre-Christian Religious Heritage of the West. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1967, p. 225ff.

Unfortunately, the book is now out of print. But recently I was able to get a replacement copy from a used bookseller, via Amazon.com. (I’d lost the volume I’d had since college days somewhere along the line.)

Here are some of my favorites from Heraclitus:

Eyes and ears are bad witnesses for men whose souls are barbarous. [Fragment 107, Eric Voegelin, translator.]

Nature loves to hide. [Fr. 123, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

If you do not hope, you will not find the unhoped-for, since it is hard to be found and the way is all but impassible. [Fr. 18, Eric Voegelin, tr.]]

Travel over every road, you cannot discover the frontiers of the soul — it has so deep a logos. [Fr. 45; Werner Jaeger, tr.]

The soul has a logos that augments itself. [Fr. 115, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

What comes within the range of eye, ear, and learning, that I prize most highly. [Fr. 55, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

The invisible harmony is better than the visible. [Fr. 54, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

From all is One, and from One is all. [Fr. 10, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

The most beautiful cosmos is like a garbage-heap strewn at random. [Fr. 124, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

Immortals–mortals, mortals–immortals, they live each other’s death and die each other’s life. [Fr. 42, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

But though the Logos is common, the many live as if they had a wisdom of their own. [Fr. 2, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

Those who are awake have a world one and common, but those who are asleep turn aside into their own private worlds. [Fr. 89, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

It is not meet [i.e., fitting, or suitable] to act like men asleep. [Fr. 73, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

Those who speak with the mind must strengthen themselves with that which is common to all, as the polis [i.e., political society] does with the law and more strongly so. For all human laws nourish themselves from the one divine — which prevails as it will, and suffices for all things and more than suffices. [Fr. 114, Eric Voegelin, tr.]

Although this Logos is eternally valid, yet men are unable to understand it — not only before hearing it, but even after they have heard it for the first time. That is to say, although all things come to pass in accordance with this Logos, men seem to be quite without any experience of it — at least if they are judged in the light of such words and deeds as I am here setting forth. My own method is to distinguish each thing according to its nature, and to specify how it behaves; other men, on the contrary, are as forgetful and heedless in their waking moments of what is going on around and within them as they are during sleep. [Fr. 1, Philip Wheelwright, tr.]

I so admire the “compactness” of Voegelin’s translations: In this, I imagine he is consciously paying tribute to the compactness of the original Koine, the language of classical Greece throughout its sphere of cultural influence.

But I have to tell you nonetheless, the Wheelwright translation of Fragment 1 ain’t exactly chopped liver….

As for all this "logos" business: Loew provides excellent insights:

Logos refers both to a sense or meaning existing from eternity and to Heraclitus' discourse [i.e., logos also means spoken word or even "story" or "tale" in Koine. This is what we mean by ancient Greek being a"compact" language]. Since all things come to pass in accordance with the eternal logos, it must be a law or order of the cosmos. Heraclitus' own logos, his exposition revealing the true meaning of existence, will be strange to those who try to grasp it because, unfortunately, the mass of men are sleepwalkers who experience reality without becoming aware of the full dimensions of their selves, especially of the dimensions of meaning provided by the divine logos. [p. 227]

Hope you find this stuff interesting, grey_whiskers. If not, thanks for putting up with a tiresome friend for the duration.

Thanks guy!!!

[betty boop]

But I tend to lean toward Albert toward solid algorithms, I like things simple.. Neils is too liberal for me, I guess..

LOLOL dear hosepipe! I see what you mean: It's you and me and quite possibly A-G lined up to "score one for Plato." :^)

And yet, if you give complementarity any credit at all, then you must give each man his proper due. :^)

[lmr]

A major complaint with most anti-depressives is that they cause the patient to be emotionally numb.

This is true. I was incorrectly diagnosed as clinically depressed and given anti-depressants. After 6 months of treatment, I noticed that I just didn't care as much about things, to the point where I just didn't care at all.

It never helped my anger either, which was the real problem. I was supposedly bi-polar and treated for that as well. Many of the drugs used to treat mania made me very anxious.

Turns out I was neither. I was just severly stressed-out. I detached myself from what was causing the stress (My job) and started letting go of it 6 months ago. I just quit my job 2 weeks ago Friday, a terrible environment, by the way and I haven't felt better in years.

I have interviewed for several jobs already and have been called back for a 2nd interview on 2 of them already.

I am finally able to get on with my life, after years of abuse and mistreatment in my former workplace.

[hosepipe]

[ And yet, if you give complementarity any credit at all, then you must give each man his proper due. :^) ]

True I wouldnt even know this or be cognizant of the difference between Einstein and Bohrs, except for your comments.. Even though I've known people in my life with exactely the same propensitys.. Thats what I draw on, those people.. So you've given me a look into Albert and Neils I would not have guessed at.. The way you describe "them" is quite a common occurance generally in my life.. I call it the rubber on the road practical's versus "the Dreamers"...

Because of our conversations I now see they are both needed(the Albert's and Neil's) for a truely practical look at things.. The rubber on the road practicals are quite short sighted/near sighted... The Neils Bohrs in us all might be the most practical of all..

You know, for use in the Spiritual Dimension.. d;-)~',',

[Paved Paradise]

OMG. The cure for depression is to anesthesia. What next? Induce a coma?

[Xenalyte]

Excitement! Cleaning out a few boxes I forgot I had yielded my Gormenghast trilogy volume.

If I hadn’t yet admitted it to you, I have not actually read Peake. Now’s my chance. I’m embarking on it over the holiday weekend.

Best of all: the book is HUGE - more than 1,100 pages.

[Grizzled Bear]

“Sleep brought a relief from the unremitting tiredness but introduced disturbing dreams. Foul and sickening, the dreams seemed to inhabit me. Sometimes I would awake screaming. They were so intense and crisp and colourful in their clarity. The images inside them were bleak and debasing and degrading. The horrors that life can and does reserve for the unfortunate few were aggregated together for me to gaze upon in seemingly unrelated but disturbing sequences. It was as if I was looking into the recesses of my own black heart and inspecting it’s cadaver and viewing the possible causes of it’s death. As within Mervyn Peake’s Gorhmengast Castle I discovered metaphorical rooms and corridors within me that had been sealed up for years and subsequently forgotten. Entering each one I was witness to degrading occult scenes of pornographic macabre savagery. This nighttime litany of torture and death was preferable to being awake and knowingly alive.”

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Sounds like a verse from a “Nirvana” Song.

[Grizzled Bear]

LOL. My cure for depression: get over it.

---

It usually helps to pick a fight with someone and beat the snot out of them. Maybe it’s the physical exersion.