Joklem wrote:
Aestu wrote:
Joklem wrote:
Whoooooooosh.
Cognitive dissonance!
Read the entire thing before replying to the first few paragraphs, if you don't understand after this, then I don't need to insult you. You insult yourself.
Anyone who studied a field of science learned very quickly that he will have to learn, unlearn and relearn regularly.
What does that mean? It means that if evidence to the contrary of the status quo is presented and proven, it would change the status quo. If the evidence is proven, the scientist has to unlearn the status quo that he learned, and relearn to keep up with the advancements in his field of science. It can take some time for the scientific community to accept the evidence -- in most cases because they are trying to disprove the presented proof. An essential step, as blindly accepting proof is as foolish as blindly dismissing it. The inverse is also true -- blindly accepting positive proof based on beliefs or the credentials of the person making the claim is foolish. Even Stephen Hawking is scrutinized, and he's probably the most scrutinized scientist in his field.
A true scientist will be excited when a theory or process is proven wrong or ineffective (and/or hazardous if we go back to psychiatry -- e.g. lobotomies), or if a problem arises from it. Why? Because it means that a new discovery has been made, that a new one has to be made to replace the old one, or that a problem has to be solved. What motivates scientists? Why of course, curiosity and making new discoveries -- advancing our understanding of the subject that is being studied, and that includes discovering that what you've learned or discovered was wrong. After all, the ultimate goal of any science is to find the truth, right?
Someone who practices in a field of science must stay skeptical. You cannot "believe" theories, you cannot say "well everyone agrees so it must be true". However, that's exactly what it may sound like to a person who hasn't studied sciences. The reason for that is that some theories are highly developed to a point where formidable and groundbreaking proof would have to be presented. They are widely accepted as a result. The next time you hear someone say "well, prove it", read it as "PLEASE, prove it!". If you prove a claim, you are recognized. If you come up with an imperfect theory, you'll find help in perfecting it, or discarding it if it ends up being unsound.
If you spew statements without proof and basically demand for them to be recognized, you may get educated, if you continue you will get ridiculized.Now, back to this here "debate":That being said, you cannot "disprove" an entire field of science. You can't say "psychology or the science of the mind and behaviours" is bullshit, because no matter what your personal opinion of that science is, there will always be researchers interested in understanding humanity and discovering new principles. The definition of science is a system of acquiring and organizing knowledge. The purpose of any science is to produce useful models of reality. Symptoms of mental illness can be observed, they can be reported by patients (and thus are experienced) and with our advancement in technology, they can now be tested or scanned for (see neuroscience in the paragraph below). They are, therefore, part of our reality as humans. One of the purposes of psychology is to further improve the understanding of those symptoms and their causes, and organize statistically recurring patterns into categories of illnesses and disorders so that there's a standard and they can be treated effectively. By definition, psychology is a science.
In modern medicine, neuroscience, or the study of the nervous system, has for one of it's goals finding the cause of those symptoms. Neuroscience is interdisciplinary and collaborates with psychology amongst other fields. Modern neuroscience greatly helps the field of psychology in classifying symptoms into illnesses/disorders by finding observable proof of the biological causes of said symptoms.
Psychiatry is a real world application of that science by Medical Doctors who specialized in mental illness by studying the knowledge about said mental illnesses acquired by research in
neuroscience, medicine, biochemistry, biology, pharmacology and psychology. A diagnosis is not made solely from a patient giving a list of symptoms. Other causes of those symptoms (e.g. temporary stress, anxiety, bad diet, lack of exercise, etc. etc. can be a causes of symptoms) are ruled out first and remedied, and if the symptoms persist, a mental illness/disorder is suspected to be the cause and a diagnosis is made. The standard treatments (therapy, medications or in combination) for the illness/disorder are recommended to the patient, who is then informed. The patient can then make a decision, if they treat the symptoms then the treatment is continued. If it's ineffective, another treatment is attempted until an effective medication and dosage (or therapy if it's the chosen treatment) is reached. Every person reacts to different drugs differently, so trial and error is used to find the right drug. The medical doctor has then accomplished his duty of treating a medical patient and the next step is follow ups.
Neuroscience is anatomy, not a field of the humanities. It's no more cousin to psychiatry than astronomy is to astrology.
In fact they are extremely similar: specious interpretations of real physical phenomena.
Homeopathy and phrenology aren't legitimate fields of medicine and neither is psychology, for the same reasons.
Psychology reflects a set of values and assumptions and has no scientific basis. The claims made by the field have changed over time not because of experimental data but because of the pressures of our social and political system.
No experiment proved homosexuality wasn't a pathology. No theory proved lobotomy was a bad idea. No scientific principle defines the difference between getting high on weed and getting by with a bottle of lithium. There's no scientific methodology for psychotherapy any more than there is for trolling.
If you're a real doctor, doing real medicine, and you prescribe an inappropriate medication, or slice a gash in someone's intestines while trying to do an appendectomy, you can get sued for malpractice. By and large this does not happen with psychiatrists because they can do whatever they want because their field is whatever they say it is because it's a lot of malarkey, short of suffocating the patient with a sofa pillow.
If we were discussing a legitimate field of science or medicine, like say germ theory, or the heliocentric theory, or the theory of relativity, I could attempt to debunk them by saying they have no basis in fact. And you in turn could prove that they do by pointing to empirical evidence and practical applications obvious even to a layman. This discussion hasn't evolved past "Trust the experts" because the hard facts aren't there.
Not so long ago, "experts" just as pedantic and pretentious as you insisted that because they were doctors, they were right that disease was caused by an "imbalance" in the humors. Of course they had doctorates and got paid the big bucks - they filled a void. They were still dead wrong, and when arguments ensued about their being right or wrong in their beliefs about the humors, they would always fall back on posturing and officiousness and not hard facts. There's a satire of this sort of thing in Plato, and another in a book about the Middle Ages entitled
TThe Gilded Century.
Needing to do so...is the hallmark of an irrational and untenable school of thought, just as it is with religion.
Modern doctors? They practice real medicine. Do we owe Hippocrates a debt? Sure. Doesn't change that most of what's in there is malarkey. There's some conceptual material of value in psychology, but as a whole the field isn't worth more than the theory of the humors.
