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The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

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Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#21

Post by jschwartzi »

phkahler wrote: post #19
jorgec wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

psychotherapy is less than 10% effective. In fact, its almost no science.

And when it goes wrong the practitioner will lie in your medical records to cover it up. When it goes even more wrong and the person is dead they'll just say "s(he) had serious issues". Having said that, I've seen it do wonders for some people.

It worked really well for me, but I probably wasn't as mentally ill as a lot of people who would seek psychotherapy. Either that or my therapist was just really good or we had a good working relationship.

Trying to act on how I feel continues to be the hardest thing I have ever had to do.

Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#22

Post by pdkl95 »

> Overall, the researchers claim, eliminating depression and anxiety would reduce misery by 20%, whereas eliminating poverty would reduce it by just 5%.

Why are these framed as independent factors? For many people the lack of financial stability is a primary source of depression and anxiety. When you truly don't know how your are going to afford next week's food/medication/rent, survival instinct kick in causing anxiety and huge mental burden that can make it difficult to focus on anything else.

One of the easier ways to fix a large amount of depression and anxiety is financial stability.

> If your neighbor becomes richer, you feel poorer.

While, I completely support increased funding to mental health services for everyone, as someone trying to figure out how to pay for a new $100/month insulin prescription with a laughably tiny disability check and a medicare "donut hole", this is pretty offensive. Feeling bad because you can't keep up with the consumerism rat race isn't "misery".

Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#24

Post by x3n0ph3n3 »

pdkl95 wrote: post #22

> Overall, the researchers claim, eliminating depression and anxiety would reduce misery by 20%, whereas eliminating poverty would reduce it by just 5%. Why are these framed as independent factors? For many people the lack of financial stability is a primary source of depression and anxiety. When you truly don't know how your are going to afford next week's food/medication/rent, survival instinct kick in causing anxi…

> Why are these framed as independent factors?

Because people have lived in poverty for thousands of years without debilitating depression and anxiety.

Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#25

Post by jschwartzi »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #20
pacaro wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would see it as less a false dichotomy than just recognizing that these issues are not always orthogonal.

I don't really understand that use of the word orthogonal. But for clarity's sake: I have read about issues like poverty for decades. In any given year, about 10 to 15 percent of Americans are below the federal poverty level. But only about 2 percent of Americans are chronically poor. This is typically defined as below the federal poverty level for at least 5 years out of 10. In fact, I have even seen stats that sugg…

> I don't really understand that use of the word orthogonal.

You can imagine a two-dimensional graph with the quantity "intractable personal issues" on one axis and "chronically poor" on the other. But when the level of chronic poorness varies, sometimes the level of intractable personal issues varies as well, leading to the motion of the quantity along both axes at the same time.

That is moving the measurement in one dimension sometimes results in its motion in the other dimension, so there is no way to move completely orthogonally(perpendicularly) to one axis. This is what is meant by "not completely orthogonal."

Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#26

Post by jschwartzi »

chris_wot wrote: post #3

Mental Health for those in crisis is fucked. If you feel suicidal, you get locked up. It’s as simple as that.

Well, not necessarily. About 6 years ago I checked myself into the ER in crisis and was released 4 hours later because I had checked myself into the ER.

Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#27

Post by DoreenMichele »

jschwartzi wrote: post #25
DoreenMichele wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't really understand that use of the word orthogonal. But for clarity's sake: I have read about issues like poverty for decades. In any given year, about 10 to 15 percent of Americans are below the federal poverty level. But only about 2 percent of Americans are chronically poor. This is typically defined as below the federal poverty level for at least 5 years out of 10. In fact, I have even seen stats that sugg…

> I don't really understand that use of the word orthogonal. You can imagine a two-dimensional graph with the quantity "intractable personal issues" on one axis and "chronically poor" on the other. But when the level of chronic poorness varies, sometimes the level of intractable personal issues varies as well, leading to the motion of the quantity along both axes at the same time. That is moving the measurement in on…

Thanks. One of the great mysteries of HN may have just been solved for me.

Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#28

Post by Raphmedia »

x3n0ph3n3 wrote: post #24
pdkl95 wrote: post #22

> Overall, the researchers claim, eliminating depression and anxiety would reduce misery by 20%, whereas eliminating poverty would reduce it by just 5%. Why are these framed as independent factors? For many people the lack of financial stability is a primary source of depression and anxiety. When you truly don't know how your are going to afford next week's food/medication/rent, survival instinct kick in causing anxi…

> Why are these framed as independent factors? Because people have lived in poverty for thousands of years without debilitating depression and anxiety.

One can live in poverty without living in misery.

Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#29

Post by lhuser123 »

aaavl2821 wrote: post #9
jes wrote: post #4

I am hopeful that we will soon see AI-based psychotherapy available at scale at a price such that anyone who wants it will be able to get it. I can imagine that it would be more or less like having a telephone conversation with a real therapist, except in this case the therapist is an AI application running in a datacenter. I think we will see something like this in the next five to ten years. Thoughts?

It would be great if that were possible, but a lot of the value of therapy comes from the therapeutic relationship rather than a specific type of therapy. Most types of psychotherapy tend to have the same level of effect in studies, suggesting there is no "recipe" for the type of therapy that works. This phenomenon also suggests (but does not prove) that the human relationship, rather than therapeutic program, accoun…

I think it would be helpful in a different way. To put it simple, it would give people in suffering, more time to talk.

I don’t think it can replace the human relationship, but it could act as helper, a listener, or something between the patient and the therapist. It could listen for hours very cheap, provide feedback, replay things previously said by the patient helping in auto reflection, create a report for the therapist, etc.

Yes, we do need the therapeutic relationship, but for most that is too expensive. Take for example someone that can only afford 2 therapies a month. That’s simply not enough in times of crisis, when the thoughts in your head can be compared with a bull stampede.

Re: The Moral Urgency of Mental Health

#30

Post by theoh »

aaavl2821 wrote: post #9
jes wrote: post #4

I am hopeful that we will soon see AI-based psychotherapy available at scale at a price such that anyone who wants it will be able to get it. I can imagine that it would be more or less like having a telephone conversation with a real therapist, except in this case the therapist is an AI application running in a datacenter. I think we will see something like this in the next five to ten years. Thoughts?

It would be great if that were possible, but a lot of the value of therapy comes from the therapeutic relationship rather than a specific type of therapy. Most types of psychotherapy tend to have the same level of effect in studies, suggesting there is no "recipe" for the type of therapy that works. This phenomenon also suggests (but does not prove) that the human relationship, rather than therapeutic program, accoun…

This seems like a case where you have downgraded the meaning of "AI" to match its current commercial connotations. A relationship with an AGI >= a relationship with a human, at least in intellectual terms.

The big hope, that AFAIK we have not abandoned, is that AGIs will be able to walk into a messy human situation, diagnose exactly what the dynamics are, and recommend the optimal thing to do to fix things. This could happen via an ELIZA-like interface or through a broader perceptual engagement. The point, though, as the GP suggested, is that AGI could quickly learn to far exceed the perceptiveness and skill of a human therapist, and do so on an inconceivable scale.

It's the idea of developing an "ecology of mind", as Gregory Bateson put it. To be able to diagnose quickly and accurately disorders (individual and collective) that currently require lucky individual insights and experience to identify.

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