Around the web

Some interesting links for the week. The last two are videos I highly recommend.

• MIND Reviews: Doctoring the Mind : Scientific American — Despite advances in our understanding of mental illness, treatments leave patients no better off today than they did almost half a century ago—according to British clinical psychologist Richard P. Bentall. In his provocative book, Doctoring the Mind, Bentall takes on the conventional field of psychiatry, arguing that it works in a way that is “profoundly unscientific” and fails to actually help patients who are suffering from mental problems.

• A happy Christmas – alone | Balaji Ravichandran | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk — I’m also afraid that we’re on the road to medicalising loneliness, and seeing it as a disease in its own right…Somehow, the image of a family happily unwrapping Christmas gifts is greeted with joy, yet a solitary figure sitting by the fire, sipping a glass of wine, and reading or contemplating her past, present and future is less than palatable. Why? And why do those of us who choose to spend Christmas alone have to endure unending condescension and pity from the likes of those who think that being together is the worst fate that could befall someone, especially towards the end of the year?

• Biopsychiatry and critical thinking « Urocyon’s Meanderings
• The statistical games behind “off-label” prescription drug use. – By Darshak Sanghavi – Slate Magazine
• Boning Up On How Merck Marketed Fosamax // Pharmalot
  “Did you know that ostopenia is considered by many physicians to be normal thinning of bones as aging occurs? And that in 1992 a group of osteoporisis experts met in Rome and decided arbitrarily who should be treated for ostopenia? Essentially, they created a new category and never imagined the term would become a marketing cry for Merck to sell Fosamax. But NPR reports that’s what happened...”
• Kool-Aid Psychology: Realism versus Optimism: Scientific American
• Bright Sided a book review — “While I’ve read a few reviews that have expressed disappointment in Ehrenreich’s attack on the positive thinking movement, her examination of the entirety the movement should serve as a warning to a culture that has effectively decided that attitude is everything. Ehrenreich ultimately wades into deep waters when making judgments about the detriments of positive thinking — even seeming to suggest, at times, that optimism itself is our enemy. Of course it’s not. The enemy, as always, is any notion carried to its irrational extremity.”
• Jose Abreu on kids transformed by music — “Jose Antonio Abreu is the charismatic founder of a youth orchestra system that has transformed thousands of kids’ lives in Venezuela. Here he shares his amazing story and unveils a TED Prize wish that could have a big impact in the US and beyond.”
• Shameless: The ART of Disability by Bonnie Sherr Klein, – NFB — “Art and activism are the starting point for a funny and intimate portrait of five surprising individuals with diverse disabilities. Packed with humour and raw energy, this film follows the gang of five from B.C. to Nova Scotia as they create and present their own images of their disabilities.”