satt comments on Is suicide high-status? - Less Wrong

9 Post author: Stabilizer 12 February 2013 09:41AM

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Comment author: Jack 13 February 2013 04:33:44AM *  2 points [-]

If suicidal ideation is a sign of clinical depression, does that mean that we can take the contrapositive and say that healthy people think about suicide very infrequently?

Sure, probabilisticly: healthy people probably think about suicide much less, on average. There are exceptions, obviously.

but is there room to talk about suicide without that "maybe get help plz" disclaimer?

Talking about suicide is not at all the same as suicidal ideation. Also, I'm not at all averse to this discussion. A disclaimer doesn't prohibit a conversation.

Comment author: satt 13 February 2013 06:55:26AM *  1 point [-]

Talking about suicide is not at all the same as suicidal ideation.

Talking about suicide implies thoughts about suicide, and the definition of suicidal ideation Vaniver quoted says such thoughts demonstrate suicidal ideation. If so, talking about suicide implies suicidal ideation.

There are narrower definitions of suicidal ideation (e.g. the two you cited earlier) but I worry that broad definitions like Wikipedia's prime people to interpret discussion about suicide in general as a reliable sign of suicidal ideation or being mentally unbalanced. jooyous might have a similar concern.

(I'm not saying you're doing that in this case. Someone mentally simulating suicide on an ongoing basis clearly is engaging in suicidal ideation.)