Ringer

Galileo also used had evidence of his claims before he made such bold statements.

What biologists believe that a single mutation can cause speciation? And what effort has been but forth to cause such a mutation? If a single mutation did cause a random species to be formed that species would not have anything to mate with and its genetic line would be moot. You may want to look at this

Junk DNA doesn't disprove anything about natural selection. If the DNA isn't hurting an organism there is no reason to assume that it will be weeded out. If the DNA seemingly doesn't code for anything anymore what is the reasoning behind that it would be weeded out. The idea of natural selection is that those who are most fit to survive will and those who are not won't. It's says nothing about how conservative the species must be. The second point shows only our inexperience involving genetic sequences, not that evolutionary theories are wrong. Genetics does give support for evolution and just because some things shock us doesn't mean that evolution is wrong; it just shows that our knowledge is lacking. The whole idea of genes anticipating anything is very wrong. Genes don't have an idea what's going on in the world nor do they know what will happen. Just because findings in certain animals are surprising doesn't mean that an entire theory is wrong, just some of our ideas concerning how animals may have developed along a timescale may have been wrong. A friend told me that Einstein's theory didn't predict black hole singularities, I'm not a physicist so I don't know if that's right, but just because there are singularities doesn't mean that relativity doesn't work.

Cloning wouldn't revive someone in any way. Cloning will just make someone with the same DNA, it wouldn't give the clone the same ideas, experiences, etc. that the person had at death. Pretty much it would just be making an identical twin of someone

This is just wrong. I assume you mean dominant to be that the males pursue females and females take care of offspring, but there are many animals where the male has more paternal investment. In these animals the females tend to be larger, more aggressive, etc. Although you could mean purely in sexual acts the woman is passive, but again this is just wrong. There are large amounts of heterosexual males who are passive and females who are dominant. Most females don't reach orgasm through vaginal penetration but through clitoral stimulation. I knew a homosexual male that said he could orgasm strictly through anal penetration, I'm not so sure how, but hey to each their own. Well heterosexual people largely disagree about what exactly is the most attractive about the opposite sex, although some things do seem to be universal (e.g. youth). Who's to say what someone else finds attractive or why. But on that note there are a few theories on what causes homosexuality. Some say it's mainly genetic; I think the gene Xq28 is the assumed gene, but there is disagreement. Homosexuality has also been absolutely related to some cultural or situational causes such as in the prison systems. Some societies, such as ancient Greece, promote young males pleasuring older males in homosexual manners.

Meh according to the Pisa website (http://www.pisa.oecd.org/dataoecd/54/12/46643496.pdf) They have different areas of China listed, i.e. Shanghai, Hong Kong, etc. Some of those areas are average or even below the average scores. If you averaged all of the Chinese scores I don't think that the difference would be statistically significant compared to the other top countries, although I'm a bit to lazy to do it.

More specificity would be nice. What do you want to know about the brain? The most basic things like neurons, or things like neurotransmitters, or just the overall anatomy?

You also have to take into consideration the fact that, at least as far as I'm aware, they only allow most of the highest scores continue on. I'm not sure how whatever studies were done saying orientals were the smartest, but for the most part western societies allow anyone to attend school eastern societies have to take standardized tests to proceed further into the educational process. This could account for eastern societies testing higher on standardized tests. Also, there are different types of IQ tests, any ideas on what ones they were taking?

there isn't a population to small for a gene pool, unless of course it's >2 for a sexual reproducing species. A population is just an animals species within an area capable of reproducing, the gene pool is the differences of genes within that population, so 24 cranes still has a somewhat substantial gene pool. As for the inbreeding, there are quite a few animals that inbreed without much damage (i.e. cats, wasps, ants, a lot of plants and weeds, etc.) to their genetic line. Even humans can mate with their families without a very large chance of genetic deficiency so long as it isn't a direct sibling or parent. I'm not real sure on the specifics but this website has a pretty thorough explanation of inbreeding.

Mutations aren't only way speciation occurs. Allopatric speciation occur much more often than random mutation as far as I'm aware. Even mutations aren't necessarily something so large as to cause some sort of problem with gamete fertilization. A mutation could be something as simple as different color that helps a certain population as a whole. There is no gene pool without a population, the gene pool is the cumulative gene of a population. Also, there is a major difference between a population and a species, evolution acts upon populations of a species not the species as a whole. And inbreeding doesn't negatively affect many species (such as house cats).

The blank slate theory is false. Think of it this way, if the brain were in fact a tabula rasa how would we know what noises we should use in language. In a lot of societies children are not even spoken to directly yet they learn language just fine.

Well any testing of this would probably be highly unethical. I doubt there have been any tries to do this. Also, the question seems to be philosophical. Would mental faculties exist without senses. What do people actually remember/imagine/etc. Personally I would say no insofar that most mental faculties are reactions to physical stimuli. What would one imagine if one has never heard/seen/felt/tasted/etc. What would one remember if nothing has been experienced.

I doubt it would be worth the effort or money to try to pay to have this done to people to read their minds. It's still far and away from perfect and the most they've been able to do is single words. Using this as a lie detector would be possible but not very cost effective. Especially when you consider lawsuits from innocent people who may have had it done.

I never said it was 100% proof, but showing strong correlation does constitute evidence towards there being a relationship. The fact that I only gave ones that correlated with mental handicaps was because that's what you specifically asked for. Mental illness is not the focus of the entirety of psychology. Why would they use brain scans to diagnose? That would be extremely expensive, like using CAT scans to diagnose a headache. Of course fMRI aren't exact and of course a single area of the brain can be in use for many different functions, but studying the brain is like studying DNA right now. Although we can't say with exact accuracy what function each little part does or how many interacting parts it does to carry out a single function we are getting closer and closer to figuring these things out. And Deepak Chopra has used quantum mechanics to 'prove' his theories, does that make physics not a science? Just because a tool can be used by quacks doesn't mean the tool is totally ineffective. Why do you keep talking about psychiatrists? They are not psychologists, they are M.D.s. Why is it you think the whole of psychology is about mental illness? Again psychiatry. Also, where are your sources that something like this happened? Or are you just making up situations to appeal to emotion? What? Are you saying brain damage doesn't cause mental conditions? So you're saying that people who study brains shouldn't mess with brains in their research? How is it that these brain studies are not related to psychology, the study of the mind? Where are you getting that these theories are not scientific? What is not scientific about them? Do you have to agree with the theories for it to be science?

Honestly I think we are arguing in circles. It could be my own fault because clinical is not my personal area of interest within psychology. But that aside, unless I'm mistaken, the main point of this thread was that since Freud was personally and professionally wrong about his clients that psychotherapy was based on unfounded assumptions. That assumption is what I'm arguing against, people can't base how well psychotherapy works by a single therapist that just happens to be famous. I won't argue for or against clinical psychology because I don't believe I can. I don't have any sort of extensive study in clinical and I don't have time to do any real independent research. But I still stand by the fact that although Freud may have been a fraud or whatever name you want to give him, you can't base you beliefs of an entire field on a single person.

http://www.molecularsciences.org/structural_bioinformatics/amino_acids

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/09/100907071249.htm

Irony? perhaps. Probably more coincidental. Good luck

surgeries suck. I've had quite a few and they are always a pain in the @$$. What's the surgery for?

Well the fact that long periods of discomfort could be a rational reaction is taken into account. Say someone had a family member die recently and are depressed, even though they may be helped by therapy, they are not clinically depressed. The difference being that they have a reason to be depressed, most clinical cases of depression have almost no root cause. There have been many brain imaging techniques done showing the difference between a normal sad subject and a clinically depressed subject. But it seems this would be a better thread for this discussion. Psychotherapy is different than psychology. I really don't like that type of blanket statement. Although the majority of people believe psychology=psychotherapy anything having to do with the study of what people do is rooted in psychology. More to the point his personal failings put doubt in his theories on psychotherapy, not psychotherapy as a whole. And Freud is not the founder of psychotherapy Most psychological experiments are done with help from other areas of studies such as neurosciences, biologists, economists, etc. My understanding is not that psychotherapy doesn't work, it's that professional therapists and nonprofessionals can help with problems through therapy. It does say that there are some problems that therapy doesn't show any significant help (marital stress, etc) but those look like personal problems and not real health problems. Psychotherapy is not my personal favorite area of study so I can't say I'm really making a truly strong argument for it, but what I am trying to prove is that psychology bashing, even psychotherapy bashing, cannot be based upon the failure of a single practitioner. Freud also didn't start psychotherapy, Most people give Wilhelm Wundt that honor.

So far as I'm aware since it was a policing action and not a war there was nothing to "win". Was the operation a success? Only time will tell.

That doesn't mean that the large animals that were around with early humans when they started migrating wouldn't be able to produce offspring with animals now if they happened to mate.

http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/160/9/1693 http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/60/6/585 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2143298 http://www.asdinfo.org/documents/files/Glutamate_neurontransmitter_abnormalities.pdf http://www.asdinfo.org/documents/files/Brain_structural_abnormalities_in_ASD_kids.pdf It goes on and on In what way are the questions and answers arbitrary. And is this purely about clinical psych or psych in general. Either way I don't see how you are saying the questions asked are unscientific. You realize everything you just discussed has been studied and proven by *drum roll* Psychology. Clinical psychologists aren't released to give drugs. And the situation you describe is a highly unethical situation that ANY doctor with the ability to write prescriptions could do, that doesn't make it not a science. Brain lesions don't exist? Do you know what a Brain lesion is? Though you're wrong about brain scans, how about attaching electrodes to certain areas of the brain then stimulating those areas to see what reactions they cause. Here are some examples Then biology isn't a science either?

Let me clarify, you ARE wrong we know there's a problem, there are ways do discern whether there is a problem or not. You use persuasion in an emotional sense in an attempt to make it seem like psychologist try to take advantage of undereducated people. But part of the problem is undereducated people don't seem to get the psychological help needed. So the assumption that only undereducated people get psychological help is unfounded. Drugs, as most psychologist will tell you, are not to CURE they help the symptoms until they can work through their problems. So, again, saying drugs don't treat the problems is somewhat true, it's not what most actually try. Look through the DSM if you want how we describe mental illnesses. If you want to see if there are differences in what a person not diagnosed with something and one that is look through some brain scans. You see major differences in both the structure and activity in certain areas. How is explaining how animals behave more scientific than explaining how we behave? Scientifically we are no different than any other animal so why should our studies of people be any different than our studies of people. But they are. fMRI, EEG, etc can all help with noting the differences of structure and function of the brain between normal/abnormal subjects. This is all just a restatement of what I already touched upon What studies are you saying do this. Can I see these papers you claim to have read that shows how bogus psychology is?

There wasn't enough time to cause humans to speciate between when they migrated out of Africa until they started interbreeding.