5 ms·

I'm part of this culture then because I don't believe in mental illnesses as defined by psychiatrists. Bring papers, proof and Science and we talk. http://arac

by Buzaga 14y ago

I'm part of this culture then because I don't believe in mental illnesses as defined by psychiatrists. Bring papers, proof and Science and we talk. http://arachnoid.com/psychology/myth.html http://arachnoid.com/psychology/myth.html

singular 14y ago
As a depressive, I can tell you the experience is certainly very real, even if much of psychology is on shaky ground, and it's certainly not a pleasant or healthy state of mind. Are there not relatively good quality studies demonstrating certain treatments such as CBT are effective in treating depression + anxiety? And surely a schizophrenic who hears voices and is detached from reality can be said to be mentally unwell? And aren't their studies demonstrating anti-psychotic pharmaceuticals are effective in those cases? Though I am all for data-based scientific reasoning in psychology, I do think there's a place for practical, empirical techniques to treat things we don't quite understand yet (and perhaps don't hope to understand for some time, i.e. a detailed understanding of the operation of the brain). When people have mental health issues they need help now, not in X years when we have sufficient understanding to make it a harder science. I often wonder about the disdain those of the harder sciences have for the 'softer' ones. Physics, chemistry + friends have the wonderful advantage of being able to examine phenomena in the small, once you examine things in the large (such as medical studies, or sociological behaviour, etc.) there are often sufficient factors to make it analytically intractable + require fuzzy uncertain statistical techniques. Does that approach make a science 'soft' in your opinion? I am not for the big fuzzy Freudian unfalsifiable theories that thus can't be tested by the way. Rather I think a lot of big problems require imperfect statistical techniques now which can be improved with a deeper understand later.
cbs 14y ago
Bring papers, proof and Science and we talk. Why would anyone even take the time to bother? You've already decided that psychology isn't a sufficiently hard science.
- Buzaga 14y ago
  Because it isn't, science is a strict term... this is a challenge for psychology/psychiatry and neuroscience(best hopes) as whole and it's not one or two weirdo proposing it... it's being thrown in it's face and begged for even by the people ~there~ itself. Of course there's good willing people there, but there's also the 'Big Pharma' issue, the 'lets put 4 year olds on drugs' issue, a past of it being used to reinforce biases(against homosexuals, for slavery, as argument to lock state-enemies in Russia, Nazi Germany). Also, normally when it's scientifically proven isn't it like "done, next question" and then they actually answer the question? They didn't got there yet it seems. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment Disclosure: Yes, I know there's situations so extreme need 'anything that helps', I've seen it in my family. With me, a bipolar 'diagnosis' and drug prescription got me 4 seizures that could have brought lasting damage, even as the dosage, the psychiatrist later confessed under my pressure, was already multiple times lower than what was considered the minimum, but he wouldn't admit having any responsibility for it, which led me to doing my own research and finding documented cases of seizures and even deaths as consequence. Anyway, gave the FU(metaphorically) to this, kept reading, making sure it was informed/not-in-denial, 3 years, not a problem, but I still have to hear about how I can't swim, box or "shouldn't even drive", this sort of stuff.

by Buzaga 14y ago

singular 14y ago

As a depressive, I can tell you the experience is certainly very real, even if much of psychology is on shaky ground, and it's certainly not a pleasant or healthy state of mind. Are there not relatively good quality studies demonstrating certain treatments such as CBT are effective in treating depression + anxiety? And surely a schizophrenic who hears voices and is detached from reality can be said to be mentally unwell? And aren't their studies demonstrating anti-psychotic pharmaceuticals are effective in those cases? Though I am all for data-based scientific reasoning in psychology, I do think there's a place for practical, empirical techniques to treat things we don't quite understand yet (and perhaps don't hope to understand for some time, i.e. a detailed understanding of the operation of the brain). When people have mental health issues they need help now, not in X years when we have sufficient understanding to make it a harder science. I often wonder about the disdain those of the harder sciences have for the 'softer' ones. Physics, chemistry + friends have the wonderful advantage of being able to examine phenomena in the small, once you examine things in the large (such as medical studies, or sociological behaviour, etc.) there are often sufficient factors to make it analytically intractable + require fuzzy uncertain statistical techniques. Does that approach make a science 'soft' in your opinion? I am not for the big fuzzy Freudian unfalsifiable theories that thus can't be tested by the way. Rather I think a lot of big problems require imperfect statistical techniques now which can be improved with a deeper understand later.

cbs 14y ago

Bring papers, proof and Science and we talk. Why would anyone even take the time to bother? You've already decided that psychology isn't a sufficiently hard science.

Buzaga 14y ago
Because it isn't, science is a strict term... this is a challenge for psychology/psychiatry and neuroscience(best hopes) as whole and it's not one or two weirdo proposing it... it's being thrown in it's face and begged for even by the people ~there~ itself. Of course there's good willing people there, but there's also the 'Big Pharma' issue, the 'lets put 4 year olds on drugs' issue, a past of it being used to reinforce biases(against homosexuals, for slavery, as argument to lock state-enemies in Russia, Nazi Germany). Also, normally when it's scientifically proven isn't it like "done, next question" and then they actually answer the question? They didn't got there yet it seems. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenhan_experiment Disclosure: Yes, I know there's situations so extreme need 'anything that helps', I've seen it in my family. With me, a bipolar 'diagnosis' and drug prescription got me 4 seizures that could have brought lasting damage, even as the dosage, the psychiatrist later confessed under my pressure, was already multiple times lower than what was considered the minimum, but he wouldn't admit having any responsibility for it, which led me to doing my own research and finding documented cases of seizures and even deaths as consequence. Anyway, gave the FU(metaphorically) to this, kept reading, making sure it was informed/not-in-denial, 3 years, not a problem, but I still have to hear about how I can't swim, box or "shouldn't even drive", this sort of stuff.