🚀 go-pugleaf

The debate continues: a quick rebuttal to some of Jason's points:

On Mon, 1 Dec 1997, Jason Seidel wrote:

> In my rant, I was writing specifically about the science of human
> experience or mental illness, not science per se. Nevertheless, as far
> as knowing when a medical or mental treatment works for *you*
> personally, do you know it has worked because scientifically it is
> *likely* or because you feel better or more healthful? A lot of people
> die from listening to their doctors rather than to what their own bodies
> are telling them. If you are close to any cancer survivors, you know how
> important "feeling" and being in touch with one's body are in the curing
> of illness.

A lot more people die because their cancers are not caught early when
treatment has a much better chance at success; in many cases reticience
for (breast, prostate, etc.) screening may be motivated by a
mistrust of science and medicine. Not that medicine is infallible...just
that many causes of cancer are preventable (smoking, poor diet, lack of
regular check-ups, etc.). Research has suggested that psychological
interventions can improve survival (see the Fawzy et al study of metastic
breast cancer) so it is likely that emotions do play a role in many
disease processes (e.g., negative emotions supressing specific immune
system activity) but suggesting that people ignore the advice of their
doctors or other health professionals in favour of (idiosyncratic?)
beliefs is irresponsible.  This is not unlike the Christian Scientist
parents who refused their child a life-saving blood transfusion, believing
that prayer would cure their child, resulting in an avoidable death (as
had happened in 2 celebrated cases).

> David mentioned Carl Sagan's view of science over faith. Wierd
> coincidence, because coming back to Buffalo (yuck!) yesterday on the
> plane, I saw "Contact", the Jodie Foster movie based on his book. I
> don't know how closely the movie portrays the book, but, it was focused
> on the limitations of the scientific, positivist view. It might be
> summed up as "experience overrides verifiability." Faith, in that movie,
> is a most triumphant human quality.

Didn't recall that ending in his novel. "Demon-haunted World" is
non-fiction and argues that science, asking questions systematically,
testing old and new ideas, is the only way we can escape superstition.

> Anyone, including me, can imagine all kinds of extreme examples of
> religious dogma or "faith" that involve human sacrifice, slavery, and
> all manner of evil. But as far as I see it, we take most "scientific
> facts" on faith. How many of us really critically read the literature on
> the claims we make? Much research is appallingly bad. In many cases, the
> conclusions and inferences are incredibly twisted from the actual data.
> Science is as much faith as it is replicated fact.

That's an argument for better science, not for throwing science out the
window! Critiquing the methodology and conclusions of that article is
part of the scientific process. Write a letter to the journal. The best
way to raise the quality of scientific knowledge-gathering is to call
people on bad science. Tossing the whole process and reverting to
superstition would be huge a step backward.

> I feel that your question skates dangerously close to a racist ideology.

  I was suggesting that your statement (referring to "oreos" and "women's
libber's"), carried to its logical conclusion, was clearly racist and
sexist and I phrased it as a question in order to give you an "out."

> If Germans in the late 1930's were given Prozac and Xanax to help them
> eliminate the symptoms of depression and anxiety associated with the
> genocide of millions of people that was accomplished with their help, do
> you think this "symptom elimination" would be "help" or "crap"?

I find your reasoning questionable. Nazis actually did use airplanes and
automobiles, does that make use of these technological developments
"crap," too? Just because something can be misused, does not mean that
they have no utility when used responsibly.

> I say that yes, taking drugs is "crap" to the individuals "helped"
> because they are being sold on an ideology that somehow their problems
> are beyond the power of human relationship and experience to resolve.

By your reasoning, the same would hold true for prayer or other
faith-driven interventions.

I'm willing to bet you have treated very few clients with severe
depression, schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. Stepping away from the
hundreds of randomized, placebo-controlled studies (where objective
support for the efficacy of various treatments should lie), I can relate
that many clients subjectively report that their medications saved their
lives. Here, psychological interventions (improving coping skills,
stress management, etc.) may be an important adjunct to their medication.
(e.g., studies suggest that cognitive behaviour therapy + antidepressants
appears to make relapse much less likely than medication alone).

Maybe another example would illustrate the absurdity of your argument:
You wrote: "taking drugs is "crap" to the individuals "helped" because
they are being sold on an ideology that their problems are somehow beyond
the power of human relationships and experience to solve." Would you deny
insulin to a diabetic because the medication wouldn't allow them to solve
their problems themselves? Surely not.

David Aboussafy
Dept of Psychology
McGill University & Royal Victoria Hospital