Are you out of your mind? Meaning are you mad? Or insane? and to what degree? Seriously, how would you know?

Consider the tool you’d be using to determine the answer could potentially be skewing the results, e.g. your mind if insane may not give the right answer.

So the question is relative. You need a frame of reference. An objective third party perhaps, such as a psychologist or psychiatrist. A neurologist could verify the physical construction of your brain but that will fall short in validating how the mind executes.

And what does it mean to be sane? Again, a relative question.

I once postulated that sanity is a spectrum, that we are all insane, only to differing degrees. For some reason my sister took great offense to this. For whatever reason this was not a realization she was comfortable with. Perhaps the notion challenged a set of beliefs she had long held.

Typically we refer to someone as sane if they are of sound and reasonable mind. On that basis I would argue that almost the entire world is insane since almost all of us have some part of our lives which are purely 100% irrational.

Personally I used to think that if I found a penny, picked it up, spat on it (my grandmother added that part), then put the spit-laden copper disc in my pocket that I would be blessed with good luck. What a nut job?

Some people believe that eating meat, especially pork, on a particular day of the week will somehow anger the trans-dimensional being that created the entire universe, 93-billion light years across. 93 billion light years and yet there is a special place for pigs. Amazing.

Others believe that you can effect the salinity (salty-ness) of your body just by thinking about it [Link]. Sort of a mind-over-kidney power. Incredible.

Members of the Flat Earth Society believe well that the Earth is a flat disc: [Link]. You and I might think that’s a parody, but unfortunately no, these people exist and are very dedicated folks indeed.

What do all these examples have in common? A lack of rationality. The lack of deductive reasoning, evidence based judgment and thinking in life “technically” leads to…insanity and unfortunately in extreme cases severe harm [http://whatstheharm.net]

There aren’t that many definitions but according to Wikipedia, Alfred Korzybski [link] put forth that a person is sane if their actions match what is going on in the world around them. Personally I don’t think this helps since it assumes a sort of cultural sanity which the individual is falling in line with.

A Sane person is expected to make rational decisions. Rational decisions might be classified as those based not on sensory input but on deductive reasoning, “logic” as Mr Spock might say.

Do the actions I take match what is going on around me? Sometimes. But is that worth striving for? History is full of folks who buck the trend, from Salvadore Dali to Oskar Schindler. Perhaps these are all mad? or maybe a thin line between madness and genius.

Consider the case of the recent mummies unearthed after 500 years atop a volcano in northwestern Argentina: [LINK].

Here were three children as young as six years old, who trekked for days to the top of this volcano. There they were ritually murdered, as a sacrifice to the mountain in the hopes it would bring good weather and prosperity to the region. Imagine the thoughts through their minds as they walked for days to the top of the hill. Imagine their parents grief. This all made sense in terms of the rules of the day.

I wonder 500 years ago, did anyone ever pause to consider the rationale behind this act. Did anyone ever question “wait a minute, how do I know this will work?”. Did anyone ever ask “where’s the evidence that the volcano god wants me to do this”? Or were they acting purely on faith in what could be considered an act of madness?

The children would have likely have been selected months prior for this “honor”. The idea must have stemmed from a single individual. Someone, at some point in that tribe raised their hand and said “we need to kill a child in order to save the harvest”. And everyone went along with it.

I’m naive but it would have been quite useful to have an absolute test for sanity, or just a test for rational thinking. When the witch doctor first suggested sacrifice, he could have been run through the test, failed, and tragedy avoided.

It’s doubtful we will ever develop a test for sanity. 500 years later, much of what we do day-to-day is devoid of rational, evidence based thinking. What have we learned?