<p>Which states of mind that are classified as mental illnesses might be a natural and useful part of our brains?</p>

<p>For example, some evolutionary biologists have suggested that some types of depression are a natural consequence of losing a fight for dominance. i.e. In order for the loser to fit into the social pecking order he must have feelings of low self worth. </p>

<p>Are there other types of "mental illnesses" that might be natural and useful? (By "natural" I simply mean evolutionary selected for.) And that if this illness was cured for all human beings it would in fact damage the social fabric of society?</p>

<p>Another example. A phobia of spiders. Most people would agree that this is not a mental illness but a common trait of most humans. A phobia of trees is probably not.</p>

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2018-07-21T16:10:55.117Z
Or a more provokative example: Suicide. Some argue that this is an adaptive behaviour functioning on kin selection, triggered when someone implicitly feels like they are more of an burden than an asset to your kin.
Alex
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2018-07-21T16:15:20.373Z
@Alex It's an interesting theory, except that I wonder how it would work in caveman times. Perhaps throwing oneself in front of a wolf.
zooby
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2018-07-21T19:23:46.467Z
Or throwing yourself down a cliff? Like bridges or skyscrapers...
Alex
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2018-07-21T22:36:09.313Z
@Yeah, but I imagine most cavemen lived in caves by the sea not near a cliff.
zooby
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2018-07-21T22:54:05.837Z
A word that is more fitting than "natural" for your use is "adaptive." I doubt that depression has been adaptive; sure, some level of reacting sad to certain situations and a certain level of rumination, but not full-blown depression. Depressive individuals appear to have lowered reproductive success presently. While that doesn't guarantee that it also lowered fitness in ancient times, it is an indicator. Depression also has a mutational load or paternal age effect. Increased mutations increases risk of depression. I recommend reading [this](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17094843).
Eff
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2018-07-22T00:28:35.027Z
This is not a good question here because it asks for a (potentially very long) list of things, with accompanying arguments/papers. Probably any mental disorder has been argued by someone to stem from an evolutionarily advantageous process. Look for example at https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/medicine_05 Also the title of the question seems to have the implication that some mental disorders are "artificial", which is actually a completely different discussion (classification etc.)
got trolled too much this week
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2018-07-22T08:10:39.647Z
Not only can this question potentially result in a book length answer, a lot can be down to personal opinion to a degree because just as @Fizz pointed out, pretty much any mental disorder can be argued to be beneficial to some extent.
Chris Rogers
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2018-07-22T17:53:13.480Z
@Eff Yes, depression is bad for the individual's involved. But it could potentially be beneficial to society as a whole. Much like how a bee dies after stinging someone. Bad for the bee but good for the bee colony. Why would an illness be "artificial" if it survived through evolution? All evolution is essentially mutations anyway. Some mutations are good some are bad and some maybe both.
zooby
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2018-07-22T18:16:39.130Z
@zooby Could it "potentially be beneficial to society"? I don't see a plausible way. I'm always ready to be convinced. If I were to guess, my guess would be that the tendency to experience negative emotion has been under stabilizing selection. Too much (depression, anxiety disorders, etc) is bad. Too little (not caring at all that something bad happens) is bad. However, I don't have a strong opinion regarding this and I'm open to being convinced by many things. If you're interested in this, read [this paper](http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0706743716632517).
Eff
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2018-07-22T18:21:27.263Z
As an example, two alpha males competing for leading a group can both damage each other with fighting leading to the group as a whole being harmed. However, if the losing alpha male forms "depression" and withdraws from the group, the survival of the group as a whole increases. Likewise a group with excess males may result in disharmony unless the excess males withdraw from the group by some means. The strengthened group then has more chance of passing on their genes (which could include recessive genes for depression).
zooby
<depression><evolution><evolutionary-psychology><phobia>
Which mental illnesses are probably natural?
zooby
# Which mental illnesses are probably natural?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2018-07-21)

Which states of mind that are classified as mental illnesses might be a natural and useful part of our brains?

For example, some evolutionary biologists have suggested that some types of depression are a natural consequence of losing a fight for dominance. i.e. In order for the loser to fit into the social pecking order he must have feelings of low self worth.

Are there other types of "mental illnesses" that might be natural and useful? (By "natural" I simply mean evolutionary selected for.) And that if this illness was cured for all human beings it would in fact damage the social fabric of society?

Another example. A phobia of spiders. Most people would agree that this is not a mental illness but a common trait of most humans. A phobia of trees is probably not.

**Tags:** depression, evolution, evolutionary-psychology, phobia

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Or a more provokative example: Suicide. Some argue that this is an adaptive behaviour functioning on kin selection, triggered when someone implicitly feels like they are more of an burden than an asset to your kin.  
> **username_0**: @username_1 It's an interesting theory, except that I wonder how it would work in caveman times. Perhaps throwing oneself in front of a wolf.  
> **username_1**: Or throwing yourself down a cliff? Like bridges or skyscrapers...  
> **username_0**: @Yeah, but I imagine most cavemen lived in caves by the sea not near a cliff.  
> **username_2**: A word that is more fitting than "natural" for your use is "adaptive." I doubt that depression has been adaptive; sure, some level of reacting sad to certain situations and a certain level of rumination, but not full-blown depression. Depressive individuals appear to have lowered reproductive success presently. While that doesn't guarantee that it also lowered fitness in ancient times, it is an indicator. Depression also has a mutational load or paternal age effect. Increased mutations increases risk of depression. I recommend reading [this](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17094843).  
> **username_3**: This is not a good question here because it asks for a (potentially very long) list of things, with accompanying arguments/papers. Probably any mental disorder has been argued by someone to stem from an evolutionarily advantageous process. Look for example at https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/medicine_05 Also the title of the question seems to have the implication that some mental disorders are "artificial", which is actually a completely different discussion (classification etc.)  
> **username_4**: Not only can this question potentially result in a book length answer, a lot can be down to personal opinion to a degree because just as @Fizz pointed out, pretty much any mental disorder can be argued to be beneficial to some extent.  
> **username_0**: @username_2 Yes, depression is bad for the individual's involved. But it could potentially be beneficial to society as a whole. Much like how a bee dies after stinging someone. Bad for the bee but good for the bee colony. Why would an illness be "artificial" if it survived through evolution? All evolution is essentially mutations anyway. Some mutations are good some are bad and some maybe both.  
> **username_2**: @username_0 Could it "potentially be beneficial to society"? I don't see a plausible way. I'm always ready to be convinced. If I were to guess, my guess would be that the tendency to experience negative emotion has been under stabilizing selection. Too much (depression, anxiety disorders, etc) is bad. Too little (not caring at all that something bad happens) is bad. However, I don't have a strong opinion regarding this and I'm open to being convinced by many things. If you're interested in this, read [this paper](http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0706743716632517).  
> **username_0**: As an example, two alpha males competing for leading a group can both damage each other with fighting leading to the group as a whole being harmed. However, if the losing alpha male forms "depression" and withdraws from the group, the survival of the group as a whole increases. Likewise a group with excess males may result in disharmony unless the excess males withdraw from the group by some means. The strengthened group then has more chance of passing on their genes (which could include recessive genes for depression).  

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## 0 answers

