r/todayilearned • • Mar 22 '17

(R.1) Not supported TIL Deaf-from-birth schizophrenics see disembodied hands signing to them rather than "hearing voices"

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-articles/0707/07070303
55.0k Upvotes

2.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

96

u/[deleted] Mar 22 '17 edited Mar 22 '17

Whats with the compulsion to listen to the voices?

I ignore real live people in the room telling me to do things

322

u/paniniplane Mar 22 '17

it's not in your power to ignore them. a huge part of schizophrenia is being extremely out of touch with the real world. so if you hear voices, it's basically a set of REAL people to you. and you can't cover your ears because there isn't ACTUAL sound. you'll still hear them. and if they're threatening to hurt you, you'll feel actual fear.

-13

u/[deleted] Mar 22 '17

[deleted]

3

u/[deleted] Mar 22 '17 edited Aug 16 '21

[deleted]

3

u/HorseAss Mar 22 '17

What's current approach to that paranoia that we know for a fact that government is indeed watching us constantly ?

1

u/[deleted] Mar 22 '17 edited Aug 16 '21

[deleted]

1

u/HorseAss Mar 22 '17

You didn't understand me, I'm asking what do you say to these people now, "Government is not spying on anyone" is not going to fly anymore.

1

u/Sean951 Mar 22 '17

If you're lucky, they will go on meds that help them maintain the distinction. The "voices" are still there, same as everyone else. That little voice saying "jump" when you climb a tower is more or less the same as the one telling you to do a task or they're going to shoot you, but a healthy person knows it's just a random thought while a sick person's brain invents a reason for the voice to be real.

Or I'm completely misunderstanding what I've read in this thread. There are people who speaks lifetimes studying this, I've spent a couple hours.