Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry • Hacker News Board

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#11

Post by droithomme » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 10:08 PM UTC

OP, please conform with HN rules by providing a workaround to the paywall. If there is no workaround, the pay-walled article is not permitted here, per the rules. Thank you.

edit: I see this was downvoted. Interesting.

October 3 2019 HN rules: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:40QUas...

> Are paywalls ok?

> It's ok to post stories from sites with paywalls that have workarounds.

> In comments, it's ok to ask how to read an article and to help other users do so. But please don't post complaints about paywalls. Those are off topic.

October 10 2019 HN rules:

Paywall rule has been removed. Paywalled articles with no workarounds are now OK. Pay up or get out.

Thank you for the correction and the tip about the new rules changes implemented this week.

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#12

Post by droithomme » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 10:11 PM UTC

gerbilly wrote: post #4

bitwize wrote: post #2

Freud dealt with the realm of ideas. As much as he got wrong, his approach of dealing with the ideas in one's mind on their own terms, and finding and sussing out the bad ideas to be replaced with good ideas did , eventually, yield beneficial results -- like the big wins of cognitive behavioral therapy.

I don't agree that it was mostly about ideas, Freud's main insight was to deduce the existence of the subconscious mind: i.e. the idea that we don't have direct access to our entire inner world. It was a big departure from the way the mind was conceived till then.

Is current consensus that this "subconscious mind" is an actual thing that exists?

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#13

Post by Mathnerd314 » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 10:19 PM UTC

droithomme wrote: post #11

OP, please conform with HN rules by providing a workaround to the paywall. If there is no workaround, the pay-walled article is not permitted here, per the rules. Thank you. edit: I see this was downvoted. Interesting. October 3 2019 HN rules: https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:40QUas... > Are paywalls ok? > It's ok to post stories from sites with paywalls that have workarounds. > In comments, it's…

This works for me in Firefox's console:

  $('.body-copy')[0].innerHTML = JSON.parse($$('script[type="application/ld+json"]')[0].firstChild.data).description

And I still see the paywall rule in the FAQ.

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#14

Post by nabdab » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 10:24 PM UTC

droithomme wrote: post #12

gerbilly wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree that it was mostly about ideas, Freud's main insight was to deduce the existence of the subconscious mind: i.e. the idea that we don't have direct access to our entire inner world. It was a big departure from the way the mind was conceived till then.

Is current consensus that this "subconscious mind" is an actual thing that exists?

No. Nothing of Freuds is actually testable. He asserts that there is a “conscious mind” and “subconscious mind” but only in concept.

You might as well try to build an alternative theory of mechanics based on an assertion that all objects have a conscious and subconscious mass, and that gravity actually act on the subconcious mass and only moves the whole because the two are interconnected.

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#15

Post by yomly » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 10:28 PM UTC

SolaceQuantum wrote: post #5

"Advances in genetics, neuroscience and psychopharmacology all at once reminded psychiatrists that biology ruled, that talk could be dispensed with, and a truly medical psychiatry could finally emerge" I don't know if this is true for a good chunk of mental illnesses, tbh. How does one use a purely biological model and treatment for PTSD, BPD, ASPD, etc?

We struggle to model individual proteins in full, and we think we can apply a comprehensive biological model to the mind?

I can say with confidence that the abstraction of chemistry in physiology is not watertight (is that a pun...?) and we still barely understand physiological chemistry in any kind of way that any self-respecting scientist could describe as rigorous.

The hubris of some people in their fields...

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#16

Post by dmix » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 10:42 PM UTC

yomly wrote: post #15

SolaceQuantum wrote: post #5

"Advances in genetics, neuroscience and psychopharmacology all at once reminded psychiatrists that biology ruled, that talk could be dispensed with, and a truly medical psychiatry could finally emerge" I don't know if this is true for a good chunk of mental illnesses, tbh. How does one use a purely biological model and treatment for PTSD, BPD, ASPD, etc?

We struggle to model individual proteins in full, and we think we can apply a comprehensive biological model to the mind? I can say with confidence that the abstraction of chemistry in physiology is not watertight (is that a pun...?) and we still barely understand physiological chemistry in any kind of way that any self-respecting scientist could describe as rigorous. The hubris of some people in their fields...

People build abstractions all the time on top of things they don’t think biochemistry is going to teach us much about IRL psychological issues.

Humans have excellent pattern matching, reasoning, and lots of research into the subject. I do believe there is value in doing it.

That said, I’m highly skeptical of a lot of talk therapy, beyond the simple gains of saying things out loud to a 3rd party and challenging your mind and assumptions.

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#17

Post by chrisweekly » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 10:47 PM UTC

droithomme wrote: post #12

gerbilly wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree that it was mostly about ideas, Freud's main insight was to deduce the existence of the subconscious mind: i.e. the idea that we don't have direct access to our entire inner world. It was a big departure from the way the mind was conceived till then.

Is current consensus that this "subconscious mind" is an actual thing that exists?

No citations handy, but there is definitely consensus that the subconscious exists.

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#18

Post by SubiculumCode » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 11:03 PM UTC

pmichaud wrote: post #9

I didn't pay the $27.95 to read this, but the abstract is alarmingly wrong. The analogous thinking is that software bugs, in particular data storage errors[1], are best understood as hardware malfunctions, and that precise interventions at the hardware level can solve them. It's not exactly wrong--for any given software issue, you might be able to devise hardware changes that correct it. But. I feel like I don't need…

I've never been convinced that the software-hardware analogy is especially enlightening when it comes to the brain and the mind, in my informed opinion.

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#19

Post by naringas » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 11:09 PM UTC

SubiculumCode wrote: post #18

pmichaud wrote: post #9

I didn't pay the $27.95 to read this, but the abstract is alarmingly wrong. The analogous thinking is that software bugs, in particular data storage errors[1], are best understood as hardware malfunctions, and that precise interventions at the hardware level can solve them. It's not exactly wrong--for any given software issue, you might be able to devise hardware changes that correct it. But. I feel like I don't need…

I've never been convinced that the software-hardware analogy is especially enlightening when it comes to the brain and the mind, in my informed opinion.

at one point I decided to disagree with the idea that the mind is just the brain.

Re: Scientific wasteland: recent problems with psychiatry

#20

Post by didericis » Thu, Oct 10, 2019, 11:12 PM UTC

nabdab wrote: post #14

droithomme wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is current consensus that this "subconscious mind" is an actual thing that exists?

No. Nothing of Freuds is actually testable. He asserts that there is a “conscious mind” and “subconscious mind” but only in concept. You might as well try to build an alternative theory of mechanics based on an assertion that all objects have a conscious and subconscious mass, and that gravity actually act on the subconcious mass and only moves the whole because the two are interconnected.

This seems to be the crux of all of the scientific issues with psychiatry and studies of personal and social behavior more broadly. Strict definitions of what is being measured and ways to go about measuring those things without administrator or self reporting bias don’t seem to exist, or at least they don’t seem to be employed that often.

There are clever ways to get around those issues and tie theories about behavior to observed action in the real world, and there are a number of psychological theories that come up with a plausible sounding evolutionary history to certain thoughts and behavior that seem correct, but a lack of good measurement instruments seems to be a very big problem preventing more concrete answers to a lot of different questions about the mind. When talking about things other than motor or perceptual related studies of the mind (bionics related stuff), the most common measurement tool seems to be self reported surveys, and although I think there are tricks you can do when wording questions and statistically analyzing results to try to account for patients trying to answer in ways they feel like they should that aren’t necessarily accurate/make sure people don’t misinterpret questions, that whole way of investigating claims seems to be very very shaky.

It’s a common complaint about the field, and I’m sure a lot of psychologists and psychiatrists are sick of hearing it, but I haven’t felt like I’ve ever gotten an adequate response about why it’s not a valid complaint.