BEAUTY.
Why Psychiatry, Clinical Psychology and psychiatric medications SHOULD BE BANNED...
I do not authorize psychological nor psychiatric formulations, interpretations nor diagnosis, etc.
This is a narrative, not an argument. it belongs to the field of hermeneutics, not of Science, and I wrote it for entertainmente purposes.s
Part 1: About the mind.
A) Psychology is not a science. It's a humanity. As, peripherically, is religion studies.
B) The mind is not real, it exists in the philosophical sense. It does not fulfill the criterion of objectivity, merely intersubjectivity at best. And it does not fulfill the criterion of independent "existence" of the believer.*
C) The only difference I perceive between the mind and the soul is that the mind depends, somehow, allegedly, on the brain. Whereas the soul aparently not.
D) The mind is a black box. No inference about its inner workings can be established from the correlation between inputs and outputs. The ins and outs of Kryten. Who is actually a robot... character...
E) In science, as poorly I understand, ORDER means puting one thing in number 1, another, different, in number 2, etc.
F) Being a black box, inner workings uninferable, the mind can't be ordered in the sense given in E. Therefore, there are no mental disorders scientifically speaking. Me being correct, I think, in D and E, and science's subject matter. One of its subject matters, only one maybe, being the real word, not the imaginary one.
G) The mind, as is the soul, is immaterial. There is no matter, no atoms, quarks, etc., no substance that constitute it.
H) Anyone claiming psychology is a science is making a humanity into a pseudo-science.
I) The mind fails the scientific epistemic criterion of falsification, It's unfalsifiable. There is no way to prove the mind CAN'T be any other way. Exemplified by the, I think, more than hundred theories of personality: one can always come up with another one. And another one, etc. Those things are clasically outside of the scientific realm.
J) The words, the symbols of psychology: love, fear, saddness, compasion, empathy, etc. Are irrational, not in the sense there is no reason to them, maybe there is. But in the sense that one cannot build consistent arguments, syllogisms, with them: free of contradictions.
K) The fields of knowledge that use those kind of words: inconsistent in syllogisms. Are humanities, that use hermeneutics instead of syllogisms. In THE humanities, not in Science. Science uses reasons and arguments, not narratives. Sciences do not use "constructs", use facts!, and beyond doubt at that!. BEFORE doing any sort of empiricism, actually.
L) As my individual appreciation, I am not an expert, those words are not usefull in syllogisms. They might be even pernicious to them. Those words cannot be used syllogistically because the manipulation of the symbols, the words, DO NOT reflect manipulations ON or WITH the concepts. 1 + 1 = 2, is transparent enough that at least I can see there are two ones in 2. Like a couple...
M) Even if there were circuits in the brain of/for "love", etc., those circuits would be symbols too!. They, if I am correct in L, cannot be used in Science, being un or anti-syllogistic, accepting an extension of L.
N) Although sometimes it is claimed that Science works, or could work inductively, I think it is true that Scientific Theories are used generally. A scientific truth acquired inductively is used as a premise, beyond doubt, unquestionably true, in a deductive way. To deduce a conclusion that actually is a premise for scientific experiments: a scientific hypothesis. To be tested, then, empirically. That, after all, IS the way mathematical induction wroks (sic). And works pretty well in a seemingly paradoxical 1.
O) Correlations are logical relationships of the type if A then B. Even if there is some probability in there, in the correlation, and in the if A then B. In the logical relationship between those variables: A and B.
P) If L is correct, then NO logical correlations can be present, can be formed, can be claimed ABOUT the mind. Or OF the mind. Except trivialy, like the "mind is not real". No logically or scientifically meaningfull correlations of the mind can be possible, can be real, even if they can exist as Love or God!, as narratives, or religion. Because of O. Even if there was a symbol such as a brain circuit. Because of M. No scientific meaning because of OM.
Q) Because of I!, aprioristically, each new "theory" of psychology is actually less likely to be true than each of the previous ones. The proof burden for each succesive one becomes tougher, higher, more difficult. The difference between N, an abstract number, and N + 1... On the probability, aprioristically, maybe Bayesianly, I'm not an expert, of being correct, given the previous ones. Related to unfasifiability of the mind!, not of the brain. That is a material difference, in a material world, of immaterial words, as Maddona sang!. Admittingly in another context. My deep thanks to Madonna too...
Ergo, QED, my deep thanks to Richard Feynman, at a minimum for the title "Surely you're joking Mr. Feynman". That phrase alone was a beautiful pissingly funny gift to me. Opened, decades after I read the title. It stuck as a paradox or a contradiction. But, surely, as a gift that looked, looks, to me, as a toy, on the cover, of a book. And I am too grateful for that.
*It does not go unnoticed to me that Crime lacks the criterion of independent existence. But unlike the alleged elements of the mind, the elements of crime might fulfill the criterion of objectivity. Useful difference, maybe irrelevant, since defining crimes does have unquestionable social value: at least prevents law by our own hands. It prevents the law of the jungle.
Part 2: About measuring the mind.
A) The mind is not real. It is a soul claimed to be attached to a brain.
B) I define internal validity* in a set of statements as lack of contradictions in that set of statements. That is a set of statements in which no contradiction is found. In mathematics that sort of statements with "internal validity" is called axioms, postulates, etc. And the they do no contradict each other within that set, and also do not contradict theselves in the next definition.
C) I define external validity as using a set of statements that are already free of contradictions to create new statatemnts that are also free of contradictions. A nice example is Euclidean geometry, external validity, from Euclid's postulates, internal validity.
D) I define real utility, utility, of a set of statements as it's ability to say something useful about the real world outside the set of statements. They say something true about the world that is not irrelevant or intrascendental. "Useful" used in "real utility", is not a circularity. They say something relevant or trascendental beyond mere statements: real utility.
E) Since the words about the mind as love, fear, sadness, anxiety, anger, etc. cannot be used in building arguments, they are illogical words because they lead to contradictions when used as arguments. They are used in narratives that admit logical contradictions, and are the subject of hermeneutics, interpretation, not of logic, and specially not of science. Science requires logic.
F) Therefore words about the mind cannot be used to describe something relevant or trascendental about reality beyond saying the mind is not real, or nothing about reality can be said with words about the mind. Those last two statements are usually called trivial statements. They are true, but are useless to build logically from them. They are trivialy true, even if they are way too meaningfull to me: they describe the nonsense around me in stuff about the mind, at least.
G) Therefore any measuring instrument that uses words about the mind such as questionaires, formulaires, simple questions, observations, correlations can't be free of contradictions. It would be an illogical instrument, an illogical artefact. And therefore logically cannot be used to measure anything usefull about reality. Let alone predict the outcome of doing something on reality based on those instruments beyond nonsensically.
H) As a consequence of G, internal validity in a measuring instrument in mind maters is NONSENSE, because of B and C. The internal validity measured with intersubjective correlations in mind issues lacks logic. It will lead to contradictions. Before searching a causality or utility to the correlation.
I) A correlation is a logical relation in the form if p then q.
J) For that correlation to have validity there has to be a logical relationship between p, q and the logical relationship connection them. A logical relationship cannot be illogical. That has nothing to do with causality. That has to do with empiricism.
K) An empirical tool, something to measure the correlation goes beyond puting two numbers in a correlation table without a LOGICAL, not a CAUSAL, relationship that connects them. Before examining causality, there has to be some truth in the corration, on why? they would be correlated. Not having whys to connect two variables in a simple correlation table is analogous of doing Alice in Wonderland logic: it is formally valid, but the conclusions are false and hilariously nonsensical. At least to me.
L) In empiricism what connects two variables in a correlation is a measuring instrument. Like a weighting scale or a ruler. Gravity gives utility to the scale, and space to the ruler. And time to the Chronometer.
M) Using ANY instrument to measure "things", stuff about the mind, mind maters, is analogous to using a random scale, or a ruler that can give any measurement. A measuring instrument that has no logic in it, and that it will never have a causality as to why it measures something USEFUL about the real world. And not even the so called "inner", mental world, because it lacks internal validity.
N) In Science, measuring instruments, aparatuses, etc. have a logic to them. They are based in Scientific Theories that give them internal validity in the sense of B: free of contradictions. Not in the sense of "internal validity" of the illogical correlational intersubjective agreement type in "mind studies".
O) In Science, measuring instruments have external validity in the sense of C, bcause of D. Using them tells us something usefull, predictive, accurate about reality. Something that is not mere statements that are free of contradictions.
P) The internal validity of measuring instruments in "mind studies" is nonsense. It has, and it will never have any logic, and therefore it will never have a causality either in the scientific sense. An it does no say anything useful about reality because it has no logic. Not even the multimentioned "inner world".
QED. Mind studies are illogical and there is no instrument, no formulaire, no questionaire, no observations, etc., that have a logic to them, let alone a causality to them.
Thanks.
* Validity in logic refers to the correct application of the rules of logic to create, or evaluate an argument. Broadly speaking it's called correctness of an argument. A valid argument is a correct argument, not necesarily leading to a true conclusion. That is a pun, the hilariousness of Alice in Wonderland logic, as far as I understand.
Strictly speaking, correctness, validity, ensures the truth, the veracity of a conclusion when the premises of the argument are themselves undoubdebtly true. True beyond questioning.
I define internal validity as I did to make a joke of the "internal validity" of "mind studies" so called "measuring instruments". For literary entertainments purposes, nothing more, like Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carrol.
Thanks.
Federico Soto del Alba