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Anesthetic Personality Disorder - Is this Real?

Mal12345

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PTypes - Anesthetic Personality Disorder

  1. Cutting, active coldness
  2. Passive insensitivity
  3. Canalization of interest into well-defined autistic directions
  4. Indifference, or unshakable equilibrium
  5. Indolent instability or active caprice
  6. Tenacity: steely energy, stubborn wilfulness, pedantry, fanaticism, logical systematism in thought and action

The first person I thought of when reading this list of traits for the Anesthetic personality was Dominique Francon (in 'The Fountainhead') and then the author of that book, Ayn Rand founder (or co-founder) of Objectivism.

I don't think this lists anything more than a few traits from the Schizoid personality disorder. I'm not sure.
PTypes - Schizoid Personality Disorder Criteria
 

Lark

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PTypes - Anesthetic Personality Disorder

  1. Cutting, active coldness
  2. Passive insensitivity
  3. Canalization of interest into well-defined autistic directions
  4. Indifference, or unshakable equilibrium
  5. Indolent instability or active caprice
  6. Tenacity: steely energy, stubborn wilfulness, pedantry, fanaticism, logical systematism in thought and action

The first person I thought of when reading this list of traits for the Anesthetic personality was Dominique Francon (in 'The Fountainhead') and then the author of that book, Ayn Rand founder (or co-founder) of Objectivism.

I don't think this lists anything more than a few traits from the Schizoid personality disorder. I'm not sure.
PTypes - Schizoid Personality Disorder Criteria

I'd say that the fact that it could be construed as the traits of an archetypical hero (in the story) or a founder of an ideology is a pretty clear indication that those are traits which some will associate with someone other than abnormality.

Though the abnormality is perhaps in exhibiting those and only those traits, all of the time, which is kind of what I would think wrong with someone who elevates those traits to virtues in a narrative fiction or ideology too. Those may be things that someone exhibits but I would suspect amongst others. Personally I'd see other things as virtuous and argue that point but I wouldnt go so far as to pathologise those I dont agree with, at least not right away with the among of information available here.

Also, sounds like a bit of a psychopathic ball bag you'd not want to spend much time around.
 

Red Memories

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This is.......really ridiculous tbh.

Not everything is a mental disorder. this honestly made me think of Borderline or something moreso than your mention.
 

Mal12345

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This is.......really ridiculous tbh.

Not everything is a mental disorder. this honestly made me think of Borderline or something moreso than your mention.

Borderline personality disorder would be an ESFP or ESTP type at their worst, more likely an ESFP, where an ESTP would more likely have an Antisocial personality when dysfunctional.

Also, personality disorders, as I hinted at previously, are serious enough (as disorders) to lead people to homelessness, prison, or death, particularly when co-occurring with other disorders. I'm not talking about normal people here, although they can behave as if they are normal.
 

Mal12345

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I'd say that the fact that it could be construed as the traits of an archetypical hero (in the story) or a founder of an ideology is a pretty clear indication that those are traits which some will associate with someone other than abnormality.

Though the abnormality is perhaps in exhibiting those and only those traits, all of the time, which is kind of what I would think wrong with someone who elevates those traits to virtues in a narrative fiction or ideology too. Those may be things that someone exhibits but I would suspect amongst others. Personally I'd see other things as virtuous and argue that point but I wouldnt go so far as to pathologise those I dont agree with, at least not right away with the among of information available here.

Also, sounds like a bit of a psychopathic ball bag you'd not want to spend much time around.

Thank you for playing along at least. Some people take these forums way too seriously.

It looks like you're familiar with the works of Rand to an extent. In fact, however, Rand did not see Dominique Francon as virtuous. Dominique liked to play the "indifferentist," acting as if she were above the common rush of humanity and indifferent to its plights. I believe that her wealth would have aided her in this delusion.

But the truth came out when she fell in love with a mere commoner (Howard Roark), a man of small means and dirty, calloused hands who was forced to work for a living, in bondage to an employer and to his own need to survive.

As far as pathologizing, I would say that having read two biographies of Ayn Rand, and having read The Fountainhead several times (and I can tell you it's kind of a shitty book, but I read it many times so I could figure out the mechanism of the plot and motives of the characters, having been raised mostly as a Christian and absolutely unfamiliar with anything like Nietzscheanism), that my "pathologizing" is spot on. Ayn Rand herself said that Dominique Francon is "myself in a bad mood," and Dominique was not an ideal person at all - she just thought she was. And Rand thought of herself as an ideal person most of the time, although she suffered from depression, thus contradicting her own notion that all of her "subconscious premises" are perfect.
 

Lark

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Thank you for playing along at least. Some people take these forums way too seriously.

It looks like you're familiar with the works of Rand to an extent. In fact, however, Rand did not see Dominique Francon as virtuous. Dominique liked to play the "indifferentist," acting as if she were above the common rush of humanity and indifferent to its plights. I believe that her wealth would have aided her in this delusion.

But the truth came out when she fell in love with a mere commoner (Howard Roark), a man of small means and dirty, calloused hands who was forced to work for a living, in bondage to an employer and to his own need to survive.

As far as pathologizing, I would say that having read two biographies of Ayn Rand, and having read The Fountainhead several times (and I can tell you it's kind of a shitty book, but I read it many times so I could figure out the mechanism of the plot and motives of the characters, having been raised mostly as a Christian and absolutely unfamiliar with anything like Nietzscheanism), that my "pathologizing" is spot on. Ayn Rand herself said that Dominique Francon is "myself in a bad mood," and Dominique was not an ideal person at all - she just thought she was. And Rand thought of herself as an ideal person most of the time, although she suffered from depression, thus contradicting her own notion that all of her "subconscious premises" are perfect.

Fromm's a better guide to mental health than Rand, though he wrote no fiction, I also think Rand is a poor guide to Nietzsche but its not surprising that you make those connections, she did herself, I think most of her ideas and fiction are legacies of being a refugee from the red menace.
 

Doctor Cringelord

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Traits don't become mental disorders until they become hindrances to functioning in and conforming to society's boundaries.
 

Mal12345

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Fromm's a better guide to mental health than Rand, though he wrote no fiction, I also think Rand is a poor guide to Nietzsche but its not surprising that you make those connections, she did herself, I think most of her ideas and fiction are legacies of being a refugee from the red menace.

Rand doesn't provide a guide to mental health. Rand offered a vision of the ideal man, Nietzsche offered a vision of the ubermensch.

I make the connections because Rand loved Nietzsche's writing when she was in college in Russia, and was highly influenced by them although later she renounced his philosophy as a variation on subjectivism.

Ayn Rand was a refugee at the age of, I think, about 11. She watched as the red army marched into her city, and then cut off supplies to her Jewish father's apothecary shop, thus ending his business and their sole source of income leaving them destitute. She and her family walked hundreds of miles to stay at her uncle's house. Eventually she asked for a visa to visit relatives in Chicago, and stayed here for the rest of her life.

So yeah, she was a bit miffed about the red menace.
 

Mal12345

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Traits don't become mental disorders until they become hindrances to functioning in and conforming to society's boundaries.

They can hinder conformity to society's boundaries, but they can also kill you.
 

Mal12345

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Fromm's a better guide to mental health than Rand, though he wrote no fiction, I also think Rand is a poor guide to Nietzsche but its not surprising that you make those connections, she did herself, I think most of her ideas and fiction are legacies of being a refugee from the red menace.

But, that being said, Rand also has stated that she was a believer in individualism before the Communist take-over.
 

Lark

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But, that being said, Rand also has stated that she was a believer in individualism before the Communist take-over.

A lot of rich people are in favour of things that might protect their riches.
 

Mal12345

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A lot of rich people are in favour of things that might protect their riches.

Or rather, the right to wealth independently generated.
 

Mal12345

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Erm, no, not at all.

All you're saying is that if Rand was born into a poor family she would have been pro-poor instead of pro-rich. Correct?
 

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Siúil a Rúin

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It reads as having some components of Aspbergers (although not to say everyone with Aspbergers fits those behaviors)

The problem with creating labels based on external behaviors is that there can be a lot of different underlying causes for the behaviors: genetic, environmental, physiological, etc. It would be more correct to create labels and categories based on the underlying causality. However, there is an added complexity there as well because people with the same root causes can have different resulting behaviors. It is a kind of circular reasoning to lump into a category the same behaviors, apply a label, and then every time the label is used, we assume that set of behaviors without understanding how it comes to be. We have the exact same problem with the labeling of chronic pain issues medically. Labeling based on common symptoms instead of common pathology is somewhat meaningless, except it creates a short-hand when referring to a set of behaviors or symptoms.
 

Mal12345

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It reads as having some components of Aspbergers (although not to say everyone with Aspbergers fits those behaviors)

The problem with creating labels based on external behaviors is that there can be a lot of different underlying causes for the behaviors: genetic, environmental, physiological, etc. It would be more correct to create labels and categories based on the underlying causality. However, there is an added complexity there as well because people with the same root causes can have different resulting behaviors. It is a kind of circular reasoning to lump into a category the same behaviors, apply a label, and then every time the label is used, we assume that set of behaviors without understanding how it comes to be. We have the exact same problem with the labeling of chronic pain issues medically. Labeling based on common symptoms instead of common pathology is somewhat meaningless, except it creates a short-hand when referring to a set of behaviors or symptoms.

There is no fair comparison between products of the mind such as attitudes and behaviors and physical disorders. If you can find a physical cause of the behavior, then great, you have a causal explanation. But most of the time you won't find it.
 

Siúil a Rúin

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There is no fair comparison between products of the mind such as attitudes and behaviors and physical disorders. If you can find a physical cause of the behavior, then great, you have a causal explanation. But most of the time you won't find it.
Remember I included environmental influences. There is actually a direct cause and effect for every attitude and behavior, but the process is complex enough that it is difficult to ascertain all of the connections, especially when attempting to create categories.
 
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