Recent Blogs Posts

For the last few decades the mentally ill have been treated largely on an outpatient basis. And, as I pointed out in my post on homelessness, most homeless people in the U.S.A. have some sort of mental illness. Some mornings a guy who believes a number of conspiracy theories sits near in Starbucks and treats me to his theories. Yesterday he admitted that he hears voices. This morning a quiet, pleasant guy I am acquainted with was punched in the face on a bus by a woman who is fairly mad. It is pretty ...

"New York Days" by Willie Morris (for research).

Comments about homelessness in the U.S.A.

Here in Amherst, Massachusetts the issue of homelessness has become a major thing recently because of some rather unpleasant people who seem to like to stay in public view. There have been homeless people here for decades, or longer, but that is true of all college towns. In the past, most of the homeless people had the good sense to be polite and keep a low profile, and those who were not polite usually were rather clearly mentally ill. For ...

So. I’ve gotten myself into a strange mood.
You remember a few years ago when I looked up depression and found out I just suffered low moods? Well. I’m wondering if that’s true.
Sometimes I’m happy. Sometimes I’m sad. I’m not normally sad for very long. So not clinical depression. It felt insulting to those with genuine depression to call myself depressed. Well. I’ve been thinking about things. Also I looked it up again a while ago. I believe I mentioned that before. And based on my ...

Or
Words and Things

The name is not the thing, but calling things something defines them and, to a significant degree, determines the nature of the discussion of those things. As an illustrative example, a few years ago some people decided to redefine the word "gender". At that time gender was a term in grammar, a set of classifications of nouns and pronouns, and that was all; although some dictionaries also included something about it being a humorous term for sex. ...