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Day 848

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calabi_yau_formatted-svg

Three centuries ago, Newton thought that reality had 3 basic components: time, particles and space. This model didn’t explain everything. Soon other forces that govern movement of particles came along like electromagnetism. Photons, gravitons and gluons emerged yet the essential ingredients of reality remain a mystery.

To explain gravity, Einstein merged space and time into a composite, space-time. Michael Faraday added the concept of a classical field that carries forces through empty space. Quantum Theory showed that all mass and energy are really excitations of underlying quantum fields. Quantum fields and space-time are incompatible, so perhaps there is a more basic component hidden beneath.

In the late 1990s, String Theory was proposed. I don’t understand it fully but basically it says that elementary particles emerge from the vibrations of one-dimensional strings. Therefore, an electron is not really a point, but a tiny loop of string. If it oscillates one way, we see an electron. If it oscillates in another way, then we call it a photon, a quark, or a …

Julian Barbour, a British physicist believes that space and time, united by Einstein must be uncoupled. The only way to define space is to consider it as the geometric relationship between observable particles. He argues that the universe is a set of possible configurations of the 3D geometry of space. He believes that these configurations or ‘snapshots’ exist in a space of possibilities. Time is not real but merely something we perceive – an illusion that comes about because the universe is constantly changing from one snapshot to another.

Spiritual masters have been teaching the concept of everything being an illusion for thousands of years. Physics seems to be catching up.

“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
– Albert Einstein

Ref:

Day 829

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Loneliness – a disturbing word, often invoking a sense of sadness and despair.

It’s not one thing. It is subjective. Imprecise.
It can be found anywhere.

When after many requests you still don’t have a sibling.
When you are born with skin colour darker or lighter than it should be.
When you are the new girl in class.
When you don’t get picked for the team.
When you sit alone at lunch time.
When you are not sure what you want and settle for what is available.
When you are stuck in a loop of cold-hearted bureaucracy.
When you are different.
When you are told ‘you should be happy’ by the one you are married to.
When you work from home and see no humans for many days.
When you feel you have to be somebody else to be successful and accepted.
When you are unable to have children.
When you have an abortion or a miscarriage.
When you have children and don’t see anyone but them all day everyday.
When your family is no longer a family.
When you have a fracture and are stuck in bed for weeks or months.
When ‘Facebook’ and ‘Instagram’  constantly offer comparisons.
When you get fired.

When you have just retired.
When a loved one suddenly disappears.
When you are blamed for a mistake you did not make.
When you get mugged.
When you are diagnosed with a serious illness.
When you are old and so easily forgotten.

Solitary confinement is one of the most severe forms of punishment because it can break your spirit. In 1951 researchers at McGill University paid a group of male graduate students to stay in small chambers equipped with only a bed for an experiment on sensory deprivation. They could leave to use the bathroom, but that’s all.  They wore goggles and earphones to limit their sense of sight and hearing, and gloves to limit their sense of touch. The plan was to observe students for six weeks, but not one lasted more than seven days. Nearly every student lost the ability “to think clearly about anything for any length of time,” while several others began to suffer hallucinations. “One man could see nothing but dogs.” A study at Harvard found that roughly a third of many solitary inmates they interviewed were “actively psychotic and/or acutely suicidal.”

In the biggest literature review into the subject of loneliness, the University of York looked at 23 studies involving 181,000 people for up to 21 years. They found that lonely people are around 30 per cent more likely to suffer a stroke or heart disease, two of the leading causes of death in Britain. More than 1 in 5 people in the UK privately admit they are ‘always or often lonely’. It is a public health problem.

I welcome the ‘Commission on Loneliness’ launched in memory of the murdered Labour MP Jo Cox, to look for practical solutions to reduce loneliness in the UK. Let’s do our bit, however small.
RIP Jo.

“Fools,” said I, “You do not know –
Silence like a cancer grows.
Hear my words that I might teach you.
Take my arms that I might reach you.
But my words like silent raindrops fell
And echoed in the wells of silence…
-Sound of Silence by ‘Simon and Garfunkel’

Ref:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/31/mps-launch-jo-coxs-commission-loneliness/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/04/19/loneliness-is-public-health-problem-which-raises-risk-of-stroke/

 

Day 821

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Suicides are grossly under-reported. Here are a few reasons for that:

  1. Criminal standard of proof, “beyond reasonable doubt”, is required when determining the cause of death as suicide. Many suicides are recorded as ‘undetermined deaths’ because of that. The Chief Coroner is supportive of the change which would reduce the standard of proof for suicide to the civil standard and has expressed his view to the Ministry of Justice but the MoJ has steadfastly refused to change the way that coroners reach a suicide verdict despite persistent requests from Suicide Prevention charities such as PAPYRUS. This leads those of us campaigning on this issue to conclude that they deliberately want to suppress the figures around the number of people who take their own lives each year.
  1. MoJ argues that a change to the law would offend certain faith groups. We, at PAPYRUS believe that determining a cause of death should be about establishing facts, not about appeasing any particular sector of the community.
  1. Many families who have lost loved ones to suicide, particularly when the deceased are their children, do not want to hear that they ended their own life. Coroners are understandably sensitive and hence, reluctant to reach a verdict of suicide and conclude that the death occurred because of an accident or misadventure. An open or narrative verdict is often returned even when the evidence clearly shows that the person took his or her own life.
  1. Death is taboo and suicide is a deeper layer of taboo underneath. Mental illness is taboo and suicide is a darker layer of taboo underneath. The stigma attached to it stops everyone from being open about it.

Research by Professor Colin Pritchard at Bournemouth University suggests that if coroners used the civil standard of proof – “on the balance of probabilities” – we would see a 30-50% increase in recorded suicides. His research validates the view held by Papyrus that the current arrangements mask the true number of suicides in the UK.

Unless we can face the enemy, how can we ever hope to vanquish it?

Sources:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/09/suicide-crisis-law-uk-cause-of-death-young-people

http://www.inquest.org.uk/help/handbook/section-4-3-verdicts

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/thousands-of-suicides-hidden-to-comfort-grief-stricken-families-5fhkspfbx

 

Day 820

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One of the French companies worst affected by suicides has been the telecommunications giant, France Télécom/Orange, where 12 employees took their own life in 2008, nineteen in 2009, 27 in 2010 and 11 in 2011. Despite a new agreement on workplace conditions negotiated with the trade unions, there has been a renewal of suicides in recent years with eleven cases in 2013 and ten suicides in 2014.

Suicides took place at a time when the company was restructuring, including a plan to cut 22,000 jobs in three years. Suicidal individuals shared a similar profile: these were typically skilled male engineers or technicians in their fifties who had been forcibly redeployed into low-skilled roles, often in call-centres.

On 17 January 2014, a 42-year old employee dealing with business customers at a France Télécom/Orange office in Paris, threw himself under a suburban train on his way to work. His sister, who is pursuing a claim against the company, contends that her brother had repeatedly complained to his bosses that he was a victim of bullying by his manager. Occupational doctors had also reported a deterioration of working conditions at the agency where he worked, with a rise of workplace stress as a result of company restructuring. Prior to his suicide, the victim had sent e-mails to family members complaining of an unmanageable workload and of constant surveillance and he referred to “humiliation”, “intimidation” and “bullying”. He held several meetings with senior management where he complained of harassment by his manager. Five days before his suicide, he sent an e-mail to his head of service in which he reiterated his request to change teams. These e-mail exchanges are being used as evidence in the investigation by the public authorities into his suicide.

Whilst in France work place suicides are an urgent public health phenomenon, in the UK, despite severe deterioration in working conditions, workplace suicide is not recognised in legislation and there are no specific official mechanisms for data collection. Even when it takes place in the workplace, suicide is presumed to be an individual and voluntary act and according to Health and Safety Executive (2016) legislation: “All deaths to workers and non-workers, with the exception of suicides, must be reported if they arise from a work-related accident.”

(Source: When work kills : http://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/abs/10.1108/JPMH-06-2016-0026?mobileUi=0&journalCode=jpmh)

Day 795

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As I read this piece of research, I could see Saagar and me reflected in it. It rang true. It gave me a deeper understanding about myself, my humanity and the precious fragility of our closest relationships. This qualitative research by Prof Christabel Owens et al tries to understand the needs of concerned family members and friends that can better equip them to intervene when their loved one is suicidal or in distress. It focuses on micro-social systems, like families or a group of friends as opposed to macro systems like nations and societies. (http://www.bmj.com/content/343/bmj.d5801)
Microsociology is the study of thoughts, feelings, moods, behaviours and forms of language that serve to maintain or threaten bonds between individuals.

Life is lived in small units – husband and wife, mother and son, boy-friend and girl-friend and so on. This is the level at which suicidal crises unfold and are managed, very often without any help from clinical services.

Family members and friends are the real frontline of suicide prevention but little is known about what goes on in these settings. A series of narrative interviews with the next of kin of 14 young people lost by suicide were analysed : What did they see and hear? What did they think was happening? What actions did they take and why? What additional knowledge, skills and support would have been useful?

Findings:

  1. Warning signs were rarely clear at the time. For example, one dad of a 19 year old boy said,“He had a teddy bear hanging from a light cord in his bed room.” In retrospect, the signs were clear but at the time, they were offset by countersigns or were difficult to decipher, open to a range of interpretations.
  2. Significant others engaged in normalizing and legitimizing their behavior. For example, a mother of a 29 years old man said, ”A few times he rang me in the early hours of the morning absolutely piddled out of his head and he’d be gabbling on but I couldn’t understand a word he was saying because he was drunk. I’d say, “Look, I’ll come and see you tomorrow and we’ll talk about it then.” I’d go there and nothing would get said and he’d seem alright.” In almost all cases, more weight was given to countersigns. The boundaries of normality were stretched to accommodate a loved one so as to avoid ‘pathologising’ or labeling them as that may be perceived as rejection.
  3. Fear (of loss) prevented them from saying or doing anything that might have prevented tragedy. For example, the partner of a 26 years old woman said, “I was trying to find the right words to persuade her to go to the GP. It’s bloody difficult and I was afraid she’d react badly. The situation was delicate and I had an awful lot to loose. And I ended up loosing it anyway.”

The article concluded that these are highly complex decisions. Due to a deep emotional involvement, we often cannot think and act in a rational manner. These findings are now being used to devise emotionally informed suicide prevention efforts, as opposed to cognitive ones which are most commonly used. These methods will help people like you and me to acknowledge and overcome our fears and act appropriately.

So far this leaflet had emerged as a result of this study:

Click to access UoA2_leaflet.pdf