It had its value and I'm not ready to jettison the whole profession as a scam, or worse yet, a destructive, controlling cancer on our society. — Hanover

Isn't it strange. I entirely agree with you. I offer some criticism, I make some connections between psychology and psychiatry, but I have actually been confronted with an axe wielding schizophrenic, and I have no doubt whatsoever that something needed to be done quick smart. I say, along with the article from the op, that it is largely hubris for anyone to claim to know causes or cures, but I have a huge respect for folks who take on that problem and do their best. And getting rid of some of the hubris would I suggest result in more humane, more responsive, more personal, and probably better treatment. This would be especially so if one could discuss openly the limitations of a scientific approach to such things and the heavy influence of social conditions on both the patient and the therapist and their theories and practices.

M'kay.

You have two options, (hearing a third one would be great) To change these attributes and presumably, become the best version of yourself. Or, remain with the same set of these disliked attributes. — SethRy

Excuse the cliched example, but suppose I live in Germany during the third Reich. And a group of people - the Nazi Party - find my dislike of Hitler, and fondness for Jews deeply flawed and toxic.

Their opinions matter alright, and I am in danger and under strong pressure to conform. But that doesn't make them morally right. Sometimes it is right to oppose society, and defy the critics. And sometimes society has it right. But I suspect that most people are natural conformists, so if something urges you towards resisting 'the group' then it is worth taking such an urge towards separation seriously.

As Harrington ably documents, a series of fiascoes highlighted the profession’s continued inability to answer Clark Bell’s question. [*] Among them was the 1973 vote by the American Psychiatric Association declaring that homosexuality was no longer a mental illness. The obvious question—how scientific is a discipline that settles so momentous a problem at the ballot box?

[*]Exactly what mental illnesses can be said to exist?

...even as the DSM (now in its fifth edition) remains the backbone of clinical psychiatry—and becomes the everyday glossary of our psychic suffering—knowledge about the biology of the disorders it lists has proved so elusive that the head of the National Institute of Mental Health, in 2013, announced that it would be “re-orienting its research away from DSM categories.”

However, it is also irrelevant (i.e., off-topic). — Galuchat

Medicine is supposed to be science based, so one would not, I hope, claim that biochemistry is irrelevant. But as it is exactly the scientific base as opposed to the socio-political base that is in question, the science of psychology should certainly inform the practice of psychiatry. It seems very odd to suggest otherwise, and also historically untrue.

the value of psychiatric treatment is an empirical question, meaning we can look at the data to determine if the various treatments are effective. — Hanover

This is likewise nonsensical. One can devise an effective treatment for homosexuality, and be as empirical as an empire about it, but the successful treatment of something that is not an illness is bad medicine at best, and a serious violation of human rights if imposed against an individual's will as in the case of Alan Turing.

If the bottom line is that psychiatry is offering assistance to those seeking assistance, then psychiatry has the right to some degree of pride in doing what it's doing. — Hanover

But that isn't all psychiatry does. Alone of the branches of medicine, it frequently and systematically imposes treatment on those not seeking assistance against their expressed will.

Treatment that is for illnesses listed in the DSM that get voted on and off from time to time in a manner closer identified with social attitudes than any kind of science, and that even researchers have decided to more or less ignore.

Just like ambulance officers don't see it as their business to stop people driving so fast. — andrewk

And the medical profession doesn't campaign against smoking, over eating, poor sanitation, or poor air quality? I seem to remember a story of doctors stopping a cholera epidemic by removing the handle of a pump.

Such a statement is an insulting grab for the moral high ground and bears no relevance to anything that had been written earlier. — andrewk

A large part of my argument is precisely to deprive the profession of its automatic presumption of the moral high ground by showing as a matter of historical fact that they are not entitled to that presumption. And one of the disqualifying factors is just such personal attacks as you have mounted. You cannot dispute the facts, so you impugn my motives. And present fatuous suggestions that the emergency services should be speed cops. Yeah- I'm saying that, aren't I? C'mon man play the ball not the man!

Possibly one of the dumbest things the scientific community did was to allow businesses like Pharma to use science as a marketing tool, hide their data and then sell billions of dollars of drugs whose efficacy was exaggerated and risks were downplayed. — Chisholm

As I brought up earlier in a casual way, psychology is heavily implicated and has great impact and influence on the advertising industry, and it is no mistake.

To put it very simply, a contented person does not spend money. The way advertising works, therefore, is to make people discontented, to make them anxious about their body hair, or how clean their work surfaces are, or whether Johnny Foreigner is coming to steal their children, or all their friends are secretly laughing at them because they have last year's suit. Psychologists are very good at this, because when you treat people as objects in the name of objectivity, then you learn how to manipulate them like objects.

Psychologists set out to create the anxiety; psychiatrists try to cure the anxiety. This is no foolish mistake, but central to the functioning of capitalism and economic growth. This is why the profession does not protest and this is why mental health is deteriorating despite all the professionals working to improve it.

I wonder if you want to play in the world of possession? The Native American culture, as far as my little understanding reaches, has a strong sense of the people belonging to the land. It is perhaps somewhat alien to a culture in which the land belongs to people. There is something of the same sense in Scotland; one belongs to the clan and the clan belongs to the land, and the laird - well the clan belongs to the laird, and so does the land, but still somehow, the laird belongs to the land. In this sense possession is opposed to freedom.

Leo, that is an unfair question, of the type that no one can answer convincingly who has not lived through it. We know that it is very hard to resist social conformity though, and one can well look at the history of psychiatry, which has by turn pathologised race, as mentioned above, gender (see hysteria), and sexual orientation - seeing homosexuality as a mental illness. So without making it personal, one can see that the profession as a whole has a piss poor record in regard to such issues.

Look at the holocaust. Some went into severe depression but many pulled out of it sanity intact. Doesn't this mean that psychiatrists many not be completely wrong in their outlook that mental illness is a personal issue? — TheMadFool

Of course they are not completely wrong, or even half wrong. But at the same time they are not only completely factually wrong but completely morally wrong. Imagine the insult of rocking up to the concentration camp and offering pills or CBT to help the inmates "adapt". No, close the damn camps, food and freedom first, surely? And then we can talk about mitigating the effects of the trauma.

it gets to the point doesn't it? — TheMadFool

I think we can get even more to the point. Without dismantling mental health facilities or banning drug treatment there are many steps that can be taken to make societies less stressful and traumatic and more supportive and inclusive. For example 'Let the train take the strain' used to be a slogan; a really good public transport system would be hugely beneficial and incidentally far cheaper than the current every man his tin box arrangement.
Reduce stress, reduce isolation, foster cooperation, minimise trauma. These simple principles should guide social policy in housing, transport, community services education. In this regard, mental health is no different from the rest of medicine, where the greatest improvements in health have come from social and environmental factors such as clean water and sewage treatment systems, health and safety and food standards legislation and so on.

One of the things psychology has been quite good at is identifying social risk factors for mental illness. Unfortunately, it has never been seen as its business to mitigate them.

Harrington ends her book with a plea that psychiatry become “more modest in focus” and train its attention on the severe mental illnesses, such as schizophrenia, that are currently treated largely in prisons and homeless shelters—an enterprise that she thinks would require the field “to overcome its persistent reductionist habits and commit to an ongoing dialogue with … the social sciences and even the humanities.” This is a reasonable proposal, and it suggests avenues other than medication, such as a renewed effort to create humane and effective long-term asylum treatment. But no matter how evenhandedly she frames this laudable proposal, an industry that has refused to reckon with the full implications of its ambitions or the extent of its failures is unlikely to heed it.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/04/mind-fixers-anne-harrington/583228/

That heedless refusal has played out here rather clearly. Every suggestion I have made that there is a social component has been taken by our resident professional not as a contribution to consider, but as an attack to be defended against, to the ridiculous extreme that "maladaptive" is somehow redefined to not be a term of relation of organism to environment, of individual to society.

One way to see it is that the hubris of psychology is to make every disagreement an ad hominem, not realising that there is a society of psychologists that is the legitimate subject of sociologists just as there are sociologists with psyches.

Do you even know what maladaptive means? — Anaxagoras

Not only do I know what maladaptive is, I also know that

Maladaptive daydreaming — Anaxagoras

...is not the same as...

suffering from a maladaptive disorder — Anaxagoras

...or...

behave in an atypical way which becomes maladaptive — Anaxagoras

Huh? Where did I display hubris? I'm a clinician and this is my professional job. — Anaxagoras

Well right there in your appeal to your own authority, amusingly, and more generally in your non engagement with any of the critical thinking on offer, and response to it instead as if it were a personal attack.

But let me ask you a question for a change. Over all, given the huge growth in psychological knowledge and training, and all the research and advances in the field, would you say that the mental health of the world is improving?

.I'm curious to know where you got this information from — Anaxagoras

D'you know I think I made it up! At any rate I cannot remember whence it came. However Over here if you add to the 5% in sales, a reasonable fraction of others involved with marketing as business managers, spin doctors, web designers, and then divide out those jobs that only use the statistical skills and not the psychological skills, then my invention is not altogether implausible.

If someone is suffering from a maladaptive disorder which is causing them to ruin their job, relationships, and is affecting their way of life sometimes medication is necessary to mitigate this problem. — Anaxagoras

Dude, I have not denied it. I bring up psychology's pseudoscience and racist past in order to encourage you and others to have a little less hubris, a little more humility, and a more careful use of language.

Have a little think about 'maladaptive disorder'. At some stage, a failure to adapt is not a disorder of the organism, but a disorder of the environment. Indeed I would suggest that at almost every stage there are both aspects in play. One might say that in the case you cite it is the successful adaptation to the cult that constitutes a maladaptive disorder wrt society in general, although there are no doubt other factors, because it is not usual even for cult victims to behave thus. But bear in mind that 'maladaptive' is necessarily relative to a particular society and being maladapted to some societies might be a sign of good mental health. If your job is torturing the enemies of the state, or indoctrinating people into a belief in demons, then losing one's job is on the road to recovery.

Most psychology graduates end up in advertising.

In the adverts, the road is smooth, and sinuously winding through wonderful scenery. The man is master of his fate, enjoying the freedom of the road, and going places in his penis extension. That is the fantasy.

The reality of being stuck in traffic in a concrete jungle, potholed and blocked by roadworks and other people's penis extensions with the kids screaming in the back and everyone looking at you as if you're the one in their way. You're supposed to be somewhere already and you're going nowhere, breathing the toxic fumes.

The conflict between fantasy and reality cannot be resolved, and this results in frustration. Let the frustration out, and you are suffering from road rage. Keep it under control and you are suffering from chronic stress.

Everyone is insane, and everyone is on drugs - the car is just another drug we are addicted to, though it makes us sick.

It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. — J.Krishnamurti

Psychiatry offers pills as palliatives, when the sickness of society requires a revolution.

I could have used the fantasy of the 'social network' and the reality of social isolation, or many other addictions as my example. Slaves used often to suffer from

behave in an atypical way which becomes maladaptive and eventually can lead into destructive behaviors. — Anaxagoras

It was called drapetomania. We found a cure for that - the abolition of slavery.

The point you're making is true of only some but not all cases. In the discussion on morality, it was useful to distinguish between moral relativism and moral absolutism. That is, what is good relative to what so-and-so thinks and feels, or what is simply good. There is no simply good. It's all relative. — S

Sure. I don't want to ban adjectives, and your example illustrates the difference quite clearly. Personally i would want to include what so-and-so is along with their thinks and feels., but is suffices for meaning to be added rather than mere emphasis that you make a distinction between absolute and relative. Once you say something meaningful, I can see where you are wrong. But still, you could have managed this more clearly by saying that what is good is always an orientation of a thinking feeling (and Material?) subject. So we can always disagree about it. And Johnny Godbotherer, can say that God's orientation is universal cos He made us in His image, or whatever. So while I'm complaining, so you don't feel left out, I'll suggest that 'isms are nearly always straw men, useful only for waving in the general direction of stuff one doesn't want to address.

But what is to be made of this? Is truth actually truth? Absolute truth is impossible.

Already there is truth, actual truth and absolute truth, and that's before we start. "If the world could all agree (on everything) there would be what I would call 'absolute truth'." we learn from the op. It would be superfluous even to comment, 'yeah, I know', because everyone would already know everything. Language would cease. Even our pig ancestor would be scratching his head a bit, wondering why he is locked up in the lounge, while this stuff is called "interesting".

Compassion is an overflowing; it comes from an abundant fullness. The gritted teeth of will, nor the urgent need of inadequacy can hope to reach it, but rather need the compassion of others.

The struggle is the need is the emptiness.

does Wallows raise the child as his own or does he file for adoption? — Nils Loc

Poor reincarnated Wallows, looks like he's buggered either way.

absolutely bewtiching — StreetlightX

Saarrfssn Rk Rastrdly.

there is no Grammar King and every man does as he pleases — Bitter Crank

Happily, that is so, and happily that is not so. There is no Grammar King and every man does as he pleases, and yet there is grammar, there is philosophy and there is a way of making sense and many ways of making nonsense, and every man who wants to philosophise must be a democratic socialist in his language or be a pseudophilosopher. Poets, politicians and mathematicians of course can do whatever they please with no qualms. If you do as you please with language, you may even have folks nod wisely at your utterances, but that doesn't mean you have said anything.

@StreetlightX is the honourable exception here, having the good sense to cast the Absolute as capitalised noun, the other to the world, rather than trying to use the unqualified as a qualifier.

Well, 'my reality' vs 'your reality' would be more of a psychological difference than a metaphysical one. — Baden

I'd say it was more an abuse of language. My fantasy and your fantasy can be different just because they are not reality. Reality is unqualified; that is my point.

Likewise, there are not degrees and kinds of truth.
There is no such thing as a false meaning, and there is no such thing as a true meaning. A proposition can be true, or it can be false, but its meaning is just whatever it means.

"Objective reality"appears in a title where it is proposed to have been undermined by science, as if there are other realities - experimental? - subjective? that are able to trump it. It's simply bad English and can only lead to confusion.

"Absolute truth" appears in another title, and is claimed to be impossible. I say it is incoherent. I don't believe people who talk in this sort of way have the least clue what absolute anything is, and take it to mean pure, or complete, or something even more vague but important - like very strong vodka.

Absolutely.

Fabulous.

I do not behave in a kind and considerate way because it is of some sort of use to me. To the contrary, if I took time to think about what was more useful to me, and behaved in that way, I'd be more deceitful and cheating. — Metaphysician Undercover

*sigh*. But you use words, you use gestures, you use the conventions of society to express your
politeness.

Now you say that we use words to convey something. What is conveyed? The use of words, and the thing conveyed must be two distinct things if we use words to convey something. It cannot be meaning which is conveyed if meaning is the use itself. — Metaphysician Undercover

No they mustn't. I use words to convey meaning and the meaning of the words is the use to which they are put.. Words have no use but to convey meaning, and no meaning apart from the use to which they are put. Meaningless words are useless and convey nothing.

The true nature of "meaning" is to be found in these meaningful relationships, not in the use of words. The use of words just facilitates meaningful relationships. — Metaphysician Undercover

Well sure.you're talking to Mr 'identity-is-relationship. And that explains why one can have a meaningful relationship with a dog and not with Siri.But we are considering the meaning of words here where their meaning comes from and where it goes to, and it comes from their social use, and of course social relations are prior to language.and meaningful without language, otherwise one could not learn their meaning.

But your example is infelicitous. Of course if one uses different words to act in a different manner the relationship and the meaning will be different. And an inflection can turn the same word(s) from a question into a command with very different meaning because different use, and the meaning of the inflection is conventional too.

So when one says 'meaning is use', it is saying that the scope of what is and is not a chair is set by the ways in which the word is used in the community, and not set by any property of the object, nor by the use one makes of the object, (doll's houses have chairs), nor by any property of the sound or sight of the word.

So if one says "please kind sir be so good as to vacate my inconsistency. for it is precious to me" one is liable to get a puzzled look and not the restoration of one's favourite stump, because 'inconsistency' doesn't mean anything like 'stump'. 'Chair' would work, or 'seat' or probably 'place'. and the work it does , the use, is to convey to, not to manipulate the other. If the response is 'No it's my turn on the stump', the words have still done their job.

Everyone who wants to talk about it still can, just we won't have anything about this ridiculous crap on the front page. — fdrake

And that is about as good a compromise as can be expected of controversial stuff.

We'd be over-run with cranks and crackpot theories. There's a lot of it about and it is very vocal. Even a second-rate gardener has to do the weeding and hope not to pull up all the plants he wants to keep.

It's more problematic when there's no good reason to believe that they're qualified to do so. — Terrapin Station

If God was in charge, we could all rest easy in our armchairs, but alas moderators always have to make judgements they are not qualified for, and so we have feedback for their education and improvement.

I'll duck out now rather than repeat the non-arguments already deleted in the original. The philosophical interest is more in the basis of the moderating decision than the hypothesis itself. I'll just mention on the way out that comparisons with flat Earth are a bit weak. We have the photos of Earth, but only cartoons of the origin of humanity. Anyone remember the cartoon ridicule of Darwin?

With respect, I am wrong more often than you think. But when I play devil's advocate and all I get is ridicule and argument from authority, I smile quietly and shake my head a little.

A knock-up argument.

Well I thought it was interesting, and no more fanciful than many a respectable mainstream origin story that has had the official seal of approval from time to time - aquatic ape theory - remember that one?

But as against that, it's not really philosophy bollocks or gospel.

to artificially inseminate pigs with chimp semen to test it, the author certainly didn't bother. — fdrake

Wrong way round dude, and rather indicates the care given to this decision.

I think the EU has more or less reached the 'fuck off and die' position, where a no deal brexit is preferable to having to deal with this miserable madness for another 2 years. They surely don't want dozens of Farages elected by the UK to screw up their governance for the next 5 years. But perhaps Europe is more selfless and kind than I give them credit for? In some ways, a no deal chaotic brexit would suit the EU mandarins quite well, pour encourager les autres.

Dogs are like Siri, you know they understand if they do what they're told.

"Use" does not seem to capture all of what meaning is. — Metaphysician Undercover

I have some sympathy with this, though I disagree.I'll try and explain.

My mother told me that my first word was "more" (this might be more revealing than I want it to be). You can imagine the scenario, She says (habitually), "do you want some more?", waving the spoon , and at some point I copy, she recognises my meaning along the lines of 'yes please, another mouthful of dinner would be very nice'.

When one only has one word, one has to work it hard. She understands what I mean, even though I do not understand the 'true' meaning of the word I have uttered. In my little mind it could mean a spoonful, a mouthful, food, feed me, these things are not distinct. Though in the end, I have it about right as the demand 'Encore' - 'Play it again, Sam'.

And the same kind of thing goes on here at TPF. Someone asks 'is X racist?' And we have a discussion about the exact scope of the term 'racist' as if there is a truth of the matter independent of how we decide to use it. And there is such a truth, but it is only the truth of how the wider community happens to use it and how it and its root-words have been used by the community in the past. Ha, see what I did there? Root - racine - race. And so to a discussion of the tree of life, root and branch of the family/ tribe/nation, and the notion of inheritance... until we are satisfied that we have the fullness of understanding of all the possibilities of 'racism'. But there is no truth of meaning beyond the way a word is used...

so whilst the above is self-evidently true, it's not really worth writing publicly unless you want to actually discuss it. — Isaac

Ah, then we are clear, have reached an understanding, and nothing more need be said. Oh Happy Day! :)

so long as we're clear. — Isaac

But are we clear? Specifically, are we clear about what it means to be clear?

This is a game we can play forever, to pick on a word, and make it the crucial piece in the game. We are only finished when we stop, and there is no standard measure unless we invent one for our own convenience. And since I do not find it convenient, I refuse to accept your suggestion that my rhetorical flourishes be the measure of anything. You may think you have your answer, but I think I have refused to answer, and I think those two together mean we are not clear.

So, can I ask what timescale you apply to this approach? — Isaac

No you bloody well can't! As it happens, there are plenty of people who well understand that position of being against the disestablishment of the church of England as the official denomination of our great and glorious nation. Or something like that. However, half an hour ago I came across the word "Tartuffery". And when I looked it up, I was referred back to the very passage from whence I had come. Further research led me to a satirical play by Moliere. I'm am simply not prepared to tolerate Nietzsche, a German, making use of a French satire of all obscurities, in one of his usual tirades against every other thinker in the world. It shall not pass into the English language!

No, actually I don't make the rules and I don't make the timescale; I simply observe that one can have no use for whereof one has no understanding. Nevertheless, I shall regard anyone who bandies "Tartuffery" about as a pathetic poseur until the play has been revived and adapted for television.

1. Absolute truth is impossible.

2. If 1. is true, it is impossible that it is absolutely true.

3. 2. is absolutely true.

4. 1. is absolutely false.

I am suggesting that the “meaning” is the “use”. — I like sushi

I agree. @Banno seemed elsewhere to demur a little, I'm not sure. The only caveat I would make is that it is always a social use; I can decide to call myself 'unenlightened', and folks will learn that usage, but if i try and insist that Banno is 'Bono', that is a misuse, I must in general follow the social use and keep my idiosyncacy within bounds, even as a poet. Meaning is use in communication.

I think this generalises quite well with a modicum of charity. Once a language has only one speaker, it has become effectively private and thus useless for communication. It only becomes meaningful again when someone else learns it, and likewise the lost ancient writing has only the potential for meaning until it is deciphered.Until then it is like those bits of stuff one keeps in the garage, that might be useful one day... a bricloleur's theory of language.

Wittgenstein was an engineer. One of his analogies for philosophy was that it was using language to do nothing, rather as the mechanic runs an engine on idle, in order to tune it and adjust things, not to go anywhere or do any work. So it doesn't even intend to 'get anywhere' but only to make it easier for scientists politicians and saints to say clearly what is on the minds. Maybe something like error trapping in your field?

One merit of this hypothesis is that it provides a neat explanation of why we do not see aliens and alien technology in the universe; as soon as they develop the tech, they all go off to live in the good old days.

Did you know you were a Hegelian?

Kant had argued that metaphysics is impossible, that it is impossible for the human mind to achieve theoretical knowledge about all of reality. Hegel on the other hand, set forth the general proposition that "what is rational is real and what is real is rational" and from this concluded that everything that is, is knowable. Since there can be nothing unknowable, the idealists were confident that they could know the inner secrets of absolute reality.

https://www.coursehero.com/file/17475102/Chapter16/

No wonder we are not on the same page, it is a very different conception of both logic and reality.

a chair/seat is that which we use primarily for sitting on, — I like sushi

Have some context. In days of yore, before the invention of the round table, there were long narrow tables, because that's the way trees grow, and along each side were benches for sitting on and at one end was the chair, also for sitting on but a solitary and privileged position that gave a view of all the guests.

Thus a chair is indeed a thing to sit on, but also a position of status and hence an act. Chairing the Bard is a ceremony equivalent for poets to a coronation - except instead of (actually as well as) decorating the poet's head, his arse is decorated. And chairing meetings is still generally performed by arses to this day.

I sometimes use a chair to reach the top shelf instead of a ladder or stilts.
But when I say "chair" in the previous sentence, you are to understand from your knowledge of the world that in this case I do not mean that I sit on the shoulders of the conductor of a meeting.
And when I say, "the chair brought the meeting to a close", I am not claiming that furniture is animated.

A word might be used to refer to a piece of furniture, a ceremony, or a person and the meaning is determined by the use.

So when philosophers ask what "chair" means, or "nature" means, having no use in mind but assuming it must always be used the same way, or else that any way other than one particular way is wrong, long pointless threads tend to ensue.

the argument in the OP? — Devans99

There's an argument in the op? My argument is the very simple one that arguments cannot constrain the universe they can only constrain talk. The world does not have to do what you or anyone else says, so if you want your talk to be true you have to say what it does, rather than tell it what it has to do.

Incidentally, if you take every negative comment as proof of your correctness you will never lose. I'll leave you to it from here.

I think you will find that 'Deriving the way things must be from the thoughts folks have' is part of philosophy and science. — Devans99

Yes, but you think wrong. and because you think wrong and derive the way things must be from that wrong thinking, you get the world wrong. So as @tim wood points out you mistake your fantasy for reality, and talk bollocks and call it 'philosophy'.