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"While healthy people expect the future to be slightly better than it ends up being, people with severe depression tend to be pessimistically biased: they expect things to be worse than they end up being. People with mild depression are relatively accurate when predicting future events. They see the world as it is. In other words, in the absence of a neural mechanism that generates unrealistic optimism, it is possible all humans would be mildly depressed."
OH REALLY.
@Miles Klee Right, this is why science has jumped the shark.
"We like to think of ourselves as rational creatures."
I really just… don't relate to anyone, anymore…
I knew I was going to read some depressing shit like this today. Happens every time. FML.
I am a goddamn oracle.
This was going to be a really great comment.
Life is only happy during the times we're drunk or doing sex stuff, right, and that's about 49% of the time, on average. Slightly related: there is no liberal media bias, conservatives are just wrong more often.
You're happy during the sex stuff? Sounds pretty optimistic to me.
"in the absence of a neural mechanism that generates unrealistic optimism, it is possible all humans would be mildly depressed"
Absence-of-historical-perspective-FAIL.
The history of the human race is one of gradual, but consistent improvement from our animal beginnings to a higher cultural and spiritual state of being. The lot of all humans has been improving since we started walking on two legs. So why would we all be mildly depressed? An accurate outlook would tell you that, eventually, things will be better than they are today. That's optimism.
I'm not touching this one.