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> explanations such as mass psychogenic illness Rheumatoid arthritis used to be a psychogenic illness. Parkinson’s. MS. Etc. It seems most psychogenic illnesse
by erentz 8y ago
> explanations such as mass psychogenic illness
Rheumatoid arthritis used to be a psychogenic illness. Parkinson’s. MS. Etc. It seems most psychogenic illnesses over time prove to be real. Doctors need to stop using this as a crutch when they can’t explain something, it’s harmful. Just say “we don’t know, this doesn’t make sense to us based on what we know at this time.”
- nikanj 8y agoI think this might be a case of ”People laughed at Galileo, but they did also laugh at Bozo the Clown”. By cherry-picking your cases, you can argue either side of the issue.
- SpikeDad 8y agoTrue. However the easy and commonness of psychogenic illness does skew the issue towards that side of the scales. There's a lot more science to throw at these issues than was available in the days of some of the other illnesses you mentioned.
- jjeaff 8y agoThere is a new series on Netflix called "Afflicted". Basically just exploring a few different people and their struggles with illnesses that are commonly thought to be all in their head. It's pretty interesting. I think the documentary tries not to draw a conclusion. Some of them definitely appear to be totally psychosymatic. The "electromagnetic sensitivity" (wifi allergy) people in particular.
- erentz 8y agoCareful making any conclusions from that show. A number of the participants have said they were totally misrepresented. You could tell they were going to slant things right from the start when they started first with introducing Bekah and her quirky “witch” and “psychic” beliefs, before even getting to the diagnostics or how they were diagnosed. The documentary makers definitely crossed some ethical lines by cutting in that doctor talking answering general prompts about psychological illness, and splicing that in with patients answering questions about their emotional state, etc. One thing it was good for though was to see just how horribly taken advantage of desperate and sick people can be by quacks. The show featured a lot of quacks such as Suzanne Kim and the Sophia Institute and that lady on Marthas Vineyard. I really wish I had the hours of material they left out to produce a documentary on what these quacks prescribed and charged their clients. Edit: I’ll say on the subject of Jamison for example, if you want a better documentary on ME/CFS take a look at Unrest, also on Netflix. (And Forgotten Plague I think on Prime.) But even that science has progressed a long way in the past couple of years since that came out.
- perl4ever 8y agoThere's a difference between saying a theory is wrong vs. what it tries to explain does not exist. Obviously you can prove that wifi sensitivity is an incorrect theory by experimenting. For the sake of argument, let's say someone's symptoms are precisely hypochondria. There must be some physical reason for that, that involves their brain but cannot be assumed limited to it, that can be investigated through science. There are people who do not suffer from hypochondria, so they can be compared. Nothing can be "all in your head" because the brain is physical and part of the body. Referring to something as psychosomatic serves the social function of ritually disclaiming responsibility for figuring it out. The harmful aspect of it is the assignation of blame to the victim, as though their will controls their illness. This is related to the same epistemological territory people go over and over when debating dark matter, or evolution, or AGW. Observations don't go away just because you question a theory.
- yellowapple 8y agoAnd there will be a lot more science to throw at such issues decades from now than is available today. We're not even close to having full understanding of the human body, and the brain is particularly troublesome to understand.
- scoom 8y agoHistory proved Bozo correct.
- dddddaviddddd 8y agoIn any case psychology is physical, connections between neutrons, hormone levels, etc. Psychogenic illnesses are necessarily biological unless you accept an immaterial soul.
- stochastic_monk 8y agoOnly in the sense that computers running software is physical in that it's on hardware.
- yellowapple 8y agoThat's not really how the brain works. Yes, it's a computer, but more like those really old computers where you did your "programming" by way of wires plugged into a breadboard.
- Angostura 8y ago> It seems most psychogenic illnesses over time prove to be real Does it? Really? Should I be worried about Korean fan-death?
- abenedic 8y agoYou can be dismissive of fan-death, but please know that the people who believe in it do so more out of national identity than reason. I have met many very smart lovely people who believed in it. Think of it more as regional pride in local barbecue than an actual belief. That said South Korea is far too hot in the summer to have a fan shut off automatically.
- tomjakubowski 8y agoCould one compare it to the continued use of imperial units in the UK/US?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- zdragnar 8y agoImperial units are used because they're generally easier to relate to and use than the metric counterparts- simpler divisors, that sort of thing. It's the same reason we have 24 hours, 60 minutes, 60 seconds. Even if you don't agree with that statement, it's what people who prefer imperial units will say, not that there's some mass delusion / patriotic identity.
- Hydraulix989 8y agoKoreans believe that you can run out of air in the room because of the fan.
- abenedic 8y agoIt is not a good practice to paint with a brush so broadly. Americans believe Russia did no election meddling.