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My Monothematic Delusions…



My brain is crapping out on me today as I try my best to crunch through a particular big set of ideas and bring things down to a size which I can usefully communicate - and come up with something which will also be useful to communicate.

One of the themes which I am assimilating at the moment has everything to do with something I just discovered has a name (monothematic delusions) a cluster of related psychological syndromes. This list is a real treasure-trove in some weird way. Check it out:

* Capgras delusion is the belief that (usually) a close relative or spouse has been replaced by an identical-looking impostor.
* Fregoli delusion is the belief that various people that the believer meets are actually the same person in disguise.
* Intermetamorphosis is the belief that people in the environment swap identities with each other whilst maintaining the same appearance.
* Subjective doubles, in which a person believes there is a doppelgänger or double of him or herself carrying out independent actions.
* Cotard delusion is the belief that oneself is dead or does not exist; sometimes coupled with the belief that they are putrifying or missing their internal organs.
* Mirrored self-misidentification is the belief that one’s reflection in a mirror is some other person.
* Reduplicative paramnesia is the belief that a familiar person, place, object or body part has been duplicated. For example, a person may believe that they are in fact not in the hospital to which they were admitted, but an identical-looking hospital in a different part of the country.
* Unilateral neglect is the delusion where one denies ownership of a limb or an entire side of ones body (often connected with stroke).
* Delusions of alien control are delusions that someone or something else is controlling ones actions.
* Thought insertion is the delusion that someone else is putting words or thoughts in one’s brain.

These are also grouped together under the heading of “delusional misidentification syndrome.” Also see depersonalization in which “A sufferer feels that he or she has changed and the world has become less real — it is vague, dreamlike, or lacking in significance.” I think that’s what they call “soul loss” in neo-shamanic circles. In fact, pretty much all of these have a creepy spirit/dream-world feeling to them. I can’t quite put my finger on what interests me so much about this stuff just yet though. There’s something funny going on here…

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16 Reader Responses

  1. jp Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 1:47 pm

    These are freaky for some reason. Maybe it’s the doppelganger thing, which consistantly freaks me out….

  2. Tim Boucher Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 4:25 pm

    I’m kind of tempted plus half-terrified out of my mind to try some kind of magickal working to contact my doppleganger

  3. jp Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 4:37 pm

    heh, just watch the second season of twin peaks about eight times in a row. ;)

  4. skip sievert Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 5:44 pm

    Someone I know suffers from most of these . I have gone over and over these things with this person , to try and explain that it is their imagination , and it does not work to use logic and persuasion usually.

    Sometimes they moderate a bit and laugh about their delusions. Sometimes even they admit they are delusional.
    After a while they go back to them though. I think there are very few people like this, at that level of delusion.

    I think they should be left alone in their delusions and not hospitalized unless proven dangerous for some reason.

    The drug company`s love these people , and usually kill them in 10 to 20 years with an assortment of dangerous drugs they over prescribe. Then they kill the next bunch. I call it harvesting pelts for the corporate drug company`s.

    Sometimes there is a drug and alcohol connection with people like this. The person I know is an excessive drinker also , and you wonder what part that may play.

  5. pmp Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 6:45 pm

    I’m kind of tempted plus half-terrified out of my mind to try some kind of magickal working to contact my doppleganger

    sounds like a good idea.

  6. Tim Boucher Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 6:49 pm

    The person I know is an excessive drinker also , and you wonder what part that may play.

    Well that’s simple. It’s called self-medication - trying to numb yourself with drugs that you freely can control, as opposed to using corporate (or rather pharmaceutical) drugs.

    I have gone over and over these things with this person , to try and explain that it is their imagination

    Well, frankly - you don’t *know* that it is their imagination. That is precisely the same thing as this person coming to you and saying to you that the way *you’re* acting is all in *your* imagination. It is precisely 100% exactly the same.

    I think there are very few people like this, at that level of delusion.

    No, but there are quite a few people who are at *your* level of delusion where they believe that how they see the world is how the world is. That delusion is probably in the 98% or greater realm.

  7. Tim Boucher Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 6:50 pm

    sounds like a good idea.

    PMP: Yeah, I am trying to figure out what would be (1) an effective method to do this, and (2) what my intention would be in doing it, and (3) how to prepare a landing pad in case it goes wrong.

    JP:

    heh, just watch the second season of twin peaks about eight times in a row.

    Yeah, absolutely. Especially the parts where he enters the Black Lodge. Perhaps I could formulate something from that. Also, while I have your ear, do you have any particular recommendations of gnostic texts that deal heavily with the double/twin element?

  8. skip sievert Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 7:55 pm

    Guess I`d rather be in the 98% zone than the other. It offers more possibility . Ha.

  9. The Oracle Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 7:57 pm

    You may enjoy “Into the Silent Land” by Paul Broks, which deals with some of these conditions. There’s a huge sample here:

    http://books.guardian.co.uk/firstchapters/story/0,6761,1072106,00.html

  10. Tim Boucher Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 8:11 pm

    What possibilities does it offer?

  11. The Oracle Says:
    December 6th, 2006 at 8:51 pm

    Oh, it’s fairly reductionist, which I suppose comes with the territory, but does a good job of discussing the sense of self, personality as a singular thing, the idea of the soul, the nature of consciousness, and mind-body dualism.

  12. whatacharacter Says:
    December 7th, 2006 at 12:57 pm

    Alas those that tread upon the land of Faeire and don’t return …

  13. jp Says:
    December 7th, 2006 at 1:19 pm

    Also, while I have your ear, do you have any particular recommendations of gnostic texts that deal heavily with the double/twin element?

    Sure, the Pistis Sophia. Here’s a little work I did on a pertinent chapter:
    http://www.snant.com/fp/archives/pistis-sophia-book-3-chapters-9-12/
    Here’s my favorite story from the PS about the “counterfeit spirit.” It’s Mary (Jesus’ Mother) speaking to the risen Christ:

    “When thou wert little, before the spirit had come upon thee, whilst thou wert in a vineyard with Joseph, the spirit came out of the height and came to me in my house, like unto thee; and I had not known him, but I thought that thou wast he. And the spirit said unto me: Where is Jesus, my brother, that I meet with him?’ And when he had said this unto me, I was at a loss and thought it was a phantom to try me. So I seized him and bound him to the foot of the bed in my house, until I went forth to you, to thee and Joseph in the field, and I found you on the vineyard, Joseph propping up the vineyard. It came to pass, therefore, when thou didst hear me speak the word unto Joseph, that thou didst understand the word, wert joyful and saidest: ‘Where is he, that I may see him; else I await him in this place.’ And it came to pass, when Joseph had heard thee say these words, that he was startled. And we went down together, entered the house and found the spirit bound to the bed. And we looked on thee and him and found thee like unto him. And he who was bound to the bed was unloosed; he took thee in his arms and kissed thee, and thou also didst kiss him. Ye became one.”

    Also, the Apocryphon of John:
    http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/apocjn.html

    And, the Thomas tradition is full of the idea that Thomas is Jesus’s twin.

  14. pmp Says:
    December 7th, 2006 at 1:32 pm

    so what exactly do you mean by the doppelganger? your metaphysical opposite? the externalization of all your negative traits? something that impersonates you so it can stalk and kill your loved ones? the exteriorization of your astral body?

    i’d be clear on that first because some of those metaphors could be disastrous if mixed unconciously.

  15. Tim Boucher Says:
    December 7th, 2006 at 5:35 pm

    Wow that Pistis Sophia excerpt is wild. Thanks!

    Pmp:you are exactly right. I completely have my metaphors mixed up with this which means that right now my unconscious intentions are all freaking scrambled as well. Which is no kind of ground from which to operate magically.

    I recorded a podcast about all this last night exploring these various themes. I dont have an answer to the question yet but it helped me process through some of these different elements

  16. Eric Blue Says:
    December 9th, 2006 at 11:22 pm

    Tim,

    If you haven’t already read this, you may find it interesting. It’s a NY Times article: Out-of-Body Experience? You’re Brain is to Blame

    http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/03/heal...0&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

    What’s of particular interest in one of these experiments is the patient’s perception of a “shadow” figure, or double, that appears to have its own intention (e.g. wouldn’t allow the woman to read).

    Another fascinating video related to this is NOVA “Secrets of the Mind”

    http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/mind/

    Of the individuals features in this episode had survived a car accident, but afterwards suffered from a delusion where he believed his parents where imposters (which I believe was the Capgras delusion).



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