dahsdebater
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Bistiza is either A) a troll (increasingly likely) or B) mentally ill
Obviously he has a pathological inability to admit that he's ever been wrong about anything. That is a disorder right there. But he also seems to live in an alternate reality. In fact, he reminds me a lot of Leo DiCaprio's character in Shutter Island. I realize this isn't a case study, but it's an example a lot of people are aware of and can understand on some level.
SPOILER ALERT: I will be giving away the plot twist at the end of Shutter Island below. If you have NOT watched the movie and want to, you should stop reading now. Seriously.
Annnyyyywhoooo... At least depending on your interpretation of the novel/film, the DiCaprio character goes through virtually the entire film in a false framework in which he generates a logical, or at least quasi-logical, interpretation of information. He fits everything he observes within the reality he perceives and it is able to make sense. When he needs it he creates a total delusion to help fill in the cracks. He also has misplaced snapshots of his own past which he tries to fit into this reality. Ultimately, the framework breaks down when he's asked how he got on the boat. How did the delusion start? He doesn't know.
There is some reality to this. There are several disorders that create dream-like delusions, many of which can be persistent. This Shutter Island example is actually a good representation of how dreams or dream-like delusions work. Everything seems real and correct in the dream, but typically backstory and motivation are missing. You don't know why you're running somewhere, just that you need to keep doing it, and that there must be a good reason. You may or may not know where you're going, probably not where you're coming from. But as long as you aren't forced to think about that, the dream seems real. This works because it mirrors how we typically think while waking. I know that right now I'm a grad student in the UC Berkeley College of Chemistry. I know, from context clues and a quick glance at the internet, that to get here I had to fill out an application, write a personal statement, and write something called a "Diversity Statement." I only vaguely remember writing the personal statement, little snippets that could easily be like Leo's misplaced memories. I don't remember what on Earth I wrote in the diversity statement as a white middle-class protestant with 2 parents. I don't remember the application. I remember telling people I got in, but I don't remember the letter. Don't know if I have it anymore or not. Anyway, there's nothing in that I couldn't easily have fabricated in my head in about 30 seconds with a few misplaced memories. The only real proof I have that the whole thing happened is that they keep paying me.
It isn't really unreasonable to think that you might not always remember the whole backstory, and thus dreamlike delusions can feel very real to people who have them. If bistiza is NOT a total troll (again, also very likely) I think he MUST suffer from Delusional Disorder or some similar diagnosis. It fits with nearly all of his arguments. Let's go back through a few of the greatest hits:
1) right here, Young Earth theory. Bistiza wants us to believe that some meaningful number of scientists agree with him, but he can't tell us who or say anything more than "Google it, you'll find it." He doesn't know where it is. He just is convinced it exists. Fits as a delusion, missing backstory. Same with the fact that he is apparently CONVINCED that he made a strong argument for the Young Earth other than the one that bad_luck continues to quote and just keeps telling us to "go find it." Again, he is sure it must exist, since his delusion tells him he wrote it. But he can't quote it, or restate it, because he has no idea where it would be (since it doesn't really exist) or what it said.
2) Socialism works. By the end of that thread he was making similar arguments that he "had explained it, go find it." Prior to that it was "it works, but you wouldn't be able to understand it." Either way, he got out of having to actually explain HOW it could work. Which worked well, because while he was convinced that it can, and that he understood how, he couldn't explain it if his life depended on it. Because he doesn't ACTUALLY know these things. He only had a delusion of knowing them.
3) Atheism is a religion. I agreed with him on this, at least in a sense, but the argument showed the same earmarks that suggest a delusional disorder - he's convinced that his argument is fully logical, and he has explained the logic, and continues to refer everyone to it; the problem, of course, is that it doesn't exist. The ability to be totally convinced that he is being entirely logical, and everyone else is being totally illogical and is simply "afraid" or "uncomfortable" about hearing a dissenting argument is a common theme throughout bistiza's arguments and fits well with a standard presentation of various delusional disorders. Being "misunderstood" is a common theme in a lower-level Grandiose delusional disorder in which the sufferer simply finds themselves to be intellectually superior and believes that everyone else just isn't capable of understanding his/her arguments.
The general themes of bistiza's arguments - that he has already explained things, that his information is out there, you just need to look for it, that his logic is irrefutable to such an extent that he shouldn't NEED to lay it out - all fit with a delusional disorder that allows him to hold beliefs that he believes have been constructed logically from facts and insights without remembering the facts, insights, or logical construction. The fact that he also claims to be some level of expert in virtually anything he argues about also feels delusional. There are a number of psych experts who believe delusional disorders are much more common than officially recognized because the sufferers have no insight into the fact that their delusions are delusions, they tend to be realistic enough to feel plausible, and thus there is no reason to report as mentally ill. Typically when told they are delusional these people simply feel either superior or persecuted. Obviously bistiza has gone in the superior direction.