MyDoorsAreOpen
Bluelight Crew
- Joined
- Aug 20, 2003
- Messages
- 8,549
rangrz I see what you're saying, but I've also seen just the reverse: people shirking responsibility for nothing more than poor choices or inaction because now they've got a bona fide diagnosis to blame it on. I think "It's not your fault, you're sick" is very much a double-edged sword. I'll definitely grant you that discoveries in psychology and medicine have empowered and dignified many people who previously would have simply been shunned, and I think that's a great thing. But on a society-wide scale, the medicalization of deviance, it seems to me, just trades one form of powerlessness for another.
I agree with ebola: we're a long, long way off from a comprehensive and universally reliable correlation of mindstates to brainstates. And part of the reason I think this remains stubbornly the case is that a refined and greatly expanded understanding of the correlations between thought and neural activity isn't really needed for helping people overcome unhelpful thought patterns.
I'll even go so far as to say I call into question the humanitarian merit of philosophy of mind and the science used as fodder for it. I question whether The Human Condition would weigh any less on most of our shoulders if we had a complete and highly detailed map of mindstates to brainstates that the general population was well-schooled in. I'm not saying it's not fascinating stuff, and that one shouldn't get into it for its own sake if one finds it interesting. But a lot of the bones it picks are wholly superfluous to the goal of helping other people live healthier and better lives.
I agree with ebola: we're a long, long way off from a comprehensive and universally reliable correlation of mindstates to brainstates. And part of the reason I think this remains stubbornly the case is that a refined and greatly expanded understanding of the correlations between thought and neural activity isn't really needed for helping people overcome unhelpful thought patterns.
I'll even go so far as to say I call into question the humanitarian merit of philosophy of mind and the science used as fodder for it. I question whether The Human Condition would weigh any less on most of our shoulders if we had a complete and highly detailed map of mindstates to brainstates that the general population was well-schooled in. I'm not saying it's not fascinating stuff, and that one shouldn't get into it for its own sake if one finds it interesting. But a lot of the bones it picks are wholly superfluous to the goal of helping other people live healthier and better lives.