My opinion on Schizophrenia.

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I do not really know ifit is an actual brain disease, still after countless years and effort spent in trying to learn about it through a scientific route has really gotten us no where in figuring out what it really is and what causes it and why..
I sometimes think that it's likely just a natural occurence that happens to humans, maybe even an evolutionary trait. So hear me out on this..
In ancient society human beings were much more connected to each other, the earth and nature and the universe in general. And we also are learning now that ancient people were truly way more advance in science than we think. I guess science went down for awhile during that major Christian period in the world?
But anyway, I believe some people we call "Schizophrenics" today would have been Shamans and what not in those days, and in fact many scholars think so too. And it makes sense..
So I've talked about the spiritual side of that before on other forums and stuff before.. But I'm going to actually look at it as scientific as I can get for a change. But I'm not really much the science type, I'm much more Anthropology and History type person.
What if it's an evolutionary trait? What if human beings naturally need spiritual aspects of life? Or even at least perhaps humans needed it on those early days, and the role of someone who could easily go into trances, and communicate and see things some others could not, would help keep the spiritual need healthy among early man. Which would help them survive in a harder and much different world than today.
I've heard people make theories that Autism/Aspergers could have been evolutionary as we needed people who were happy to be solitary always and different lives than the tribe. Someone too scout for food, etc.
I think also that many Autistic people in those days played roles as Shamans too, because of the way our minds work. . I know I personally practice Shamanistic faiths based of Ancient Europe and I can become very very involved with it and could probably just spend my whole life in a hut going on out of body experiences and teaching to people about the ancient stories and stuff.. And we know that anyone can "hallucinate" or go into what they call "out of body" trances without the use of drugs or anything.
I infact do not really believe Schizophrenia or Autism even exists. I think every human brain is so unique, so diagnosing everything into one label, just doesn't work for the Human race.

I've read in an anthropology textbook that persons with talents for trances, visions, and communicating were respected as shamans and similar roles, at least by some hunting-gathering and tribal peoples.

I myself went through my Christian period from ages 13 to 15. It was hurtful in a number of ways. It was scary, upheaval, and at times bleak and sad to leave, but I'm glad I did. I would prefer to view visions as metaphor and as story from which wisdom emerges, at times deep wisdom. And this rather than literal truth. Now, this is me. If other people do it differently, more power to them.

Psychology, counseling, and all that, could be about "play to strength, be matter-of-fact about deficiencies." But no, it tends to be pro-normalist to a huge degree.

Labels could potentially be useful as best bets, or say better bets. still with light touch or medium touch. The idea of medium step, feedback, another medium step, additional feedback, etc. But on this one, too, it seems like a lot of professionals practically get married to the label as if it's the end all and be all.

I tend to think of schizophrenia as a brain disease. That's assuming it's diagnosed correctly. Some people are diagnosed who shouldn't be.

Certain drugs like crystal meth can cause symptoms very similar to schizophrenia. I think most people would say that the brain is functioning abnormally in crystal meth users. I tend to feel the same about schizophrenics.

It is an interesting theory I will admit. Mental illnesses are all relative to the time and society from which the person comes from. For example being homosexual was until fairly recently (relatively speaking) classes as a mental illness.
When it comes to schizophrenia, a prerequisite of being diagnosed with it is not having a background that would see your experiences as shamanistic or spiritual. Because you cannot medicalise something that is not seen as subnormal in your society. Or at least that is what I have gleaned from my own experiences and from studying psychology and anthropology at uni.
Schizophrenia is your body malfunctioning though, because if you put someone with schizophrenia in a scanner and they hallucinate, their brain will light up in the same way as if their hallucinations were 'real', but there is actually no sound/smell/movement/touch/sight of whatever the person felt.

It's a nice hypothesis, but you have to look at the brain chemistry. Some neurotransmitters such as dopamine act differently in different parts of a schizophrenic's brain when compared to a non-schizophrenic.

It doesn't seem all that spiritual to me.

Granted, hearing someone calling your name, someone talking to you, seeing monsters that aren't there, and all that cool jazz I have, probably could be interpreted that way if you were...dumb.

Schizophrenics have the same differences in how the dopamine system of their brain works as many highly creative individuals.

Doesn't mean the brain is the same. Highly creative non schizophrenic individual's brains don't create very real sensory stimuli or delusions out of nothing.

Are you familiar with Alan Watts?
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuX8sKr1Sa4[/youtube]
It's long, but the gist of it is that sanity is a consensus. Worth a listen, if you're interested in mental health issues.

As for schizophrenia, it's an umbrella diagnosis that they give to everyone who displays a number of "symptoms" - and most schizophrenics i've known, myself included, vary greatly in how our symptoms manifest. How mental issues are diagnosed also varies from location to location, for example USA is the only place on the planet you can get diagnosed with multiple personality disorder. Does it even exist? Who knows. But someone's making big money selling the medicine, tell you what.

It's also diagnosed, not with tests or anything like that, but with a doctor's opinion. So basically if a psychiatrist says you're schizophrenic, you are. That's the most accurate definition we have. :/

That's pretty much how they all are diagnosed.

I never took any tests for AS or Schizophrenia. The only one I took a test for was OCD in a mental hospital, and the test itself wasn't an endgame qualifier.