Some comments from a reviewer recently I received for an effort criticizing both psychiatry and psychology for basically being fad driven:
"mind sciences are in such an early stage of development".
True in the sense they don't have a model, but that wasn't the point he was making. It sems every time they come up with new "fad/tool" they reset their development timeline as a science.
"The view of psychiatry is extremely biased and lacks intellectual generosity."
Maybe intellectual generosity has a academic meaning I am not aware of, but that one made me laugh.
1. Early stage science is correctly called protoscience. If you want to be generous, call it "scientific preliminaries," e.g. Linnaean nomenclature. Description is not science, it is a preliminary.
2. Not a question of whether the view is "biased" but whether it is correct. See Shaw: "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. All progress, therefore, depends on the unreasonable man" (Maxims for Revolutionists, No. 124) Vive l'homme déraisonnable
3. I'm glad you laughed, I would have punched his head in.
Anxiety is easily the root of most mental problems. Experiencing a major panic attack is scary (Tautology, surely?).. even with years of meditation under the belt, and considerable experience in LSD use when younger (What doesn't kill you makes you stronger etc etc).
The fear of fear becomes a self-loop, and to my knowledge never ends of its own accord.
"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."
Mesmer on the other hand brought a lot of old 'magickal' knowledge out there, I have no idea if he had contact with the occult lodges or their works, but the teachings that became "Hypnosis" had been carefully locked away by the totalitarian Christian dictatorship for a millennia, so they could bamboozle the illiterate peasants with the stained glass windows, hypnotic chants, and bully-pulpit.
The absolute genius Wilhelm Reich took Mesmer's ideas and put some serious flesh on them, enough that the fascist state USA arrested him, and ordered ALL copies of his books burned.
It was unfortunate for Mesmer to live in "Christian" Europe, had he instead been raised in the more intelligent far-east, he would have learned the energy he was feeling was called "Chi", is very very real, and can be manipulated by anyone willing to put the time and effort in, and this wasn't some novel breakthrough.
Most Westerners today call it "Force", because of where they learned it from.
Needless to say, uptight Victorian morality was destroying people left and right, because normal people couldn't live up to it - and it was the Victorians who gifted us 'Homo Economus', the completely rational consumer who has only ever existed in textbooks.
At the same time, at least in the UK, the Victorian also left us with plenty of free public toilets
(Until the Thatcherites saw "entrepreneurs" could turn them into cafes instead), and sewer systems.
So, swings and roundabouts.
But enough about them, how will we save vulnerable people from these narcotic-pushing charlatans?
You acknowledge that the troubled person has a sincere belief: that they are ill. Many psychiatrists who diagnose and treat them also have a sincere belief: that they are guided by science; it is what they learned in their training, often from eminent professors. Carolyn
Patients sincerely believe something is wrong. Whether they believe it is illness or something else is beside the point of their awareness that all is not right with them and they need somebody to do something about it because their efforts are going nowhere, and Aunty Aggie's advice didn't work.
Question of whether psychiatrists sincerely believe they are guided by science is the wrong question. Mesmer sincerely believed in his theory of cosmic fluid but it wasn't enough to prove his case. The question for psychiatrists is this: Is your belief justified?
Cambridge economist Joan Robinson, often known as "Red Joan" because of her marxist leanings, said: "Progress is slow partly from mere intellectual inertia. In a subject where there is no agreed procedure for knocking out errors, doctrines have a long life. A professor teaches what he was taught, and his pupils, with a proper respect and reverence for teachers, set up a resistance against his critics for no other reason than that it was he whose pupils they were."
She also reputedly said: "The purpose of studying theory in economics is to avoid being deceived by economists," although I can't find the original. That's true of psychiatry.
Psychiatrists are not, however, mere conspirators. They are not lacking intelligence; rather, theirs is the conspiracy of the insipid, a reluctance to look beyond the obvious for fear it may disturb their shared complacency. For example, all the psychiatrists (including the entire upper echelons of the RANZCP) who endorse the "biopsychosocial model" have had half a century to ask "Can somebody give me a copy of this model, I have to admit I've never actually seen it." Then they would realise it doesn't exist and, by endorsing it on its website, the RANZCP is acting fraudulently. But if you point that out, you are being unreasonable and must be ostracised.
In science, there is indeed an "agreed procedure for knocking out errors," it's called a self-critical attitude. Carl Sagan said:
“...at the heart of science is an essential balance between two seemingly contradictory attitudes – an openness to new ideas, no matter how bizarre or counterintuitive, and the most ruthlessly sceptical scrutiny of all ideas, old and new. This is how deep truths are winnowed from deep nonsense.”
Like the virtues of poverty and humility, a self-critical attitude is not catching on as it lacks intrinsic appeal. We soldier on.
ARE they so "sincere", Carolyn? How many of those psychiatrists would spend their OWN money on these "cures" for their patients?
A simple test would suffice: the psychiatrists are given their annual budget for the office in toto at the beginning of the year. They can spend on these cures, or they can keep the money.
In your honest opinion, would the prescription rate go up or down?
Perhaps. But I've yet to meet any actual scientists in any other field who could view their results, and say that a 1-5% success rate *AT BEST* validated their models and hypotheses.
Imagine going to buy a car, and the manufacturer states that "Due to our rigorous scientific approach, there is a one-to-five% chance that it will actually drive anywhere, and not explode on the spot".
I hate to say it, but even Musk is more actually "scientific" than the entire psychiatric profession. Although it's a close call re Tesla.
Any REAL scientist would look at the outcomes, which as Niall has stated in previous essays approach statistical meaninglessness as the natural rate of
healing is actually higher than what the "profession" of psychiatry even claim for themselves!
Perhaps there are indeed some highly-self-deluded psychiatrists, who watch the troop of people coming in with mild symptoms, and leave with terrible addictions and a melting body and mind, and conclude that they are doing good. People can believe anything when it leads to free golfing holiday rewards for pushing harmful addictive drugs onto highly vulnerable and confused people.
There have been natural experiments in the past. In Norway, ECT is only given in government hospitals and there is normally an 8 week wait. By international standards, they use very little, a tiny fraction of Australia's, where it is believed to be "essential, irreplaceable, life-saving," etc. but in reality, simply makes a lot of money.
Similarly, in West Australia in late 1980s, rates of prescription of stimulants for minors were low, then suddenly started to rise. Adding to it, a new psychiatrist had moved to Perth and in one year, started 2,000 people on these drugs. This alarmed the government which had to pay for the drugs so they imposed a new rule where each prescription required the psychiatrist to call the Health Dept for an individual authorisation. The rates plummeted and remained low for years until the ADHD lobby managed to get that regulation lifted.
The central problem is that there is so much flexibility built into the diagnostic and therapeutic systems that psychiatrists can always justify whatever they do. This is a typical feature of pseudosciences.
But most `pseudosciences fade quickly - this one is being funded to the tune of colossal amounts by both state and private funding.
Apart from the propensity of many to enjoy the suffering of others, what actual plan could be behind these sadistic biochemical experiments on vulnerable people who have no recourse?
It's no secret that the Nazi scientists of WW2 were given high positions in the West post-war, including the "medical" experiments, and that attitude to the "worthless insane" was not restricted to Nazi Germany before the war either.
Nor is it anymore a secret that the wealthy and powerful in the West would love to have a population of willing, happy slaves, who can watch atrocities live-screened and feel... nothing.
Or take a pill, if all that screaming and mangled babies and pregnant mothers made you depressed.
Perhaps there's a real aim behind all this experimentation, and it's not what is claimed. Which is why the funding never dries up on this pseudoscience.
Some comments from a reviewer recently I received for an effort criticizing both psychiatry and psychology for basically being fad driven:
"mind sciences are in such an early stage of development".
True in the sense they don't have a model, but that wasn't the point he was making. It sems every time they come up with new "fad/tool" they reset their development timeline as a science.
"The view of psychiatry is extremely biased and lacks intellectual generosity."
Maybe intellectual generosity has a academic meaning I am not aware of, but that one made me laugh.
1. Early stage science is correctly called protoscience. If you want to be generous, call it "scientific preliminaries," e.g. Linnaean nomenclature. Description is not science, it is a preliminary.
2. Not a question of whether the view is "biased" but whether it is correct. See Shaw: "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. All progress, therefore, depends on the unreasonable man" (Maxims for Revolutionists, No. 124) Vive l'homme déraisonnable
3. I'm glad you laughed, I would have punched his head in.
Anxiety is easily the root of most mental problems. Experiencing a major panic attack is scary (Tautology, surely?).. even with years of meditation under the belt, and considerable experience in LSD use when younger (What doesn't kill you makes you stronger etc etc).
The fear of fear becomes a self-loop, and to my knowledge never ends of its own accord.
"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."
Mesmer on the other hand brought a lot of old 'magickal' knowledge out there, I have no idea if he had contact with the occult lodges or their works, but the teachings that became "Hypnosis" had been carefully locked away by the totalitarian Christian dictatorship for a millennia, so they could bamboozle the illiterate peasants with the stained glass windows, hypnotic chants, and bully-pulpit.
The absolute genius Wilhelm Reich took Mesmer's ideas and put some serious flesh on them, enough that the fascist state USA arrested him, and ordered ALL copies of his books burned.
It was unfortunate for Mesmer to live in "Christian" Europe, had he instead been raised in the more intelligent far-east, he would have learned the energy he was feeling was called "Chi", is very very real, and can be manipulated by anyone willing to put the time and effort in, and this wasn't some novel breakthrough.
Most Westerners today call it "Force", because of where they learned it from.
Needless to say, uptight Victorian morality was destroying people left and right, because normal people couldn't live up to it - and it was the Victorians who gifted us 'Homo Economus', the completely rational consumer who has only ever existed in textbooks.
At the same time, at least in the UK, the Victorian also left us with plenty of free public toilets
(Until the Thatcherites saw "entrepreneurs" could turn them into cafes instead), and sewer systems.
So, swings and roundabouts.
But enough about them, how will we save vulnerable people from these narcotic-pushing charlatans?
You acknowledge that the troubled person has a sincere belief: that they are ill. Many psychiatrists who diagnose and treat them also have a sincere belief: that they are guided by science; it is what they learned in their training, often from eminent professors. Carolyn
Patients sincerely believe something is wrong. Whether they believe it is illness or something else is beside the point of their awareness that all is not right with them and they need somebody to do something about it because their efforts are going nowhere, and Aunty Aggie's advice didn't work.
Question of whether psychiatrists sincerely believe they are guided by science is the wrong question. Mesmer sincerely believed in his theory of cosmic fluid but it wasn't enough to prove his case. The question for psychiatrists is this: Is your belief justified?
Cambridge economist Joan Robinson, often known as "Red Joan" because of her marxist leanings, said: "Progress is slow partly from mere intellectual inertia. In a subject where there is no agreed procedure for knocking out errors, doctrines have a long life. A professor teaches what he was taught, and his pupils, with a proper respect and reverence for teachers, set up a resistance against his critics for no other reason than that it was he whose pupils they were."
She also reputedly said: "The purpose of studying theory in economics is to avoid being deceived by economists," although I can't find the original. That's true of psychiatry.
Psychiatrists are not, however, mere conspirators. They are not lacking intelligence; rather, theirs is the conspiracy of the insipid, a reluctance to look beyond the obvious for fear it may disturb their shared complacency. For example, all the psychiatrists (including the entire upper echelons of the RANZCP) who endorse the "biopsychosocial model" have had half a century to ask "Can somebody give me a copy of this model, I have to admit I've never actually seen it." Then they would realise it doesn't exist and, by endorsing it on its website, the RANZCP is acting fraudulently. But if you point that out, you are being unreasonable and must be ostracised.
In science, there is indeed an "agreed procedure for knocking out errors," it's called a self-critical attitude. Carl Sagan said:
“...at the heart of science is an essential balance between two seemingly contradictory attitudes – an openness to new ideas, no matter how bizarre or counterintuitive, and the most ruthlessly sceptical scrutiny of all ideas, old and new. This is how deep truths are winnowed from deep nonsense.”
Like the virtues of poverty and humility, a self-critical attitude is not catching on as it lacks intrinsic appeal. We soldier on.
ARE they so "sincere", Carolyn? How many of those psychiatrists would spend their OWN money on these "cures" for their patients?
A simple test would suffice: the psychiatrists are given their annual budget for the office in toto at the beginning of the year. They can spend on these cures, or they can keep the money.
In your honest opinion, would the prescription rate go up or down?
With the sort of psychiatrists I am referring to, those who have a sincere belief in the 'science' of psychiatry, probably it would stay the same.
Perhaps. But I've yet to meet any actual scientists in any other field who could view their results, and say that a 1-5% success rate *AT BEST* validated their models and hypotheses.
Imagine going to buy a car, and the manufacturer states that "Due to our rigorous scientific approach, there is a one-to-five% chance that it will actually drive anywhere, and not explode on the spot".
I hate to say it, but even Musk is more actually "scientific" than the entire psychiatric profession. Although it's a close call re Tesla.
Any REAL scientist would look at the outcomes, which as Niall has stated in previous essays approach statistical meaninglessness as the natural rate of
healing is actually higher than what the "profession" of psychiatry even claim for themselves!
Perhaps there are indeed some highly-self-deluded psychiatrists, who watch the troop of people coming in with mild symptoms, and leave with terrible addictions and a melting body and mind, and conclude that they are doing good. People can believe anything when it leads to free golfing holiday rewards for pushing harmful addictive drugs onto highly vulnerable and confused people.
There have been natural experiments in the past. In Norway, ECT is only given in government hospitals and there is normally an 8 week wait. By international standards, they use very little, a tiny fraction of Australia's, where it is believed to be "essential, irreplaceable, life-saving," etc. but in reality, simply makes a lot of money.
Similarly, in West Australia in late 1980s, rates of prescription of stimulants for minors were low, then suddenly started to rise. Adding to it, a new psychiatrist had moved to Perth and in one year, started 2,000 people on these drugs. This alarmed the government which had to pay for the drugs so they imposed a new rule where each prescription required the psychiatrist to call the Health Dept for an individual authorisation. The rates plummeted and remained low for years until the ADHD lobby managed to get that regulation lifted.
The central problem is that there is so much flexibility built into the diagnostic and therapeutic systems that psychiatrists can always justify whatever they do. This is a typical feature of pseudosciences.
But most `pseudosciences fade quickly - this one is being funded to the tune of colossal amounts by both state and private funding.
Apart from the propensity of many to enjoy the suffering of others, what actual plan could be behind these sadistic biochemical experiments on vulnerable people who have no recourse?
It's no secret that the Nazi scientists of WW2 were given high positions in the West post-war, including the "medical" experiments, and that attitude to the "worthless insane" was not restricted to Nazi Germany before the war either.
Nor is it anymore a secret that the wealthy and powerful in the West would love to have a population of willing, happy slaves, who can watch atrocities live-screened and feel... nothing.
Or take a pill, if all that screaming and mangled babies and pregnant mothers made you depressed.
Perhaps there's a real aim behind all this experimentation, and it's not what is claimed. Which is why the funding never dries up on this pseudoscience.
Thanks for the food for thought. My mind will be chewing on this for an entire week. :-)
You're getting value for money then.
Yeah, im saving up so I can buy one of your books, maybe two if shipping isnt killing me.
Tell your local library to get a copy on interlibrary loan, start with Theories in Psychiatry from a year or two ago, then Natural Dualism.
Thats indeed a good one.
Im going to search the titles on the library websites.
If enough people search for you then it should also show up in their search stats..
;-) that's a hint for other Dutch people to help along.
...
Im now heading to their website, tomorrow I'll go to the actual library and request it