Trampling on corpses to feel alive

[motherengine]

do people use intelligence as a defense against feelings of insecurity and inferiority and is this a type of violence? sticks and stones cause actual physical destruction to tissue that can be seen. what of attacks through language? one can not see a well crafted insult but in the hearing does an actual chemical damage occur in the brain? word can provoke violence. why? and if intelligence [defined as the ability to gather and apply information] is used to hurt others emotionally is it beneficial to society or not; is the hostile use of intellect to demean another a constructive outlet for people?

[Fishteacher73]

I do not think that a specific individual comment can cause aharmful physical change of the brain, but most definatly persistant emotional abuse will effect development, and the younger the age the more impact such prods to the psyche cause. Wether this is more a physiological changer or a psychological change, I am not sure.

[sanctus]

I don't agree with you Fishteacher, I thinkalso an individual comment can cause harmful physical change, it just has to be horrifying enough.

[IrishEyes]

First of all, great topic! Very appropriate for these forums, and it should be an interesting discussion.

 

do people use intelligence as a defense against feelings of insecurity and inferiority /QUOTE]

Yes, people do. If you want, I will give links, but I think this one is fairly obvious.

 

what of attacks through language? one can not see a well crafted insult but in the hearing does an actual chemical damage occur in the brain?

I don't think it is classified as 'chemical damage', but there is a change that occurs. Of course, there is a change with virtually any stimulus. Here are a few quick links that document some changes resulting from different positive or negative stimuli.

 

http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/s/u/sum158/writingsample.htm interesting stuff, from a student. worth the read. maybe we can get this person to come to Hypography?;)

 

http://psych.wisc.edu/harmonjones/abstracts.htm much more scientific, and the related part is below

Harmon-Jones, E., & Sigelman, J. (in press). State anger and prefrontal brain activity: Evidence that insult-related relative left prefrontal activation is associated with experienced anger and aggression. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

Research has demonstrated that left prefrontal cortical activity is associated with positive affect or approach motivation, and that right prefrontal cortical activity is associated with negative affect or withdrawal motivation. In past research, emotional valence (positive/negative) has been confounded with motivational direction (approach/withdrawal), such that, for instance, the only emotions examined were both positive and approach-related. Recent research has demonstrated that trait anger, a negative but approach-related emotion, is associated with increased left prefrontal and decreased right prefrontal activity, suggesting that prefrontal asymmetrical activity is associated with motivational direction and not emotional valence. The present experiment tested whether state-induced anger is associated with relative left prefrontal activity, and whether this prefrontal activity is also associated aggression. Results supported these hypotheses.

 

if intelligence [defined as the ability to gather and apply information] is used to hurt others emotionally is it beneficial to society or not

I think this is a tough one, as not *all* intelligence is used to hurt people emotionally, so to try to make a judgement on whether or not it is 'beneficial to society' as a whole is not really possible. I think I understand your point, but I'm not sure that your question has an answer.

 

is the hostile use of intellect to demean another a constructive outlet for people?

Well, is the hostile use of intellect used in conjunction with any other means of hostility, like a fist? If the choice is between teasing someone and hitting, I know I'd choose to be hit. Bruises on the outside seem to heal much faster than the ones on the inside, if you know what I mean. But that's not really a scientific answer, so I'll do some checking.