Ottava leaves Wikipedia Options

[Coffee]

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=324205438

[Malleus]

Ah! I'm firmly in the Thomas Satz camp; "mental illness" is a fiction dreamt up by medical doctors.

[Friday]

Ah! I'm firmly in the Thomas Satz camp; "mental illness" is a fiction dreamt up by medical doctors.

You've been around Wikipedia how long?

How is it possible that you don't believe in mental illness?

[Malleus]

Ah! I'm firmly in the Thomas Satz camp; "mental illness" is a fiction dreamt up by medical doctors.

You've been around Wikipedia how long?

How is it possible that you don't believe in mental illness?

Fair point.

To answer you seriously though, I believe that there are some physical conditions that result in behavioural disorders, but not all (or even most) behavioural disorders are rooted in a physical condition, so the concept of "mental illnesss" is meaningless.

[Milton Roe]

Ah! I'm firmly in the Thomas Satz camp; "mental illness" is a fiction dreamt up by medical doctors.

You've been around Wikipedia how long?

How is it possible that you don't believe in mental illness?

Fair point.

To answer you seriously though, I believe that there are some physical conditions that result in behavioural disorders, but not all (or even most) behavioural disorders are rooted in a physical condition, so the concept of "mental illnesss" is meaningless.

Um, how do YOU know whether or not most behavorioral disorders are rooted in a physical condition? The best you can say is that most are not rooted in any physical condition we can find, but since they are problems with the performance of the brain-as-computer, we wouldn't EXPECT to, so that's not worth much. We can't examine the brain very well at the level of software and programming. But each time we do, we find evidence that behavioral pathology is connected to physical pathology we not aware of.

The terms "software" and "hardware" when it comes to computers are still useful terms, although I defy you to define either one in a way which naturally excludes the other (which one is "firmware"?).

Mental illness is a term useful for behavioral problems which are resistant to simple behavioral modification. At least some of these are physical. We don't know about the others. This no more makes the term "mental illness" meaningless, than "software corruption" is made meaningless because we don't have a hard definition of "software."

[Malleus]

Ah! I'm firmly in the Thomas Satz camp; "mental illness" is a fiction dreamt up by medical doctors.

You've been around Wikipedia how long?

How is it possible that you don't believe in mental illness?

Fair point.

To answer you seriously though, I believe that there are some physical conditions that result in behavioural disorders, but not all (or even most) behavioural disorders are rooted in a physical condition, so the concept of "mental illnesss" is meaningless.

Um, how do YOU know whether or not most behavorioral disorders are rooted in a physical condition?."

I don't need to "know", I simply need to be able to find Occam's Razor. For many conditions, nothing is explained by the medical model of "illness" that can't be equally well explained by more straight-forward psychological explanations.

Or to put it another way, I don't believe in mental illness for the same reason I don't believe in ghosts, or life after death.

Your analysis is also very simplistic, ignoring as it does the cultural aspects of "mental illness". Many of those revered as saints in medieval times would be considered the most hopeless lunatics if they were alive today. When do you think that the concept of mental illness first emerged?

This post has been edited by Malleus: