"Part of being sane, is being a little bit crazy.”
--Janet Long
“You're only given a little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it.”
--Robin Williams
“'But I don’t want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.
'Oh, you can’t help that,' said the Cat. 'We’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.'
'How do you know I’m mad?' said Alice.
'You must be,” said the Cat. 'or you wouldn’t have come here.'”
--Lewis Carroll
“A person needs a little madness, or else they never dare cut the rope and be free”
--Nikos Kazantzakis
All of the above quotations assume a certain amount of "madness" in life. Here's today's question: How do you define "sane" behavior?
11 comments:
there's not a line between sane and insane there just is what you are and how you see yourself.
I have a bit of an obsession with this topic. One reason I love Shakespeare so much (Hamlet in particular) is that he used his plays to delve pretty deeply into the question of madness (he didn't have the terms "mental illness" or "psychosis" or any of the language of psychiatry that we use today). He understood the idea of mental instability quite well, and he knew that mad people often are connected to a reality that the rest of us can't see.
Madness and genius are closely related. Scientists, artists, poets, musicians, and physicists: the best of them are just a little (or sometimes more than a little) crazy/mad/off, choose what term you will.
Am I crazy if I believe in God or Heaven? after all, I can't see God or Heaven? Am I crazy if I spend my life playing a musical instrument? Shouldn't I be doing something more "productive"? Does a sane person lose his temper? Does a sane person fall in love?
Society determines what is "sane" and "insane." I'm not sure it should be that way. If a 50 year old man chooses to play with stuffed animals as a hobby, how exactly is that different than the same man being a fanatical stamp collector or model train enthusiast (or pro football fan, for that matter). Why is one "sane" and acceptable, but the other is somehow weird?
Was the first person who ever decided to eat an oyster (or an artichoke) sane or crazy? Answer me that?
Mr. Amos left very little for me to say. Sanity, frankly, is almost entirely relative. How can we know that autistic people can't actually see the world the way it is, and that it is we who are ignorant? How do we know that the people who prophesy and dream don't indeed have a better understanding of this world than we? Galileo was widely considered to be crazy for a very, very long time, until other people agreed with him. Sanity is purely relevant to the rest of society. If you think thoughts which are too different from everyone else's, you are probably nuts.
I agree that society determines whether or not you are sane or your behavior is sane. To be sane is to be normal and act to the standards that you society has laid before you. Being insane is being abnormal.You might be completely insane from one person's point of view but from another person's you might entirely within the realm of sane. It really just depends the society you live in and who you associate yourself with. There really is not an exact definition of sane behavior.
Those who worry about what others think of them will be haunted for their entire existence. The problem is that people throw the word insane or sane around too loosley. They make no distinction between real mental insanity or just someone or something they consider weird. Whenever I experience this I think about Teddy Roosevelt's famous speech in Paris that says "it's not the critic that counts." His words show how people should ignore the jeers and insults from the "norm" and pursue their goals.
In response to Mr. Amos, I've often wondered about who would be hungry enough to eat an oyster, or to scrape the stuff off of artichoke leaves. He was walking the fine line between genius and madness.
It is true that the societal norms decide what is "sane" and "insane." But the norms are really just the collective thoughts of the majority.
Of course, a 50 year old man who plays with stuffed animals is different because his hobby (or obsession) is more fit for a child, as opposed to stamps or trains, which have a more mature air about them.
But the man who decided to eat the oyster and the artichoke (for it was likely the same man) is a genius.
Really there is not much left to say as everyone seems to agree that sanity is relative to society. It is very interesting to think what is sane or insane because it all depends on who is the judge. However it seems that society is the judge for the most part and that is why people who are deemed insane are at loss.
While looking over the quotes posted above, I also ran in to an interesting take by Angela Monet who said “Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who could not hear the music.” It is really a great say, when you think about it. It is not societies’ fault, really, to label those who seem different insane – we just can’t hear the music.
This topic reminds me of John F. Nash – a mathematical genius from West Virginia. When he applied to Princeton in 1948, his old professor wrote one sentence for his recommendation: "This man is a genius." Most of you might have seen A Beautiful Mind (2001), a great movie made in memory of Nash. Although Nash is genuinely a genius, who was in a completely different state understanding, he seemed pretty lonely. He is not the first lonely genius is he? This different state of mind not only discourages society from interact with these insane people, but they also close themselves from society because you can’t dance with someone who can’t hear the music. And even if you did, it would go horribly wrong.
I have to agree with Tyson, saying that, "Society determines what is 'sane' and 'insane.'" I think everything is relative, but everyone has a little bit of insanity in them. That’s what makes life interesting! Being ordinary or sane is boring. I think that is why the wild artwork or music has become popular in our culture. It brings change, and new way of looking at something. Life without a little madness is dull.
Robin Williams said, "You're only given a little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it." I think he hit the nail on the head, and I'm going to throw this back to The Brave New World. In that society, people were created, conditioned all the same, based on their class, to perform a role in society. In a sense, their madness was taken from them with the use of hypnopeadic messages and conditioning, and I feel like they lose their identity because of it. The mistakes you make, and crazy things you do make you who you are, and mold you into an individual. If we all kind of have the same about of craziness to start with, then I think it's hard to say who's sane and who's not. There are countless examples above me to back this up so I won't beat the dead animal.
Oh.. and I'm glad we finally had someone else comment on our blog besides us haha
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