Schizophrenia' may not exist

[emad]

Schizophrenia' may not exist

Schizophrenia has been attributed to everything from genetic predisposition, brain chemistry, sufferers' home environment and even cat-borne viruses, but no consistent causal pattern has ever been identified. As a result, treatment outcomes for today's patients are not very different from those of patients treated 100 years ago.

According to Richard Bentall, Professor in Experimental Clinical Psychology at The University of Manchester, the problem is that the psychiatric category 'schizophrenia' falsely groups people with a wide range of problems together.

"Psychiatric diagnoses are based on a set of false assumptions stemming from the 19th century," says Professor Bentall, writer of the highly successful book 'Madness Explained'. "Although deep-seated, these assumptions have very little scientific value, and could actually be detrimental to patients and their treatment options.

"The idea that there is a clear division between 'mad' and 'sane' people, and that distinct psychiatric categories like 'schizophrenic' actually exist, is resulting in the mass-application of treatments which, will benefiting some, are very harmful to others. And because psychiatric patients are seen as having a biological brain illness which affects their rationality, they are not usually allowed a say in the matter."
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=30195


R D Laing had an interesting take on this. He said that trauma makes some people act out their family dramas irrespective of whether there's a willing audience to this or not.

[NWHarkness]

1. I just read a blog post on that same article

http://www.drcherylfuller.com/mt/

[murray hill farm]

2. misdiagnosis and lumping has always been a problem...

but schizophrenia...it definitely does exist!

[NNadir]

3. I had a housemate who went insane and ultimately killed himself.

Schizophrenia definitely exists in my opinion.

It's been fashionable to deny the existence of this most unfortunate mental disorder in particular and mental disorders in general. This is nonsense. If you've lived with a schizophrenic, you know very clearly what it is.

My housemate was a very talented and very fine person until the disease kicked in. I try to laugh the whole thing off, but it was, nonetheless, very, very, very tragic.

[preciousdove]

4. Article says mental illness exsists; catagories are in error, need update

[NNadir]

17. I was compelled to watch "A Beautiful Mind" by this thread.

It was well done over all. It certainly seemed familiar when I thought of my housemate's case. He had these moments of lucidity puncuated by delusions and hallucinations, before, as I said, he killed himself.

This movie was not the usual Hollywood portrayal of what a schizophrenic is. It seemed rather close to reality.

[bemildred]

5. Our comprehension of the workings of the human mind is shallow.

At best. A good deal more humility is called for. Mental
illness exists, that it resembles physical illness as a general
rule seems questionable, that the modern categories are any
better than the imaginative fictions that Freud came up with
to explain his profound insights about the unconcious seems
very unlikely to me.

The one area where we do seem to have real and valuable progress
these days is in psycho-pharmacology and treatments based on it.
It would be foolish however to assume reductively that the mind
is just really complicated chemistry.

[HuckleB]

6. So what is the mind besides a biochemical machine?

[bemildred]

7. What is a computer but a bunch of transistors? nt

[HuckleB]

10. So, no answer, eh?

[Pepperbelly]

12. is it?

That's actually a very silly thing to say. If you had actually had the foresight to think about it, then you would know that the brain is that organic machine, not the mind. The mind is the result of the functioning of the brain, at least according the the materialist's and literalistic view. Yet, you botched even that low threshold, then taunted someone else?

Amazing.

You experience, I assume, mind. Right there inside of yourself. That part of you that told you to taunt someone because they didn't respond to your rather silly metaphor. Check out that experience for a moment, without clouding it up with defensiveness or, even worse, preconceived notions of what it is. Then describe what you experience.

This topic is not something for flip analysis or sniping. It is a very legitimate realm of inquiry. Perhaps, you would define the word 'mind' for us sans dictionary. I've read those definitions and they do not feed the bulldog.

[bemildred]

13. Thanks for the defense.

There was perfectly good answer in there, but you
can't make people see what they don't want to see.
If a computer is just a bunch of circuits, then I
suppose the brain is just a chemical machine, and we
are all just little sub-atomic particles banging
around against each other. If that satisfies someone,
who am I to worry about it? :hi:

[HuckleB]

14. Blah. Blah. Blah.

You're about ten years behind the times with that post.

I asked a legitimate question, and I got flippant answers. So I asked again. That's not taunting. That's pointing out the flippant nature of the bogus answers given.

[Pepperbelly]

15. no, your question is ...

indicative of a total lack of both understanding AND knowledge. Perhaps a dictionary would be a good investment for you.

And one would think that you might at least have the grace to be embarrassed by your own imprecise and loose use of words. But, perhaps that would be an unfulfilled expectation.

And no, I am not ten years behind the times. Your attempt to cast stones to distract from the silliness of your own post is clumsy. Go ahead and check that dictionary since clearly my request was beyond you.

[HuckleB]

19. Baloney.

The only one who needs to be embarassed is the flippant and personal attacks that have developed from my question, including yours.

Grow up. No one answered at all, in fact. Which shows exactly how little those who responded know. But thanks for making accusations based on nothing at all.

[Pepperbelly]

20. do you honestly not know the difference between a brain and a mind?

Seriously, read the definitions. You have mixed up your terms.

[bemildred]

16. It is a stupid question, and my answer was not flippant.

The notion that "the mind is just a biochemical machine"
is rather a strong assertion, and as such it requires PROOF,
and there is no such proof. All that we have is a collection
of facts that show that the brain is, among other things, a
bio-chemical engine, of sorts, and that biochemical facts in
the brain correlate with various mental effects.

You instead want to assume that, and challenge me to prove what
should be the null hypothesis.

The point of my response about computers was that in a computer
the electronics are completely insufficient to explain what the
machine does, one needs to look at the program as well. I
submit that a similar situation holds with the human mind, one
has the biochemical machine and then one has the organization or
programming of the machine, and understanding the mind very much
requires understanding the "program".

[HuckleB]

18. Your hypothesis of computers, in the end,

would show that the brain is all biochemical still. The program is still a biological process.

Unless you are arguing for magic, I don't see what any of your hand-wringing has been about.

[bemildred]

8. What is God but a guy with a really, really big brain? nt

[Meldread]

9. My Aunt is a Paranoid Schizophrenic

I don't know exactly what it is like, but without her meds, lemme tell ya... she is wacko. I would certainly classify her as "insane" without her medication. Unless, of course, you think the entire world out to kill you is sane. ...and you hear voices telling you to hurt people...

[gate of the sun]

11. My brother was diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic

in his 20's. I read RD Laing back then.....20 years ago and I give some credence to what he said. Recently the last nine months I've been taking care of an Alzheimer patient and see similarities...william James said "anything one experiences is real". For these people they are living in a different reality and it make communication hard. I can definitely express that...to what is really going on no one knows. People like to label things like this as madness. Considering that we can't really explain the universe and how it looks all we can really say is that some people experience life different than we do. All of the labels and ideas don't really work for me and I have first hand knowledge and experience with these situations. They are not easy but I don't believe we can really judge what is going on.....alot of the things going on in the world right now could be considered "mad" like the continuing of destruction of out planet which is "suicide".

[WoodrowFan]

21. guess they've never read the 9-11 forum... (NT)