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The DSM ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manual_of_Mental_Disorders http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manu... ) w

The DSM ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manual_of_Mental_Disorders http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manu... ) was created by the psychiatric profession and psychiatry is quite different than the field of psychology. Disclaimer: I have a B.S. in psychology (and a B.S. in Computer Engineering) so I'm probably biased. But I do agree the DSM is useless. I think psychiatry is a reductionist framework that tries to mechanize everything about a person, treating them like a engineering problem. But it is only useful in limited circumstances, much less than it claims, and from that follows all the controversy around anti-depressants, the overuse of powerful psychiatric drugs in children, etc. To use a bad analogy, thinking everything can be viewed through a psychiatric framework is like trying to debug software errors by analyzing each of the individual chips of the motherboard. People are a lot more complex than that, and so psychology is the more appropriate framework to handle this fuzziness. Psychiatry is only useful when the person's biology is definitely out of spec and most people's aren't.

nzp 13y ago
> Disclaimer: I have a B.S. in psychology (and a B.S. in Computer Engineering) so I'm probably biased. You're not biased, and that shouldn't be a disclaimer. You just know what you're talking about. ;)
lutusp 13y ago
< The DSM ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manu.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manu.... ) was created by the psychiatric profession and psychiatry is quite different than the field of psychology. Not really. Psychiatrists and psychologists receive the same psychological training. Psychiatrists hold a medical degree, psychologists don't. Psychiatrists can prescribe drugs, psychologists cannot. In a nutshell. > Psychiatry is only useful when the person's biology is definitely out of spec and most people's aren't. Wait, what? If a person's biology is out of spec, a mental doctor is the wrong choice. The mind is not part of biology, but biology can certainly play havoc with the workings of the mind. Therefore if a biological problem is suspected, one would want to consult a real doctor, a practitioner in the biological realm. Treating a biological problem with mental therapy would be like giving a cancer patient a more comfortable pillow -- someone will surely argue that it's beneficial, but it's equally obvious that it's missing the point. Also, surely you have noticed that more and more "mental" conditions have turned out to be physical ailments with mental symptoms, yes? There will be more of those, and I predict that, in the final analysis, no purely mental illnesses will remain.

nzp 13y ago

> Disclaimer: I have a B.S. in psychology (and a B.S. in Computer Engineering) so I'm probably biased. You're not biased, and that shouldn't be a disclaimer. You just know what you're talking about. ;)

lutusp 13y ago

< The DSM ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manu.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manu.... ) was created by the psychiatric profession and psychiatry is quite different than the field of psychology. Not really. Psychiatrists and psychologists receive the same psychological training. Psychiatrists hold a medical degree, psychologists don't. Psychiatrists can prescribe drugs, psychologists cannot. In a nutshell. > Psychiatry is only useful when the person's biology is definitely out of spec and most people's aren't. Wait, what? If a person's biology is out of spec, a mental doctor is the wrong choice. The mind is not part of biology, but biology can certainly play havoc with the workings of the mind. Therefore if a biological problem is suspected, one would want to consult a real doctor, a practitioner in the biological realm. Treating a biological problem with mental therapy would be like giving a cancer patient a more comfortable pillow -- someone will surely argue that it's beneficial, but it's equally obvious that it's missing the point. Also, surely you have noticed that more and more "mental" conditions have turned out to be physical ailments with mental symptoms, yes? There will be more of those, and I predict that, in the final analysis, no purely mental illnesses will remain.