# The world after the Happy Pill **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 17, 2006, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-world-after-the-happy-pill/380902 "2006-11-17T23:54:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2006, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-world-after-the-happy-pill/380902/21 "2006-11-20T02:25:47Z")
[QUOTE=Nothing Special] We are going to achieve massive human life extension [/quote] Cite? > [@](#): > > and the eradification of all known diseases Cite? What is eradifiaction anyway? > [@](#): > > within the next 30 years, and probably far less, if we don’t destroy ourselves beforehand. > > We will be living for thousands of years, and the playing field of a human lifespan will have changed unalterably. > > This is what we have to look forward to. Personally, I’m looking forward to it. Me, I’d settle for an end to non-sequiturs. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2006, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-world-after-the-happy-pill/380902/22 "2006-11-20T02:42:15Z")
OK, so someone HAS been taking their Happy Pills… (BTW add another vote to the defense of properly prescribed and used antidepressants.) ---
**Author:** ![Nothing\_Special](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/9f8e36/32.png) [@Nothing\_Special](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nothing_Special)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2006, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-world-after-the-happy-pill/380902/23 "2006-11-20T03:50:43Z")
[QUOTE=Mangetout] Cite? Cite? What is eradifiaction anyway? [/QUOTE] Ah, cite. Let’s try [www.sens.org](http://www.sens.org) to begiin with. I meant eradification. [QUOTE=Mangetout] Me, I’d settle for an end to non-sequiturs. [/QUOTE] There is no such thing as a non sequitor. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2006, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-world-after-the-happy-pill/380902/24 "2006-11-20T13:32:55Z")
“Side effects include apathy and passivity. Rare instances of violent psychotic breakdown have been reported in some users. Ask your doctor if Pax is right for you.” ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2006, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-world-after-the-happy-pill/380902/25 "2006-11-20T20:50:45Z")
There is an Abenaki story that tells about the time when Gluscabe (a divine-type character) arrives at a village to find it abandoned, the fires cold, the fields gone fallow, and doors left open. As he wandered the village he heard a strange moaning coming from over the hill. When he went to investigate, he found all the people of the village, lying on their backs in a Maple grove. At this time, maple sugar flowed through the maple trees, and the people had simply cut the branches, and lay there as the trees dripped maple syrup into their mouths. They had become so fat on maple syrup that they could barely move. When Gluscabe told them to get up and return to their village, to tend to their homes and crops, they ignored him. So, Gluscabe filled the trees with water, and thinned the syrup. The people were sad and asked where the sugar went. He told them that they would now have to work to get maple sugar. They would need to make buckets out of birch bark to catch the sap, and fires would need to be made to heat rocks, which would need to be thrown into the sap to boil the water in order to get maple syrup. And, they would only be able to do this for a short time each year, so that they could remember the error of their ways. So, no, I don’t think it would be a good thing. As others have said (and as you can see with, for example, heroin adicts), once you’ve got pleasure, other important responsibilities get left by the wayside. There is no motivation for anything anymore. ---
**Author:** ![Anne\_Neville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Anne\_Neville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anne_Neville)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2006, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-world-after-the-happy-pill/380902/26 "2006-11-20T22:33:56Z")
[QUOTE=Hilarity N. Suze] “Well, I just can’t get everything done…the house, the kids, the spouse. I’m not really happy with anything. My house is a mess, I don’t have enough time to spend with my kids, and I’m distracted at work. It’s depressing.” The doc says, “Well, now, we better treat that **depression** ” (ignoring that the actual problem is something else–lack of energy, not knowing how to prioritize, disorganization) and gives you, let’s say, Lexapro. So a few weeks later how are things going? Wonderful! Your house is still a mess, your children are still deprived, and you’re still just skating by at work–in other words, you still don’t have energy/organizational skills–but you are now not depressed about it. [/QUOTE] As others have pointed out, antidepressants don’t work that way. I’ll point out that clinical depression and feeling down about some circumstance in your life are two totally different animals. It’s unfortunate that they share a name- people think they’re the same, but they’re not. Depression is feeling hopeless, helpless, and just plain horrible _for no reason at all_. Your life can be, by any objective measure, going quite well, and yet you lie in bed mornings obsessing about how hopeless everything is and what a terrible, worthless person you are. And having someone point out to you that your life is going well and that you accomplish many worthwhile things _makes no difference to those feelings_. You might even know, in your rational brain, that things aren’t bad enough to justify your feelings, but the feelings come back anyway. (At least that’s what it was like for me- different people do experience depression differently) I noticed that Prozac was working for me when I realized that I’d gone a week (about the second week I was taking Prozac) without one of those waves of depression. Now that I’m on antidepressants, it’s not the case that there is nothing in my life that I am dissatisfied with. But those irrational fits of hopelessness and worthlessness are gone. Depression may well be diagnosed by some doctors in some cases where the problem is actually a lack of life skills or something like that, but that doesn’t mean that’s the case for everyone diagnosed with depression. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-world-after-the-happy-pill/380902.md?page=1)