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Spare a thought for the Psyche Lobby

Adam

Senior Member
Messages
495
Location
Sheffield UK
I'm sure Philip K Dick would not have minded me quoting from one of his many novels. The folowing piece comes from The Ganymede Takeover (1967) with Ray Nelson.

The thing that annoyed him (Dr. Balkani) most seemed to be Ringdahl’s insistence that he ‘crack them’. I want to cure them, not crack them, he thought to himself, as he entered his office.

He thought, then, about Joan Hiashi. An interesting case but not in accord with any of his previous findings; her reaction to oblivion therapy was unique. He would have to write an entire new chapter in his thesis in the New Psychoanalysis, all because of her. Perhaps, he reflected, I’ll have to revise my entire theory. What a painful thought…a life’s work down the drain, just because of one exception. And yet, as he well knew, a single inordinate exception such as this did not prove the rule; it broke the rule.

Perhaps, he mused, I’ll honour her by naming a mental illness after her. ‘The Hiashi Complex’. No, that was perhaps too ambitious. ‘The Hiashi Syndrome’. That would be better.

Closing the door of his office after him he seated himself at the foot of his analyst’s couch and glared sightlessly at the rather tarnished bust of Sigmund Freud looming on top of the bookcase. Quite a frowning father figure, aren’t you? he thought.


Substitute XMRV for Joan Hiashi and CBT for oblivion therapy, and WPI's study for a single inordinate exception and it becomes eerily contemporary.

You don't think Wesselly et al will get to name it XMRV Syndrome do you?

Anyway, there you are, you spared a thought.

I don't expect anyone to dwell on the misery XMRV should/will one day heap on our nemesis(s), not with all the misery it has already heaped upon us.
 

Dr. Yes

Shame on You
Messages
868
"XMRV Syndrome".... (shudder)

"CBT for XMRV Syndrome has been shown to help affected patients cope with the maladaptive behaviors that are frequently comorbid with this very real retroviral infection syndrome. All chronic illnesses can produce symptom amplification, stimulus augmentation and kinesiophobia in many patients; they should be encouraged to work with a qualified CBT practitioner to remove these obstacles.

"Carefully graded activity for XMRV syndrome is frequently prescribed to reduce the deconditioning that naturally results from this VERY REAL retroviral infection.

"Various studies (Sharpe, White, Chalder, Bleiejenberg, Wessely, Voldemort) have found that CBT/GET programmes can increase general immune function, which may decrease viral load of XMRV or of coinfections. Despite the fact that the controls were cadavers, we are confident in our results. There are far more positive published studies of this therapy than of any other."

-From "The XMRV Syndrome: Psychosocial Manifestations and Management of a Retroviral Disease Complex (trademark)" by Anthony Cleare


:eek::eek::eek:

What's the matter? Did I SCARE you?

(I can write prophetic science fiction, too! :Retro wink:)




 

Adam

Senior Member
Messages
495
Location
Sheffield UK
What's the matter? Did I SCARE you?

(I can write prophetic science fiction, too! )

A statement. I don't scare easily Dr. Yes.

A question. A simple answer (yes or no) will suffice.

Did you room with PK Dick?

Another question (you might want to think carefully how you answer this one).

Did you know that I am a fan (NB short for fanatical) of the aforementioned PK Dick and that collectively us 'fans' are known as 'Dickheads'?

BTW the K in PKD is Kindred, implying an affinity, similarity in belief or blood tie.

And finally, whilst I have you up against the metaphoric ropes, further interrogation...

What is your relationship with/to JK Rowling?

The Dark Lord?

Darth Vader?

I expect an unambiguous response post haste, or by noon GMT (7 am East Coast time) tomorrow. Do not prevaricate or use weasel words. They will not do. If I perceive any equivocation I will procede to Stage 3B of my plan and bombard your inbox with a litany of obscure quotes from VALIS and UBIK and THE MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE and (no one has yet survived this) THE THREE STIGMATA OF PALMER ELDRITCH.

There are several HERVS contained in this message. One Alpha-Beta Retro virus, two Smarties, but no computer viruses.

I remain your unobedient servant

etc

etc
 

ukxmrv

Senior Member
Messages
4,413
Location
London
It's not so "Science Fiction" after all........

after the claim to the Gibson Inquiry that Trudie Chalder and friends, could change gene expression through CBT only, then curing a retrovirus should be a piece of cake to them.
 
Messages
5,238
Location
Sofa, UK
Preferring to ride the wave of hope, personally I'd rather focus on the already well-documented prediction of a devastating condition known as Wessely's Post-Career Stress Disorder or Wessely's Disease. Severe trauma is induced by the sufferer's sudden realisation that their life's work has been fundamentally flawed and has caused decades of persecution of severely ill patients. The only known treatment is profound public repentence and sacrifice of their ill-gotten gains in compensation of those affected by their work.
 

Dr. Yes

Shame on You
Messages
868
Did you room with PK Dick?

No, I never roomed with Philip K., but I had this roommate in college who was a total...

Another question (you might want to think carefully how you answer this one)

Did you know that I am a fan (NB short for fanatical) of the aforementioned PK Dick and that collectively us 'fans' are known as 'Dickheads'?
Yes. Okay no.

BTW the K in PKD is Kindred, implying an affinity, similarity in belief or blood tie.
Hey, that's swell!

And finally, whilst I have you up against the metaphoric ropes, further interrogation...
I am not a terrorist. Well, okay, I sort of am. But I wasn't going to blow up this plane. Okay, that's only partially true.

What is your relationship with/to JK Rowling?

I did not have sex with that woman.

The Dark Lord?

(Sorry, only saw a couple of the Potter movies. Not enough material.)
Darth Vader?

I was Darth Vader for Halloween once as a little kid. This was when "Star Wars" first came out. I thought I was hot sh*t. Then at one house they locked us in and tried to scare us. It worked. Darth Vader started to cry. Not his greatest moment.

I expect an unambiguous response post haste, or by noon GMT (7 am East Coast time) tomorrow. Do not prevaricate or use weasel words. They will not do. If I perceive any equivocation I will procede to Stage 3B of my plan and bombard your inbox with a litany of obscure quotes from VALIS and UBIK and THE MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE and (no one has yet survived this) THE THREE STIGMATA OF PALMER ELDRITCH.
Dude, I really, really, really have no idea what you're talking about. Ever.
 

Snow Leopard

Hibernating
Messages
5,902
Location
South Australia
But really, who cares about what the shrinks think? All medical practitioners (should) understand that their practise is heavily dependent on the developments of science. If science has not yet proven a conclusive etiology (which the shrinks haven't even attempted to do), then such practise is always subject to revision.

If you talk to real scientists, they will tell you how little we actually know about anything. All we have built are excessively reductionistic models - nothing that compares to real world complexity. Even the most common diseases are not characterised well enough to avoid significant paradigm shifts (I suspect towards more complex multi factor etiology - very few diseases can be reduced to a single primary factor, even in diseases which involve single nucleotide polymorphisms, it is not proven how all of the symptoms result).
 

Ecoclimber

Senior Member
Messages
1,011
Psychiatry is a mental illness

I mean what flavor of the month do they come up with each year. Freud, Gestalt, Rogerian,Act, Field Therapy, wave therapy, CBT? Remember these guys are the ones who promoted frontal lobotomies and Electroconvulsive therapy. It is all theory not science. What profession treats the brain without proper diagnostic tools. It is only recently through MRI and Spect scans that they were able to map out the brain which changed many theories of how the brain functions. They are still in the dark ages when it comes to science. Science is just beginning to understand brain chemistry . Neurological research has identified over 50 kinds of neurotransmitters. Scientists have found that several neurotransmitters are directly related to mental health. These specific neurotransmitters are Dopamine, Serotonin, Norepinephrine, and Gamma Aminobutyric Acid (GABA). They still can't measure the serotonin levels and administer ssri antidepressants on guesstimate science which is more akin to witch doctors then anything else.

How many times over the past did they label diseases as mental illness only to find medical cause? Parkinson, diabetes, lupus, Lyme , MS, CFIDS?

I think that all psychiatrists need Electroconvulsive therapy to knock them out of their stupor and denial of legitimate diseases.

Just my 2 cents worth
 
Messages
28
agreed

I mean what flavor of the month do they come up with each year. Freud, Gestalt, Rogerian,Act, Field Therapy, wave therapy, CBT? Remember these guys are the ones who promoted frontal lobotomies and Electroconvulsive therapy. It is all theory not science. What profession treats the brain without proper diagnostic tools. It is only recently through MRI and Spect scans that they were able to map out the brain which changed many theories of how the brain functions. They are still in the dark ages when it comes to science. Science is just beginning to understand brain chemistry . Neurological research has identified over 50 kinds of neurotransmitters. Scientists have found that several neurotransmitters are directly related to mental health. These specific neurotransmitters are Dopamine, Serotonin, Norepinephrine, and Gamma Aminobutyric Acid (GABA). They still can't measure the serotonin levels and administer ssri antidepressants on guesstimate science which is more akin to witch doctors then anything else.

How many times over the past did they label diseases as mental illness only to find medical cause? Parkinson, diabetes, lupus, Lyme , MS, CFIDS?

I think that all psychiatrists need Electroconvulsive therapy to knock them out of their stupor and denial of legitimate diseases.

Just my 2 cents worth



For those who haven't seen it, there is a very disturbing American Experience episode on lobotomies that you can watch online:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/lobotomist/

"In the 1940s Dr. Walter Freeman gained fame for perfecting the lobotomy, then hailed as a miracle cure for the severely mentally ill. But within a few years, lobotomy was labeled one of the most barbaric mistakes of modern medicine."
 

jace

Off the fence
Messages
856
Location
England
Wessely et al do have curative powers, in as far as they provide the background for a duel of sidesplitting humor from Adam and Dr. Yes. After all, laughter is great medicine and my cheeks hurt from grinning so much!

Serious: The nature of truth, the complexity of reality, and the limited and conditional understanding which we humans have of the real world has been exercising my thoughts lately. Beware of anyone who says they have the only true answer, for certainty blinds to further discovery.

I wonder whether XMRV might have a role in many illnesses apart from ME and Prostate Cancer... maybe autism, could be MS, how about Altzheimers, OCD, Attention Deficit Disorder, other cancers....
 

Adam

Senior Member
Messages
495
Location
Sheffield UK
Serious: The nature of truth, the complexity of reality, and the limited and conditional understanding which we humans have of the real world has been exercising my thoughts lately. Beware of anyone who says they have the only true answer, for certainty blinds to further discovery.

I love this paragraph Jace. And your signature BTW.

I lost touch with certainty around 10 years ago (4 years into CFS).

Recently I wrote:

After a while, he said to himself, for the love of…I can’t even rest properly these days! And sat up thinking; how the hell did I get like this?

He had no answer to that, just more questions, inevitable ones like; does it really matter if my mind is a little out of joint, especially when it’s consistently that way? He suspected it didn’t matter. After all, hadn’t he figured out long ago that was how to get by, with his condition, in this world, where certainty was a commodity hard to come by?

And yet, habitually wary of absolute certainty he returned to conjecture.