I'm going to go with "Go see a therapist" for $120 an hour. Yow.

And no masturbating on top of the sheets.

Yeah, I looked at his other askme question & thought, uh oh.

There's a time device inside of me, I'm a self-destructin' man
There's a red, under my bed
And there's a little green man in my head

I thought it was interesting that he is pursuing a Ph.D. in mathematics, a la John Nash. Then I did a google search and found this, which says that "the incidence of psychosis is greater than expected among mathematical scholars." Hmph.

Question - are we, as a community, under an ethical imperative to help? If the answer is yes, is it practical/possible for us to help?

porpoise, I like to think that we are under such an obligation -- insofar as it's practical.

This thread really bothered me but I didn't want to bring it up in MeTa and put more attention on it. I feel like this guy needs some serious help right now.

The guy's already on meds and has a doctor. There's not really anything more any of us could do for him.

He is on psychiatric medications, and is therefore presumptively under the care of a psychiatrist. He knows that he is paranoid, but it sounds like he is working to deal with it. It's heartbreaking to see someone who is clearly suffering, but I'm not sure what there is that any of us could do to help.

On preview, what cmonkey said.

Thanks cmonkey & amro - I was just feeling bad about being impotent to help.

Well, there's enough info in his profile to trace him, but what then? Any clinic or counseling center will defer to his doctor (i.e. it's not their problem.) And the privacy laws forbid even disclosing whether or not he is under treatment. It's a terrible thing to watch, but astragallus's consent is required to proceed with anything, unless there is clear evidence he is a danger to himself or others.

The really sad part is reading the comments in that thread. Sheesh. Nerds.

True paranoia (this doesn't look like a clear cut case at all) is extremely rare. Paranoid ideation is incredibly common and widely present among "healthy" people. It seems to be the modern condition. But clinical paranoia is so rare that my sister (30 years clinical experience) has only seen one case.

In most cases of recovery from acute episodes, people just "click" and decide they want things to be different. Where organic causes are present, it's more a case of adapting.

A great deal of recovery from any sort of somatic or psychic trauma is simply rediscovery of what it felt like before things turned bad.

There are a lot of both lay and professional therapists who simply make things worse by re-exploring the trauma. Kinda like irritating a wound. Healing is a return to the balance that existed earlier.

"the incidence of psychosis is greater than expected among mathematical scholars."

Yeah, one of my best friends from high school, who was my flatmate in undergrad, had a psychotic break. This was as he was about to start his PhD in theoretical physics. It was really scary. (but kind of interesting, in a whacked out way... I was studying neuropharmacology at the time, and when I went to visit him in the acute psych ward I was filling him in on all his drugs)

Even if the guy is on meds, it's clear that it is time to adjust the dose. Modern healthcare being what it is in the US, it's quite likely that the prescribing pdoc sees the patient for an hour a month at most. That may not be frequently enough to effectively treat a changing illness.
I see it as incumbent upon the community to honestly encourage the person to actively seek additional medical help. It's not enough to shrug and say "Meh, you've already got a doctor." You are helping by simply adding your voice to the rational-soundingboard chorus.

Not going to stick my oar in over there, but one of the things you have to ask yourself when you have a thought like this, is "who would have both the means and the motive to do something like that?" Setting up the equipment to undetectably spy on someone and then monitoring that equipment is costly in terms of manpower and logistics. So to suppose that someone is doing it when you have no secrets vital to any agency capable of doing it, ones which can't be much more easily uncovered in more mundane ways, is not only delusional it's irrational.

If you're politically active there's a very good chance that you're getting some kind of attention, but at worst it'll be interviews with your acquaintances and bugging your telephone. Nobody puts a camera in your bedroom unless they want evidence of sexual peccadillos, and unless you're a public figure nobody gives a crap.

The "being spied on" thing is such a common schizophrenic symptom that I'm surprised nobody who knows the guy in person has picked up on it. Or maybe they have... I only read the "camera in my bedroom" thread, not his first one, but it sounds like some of his friends enjoy some of his freakouts, which is sad.

I don't think his help can or should come from the online world... hell, that might actually freak him out MORE. If anybody knows anyone who knows him in real life, though, I'd say they should apply serious pressure to get the guy back to his doctor for an adjustment on his meds. He sort of laughs about it now, but things could get worse for him without the least bit of warning, and he'll be screwed.