Reply To: Perhaps THE fundamental issue:

[sdwa]

That’s pretty heavy, what he’s saying about self-regulation (or lack thereof).

I am reading  a book that questions the notion of free will, which I started to question after I was diagnosed, because I know trying harder doesn’t help, having good intentions doesn’t help, and almost everything I do to modulate my emotional life fails. I really have to work at it to get back on an even keel if things go wrong, and often it seems a change in perspective comes about from something physiological.

But the book I’m reading suggests that individual self-control is a false expectation for any human being, not just us. How we behave is a product of the social environment – the structures, systems, and hierarchies external to the individual that nevertheless influence individual decision making processes. Essentially this theory says that faulty social systems inescapably produce negative behavior, as has shown to be the case in a range of psychological studies where apparently “normal” people were encouraged by authorities to become violent, abusive, and sadistic without much provocation or encouragement, and appeared highly suggestible to the opinions and attitudes of the leaders. Which is not only creepy but calls into question the wisdom of group decision making – people make decisions in groups for social not rational reasons.

In the future, a hundred or two hundred years from now, I think people will understand that we are all creatures without much more self-control than the average farm animal. We’re all animals. Humanity has a bizarre opinion of itself as inherently greater or more noble or complex than other species. But I think if you look at the history of what humanity has produced throughout the ages, it is all pretty predictable – a quite limited repertoire of possible behaviors.

I can only hope that pro-social values will dominate as more of these things are understood – if we are to be manipulated by external forces, can those forces at least be smart enough or moral enough to shape communities in a constructive way?

That could be brain science at its best. On the other hand, I know someone who thinks the term “brain science” is an oxymoron.

It is not only ADHDers who lack objectivity about ourselves. This is a human problem.

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