Uploaded March 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Depression may be anticipatory: prognostication prone to catastrophizing leads to conservation of energy.
Depression has biological underpinnings: microbiome, neurotransmitters. But the medicalization of depression relies on a tautology (on the observed effects of antidepressants).
Depression is an adaptive, appropriate response to stressful or dystopian environments. It is a sign of mental illness to NOT be depressed in Auschwitz or in today’s reality.
So, depression must have evolutionary, adaptive, and recuperative functions: It is an alarm signal, it includes catastrophizing (preparedness for the worst), mourning/grieving, reframing, restoring reality testing, emotional release, economizing energy, rebuilding defenses, reconstellating the self.
We should intervene only with suicidal ideation. Otherwise, we should let nature takes its course in restoring equilibrium and homeostasis.
The concept of depression relies on two meta concepts: the individual and dysfunction. These are counterfactual ideals based on a statistical “normal”.
In reality, there is a spectrum, the approach should be dimensional, like in the ICD-11 and the alternate models in DSM5: a holistic and relational psychology.
Find and Buy MOST of my BOOKS and eBOOKS in my Amazon Author Page: amazon.com/stores/Sam-Vaknin/author/B000APLOFK/allbooks
Depression may be anticipatory: prognostication prone to catastrophizing leads to conservation of energy.
Depression has biological underpinnings: microbiome, neurotransmitters. But the medicalization of depression relies on a tautology (on the observed effects of antidepressants).
Depression is an adaptive, appropriate response to stressful or dystopian environments. It is a sign of mental illness to NOT be depressed in Auschwitz or in today’s reality.
So, depression must have evolutionary, adaptive, and recuperative functions: It is an alarm signal, it includes catastrophizing (preparedness for the worst), mourning/grieving, reframing, restoring reality testing, emotional release, economizing energy, rebuilding defenses, reconstellating the self.
We should intervene only with suicidal ideation. Otherwise, we should let nature takes its course in restoring equilibrium and homeostasis.
The concept of depression relies on two meta concepts: the individual and dysfunction. These are counterfactual ideals based on a statistical “normal”.
In reality, there is a spectrum, the approach should be dimensional, like in the ICD-11 and the alternate models in DSM5: a holistic and relational psychology.
Find and Buy MOST of my BOOKS and eBOOKS in my Amazon Author Page: amazon.com/stores/Sam-Vaknin/author/B000APLOFK/allbooks
