Freud: Liar and Fraud

[Ringer]

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.

[stradi]

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 that means it's a subjective definition, and therefore not scientific. Someone may appear to have no reason to be depressed yet have a physical disorder which has depression as a symptom (like typhus or lyme's disease, for example).

 

Most psychological experiments are done with help from other areas of studies such as neurosciences, biologists, economists, etc.

 

Could you give me an example of how this works in practice? FWIW I believe in business psychology, ... It's clinical psychology whose efficacy I doubt.

 

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.

 

As a palliative measure, right?

[Ringer]

But that means it's a subjective definition, and therefore not scientific. Someone may appear to have no reason to be depressed yet have a physical disorder which has depression as a symptom (like typhus or lyme's disease, for example).

 

 

 

Could you give me an example of how this works in practice? FWIW I believe in business psychology, ... It's clinical psychology whose efficacy I doubt.

 

 

 

As a palliative measure, right?

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.

 

 

[stradi]

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.

 

 

But that's why I keep asking: what is the basis of clincial psychology's supposed efficacy today? How is it necessarily efficacious in a way that, say, talking to a good friend will not be?

[pioneer]

The phenomena of consciousness are generated by the brain and are best observed from within. If we observe these phenomena from the outside, we not only lose data, but we also depend on our own consciousness, to rationally/subjectively access the smaller set of observable data. This can add observational subjectivity and bias to limited data collection.

 

For example, someone is complaining about back pain. If you could crawl into their skin and observed (feel) what they feel (from the inside) we could determine if there is indeed strong pain, whether their pain is more in their head than physical, whether they are overreacting to a smaller amount of pain, or whether they are just trying to get strong drugs for an addiction.

 

If we only collect data from the outside we can't know for sure. The observer will have to use their reasoning ability and experience, blended with their own internal subjectivity to make this determination. If they feel sorry for the person they may conclude there is pain. If they are suspicious they may assume fraud, etc. If they are paranoid about their reputation but want to help they may give a weaker drug, etc . If they earn a living dealing with the mind maybe it is the mind, etc.. All these theories are possible and all may work for certain cases, but three out of four will be wrong in this case. The entire quackery stems from using external data and internal observational subjectivity to access internal data in a second hand way.

 

Relative to Frued, his observational subjectivity was biased toward sexuality. Sometimes this worked for accessing internal data from the outside, but not all the time. Due to this bias and his own subjectivity of being right, he may use the power of suggestion to get the other person to generate the external data he expects. If he could have climbed into the person's skin and observe all the data first hand, he could overcome his own bias and deal with the direct data.

 

The analogy is seeing an alien space craft but from the outside. We can assume there are chairs for the pilots and computers on board. As long as we only collect external data and don't go inside, we can marvel at our inductive ability while being wrong. Once you go inside, reality appears. Instead of sending a scientist inside to investigate, we send a layman and then ask him leading questions to get what we expect to see. For example, is there a type of chair that the alien pilot uses"? It could be a box that is near the console that is used for something else, but since the layman is led by the chair question, it says, yes there is a chair. A better way would be sending an unbiased scientist inside to observe and infer from the direct internal data. This gets rid of many degrees of separation.

Edited September 11, 2010 by pioneer

[stradi]

The phenomena of consciousness are generated by the brain and are best observed from within. If we observe these phenomena from the outside, we not only lose data, but we also depend on our own consciousness, to rationally/subjectively access the smaller set of observable data. This can add observational subjectivity and bias to limited data collection.

 

For example, someone is complaining about back pain. If you could crawl into their skin and observed (feel) what they feel (from the inside) we could determine if there is indeed strong pain, whether their pain is more in their head than physical, whether they are overreacting to a smaller amount of pain, or whether they are just trying to get strong drugs for an addiction.

 

If we only collect data from the outside we can't know for sure. The observer will have to use their reasoning ability and experience, blended with their own internal subjectivity to make this determination. If they feel sorry for the person they may conclude there is pain. If they are suspicious they may assume fraud, etc. If they are paranoid about their reputation but want to help they may give a weaker drug, etc . If they earn a living dealing with the mind maybe it is the mind, etc.. All these theories are possible and all may work for certain cases, but three out of four will be wrong in this case. The entire quackery stems from using external data and internal observational subjectivity to access internal data in a second hand way.

 

Relative to Frued, his observational subjectivity was biased toward sexuality. Sometimes this worked for accessing internal data from the outside, but not all the time. Due to this bias and his own subjectivity of being right, he may use the power of suggestion to get the other person to generate the external data he expects. If he could have climbed into the person's skin and observe all the data first hand, he could overcome his own bias and deal with the direct data.

 

The analogy is seeing an alien space craft but from the outside. We can assume there are chairs for the pilots and computers on board. As long as we only collect external data and don't go inside, we can marvel at our inductive ability while being wrong. Once you go inside, reality appears. Instead of sending a scientist inside to investigate, we send a layman and then ask him leading questions to get what we expect to see. For example, is there a type of chair that the alien pilot uses"? It could be a box that is near the console that is used for something else, but since the layman is led by the chair question, it says, yes there is a chair. A better way would be sending an unbiased scientist inside to observe and infer from the direct internal data. This gets rid of many degrees of separation.

 

Sorry pioneer, you've obviously put a lot of work into that answer but it doesn't really address my point.

 

What evidence is there that clinical psychology is an efficacious treatment for mental illness?