Wessely gets touchy feely

[Obermann]

"Psychiatrists are doctors who feel with their mind and think with their soul. They are just as comfortable with poetry as pathology."

It is abundantly clear that the psychiatrists who developed the biopsychosocial illness model for ME/CFS did not use their minds to think. It is good that Sir Simon finally acknowledges this. It is also good that he is comfortable with the poetic justice that inevitably will follow when the PACE study finally is rejected as pseudoscience.

 

[Wonko]

Is the soul an accepted "thing" in psychiatry? And is it considered an acceptable metaphysical construct to replace the brain with? And as it is seemingly replacing the brain, and the mind, does this mean that it is out of bounds to psychiatry, being more tied to religion?

Worms, can, bonkers - this man is in charge of reviewing and rebuilding mental health in the UK!!!

 

[Inara]

Is the soul an accepted "thing" in psychiatry?

I don't think so.

In Psychology, soul and psyche are distinct entities (at least, that's what I found and a psychologist confirmed). When I searched for an official definitions of "psyche" it was hard to find one. At last, what I found is something like "psyche is the entirety [you could say 'set'] of all feelings, motivations, desires, actions and so on"; which is a definition of something abstract. This definition doesn't allow the conclusion that 'psyche' is something materialistic, physical, biological. This suggests that psyche and soul may share one common characteristic: non-materialism.

I guess in Psychiatry as well as psychology "psyche" is often thought and spoken of as a "thing", something materialistic, although their definition says something else.


At some point, a person should check whether their self-conception has any contact with reality at all. If not...I guess there's a psychiatric illness for this...

 

[large donner]

I wish he would make up his mind, one minute he is all about psychiatry is about soul and mind and outer space the next he is saying there should be no separation between neurology and psychiatry.

 

[TiredSam]

This definition doesn't allow the conclusion that 'psyche' is something materialistic, physical, biological. This suggests that psyche and soul may share one common characteristic: non-materialism.

You're going to get along with @alex3619 like a house on fire .

"Psychiatrists are doctors who feel with their mind and think with their soul."

The "are" is in the wrong position in that sentence. It should read:

"Psychiatrists, doctors who feel with their mind and think with their are soul."

 

[NexusOwl]

ICYMI Sir Professor Simon Wessely got all misty eyed on Twitter




James Coyne was not impressed

Sometimes you've got to love Coyne. (Some others you just can't)

 

[Liv aka Mrs Sowester]

Sometimes you've got to love Coyne. (Some others you just can't)

Well, he did tell us that he isn't the Messiah!

 

[Inara]

Well, he did tell us that he isn't the Messiah!

Good he let us know that - some people could be confused...

 

[alex3619]

You're going to get along with @alex3619 like a house on fire .

"Psychiatrists are doctors who feel with their mind and think with their soul."

I think the entire notion of mind is beyond its use by date. There is so much fallacious and baseless discussion of mind. Discussing brain, brain function, and learned experience avoids many of the logical pitfalls involved with discussing mind.

 

[Wonko]

Well, he did tell us that he isn't the Messiah!

But he must be.....he isn't called Brian.

We all know Brian isn't the messiah, coz Brian's mum, the mother of the messiah, said so, so logically it follows, that the messiah isn't called Brian.

He isn't called Brian, therefore......

 

[Inara]

I think the entire notion of mind is beyond its use by date. There is so much fallacious and baseless discussion of mind. Discussing brain, brain function, and learned experience avoids many of the logical pitfalls involved with discussing mind.

I agree with you.
I also think mind, as soul, are interesting notions one can philosophize about, as was done for thousands of years. But scientifically, there is nothing to discuss.

My experience is, terms often are used without knowing what they exactly mean. Soul and psyche are used interchangeably - in fact people euqualize them most often - mind is confused with brain, emotions or behavior are called "psychological".

Why in fact do I need another word for emotion or behavior? A word that is so flabby and not very suitable for real life. And why does it make sense to subsume emotions, wishes, behavior, action under ONE word? Only in an academic setting, like in philosophy, it makes sense to define "sets", "subsets" and so on and use them for establishing theories of thought and the like.

 

[Jonathan Edwards]

A shortish trick cyclist named Simon
Claimed that his chums all loved rhymin'
Too bad his own prose
Just gets up your nose
Like those dreadful never-ending repetitive piano tunes by Michael Nyman

 

[adreno]

I think "the mind" is an epiphenomenon. It's the monitor, not the computer.

 

[Joel]

You're going to get along with @alex3619 like a house on fire .

"Psychiatrists are doctors who feel with their mind and think with their soul."

The "are" is in the wrong position in that sentence. It should read:

"Psychiatrists, doctors who feel with their mind and think with their are soul."

Spoiler: click to see animated gif

 

[Ysabelle-S]

A shortish trick cyclist named Simon
Claimed that his chums all loved rhymin'
Too bad his own prose
Just gets up your nose
Like those dreadful never-ending repetitive piano tunes by Michael Nyman

Oi you, The Piano was a great soundtrack. I'll not have a word said against it!

 

[Barry]

Ah now I get it, psychiatry is science fiction!

No, just fiction.

 

[Barry]

It seems to me that when the pressure is on to focus on real science, the BSP brigade start blurting trying to suggest science is of secondary importance. When the pressure is on to use real objective outcome measures, they start spouting (as I've seen somewhere in the recent past) stuff that suggests objective measures are overrated anyway. It's like stepping back 500 years.

 

[Barry]

Ah soul!

 

[alex3619]

No, just fiction.

With psychopsychiatry very little if any is science, so yeah. With biopsychiatry at least some is science.

 

[alex3619]

It seems to me that when the pressure is on to focus on real science, the BSP brigade start blurting trying to suggest science is of secondary importance. When the pressure is on to use real objective outcome measures, they start spouting (as I've seen somewhere in the recent past) stuff that suggests objective measures are overrated anyway. It's like stepping back 500 years.

I think it was Peter White who made the claim that objective measures are not that important, if I recall correctly. He was defending using subjective outcomes in PACE.