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I think you got really lucky. The evidence is piling up that extended solitary is inhumane because the social isolation and lack of stimulus drives you insane: https://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/05/solitary.aspx

I'm really glad you turned things around. Perhaps one day you can write a book about your experience, perhaps under a pseudonym.

> I think you got really lucky. The evidence is piling up that extended solitary is inhumane because the social isolation and lack of stimulus drives you insane

[op] > I spent the time focused on mathematics and actually became a decent analyst near the end of it.

Finally, a one-path track to mathematical competence

> I wish so much that normal US citizens would tour a prison and see what this does to people, because maybe then this would be outlawed.

it didn't even occur to me that you could tour a prison and see much of anything. how would you expect the effects of solitary confinement to be visible during a tour?

Short term stays are not so bad, the person is stressed, but not showing signs of any real disturbance. The longer term stays are where you see the worst. You will generally notice that the person is just off in some way. They may stare into space rather than at you when you talk to them, pace around and mumble, have twitches or obsessive tics, etc. You will immediately notice who has been there awhile. Some simply have a psychotic break and this is quite obvious as well.

I'll also say that I was speaking rhetorically, you generally can't visit a prison and certainly not the hole. This should be allowed though, people need to see what this does to people.

> I spent 3 years in solitary confinement

Holy crap. That's torture. Good to see you still in one piece.

> Given what I have seen, this really is tantamount to torture.

It is torture.

Note that often prison officials will come up with reasons to move weak/nerdy/awkward inmates into solitary to "protect" them from more violent inmates. Sometimes that detention requires coming up with "violations" of prison rules that can lead to denial or delay of probation release.

I'm impressed with your story.

Would you mind sharing more on your learning experience in solitude?

What books/resources you had at your disposal?

What was it like having to grok things without being able to ping-pong on understanding with peers (in what would be a study group)?

EDIT: line breaks.

I read and solved most of the problems from Walter Rudin's Real and Complex Analysis, Stephen Willard's General Topology, and a small collection of other books I bought with my limited funds and had shipped to me. I mostly bought from Dover, which has a very nice collection of quality math texts for very low prices, I will say.

My learning method was to try to get up to three texts on the same subject, so I could compare different treatments of the material. This was beneficial because if one text was unclear, I could compare with how the other texts explained this concept and it would hopefully dawn upon me what is right and makes sense. Other than that, I can say that I was at it 8 to 10 hours a day and in many respects, it was my one form of entertainment. I solved PDE's or proved theorems like other people did sudoku or crosswords. I looked at the problems as puzzles and tried very hard to solve them because it was all I had that was amusing. I also became very aware of how beautiful mathematics is and I truly began to love it. That passion helped a lot.

I expect your intelligence helped as well. Many people would simply not be capable of that type of self-directed learning, however much uninterrupted time they had on their hands. That advantage is probably a big part of what allowed you to get through the experience and even get some benefit from it.

This reminds me of a similar thing you see with people who manage to escape the trap of abusive or just otherwise bad parents. Many people fall into mimicking those same behaviors later in life, or are just so psychologically damaged by them that it significantly hampers their future quality of life. Of course, some people do manage to have positive, productive lives despite terrible childhood experiences, but on average those who do tend to have above-average intelligence; they're able to rationalize what happened to them, and thereby have some control over its effects.

Good taste in books.

I'm just surprised they allowed you to read at all. Is it common?

Also, how old were you then?

While it is becoming widely acknowledged that long-term solitary confinement is essentially a form of torture, in theory it's not about causing suffering, but rather about protecting inmate safety. Denying books wouldn't really make sense in that context.

> While it is becoming widely acknowledged that long-term solitary confinement is essentially a form of torture, in theory it's not about causing suffering, but rather about protecting inmate safety. Denying books wouldn't really make sense in that context.

That seems to go against what Wikipedia says? It says it's primarily about punishment rather than safety:

> [Solitary confinement] is mostly employed as a form of punishment beyond incarceration for a prisoner, usually for violations of prison regulations. However, it is also used as an additional measure of protection for vulnerable inmates.

It may be both, but certainly the stated goal is not psychological torture—so it's not surprising that some limited amount of entertainment is allowed.

It is rather common for inmates to read in prison, there is virtually nothing else to do. However, we were only allowed to have 12 books at a time, so I had to mail many home as I acquired new ones to study. I was 20-23 in solitary, and 18-28 during my sentence.

I didn't have the resources to purchase outside books during my 2 year incarceration but it was remarkable how outdated the "jail library" books were. I read quite a bit of cosmology and physics, mostly 30 or so years old. A personal highlight was finding a Ray Kurzweil book.

> I read quite a bit of cosmology and physics, mostly 30 or so years old

Well, you get all the way to the standard model, so not so bad. I suppose the book quality might have been a problem though.

May I ask what did you do to get punished with 3 years in solitary confinement?

Possession of marijuana while in a correctional institution. My case got dragged out and I was in solitary until it was resolved.

EDIT: I'll add to this that marijuana was one of the things that helped me in prison. It really did function as a medicine at times, letting me drift away from the craziness of my situation and think about myself and what I wanted to become and the person I wanted to be. I think that helped me to internally rehabilitate myself and become the person I am today.

Wow 3 years for that sounds particularly harsh. I'm sorry that happened but I'm glad you feel better for the experience.

It doesn't sound harsh. It is. It's worse than that. It's a moral abomination with no rational basis in humanity whatsover.

Don't sugar coat the reprehensible to sound agreeable.

This is insane, revolting. I can't understand how this is even possible in a civilized country.

>> how this is even possible in a civilized country.

Its not. we do not live in a Civilized Country (the USA) we live in a Barbaric Nation with as the facade of civility painted over the Barbarism

The current USA is definitely far away from civilized indeed.

You can’t have the president of a civilized nation threatening nuclear war because he woke up on the wrong side of bed.

I can’t believe you got solidarity for marijuana. How do you feel that now it’s legal in so many states?

My personal feelings about getting 3 years of solitary for marijuana possession are that I got screwed because of a failed social experiment, to be honest.

Thank you for sharing your experience and congrats on turning your life around. Please share your story in a book or blog to spread hope to others in prison who need something to live for and a positive role model. Take care friend.

>When I left it, some had been there for 10 years straight. I can assure you that many of these men were deeply disturbed.

Such treatment, and for such BS reason (grooming), even of convicted murderers and such, shows a terrible medieval society.

Those responsible for this should have gone into jail themselves in a civilized society.

There are a few stories similar to that but take place in Soviet Russia. Natan Sharansky became really good at chess during his 9 years in prison and Eliyahu Rips developed a previously unsolved mathematical proof during his 2 years.

Amazing.