Schizophrenia AKA Schizoaffective Disorder
[related: Alogia, Apophenia]
A mental disorder characterized by bizarre and persecutory delusions, passivity phenomena (the feeling that thoughts are being inserted into one's mind), the sudden and dramatic appearances of discrete alters, and an addiction to nicotine (80-90% of patients diagnosed with the disorder are lifelong smokers, as compared to 20% of the general population). Three notable risk factors in developing the disease are 1) being born in winter or early spring resulting in fetal Vitamin D deficiency 2) abuse of cannabis (especially in the form of water bongs) and/or narcotics and 2) being an identical twin, either literally or figuratively. Negative symptoms (symptoms most prominent outside of schizophrenic episodes) include alogia (poverty of speech) and blunted affect/flat expression. Patients with treatment resistant schizophrenia are often administered ElektroShock Therapy™ and/or prescribed Clozapine (see also: Risperidone), a medication often resulting in Tardive Dyskensia, a disorder characterized by involuntary grimacing, sticking out of the tongue, and smacking of the lips. The medication's mechanism of action is currently unclear to scientists. Clozapine is often prescribed off-label to treat Parkinson's disease, despite the illness's many commonalities with Tardive Dyskensia. Current schizoaffective modeling maps the disease as a vector rather than a binary, a graduative sinking in and out of gradient levels of bicameralism in accordance with various environmental factors. However, those diagnosed with the disease still cite a "snap into" or "sudden onset" moment in their cycle of de-/re-personalization. In Buddhist doctrine schizophrenia is thought to represent a core divide between self/non-self, a veritable digitization of the fundamental fluidity of being. Notable public figures diagnosed with schizoaffective disorders include:
- Philip K. Dick
- Robert Anton Wilson
- Nikki, the central protagonist in Queensrÿche's Operation: Mindcrime
"At last he appears, a bridge over that interminable, untraversable mental abyss - the gravel-throated Hollywood villain, prodding me towards some alternate threshold, flirting with his own annihilation. Sounding both far away and close, both innately "other" and supremely indigenous to my aural mind."