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The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

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Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#61

Post by mtlmtlmtlmtl »

matrix87 wrote: post #47
0xcde4c3db wrote: post #9

Frances's concerns definitely aren't wrong on the whole, but I feel like he's not seeing the forest for the trees. This ultimately isn't just a question of whether this or that DSM revision is helpful. The patterns of the mental health establishment of the 21st century are oddly reminiscent of where physics and chemistry stood ca. the mid-19th century. Legitimate advances are being made, but most of the tools are sti…

> Legitimate advances are being made Like what? Realizing that lobotomies aren't a legitimate treatment?

No, like the Bergen 4 day treatment which is continuing to show highly promising results against severe anxiety disorders.

The use of psychedelics and ketamine for treatment of ptsd and depression respectively are also very promising.

There are advances being made in the treatment of psychotic disorders both on therapy side and on the medication side, with less harmful antipsychotics in development. And the need for chronic antipsychotic treatment(which is quite harmful in many ways) being questioned more and more.

You might wanna do some research before implying the field hasn't moved at all in the last 50 years...

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#62

Post by weweersdfsd »

deanresin wrote: post #13
triumphblr wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, psychology is a dying profession. A mental illness is described as a set of symptoms manifested from physical biological systems we don't fully understand yet. But once understood, psychology becomes obsolete. That's a fundamentally reductionist perspective and assumes everything is biological in its etiology? For example, you could say we don't need a justice system once we have the biology worked out, or ar…

If you understand the systems that manifest a mental illness then you can treat it more directly with medicine, you can test for the mental illness directly with physical sampling. We've already seen this shift from psychology to medicine with the invention of anti-depressants. Less people are seeking counsel from psychologists and instead just getting a prescription from their doctor. While the systems and even anti…

I haven't seen such a shift at all. My country has a record shortage of psychologists, and mental health epidemics, particularly in the young. Antidepressants kind of suck too, major side effects and often barely better than placebo in studies.

I think it's questionable to treat something like depression with medicine without even fully understanding what causes depression, and how the medicine works. Of course it's the least bad option for some cases, but for many milder cases therapy, or even physical exercise, is likely to be a safer, and quite possibly just as efficient option. It's just not as profitable and easy to prescribe as SSRI's.

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#63

Post by faeriechangling »

matrix87 wrote: post #53

It's kind of strange that psychology has this dual role of both giving advice to the sane and managing the insane. The same division was a thing in psychoanalysis too with neurotics vs psychotics Why does it do both? Why do people use it as a go-to source for life advice? People will go to a psychologist for marriage troubles, and they'll also go to a psychologist for psychosis. Seems like a weird place to go to marr…

I look at this from the other direction and find psychology's obsession and fixation on trying to discover what is wrong with their patients and labelling them to be an uncalled for and likely harmful.

I feel the idea that a psychologist should make your life better regardless of how healthy you are to be the normal, obvious idea. It's the compulsive pathologization that is truly bizarre. Why is that helping them?

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#64

Post by geraldhh »

worthless-trash wrote: post #57
gverrilla wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is exactly the role religions used to play - more so in the past, yes, but still pretty much in scene today still, although perhaps weaker - so this answer your question: > Why does it do both? Demand. For what? For adaptation to the current metagame. While writing this reply, I remembered a few passages from a great thinker, that I think may contribute and expand the conversation, for those interested: "Art, ethi…

I'm not sure if its my internal bias, but I'm reading that as the way to prevent the slow slip into insanity is violence with an intent to change the world. The funny part is there may be truth to that.

though we monopolized physical violence and most of society runs on psychological warfare

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#65

Post by paganel »

p_j_w wrote: post #20
deanresin wrote: post #6

This conundrum reminds me of a thought experiment. You have people use a mental illness as a defense in courts of law. But could you not plausibly define anyone who commits major crimes to be mental ill? Mental illness could also be defined by a person's ability to function in their community and social constructs. But a healthy species, evolutionary speaking, requires these outliers. These deviations from the "norm"…

> Mental illness could also be defined by a person's ability to function in their community and social constructs. Are you suggesting rebelliousness and non-conformity should be considered mental illnesses, defects to be cured?

In a way, yes. That's why repressive governments here in Eastern Europe had started using psychology as a tool/weapon in order to institutionalise dissidents, because it was seen as a mental illness not to be on the same page as the predominant ideology back then.

I think a similar thing is starting happening in the West, even though (fortunately) not at the same scale just yet, meaning people who are seen as being against the system are already categorised by the powers that be as "deplorables" (to quote a recent US presidential candidate), i.e. one step way from those having a mental illness.

Later edit:

Something like this [1]

> Ken Stern, a former CEO of National Public Radio, in his new book Republican Like Me: How I Left the Liberal Bubble and Learned to Love the Right, explains that most of the media has been feeding America a negatively skewed view of Trump along with negative characterizations of the "deplorables," the people who hold more conservative viewpoints. Insistence that Trump is "mentally ill" can be regarded as part of this contemptuous discrediting of others whose beliefs differ from theirs.

[1] https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/resolution-not-confl...

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#66

Post by faeriechangling »

veltas wrote: post #56
crtified wrote: post #18

Is there any condition with as broad a definition as autism? It can cover anywhere from a non-verbal 9 year old with an IQ of 70, to a popular attractive valedictorian genius with incredible masking skills. A slow developing 3 year old labelled early and for life, or a perennial loner 80+ year old finally discovering that their traits are shared with many others.

But autism isn't defined by intelligence or age. You might as well say 'isn't alcoholism such a broad definition, when everyone from world leaders to young people to a perennial loner 80+ year old finally discovering that their traits are shared with many others.

The two extremes don't have the same traits in common whatsoever.

One will clearly be unable to communicate. The other will clearly communicate but allude to an internal torment. One will struggle with the activities of daily living. The other will have a family, a full time job, commitments in the community.

The two people supposedly lack the same abilities. In truth, Autism simply got tied up with entitlements and the diagnosis has been grossly abused as a lever to get access to said entitlements.

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#67

Post by faeriechangling »

0xcde4c3db wrote: post #10
triumphblr wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, psychology is a dying profession. A mental illness is described as a set of symptoms manifested from physical biological systems we don't fully understand yet. But once understood, psychology becomes obsolete. That's a fundamentally reductionist perspective and assumes everything is biological in its etiology? For example, you could say we don't need a justice system once we have the biology worked out, or ar…

The shape of that argument works equally well for unduly centering psychosocial mechanisms, though. That's how we got pseudoscientific garbage like the "refrigerator mother" theory of autism, the "anal retentive" theory of OCD, "tabula rasa" theories of social behavior, and so on. Maybe what I'm getting at is that double standards abound when it comes to mental illness, and it's fucking exhausting work to even attemp…

Regarding the refrigerator mother theory, autism as a diagnosis has expanded over 100x since that was first debunked and I have no idea why people have any confidence whatsoever that bad parenting cannot cause Autism. This was from a time before people as functional as "Rain Man" were the norm. Twin/Sibling studies were used to debunk this but twin studies don't totally control for shared environmental influences.

It seems more like a politically controversial thing than something which has been seriously scientifically examined either way. It can't be the smoking gun only cause but I see no actual evidence that it's impossible that parental neglect can't be a contributing cause. I will note that it is more politically convenient to simply blame a child's inherent defects instead of parental neglect, since the children relative to their parents lack political power.

I'll also point out that contemporary autism diagnosis relies on parent reports to establish a diagnosis, and people often only get diagnosed if a parent actively seeks out a diagnosis. Autism is also based on observation, if somebody was socially impaired due to neglect, how exactly would an examiner know the difference between that and somebody being socailly impaired due to say epigenetics? I would be rather surprised if who raised somebody doesn't have a rather large impact on if somebody will end up with an autism diagnosis. As in an especially well resourced and attentive parent might mean somebody who would be considered autistic might not be, and somebody who was overstretched and inattentive might have a child who would otherwise not be considered autistic be considered autistic.

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#68

Post by bruce343434 »

faeriechangling wrote: post #66
veltas wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But autism isn't defined by intelligence or age. You might as well say 'isn't alcoholism such a broad definition, when everyone from world leaders to young people to a perennial loner 80+ year old finally discovering that their traits are shared with many others.

The two extremes don't have the same traits in common whatsoever. One will clearly be unable to communicate. The other will clearly communicate but allude to an internal torment. One will struggle with the activities of daily living. The other will have a family, a full time job, commitments in the community. The two people supposedly lack the same abilities. In truth, Autism simply got tied up with entitlements and…

Entitlements? What are you talking about?

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#69

Post by [deleted] »

faeriechangling wrote: post #66
veltas wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But autism isn't defined by intelligence or age. You might as well say 'isn't alcoholism such a broad definition, when everyone from world leaders to young people to a perennial loner 80+ year old finally discovering that their traits are shared with many others.

The two extremes don't have the same traits in common whatsoever. One will clearly be unable to communicate. The other will clearly communicate but allude to an internal torment. One will struggle with the activities of daily living. The other will have a family, a full time job, commitments in the community. The two people supposedly lack the same abilities. In truth, Autism simply got tied up with entitlements and…

[deleted]

Re: The Battle to Define Mental Illness (2010)

#70

Post by emptyfile »

faeriechangling wrote: post #66
veltas wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But autism isn't defined by intelligence or age. You might as well say 'isn't alcoholism such a broad definition, when everyone from world leaders to young people to a perennial loner 80+ year old finally discovering that their traits are shared with many others.

The two extremes don't have the same traits in common whatsoever. One will clearly be unable to communicate. The other will clearly communicate but allude to an internal torment. One will struggle with the activities of daily living. The other will have a family, a full time job, commitments in the community. The two people supposedly lack the same abilities. In truth, Autism simply got tied up with entitlements and…

>Autism simply got tied up with entitlements and the diagnosis has been grossly abused as a lever to get access to said entitlements

I just love when narrowminded Americans (I would wager 1000$ that the poster is from that country) assume the thing that happens in their city/state/country is a worldwide phenomenon with the rest of us 8 billion people.

And even better writing in this snarky obfuscating style so the rest of us don't have a clue what they're talking about. Entitlements???

In my (EU) country talking about your mental issues is simply not done, let alone your actual diagnosis.

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