It seems to me that a lot of people with psych diagnoses talk as though their sense of self-esteem is highly invested in the notion that their psychological affliction is basically a physiological phenomenon. As Shakespeare put it, methinks "thou doth protest too much." Sure, more than likely there are all kind of genetic/biological vulnerabilities that predispose a person to a mood disorder, or any other psych dysfunction. But why, oh why, is it so awfully important to many people that that should be the case?

I'm not closed to the theory that nature, rather than nurture, may account for a lot, but I'm suspicious of why this gets proclaimed with such passion.

I know why the drug companies want this to be so. I know why psychiatrists want this to be so. I think I know why psych patients want this to be so, and I think it's too bad.

You can take a puppy at random out of just about any litter and turn it into a nice companion, who can lead a pretty joy-filled existence alongside of you. At least, that is generally possible, if you are a person with a reasonable idea of what a doggie needs to have a decent little doggie life . . . and you are able to provide that.

It is also possible to grab any one of that puppy's litter mates, with similar genetic endowment, and turn it into a totally neurotic and miserable little creature. You can make it vicious . . . or nervous . . . or fearful . . . or attention-seeking. Unfortunately, this actually happens quite a bit.

If we see a dog that is a nervous wreck, we don't tend to say, "Gee, I wonder what kind of brain pathology that dog has?" or, "I wonder if his limbic system is wired up okay." Most of us will say, "Gee, I wonder what kind of abuse this dog suffered" . . . . or, "I suppose no one gave this dog any appropriate training" . . . . or, "I guess this dog never got much attention."

I think that what is true of dogs is even more true of humans. Dogs can actually withstand quite a bit of misguided whacking around without turning nasty, or neurotic. The human brain is way more complicated than that of the dog, or any other creature. The modern environment of humans is awfully different from what the human brain evolved to cope with. The human mind is exquisitely sensitive. The potential for the environment in which a human develops to be non-optimal for the best outcome is so huge . . . IMO. I find it amazing that many of us are even the least bit well-adjusted at all.

Then, I look at it in macrocosm. I consider the perversity and depravity of the Third Reich, as a handy example of behavioral pathology on a mass scale. Was biology behind it? I suppose you could make a tortured argument for that being somewhat true. (You could claim, and people do, that the German temperament is excessively given to find comfort in ultra-authoritarian social compacts.) You can make an argument for anything.

But one of the golden rules of reason is to look for the most obvious and simplest explanation for phenomena, before getting into the convoluted stuff. Ideas matter. Humans spend a lot of their period of growth and development internalizing ideas and beliefs that have huge import for their emotional well-being, or lack thereof. In 1945, Germany was a land of weeping and wailing, much of it due to this nation having embraced some real crazy ideas.

Back to the microcosm, the individual human: Our need to attach ourselves to ideas is just fantastic. And there is all kind of competition among purveyors of competing ideas seeking our allegiance. I maintain that this is very stressful . . . and the more caring about ideas an individual is, the more stressful it can get. So, even if one comes from a nice home with decent parents and has led a reasonably safe existence, there is still so much opportunity for the mind to get quite stressed out trying to decide what ideas to appropriate to itself as what it believes in. And some unfortunate minds can latch on to some ideas that are very toxic to hold. And some minds get over-ambitious in their notion of what they can hold themselves responsible for.

My main point is this: A person can be born with an excellent endowment in terms of the physiologic functioning of the brain and still find the pathway to chronic emotional distress broad and easy to wind up following. There is so much that can distress us . . . so much more than what a doggie concerns himself with. I think we've reached that point in our evolution, where what we find ourselves endowed with, in terms of the ideas we internalize, may count for more than the sequence of genes in our chromosomes . . . at least in terms of our mental well-being. And I think it doesn't get enough press.