Freud: Liar and Fraud

[stradi]

Who was Sigmund Freud?

So who was this giant whose insights have indirectly played a major role in our resistance to exploring the benefits of controlling our sexual desire, and how did he reach his conclusions?

 

In investigating this question I learned that Freud supported his conclusions with only six full case studies. Some of the patients were not even his.

 

Since Freud’s lifetime scholars have dug up letters and contemporaneous case notes that demonstrate Freud did not, in fact, produce dramatic cures in these cases. In 1998 professor Frederick C. Crews published a series of essays by experts, called Unauthorized Freud: Doubters Confront a Legend.2

 

Was the father of psychoanalysis a fraud? … The myth: Sigmund Freud was the heroic investigator who …[freed] a culture from its dependence on sexual denial. The reality: Professor Crews argues that Freud devised a self-validating method of inquiry, deluded himself about his patients' illnesses, and failed to cure them. He founded a doctrinaire movement that has excommunicated dissenters while trying to evade empirical scrutiny.

 

As one reader said:

 

The essays show Freud as a fabricator of his patients' confessions, a liar, a cheat, a ruthless censor, a myth creator (about himself), a paranoiac, an icy remorseless opportunist, a jealous and imperious character full of a priori's, a megalomaniac, an impostor, a tyrant and a misogynist ('the self-evident superiority of male to female sex organs'; 'civilisation was a male creation.')

 

He projected his own obsessions on his patients and on his analytical writings ... He could himself not show one single validated psychoanalytical cure! More, he was even not interested in cures: 'I prefer a student ten times more than a neurotic.'

 

Here’s a tongue-in-cheek account of one the six famous Freudian case studies.3

 

'Dora' was a depressed and "hysterical" seventeen-year-old (not eighteen, as Freud claimed) who reluctantly came to Sigmund because of problems involving friends of the family, Mr. and Mrs. K.

 

Dora was upset because (1) Mr. K. obviously wanted a piece of her and had even made passes at her when she was thirteen and sixteen, and (2) she rightly believed that her father and Mrs. K. were getting it on. The good doctor immediately sussed what was really happening: Not only was Dora in love with Mr. K., she also wanted to give her father a blowjob and hop into the sack with Mrs. K.

 

Not surprisingly, Dora thought this was a load of crap and abruptly quit seeing Freud after eleven weeks. She was still a mess when she died.

 

Although an impressed reviewer of Crews' book declared the Freudian Revolution dead, that revolution is still reverberating throughout the educations of today’s sexologists.

 

The Freudian (addictive) cycle

It is worth noting that Freud’s own reward circuitry (in the brain) was apparently out of balance. He used cocaine for years, and publicly touted its supposed benefits, even claiming that it could cure addiction to morphine.

 

He was fatally addicted to tobacco. He smoked 20 cigars a day, and did not quit even when he was diagnosed with cancer of the jaw. He was operated upon more than two dozen times before the disease finally killed him. Even when his entire jaw had been replaced, he continued to smoke all day, every day.

 

Following a rare period of abstinence from tobacco, engaged in at the insistence of his physician, he wrote:4

 

"I have not smoked for seven weeks since the day of your injunction. At first I felt, as expected, outrageously bad. Cardiac symptoms accompanied by mild depression, as well as the horrible misery of abstinence. These wore off but left me completely incapable of working, a beaten man. After seven weeks I began smoking again...Since the first few cigars, I was able to work and was the master of my mood; before that life was unbearable."

 

In short, we are still governing our sex lives based on the advice of an addict. This is significant, since sex is governed by the same reward circuitry as all addictions. It seems likely that many of Freud's sexual "insights" were unwittingly based on addict-think. Clearly, if the best answer lies in moderation and inner equilibrium, Freud could not have found it. For him, the way to treat the discomfort of withdrawal was indulgence, however deadly.

 

Those of us who have grown up steeped in Freud's influence find it hard to conceive of a world where children and adults are taught the benefits of a middle path. Yet the pendulum may one day swing in the direction of an approach to sex that calls for no sexual repression based on threats of hell, but instead advises making love regularly - with a clear understanding of the benefits of self-control.

 

Just think how good it will feel when we stop beating our heads against the Freudian wall.

[Sisyphus]

 

In short, we are still governing our sex lives based on the advice of an addict.

 

Who is?

[Ringer]

You realize that virtually nobody takes Freud's methods seriously anymore. Pretty much the only way he is taught is in a historical sense. Even the new age Freudians are only very loosely based on Freud's psychoanalysis theories. You could spend hours and hours talking about his research and finding and why they are wrong, but there's no need.

[PhDwannabe]

Just think how good it will feel when we stop beating our heads against the Freudian wall.

As the two other people who have posted have already done a pretty good job of showing: Stradi, your familiarity with modern psychological science and practice is hovering near zero. Perhaps psychodynamic theory shows up in self-help books you've read, or perhaps introductory psychology classes you've taken. Or perhaps you're just quoting much of this, without much understanding of context, from Russ Kick's modern paranoid masterpiece, "50 Things You're Not Supposed to Know, vol. 2". When we remove the insane conspiracy theories, most of us understand that Freud was not a "liar" and "fraud," but a decent social commentator who nonetheless made a lot of unwarranted generalizations about the human condition, and created a system of psychotherapy which we today typically regard as sort of a waste of time.

 

I'm going to quote myself from a thread I commented on weeks ago. This is the second time I've dragged this quote out, and I'm beginning to realize it won't be the last:

 

Though you will find certain quarters of psychologists who are still more into it. Tends to be a bit more alive on the East Coast of the U.S. and in Europe. Even the psychodynamic folks, those who are willing to name themselves heirs to a Freudian system, don't even really believe or focus on the early Freudian view of the tripartite personality anymore--they're mostly far more informed by object relations and attachment. Full disclosure, though: being a cognitive-behaviorist, I tend to regard those two as about 90% and 70% bogus, respectively. Depending on the day.

 

Guess what? The science and practice have, in large part, moved on. Please update yourself on the state of that science and practice, so you can write more relevant and well-informed screeds. (Or, if not outright screeds, your more usual M.O.: massively long quotes harvested from other sources which seem to strongly imply that psychology/psychiatry is bogus in general.)

[Ophiolite]

I just want to add a fourth voice that expresses surprise that anyone today would think Freud's concepts were worth a damn. Is does seem to me that he was important because he highlighted the possibility at looking at behaviour in a new way. Pioneers should be respected for taking the first steps, regardless of how tentative or misguided they turn out to be. I recall reading Interpretation of Dreams when I was fourteen or fifteen and reaching the conclusion that if you base your theories on sexually repressed middle class Austrians, little of value will come of it.

[stradi]

When we remove the insane conspiracy theories, most of us understand that Freud was not a "liar" and "fraud," but a decent social commentator who nonetheless made a lot of unwarranted generalizations about the human condition, and created a system of psychotherapy which we today typically regard as sort of a waste of time.

 

 

 

A five year old boy comes to you complaining of being traumatised after seeing a horse fall down in a street. You tell him he wants to sleep with his mother and kill his father and sister. This is "decent social commentary"... how? His treatment of his patients constituted sexual harassment.

 

And how can psychotherapy have evolved to have become worthwhile when the roots that Freud laid down for it were bogus in the first place? If you mean talking to an understanding listener is worthwhile... surely this was known 10,000 years previously?

 

Pioneers should be respected for taking the first steps, regardless of how tentative or misguided they turn out to be. I recall reading Interpretation of Dreams when I was fourteen or fifteen and reaching the conclusion that if you base your theories on sexually repressed middle class Austrians, little of value will come of it.

 

But how does that constitute being a pioneer? Satanists, for example, teach that happiness comes from liberation of repressed desires - sexually repressed desires particularly. I assume they were doing so long, long, before Fraud graced us with his "thesis".

 

The science and practice have, in large part, moved on/

 

Right... moved on to what exactly?

[DJBruce]

And how can psychotherapy have evolved to have become worthwhile when the roots that Freud laid down for it were bogus in the first place?

 

I am fairly sure that PhDWannabe said:

 

created a system of psychotherapy which we today typically regard as sort of a waste of time.

 

Also just because something has less than credible and worthwhile roots does not mean that it should be discarded, or do you not believe in Chemistry, Astronomy, and Medical Sciences.

[insane_alien]

A five year old boy comes to you complaining of being traumatised after seeing a horse fall down in a street. You tell him he wants to sleep with his mother and kill his father and sister. This is "decent social commentary"... how?

 

thats a misrepresentation of freuds work to be honest. this is the strawman fallacy.

 

as has been repeatedly mentioned, freudian psychology is only studied for historical purposes these days, no sane psychologist would use it to actually diagnose and treat patients.

[Ophiolite]

But how does that constitute being a pioneer? Satanists, for example, teach that happiness comes from liberation of repressed desires - sexually repressed desires particularly. I assume they were doing so long, long, before Fraud graced us with his "thesis".

He introduced a methodology that was new to the treatment of mental illness and our psychological makeup. He sought to explain behaviours on the basis of a logical sequence of developmental events in the life of the individual. He attempte to show that simialr events led to simialr outcomes, and he sought to demonstrate this through observation and construction of case studies. Most of these elements were new, and certainly none of them had ever been brought together in a cohesive manner before. That, in my book, certainly marks him out as a pioneer.

 

Was he wrong? Of course he was. So were the early chemists who promoted the phlogiston theory: that doesn't alter the fact that they were pioneers too.

[pioneer]

Freud was a pioneer in his day. His long term affair with his wife's sister, while married, indirectly allows us to infer how sexuality was on his mind. This wife was more a traditional wife who was the matriarch of the house. His sister-in-law hung on his every word like a date. Based on his internal observations of his strong sexual impulses in light of his relationship to his wife, he tried to extrapolate this as a general rule for human behavior. Although sex is one of the strongest natural urges, it is one among many, with a more complete system able to take into account all the impulses, as well as the possible combinations.

 

If Freud had preferred food, his theory may have been connected to the nurturing, depriving or over-loading mother. This may be reasonable for that one instinct. It would then set a basic pattern for the psyche from which other orientations would spin-off. As a loose analogy, if Freud invented rap music, others would copy his basic style, but take it in new directions, or even to another level, by adding additional music and voice content. But still, Freud was a pioneer of psycho-rap.

 

I liked his star student, Carl Jung, better. He was suppose to carry on the tradition, but went his own way after he and Freud has a bad fight. Jung's theory of the archetypes of the collective unconscious was his pioneer attempt to map out the diversity of the psyche instead of one impulse. The Freudian ID was differentiated into an array of deeper and deeper layers of collective human propensities. The problem was Jung's orientation's next logical step, was to collect internal data. From the outside looking in, Jung's orientation appeared too mystical and religious, since he used these sources collective symbolism. This may have touched upon an atheist taboo.

 

Back in the day, to move psychology, from the outskirts of science, to make it more mainstream science, the founders knew they had to follow the rules of science. This meant outside, looking in, collecting data in the third person, that is repeatable and treatable (applications). Other theories became more practical, using the science external POV. The Jung's internal proof was left unfinished.

 

I was a Jungian pioneer of sort, when I was much younger who tried to generate the internal data. Jungian map was the guide but the data observed led to new details and twists in the dynamics, which helped me extend his map.

Edited August 28, 2010 by pioneer

[PhDwannabe]

This is "decent social commentary"... how?

Stradi, dude, I don't have the energy to try to provide you with context. Read a couple of Freud's works, complete, let's say, an undergraduate psychology major, and talk to me in four years. Until then, enjoy all of the straw-man garbage you can handle.

 

And how can psychotherapy have evolved to have become worthwhile when the roots that Freud laid down for it were bogus in the first place?

Umm... maybe the way chemistry or astronomy moved on from alchemy or astrology? Maybe because your hilarious black-and-white conception of "bogus"/"not-bogus" takes a big dump all over the detail and nuance of scientific progress?

 

If you mean talking to an understanding listener is worthwhile... surely this was known 10,000 years previously?

No. No, actually, I don't.

 

moved on to what exactly?

Cognitive behaviorism, in large part. If you had any knowledge about the modern state of the discipline you complain about, you'd know that already.

Edited August 28, 2010 by PhDwannabe

[ccdan]

other sources which seem to strongly imply that psychology/psychiatry is bogus in general.)

well, the trouble is, there's no real science in either psychiatry or psychology

 

Also just because something has less than credible and worthwhile roots does not mean that it should be discarded, or do you not believe in Chemistry, Astronomy, and Medical Sciences.

anything that is not scientifically valid (independently verifiable) should be discarded right away!

 

 

Freud was a pioneer in his day.

it depends on what you mean by "pioneer"

if you think that any bored idiot with rich imagination can be called "pioneer", well, yes, he was a "pioneer"

 

the founders knew they had to follow the rules of science.

no one in psychiatry or psychology uses the "rule of science"

at best, they use some tools usually used in science, like statistics, but they don't follow the scientific method

 

Cognitive behaviorism, in large part. If you had any knowledge about the modern state of the discipline you complain about, you'd know that already.

that's bullsh*t

[DJBruce]

well, the trouble is, there's no real science in either psychiatry or psychology

 

That seems much more like an opinion than a fact, and since it is not scientifically valid it should be discarded so that we can stay consistent with your following statement.

 

If you want to see the debate if psychology is a science here it is.

 

 

anything that is not scientifically valid (independently verifiable) should be discarded right away!

 

My point was that things that are clearly science now days often evolved from areas that were not science.

 

no one in psychiatry or psychology uses the "rule of science"

at best, they use some tools usually used in science, like statistics, but they don't follow the scientific method

 

This is completely wrong. The scientific method is used by numerous psychologist when they conduct studies. You can guarantee that almost any psychology paper in a peer reviewed journal followed the scientific method. Do you have evidence of your claims here because otherwise they are just baseless assertions.

 

that's bullsh*t

 

Why? Making a claim that something is BS does not make it so.

[stradi]

well, the trouble is, there's no real science in either psychiatry or psychology

 

 

anything that is not scientifically valid (independently verifiable) should be discarded right away!

 

 

 

it depends on what you mean by "pioneer"

if you think that any bored idiot with rich imagination can be called "pioneer", well, yes, he was a "pioneer"

 

 

no one in psychiatry or psychology uses the "rule of science"

at best, they use some tools usually used in science, like statistics, but they don't follow the scientific method

 

 

that's bullsh*t

I wrote a long and detailed reply to PHD wannabe's post, only for my comp to lose it. CCdan could be looking into my mind right now. i would just add

 

1) as we appear to be agreed Freud's psychotherapy wasn't valid in the first place, on what basis are people assuming psychotherapy's become scientific since?

2) Freud falsified his own case histories... wrote his patients up as cured when in fact if anything he made them worse. He ought to have been struck off; why was he allowed to pioneer anything?

 

George Frank examined the scientific assumptions psychotherapy appears to base itself. He looked through 70 years of literature and found there was little evidence to support it.

[DJBruce]

2) Freud falsified his own case histories... wrote his patients up as cured when in fact if anything he made them worse. He ought to have been struck off; why was he allowed to pioneer anything?

 

Can you please cite your evidence for this?

[Ophiolite]

Stradi,

a suspicion is growing in my mind that you are conflating psychology with abnormal psychology. Is this the case? Do you recognise that many of the studies of psychology conducted today are very much focused on what you and I might call 'normal' behaviour and are in fact designed to define and elucidate normal behaviour? Do you consider these studies bogus and unscientific?

[stradi]

Can you please cite your evidence for this?

 

 

Yep - Frederick Crews - "Unauthorised Freud".

a suspicion is growing in my mind that you are conflating psychology with abnormal psychology. Is this the case?

 

How are you defining "abnormal psychology"?

 

Some apt quotes about Freud here:

 

How Freud really thought about his clients behind their backs:

"He compared himself to a lion in a cartoon he saw. The lion is checking his watch at feeding time and asks, "where are my Negroes?" Freud said his patients were his "Negroes". (Jones p. 116)"

 

How much concern Freud really had for his clients:

"Turning down an invitation to travel, Freud wrote that a wealthy woman client "might get well during my absence.""

 

 

"The philosopher Karl Popper said Freudian psychoanalysis is as devoid of scientific method as palm reading."

 

Freud's involvement with the Sabbatean movement:

"Freud discussed Kabbalah with a rabbi Chaim Bloch in 1920. The rabbi told Prof. Bakan that the two men argued when Freud proposed that Moses had been an Egyptian pharaoh, not a Jew. Freud stormed off, leaving the rabbi alone in his study. It was then that Bloch saw books on the shelves which identified Freud as a follower of Sabbatai Zevi, (the Sabbatean founder.) "

 

 

http://www.henrymakow.com/freud_sabbatean.html

[Ringer]

How are you defining "abnormal psychology"?

http://www.purgatory.net/merits/abnormal.htm

Some apt quotes about Freud here:

 

How Freud really thought about his clients behind their backs:

"He compared himself to a lion in a cartoon he saw. The lion is checking his watch at feeding time and asks, "where are my Negroes?" Freud said his patients were his "Negroes". (Jones p. 116)"

 

How much concern Freud really had for his clients:

"Turning down an invitation to travel, Freud wrote that a wealthy woman client "might get well during my absence.""

 

 

"The philosopher Karl Popper said Freudian psychoanalysis is as devoid of scientific method as palm reading."

 

Freud's involvement with the Sabbatean movement:

"Freud discussed Kabbalah with a rabbi Chaim Bloch in 1920. The rabbi told Prof. Bakan that the two men argued when Freud proposed that Moses had been an Egyptian pharaoh, not a Jew. Freud stormed off, leaving the rabbi alone in his study. It was then that Bloch saw books on the shelves which identified Freud as a follower of Sabbatai Zevi, (the Sabbatean founder.) "

 

 

http://www.henrymako..._sabbatean.html

Everyone agrees Freud was wrong, no one has argued that point. But instead of ad hominem attacks why don't you attack his methodology? I'll do it for you, he assumed a constant 2 parent male/female family, most (if not all) of his work was done on specific case studies, his theories were based on the idea that all development happened during childhood, his theories were based on the idea that every developmental problem was the fault of the parent, his theories weren't falsifiable. You could go on and on about what was wrong with his science without once attacking him personally. He was wrong, move on.

 

That out of the way, in what way does this make psychology as a whole, even clinical psychology, wrong? Just because Freud may be the only psychoanalyst you know of doesn't mean he's the only one psychologists know of. Just because medicine used to be based on the 4 humours makes medical science fraudulent? No, psychology, like any well behaving science, has moved on even if the majority of bashers haven't.

 

Also, Jung was as much of a quack as Freud. Just because he makes people feel cuddly inside doesn't make him right. If you base your facts on what makes you feel good write a self-help book, not a scientific paper.

 

 

[stradi]

No... how are you defining "Abnormal Psychology"?

 

But instead of ad hominem attacks why don't you attack his methodology?

 

Because it wasn't just his methodology that was wrong. He was a Professional Liar. He perpetrated a Professional Fraud.

 

I'll do it for you, he assumed a constant 2 parent male/female family, most (if not all) of his work was done on specific case studies, his theories were based on the idea that all development happened during childhood, his theories were based on the idea that every developmental problem was the fault of the parent, his theories weren't falsifiable. You could go on and on about what was wrong with his science without once attacking him personally. He was wrong, move on.

 

Well yeah, that's a fraction of it. He assumed everyone had his own incestuous desires, his theory of repression etc.

 

That out of the way, in what way does this make psychology as a whole, even clinical psychology, wrong?

 

Because clinical psychology's status as a cure for mental illness has no basis in scientific fact. It's a mass assumption that it cures mental illness... where is the evidence? This is why I asked above:

 

as we appear to be agreed Freud's psychotherapy wasn't valid in the first place, on what basis are people assuming psychotherapy's become scientific since?

 

 

Just because Freud may be the only psychoanalyst you know of doesn't mean he's the only one psychologists know of. Just because medicine used to be based on the 4 humours makes medical science fraudulent? No, psychology, like any well behaving science, has moved on even if the majority of bashers haven't.

 

I know nothing about the humours, but Medical treatments today are based on scientific fact. That's the difference.

 

Also, Jung was as much of a quack as Freud. Just because he makes people feel cuddly inside doesn't make him right. If you base your facts on what makes you feel good write a self-help book, not a scientific paper.

 

I quite agree Jung was a quack... but why you've mentioned him out of the blue or added "Just because he makes people feel cuddly inside doesn't make him right. If you base your facts on what makes you feel good write a self-help book, not a scientific paper." is a mystery to me.

[7th]

As the two other people who have posted have already done a pretty good job of showing: Stradi, your familiarity with modern psychological science and practice is hovering near zero.

 

I disagree with this sentence whole heartedly. I believe psychology is nothing but a hoax as no-one will never be able to truly understand what someone else is thinking and all the education students recieved on the subject will not help them achieve that goal, now or any time in the future; it only gives them a false sense of intelligence. All minds are their own, and everyone is different -- a psychologist may be able to help some cases with psychological problems, but only those who are influenced by their techniques; and that's not being 'educated' but rather 'influencial'. Psychological science is level with tarrot reading, plate spinning and other nonsense money-making arts. No offense intended, I just don't think it's a required field to be knowledgable in, especially whilst interpreting past events and people alike. I'm a good judge of character and very good at spotting liars, and I've never studied psychology.

 

The above statement also applies to the thread itself, my opinion on Psychological Science.

[Ringer]

No... how are you defining "Abnormal Psychology"?

I would assume everyone here is using the same definition.

 

Because it wasn't just his methodology that was wrong. He was a Professional Liar. He perpetrated a Professional Fraud.

What does someone's personality have to with their findings? There are plenty of good scientists were probably "bad" people. He didn't perpetrate fraud because he believed what he taught.

 

 

Well yeah, that's a fraction of it. He assumed everyone had his own incestuous desires, his theory of repression etc.

Ya, and he was wrong. But it was all based on his observations and his own experiences. He had incestuous desires toward his mother at one point and assumed most people shared that experience. He was raised by a nanny and it's not rare for orphans or people not raised by there parents to have sexual desire towards them when they meet. Evolutionarily it's believed that the only way you can tell you're family is being around them (we can't tell by smell or some of the other ways animals do) and not being around your birth parent's you don't gain the incestuous disgust toward them.

 

Because clinical psychology's status as a cure for mental illness has no basis in scientific fact. It's a mass assumption that it cures mental illness... where is the evidence? This is why I asked above:

 

as we appear to be agreed Freud's psychotherapy wasn't valid in the first place, on what basis are people assuming psychotherapy's become scientific since?

 

Because the multitude of scientific studies done.

 

I know nothing about the humours, but Medical treatments today are based on scientific fact. That's the difference.

Is that why there are never studies that show how medicines and treatments are worse than the disease they are supposed to cure

 

I quite agree Jung was a quack... but why you've mentioned him out of the blue or added "Just because he makes people feel cuddly inside doesn't make him right. If you base your facts on what makes you feel good write a self-help book, not a scientific paper." is a mystery to me.

 

Some one else mentioned him earlier

[Ophiolite]

I believe psychology is nothing but a hoax as no-one will never be able to truly understand what someone else is thinking

I see. So you think the function of pschology is to understand what other people are thinking. Interesting. (Wrong, but interesting.)

all the education students recieved on the subject will not help them achieve that goal, now or any time in the future; it only gives them a false sense of intelligence.

As far as I am aware - and I invite you to educate me in this area - the only studies that reveal certain actions to give a false sense of intelligence are pscyhological studies. Ironic, isn't it?

 

All minds are their own, and everyone is different -- a psychologist may be able to help some cases with psychological problems, but only those who are influenced by their techniques;

Again, this obsession with the notion that psychology is about abnormal psychology.

 

Businesses have been able to increase the productivity and satisfaction of their workers by taking advantageof the Hawthorne effect. Their are hundreds of similar examples. Indiustrial psychology works: it delivers results. what makes you doubt these results?

 

Psychological science is level with tarrot reading, plate spinning and other nonsense money-making arts.

You have offered zero evidence in support of this contention. Your entire argument appears to be "Freud was wrong therefore all psychology is nonsense."

It isn't a convincing argument.

 

I'm a good judge of character and very good at spotting liars, and I've never studied psychology.

So you can judge character and spot liars without knowing what other people are thinking. Wonderful skill. I am sure you find it useful.

[stradi]

I would assume everyone here is using the same definition.

 

Well then, please state it.

 

 

What does someone's personality have to with their findings? There are plenty of good scientists were probably "bad" people. He didn't perpetrate fraud because he believed what he taught.

 

In this case, that fact he committed profesional fraud. Whether he believer what he taught or not, he deliberately falsified his case histories. That's what I mean by lying and committing professional fraud. He was publicly claiming his case history patients were cured but privately admitting to close associates that they were anything but.

 

Take Anna O - the founding case of psychoanalysis. At Freud's insistence, he and Breur fabricated the case, claiming she was fully cured. But in reality she was committed to an asylum. Freud told his fiancee in a letter that Breur thought she would never be well.

 

He did the same thing with Dora (a mess when she died, but perfectly cured according to Freud). Same thing with Ratman (a mess when Freud left him as privately admitted by Freud, but Freud publicly claimed he had engineered "the perfect restoration of the fellow's personality").

 

These were not "honest mistakes". These were deliberate falsifications.

 

 

But it was all based on his observations and his own experiences. He had incestuous desires toward his mother at one point and assumed most people shared that experience.

 

But he had patients telling him time again they didn't share his sick fantasies. He ignored them. He was raised by a nanny and it's not rare for orphans or people not raised by there parents to have sexual desire towards them when they meet.

 

 

Because the multitude of scientific studies done.

 

But many of those studies appear to have been done without controls, by psychologists who were already invested in psychotherapy for a living. They weren't independent.

 

NIMH claimed a mere 19% - 30% of depressives got better from either psychotherapy or SSRI's. Surely psychotherapy would have a satisfactory cure rate if it actually worked?

 

What is the scientific basis of clinical psychology? Was it actually supposed to be achieving?

 

 

Is that why there are never studies that show how medicines and treatments are worse than the disease they are supposed to cure

 

 

... What?

Edited September 3, 2010 by stradi

[Ringer]

Well then, please state it.

 

From the link I posted

. . . There are certain catergories of behavior that suggest the presence of psychological disorders which are, in one way or another, maladaptive in that they threaten the well-being of the individual. These catergories include long periods of discomfort, impaired functioning, bizarre behavior, and disruptive behavior.

¹

Long Periods of Discomfort

Given, everyone experiences some kind of psychological discomfort during their life. This could be anything as simple as worrying about a calculus test to grieving the death of a loved one. This distress, however, is related to a real, related, or threatened events and passes away with time. When such distressing feelings, however, persist for an extended period of time and seem to be unrelated to events surrounding the person, they would be considered abnormal and could suggest a psychological disorder.

¹

Impaired Functioning

Here, again, there must be made a distinction between simply a passing period of inefficiency and prolonged inefficiency which seems unexplainable. For instance, a very brilliant person who consistently fails classes or someone constantly changing jobs for no reason.

Bizarre Behavior

There are many things people do that others would find strange. The various piercings today's younger generation chooses to get and their style of dress may seem bizarre to adults, but their motivations are not hard to understand, which keeps them from being considered clinically abnormal. Bizarre behavior that has no rational basis, however, seems to indicate that the individual is confused. The psychoses frequently bring on hallucinations (baseless sensory perceptions) or delusions (beliefs which are patently false yet held as truth by the individual).

¹

Disruptive Behavior

<p align="left">

All of these types of behavior are maladaptive because they directly affect the well-being of the individual and those around them, and block the growth and fulfillment of the individual's potential.

¹

 

 

 

In this case, that fact he committed profesional fraud. Whether he believer what he taught or not, he deliberately falsified his case histories. That's what I mean by lying and committing professional fraud. He was publicly claiming his case history patients were cured but privately admitting to close associates that they were anything but.

 

Take Anna O - the founding case of psychoanalysis. At Freud's insistence, he and Breur fabricated the case, claiming she was fully cured. But in reality she was committed to an asylum. Freud told his fiancee in a letter that Breur thought she would never be well.

 

He did the same thing with Dora (a mess when she died, but perfectly cured according to Freud). Same thing with Ratman (a mess when Freud left him as privately admitted by Freud, but Freud publicly claimed he had engineered "the perfect restoration of the fellow's personality").

 

These were not "honest mistakes". These were deliberate falsifications.

 

Still doesn't make the entire field of psychology wrong

 

But he had patients telling him time again they didn't share his sick fantasies. He ignored them. He was raised by a nanny and it's not rare for orphans or people not raised by there parents to have sexual desire towards them when they meet.

 

 

And his theory of the ego and the subconscious was supposed to cover that. Not that it was true but he did cover why people denied these things.

 

But many of those studies appear to have been done without controls, by psychologists who were already invested in psychotherapy for a living. They weren't independent.

So studies of psychology aren't supposed to be done by psychologists? Of course psychological experiments are going to be done by psychologists

 

NIMH claimed a mere 19% - 30% of depressives got better from either psychotherapy or SSRI's. Surely psychotherapy would have a satisfactory cure rate if it actually worked?

Could I get a link to that study.

 

What is the scientific basis of clinical psychology? Was it actually supposed to be achieving?

 

What do you mean what's the scientific base? The fact that there are major psychological abnormalities or what basis are the studies conducted upon? It is supposed to help people with these sever abnormalities and find out where these abnormalities come from. I'm sure PhdWannabe would be able to answer better since clinical is his specialty

 

 

... What?

 

I was making a blatantly false statement that is the argument you are making against clinical psychology by showing how it looks with medical sciences that you say are far more based in scientific fact. All sciences can make mistakes and act upon those mistakes for many years until the mistake is shown. That doesn't make it any less of a science, on the contrary, the fact that these specialties can be shown to be wrong is exactly what makes them based in science. Clinical psych is still a young science and all young sciences are prone to mistakes and general distrust, luckily psychology will move past this prejudice and keep growing like any good science. Clinical psych is roughly 130 years old if you look at most other sciences when they were that young you would be amazed at what some of what you would consider sciences believed.

[stradi]

OK...

 

1) I'm not sure I agree with your definition of abnormal psychology. For example, "long periods of discomfort" might be an entirely rational response to discomforting circumstances.

 

2) You asked why I made an ad hominem attack on Freud - I replied his dishonesty is critical to understanding why his work was a failure. You then make a different point "Still doesn't make the entire field of psychology wrong". It calls into question the validity of the scientific basis of psychotherapy, supposedly established by Freud.

 

3)"Of course psychological experiments are going to be done by psychologists".

The data can - and shoulod - be analysed by people who are in a position to be objective and unbiased in respect of their conclusions. The experiments also need to contain a control group and a clear definition of success.

 

4) "Could I get a link to that study."

 

I've no link to the study itself; you can see it quoted in "Psychology Today" here:

 

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/199403/oops-very-embarrassing-story?page=2

 

What do you mean what's the scientific base? The fact that there are major psychological abnormalities or what basis are the studies conducted upon?

 

Neither... is psychotherapy supposed to restore, say, depressed patients to wellness? If so, by what mechanism is it supposed to achieve this?

 

 

I was making a blatantly false statement that is the argument you are making against clinical psychology by showing how it looks with medical sciences that you say are far more based in scientific fact. All sciences can make mistakes and act upon those mistakes for many years until the mistake is shown.

 

Hmm.. no. I'm not saying clinical psychology is unscientific because its made "mistakes". I'm saying it's unscientific because there's no identifiable scientific basis for it. Whereas there is in clinical medicine... you get a skin infection, you take antibiotics. You get asthma, you take ventolin. There's an identifiable scientific basis upon which the medicine remedies the ill.