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Sarcasm Useful For Detecting Dementia
Posted by
CmdrTaco
on Mon Dec 15, 2008 12:28 PM
from the yeah-that'll-work dept.
from the yeah-that'll-work dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Sarcasm may be the lowest form of wit, but Australian scientists are using it to diagnose dementia, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of New South Wales, found that patients under the age of 65 suffering from frontotemporal dementia (FTD), the second most common form of dementia, cannot detect when someone is being sarcastic."
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Submission: Sarcasm useful for detecting dementia by Anonymous Coward
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This will end badly... (Score:5, Funny)
Studies also found that old people who do not have dementia are likely to whack you with their canes for sassing them.
Doctor: "Oh, yeaaaa, you're normal"
Patient: "Why you little whippernapper! *WHACK* *WHACK*"
Doctor: "No! Ow! No! It was a medical test!
Patient: "I lived through 15 wars and 5 depressions, and I'm not going to let some damn young quack backtalk me in the name of science!" *WHACK* *WHACK*
Re:This will end badly... (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, I wonder if this is exactly why the behavior of being a smart-ass has evolved in children. We need some way for young people to be able to know if an elder is mentally competent enough. If someone with dementia can't detect sarcasm, it stands to reason that by being a smart-ass, you can tell if they're still capable of making leadership decisions. If they are, then they'll smack you, if not, you put them out on an ice floe.
Parent
Re:This will end badly... (Score:5, Funny)
And I thought I was just an ass, turns out I'm a dementia detecting savant.
Parent
Re:This will end badly... (Score:5, Interesting)
that reminds of the summer i spent at a Buddhist temple/monastery in Taiwan. i was in junior high or just entering high school, i think, and I went there with a couple other Asian-American teenagers as part of a Buddhist/animal rights summer camp program that our parents enrolled us in.
despite being pulled out of bed at 4 in the morning, not being able to eat meat, being made to do farm work (the monks grew most of their own food), and having to recite stupid mantras [wikipedia.org] every morning, and even being locked in a urine-soaked livestock trailer in the baking sun for half an hour (yes, i'm serious.), it was a really interesting experience.
but one of the more unexpected things to happen was learning that Taiwanese people aren't familiar with sarcasm. while we were socializing with a few of the younger monks (their ages ranged from mid-teens to early-20's) one of the American teenagers responded to a question from one of the monks with a sarcastic reply. and while it was pretty obvious to all of us Americans that he was being facetious, the monks were rather perplexed. we tried to explain it to them, but the culture gap was too big. to them there was no difference between being sarcastic and lying.
Parent
sarcasm is cultural.... (Score:4, Informative)
sarcasm is cultural.... I grew up in Jamaica, after moving to the US I had a very hard time understanding sarcasm which is very common here. In my experience growing up in Jamaica sarcasm wasn't common at all.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
People really eat this shit up, don't they? Not a god damned thing was funny about this, but it still got the mandatory +5 Funny like too many other lame unoriginal jokes.
Talking about the moderation is sooooo insightful.
If you can read and understand this, you don't need glasses^Wa fix for dementia.
Sarcasm mark (Score:5, Interesting)
In certain Ethiopic languages, sarcasm is indicated with a sarcasm mark, a character that looks like a backwards question mark at the end of a sentence, similar to Alcanter de Brahm's proposed irony mark ().
So did the fledgeling movement of Slashdotters who proposed using the tilde ~ as the sarcasm mark beat them to it?
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:5, Funny)
~yeah, ~as ~if ~that ~would ~work().
Parent
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:5, Funny)
Your smiley has a goatee.
Parent
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:4, Funny)
Or drool...
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:5, Funny)
Sarcasm has no place on the internet. period.
Parent
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:5, Funny)
Unfortunately it can also be a problem in real-life, generally when I'm being sarcastic I sound and act exactly as if I wasn't, combine this with my quirky personalty and it gets interesting.
(while in a job interview)
Interviewer: so what kind of hobbies do you have, apart from coding?
Me: Well, rock climbing, some music production, necrophelia and subtle dark humor.
I wanted to convey that he's just trying to make small-talk to cover up the fact that he's already decided they weren't going to employ me, instead his face twitched for a second and his mouth opened and you could see his brain clicking away trying to digest what I'd just said.
Um yah, getting back ontopic you can be sarcastic on the internet if people know you well, we all understand subtle humour & emotions while reading what other people write, but for complete strangers that's pretty much impossible.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
to cover up the fact that he's already decided they weren't going to employ me
Whether or not that's true, your comment certainly would have cemented him into that position. Self-fulfilling prophecy indeed.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
More-then likely you shot yourself in the foot. I have interviewed many people and when I don't want to hire someone i try to end the interview fast with the least amount of questions. The small talk, as others have noted, was p
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Everybody knows that sarcasm contains no iron.
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:5, Funny)
It does if it's ferocious enough.
Parent
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:4, Informative)
I have a friend who said once that you can give sexual meaning to any statement as long as you end it with "if you know what I mean". Something like:
Now I will recompile my kernel, if you know what I mean.
Maybe people could use a sentence like that to imply sarcasm... maybe 'Obviously'.
...if you know what I mean.
Parent
Re:Sarcasm mark (Score:5, Funny)
I have a friend who said once that you can give sexual meaning to any statement as long as you end it with "if you know what I mean".
Ironically, the same results can be achieved by ending statements with 'would you have sex with me.'
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
"that's what she said?"
Hmm I guess I'm starting to get it.. ;)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Sarcasm is mostly down to the tone of voice, which is why the /sarcasm tag is sometimes necessary. That is, unless you are able to word what you are saying to be as unambiguously sarcastic as possible. "That's a workable solution /sarcasm" contrasted with "Yeah. Right. That's gonna work". Get it wrong on Slashdot and you get modded down. ;)
Speaking of the tone of voice, I have a naturally-sarcastic tone of voice. This makes it sometimes tricky for others to tell whether I'm kidding or not. I remember talkin
Obligatory (Score:3, Funny)
<sarcasm>Really?</sarcasm>
Re:Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
I wonder if whoever called sarcasm the lowest form of wit was demented.
Parent
This just in... (Score:5, Funny)
...90% of the internet is demented.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Fortunately Slashdot is in the other badger.
Re:They recognize it (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Irony. It's like goldy or bronzy, only it's made of iron.
Ooo.. nice. (Score:5, Funny)
What a great idea.
If you're wondering if you've got dementia, and you thought this comment was sarcastic, then you have because it wasn't.
If you're not wondering if you've got dementia, then you have too because it totally was sarcastic.
Or maybe it's me who has dementia. I don't know if I'm being sarcastic. Oh dear.
Does this mean the Internet is a dementia sim? (Score:5, Insightful)
Since sarcasm is notoriously difficult to convey online, does this mean the Internet is a dementia simulator? Actually, that would explain a lot of things...
House (Score:3, Funny)
Alternate title (Score:5, Funny)
A good idea for early detection of mental illness (Score:5, Interesting)
"Sarcasm may be the lowest form of wit, but Australian scientists are using it to diagnose dementia, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of New South Wales, found that patients under the age of 65 suffering from frontotemporal dementia (FTD), the second most common form of dementia, cannot detect when someone is being sarcastic."
I have suffered from Paranoid Schizophrenia since the age of 15. I'm 33 now, and I can say from my own personal experience that this is very true.
One of the many reasons I have trouble 'fitting in', especially at social gatherings, is my inability to detect sarcasm. It can be terrifying when someone says something that could be interpreted 'literally' as demeaning or cruel but is only 'joking around' etc.
I'm better now than I was, but usually only after getting to know a person well. Surprisingly however, even people I've known for 5+ years can still be sarcastic occasionally and it will go right over my head. They know about my illness however, and on occasions like those do me the favor of pointing out they were just being sarcastic, which helps.
I think the approach in the article could be a great diagnostic tool for early detection of these types of mental illness...I suffered from schizophrenia without knowing I had it for almost 10 years. My life fell to pieces; that and my family and friends (the few I had left) finally convinced me I had a problem. I was the last to know I had schizophrenia...and it has been very very difficult coming to terms with it.
Maybe if it was detected earlier I could have been treated earlier, and the damage to my life and my state of mind might have been mitigated considerably. I don't know.
In related news... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:In related news... (Score:4, Funny)
It's not lupus.
Parent
I propose... (Score:5, Insightful)
Speak as a Masshole (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Speak as a Masshole (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:Speak as a Masshole (Score:5, Interesting)
I found that after a few days in the south I started talking with a drawl. Strangers became much friendlier to me.
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Not just for dementia (Score:4, Interesting)
From my own experience I have noticed that people
in the very start of a psykosis episode also suffers from not beeing able to understand sarcasm.
This is before they show any real signs of the mental illness.
I lived together with a woman many years that had this kind of problems and I used sarcasm to check her up so to speak. It never failed to indicate when she was about to have a new episode and to be prepared to help her out.
goodluckwiththat (Score:5, Funny)
Thanks!
Lowest Form of Wit (Score:3, Interesting)
Sarcasm may be the lowest form of wit...
Never, never begin a submission with a clever aside. You're absolutely begging to be contradicted!
Here's the kind of wit that's lowest in my esteem, in rough order of lowness. Oddly enough, they're all popular on Slashdot!
Re:Lowest Form of Wit (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
EMT technique? (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't know if this is common or not, but an EMT seemed to use this once to tell if I was going to pass out. I had broken my upper arm and at some point I guess I was looking whiter than usual (according to my friends). After putting the arm in a sling the EMT looked at me very seriously and said something like "What's the problem? You're a big guy. What's the big deal?" I was confused for a moment, then I realized he was being sarcastic and I laughed. When I did, he smiled, patted me on the (other) shoulder and announced "Yeah, he's okay. He'll be fine."
I thought that was a pretty good way to tell how out of it I was. Of course some people don't get sarcasm at all, so it might not work all the time.
Asperger's connection...? (Score:4, Interesting)
From TFA:
That sounds almost like a textbook description of Asperger's Syndrome. Hmmmm....
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I am tired of people trying to appear insightful by stating an obvious irony in a sneering and sometimes exaggerated way
I bet you're fun at parties.
Re:Sarcasm is a Scourge (Score:5, Funny)
I bet you're fun at parties.
Ha! Dementia detected.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
**Whoosh!**
He was saying (and I fully agree) that puns are a lower (much, IMO) form of humor than sarcasm.
Actually, what many people refer to as sarcasm is really irony or satire. Sarcasm implies scorn or contempt. It does not imply "saying the opposite of what you mean". That's a particular form of irony. It may be sarcasm if the intent is to wound or disparage, but if it's simply done in good humor, then it's not sarcasm at all.
Dry irony is actually one of my favorite forms of wit, although I tend to