Maggie's Farm

Polanski is on record as claiming that all guys "want to f- young girls." Perhaps some do, but guys with young daughters tend not to approve of the notion: the idea tends to make them go load their guns. Althouse wonders about the pedophilia of Hollywood types.

I would just like to offer the comment that, from a psychological standpoint, desire for 13 year-old girls is not really pedophilia. In the past, 13 year-old women routinely married and, without spending time on a search, I wonder how many girls in NYC get pregant at 13? I'll bet it's many. 

No, the issue is not whether men (or women, for that matter) are sometimes attracted to young people, or whether 13 year-olds can be sexy witches, or whether 44 year-olds can be drawn to young females.

The issue is the law. Forcible sex, and sex with the underaged, are illegal. Admittedly the latter is rarely enforced when the guy is underaged too but, regardless of our sexual inclinations and fantasies, or our opinions about every law, we all implicitly agree to obey the laws by virtue of our citizenship - or to accept the consequences like the adults we are presumed to be. That's Adulthood 101.

Rape is illegal. Everybody knows that. We used to hang people for it. It has never been in fashion, to my knowledge. Until now.

There is no doubt that humans tend to, or prefer to, think in metaphors. Much of it is laziness, I think, and some of it is how our brains try to work efficiently. We have posted on this subject in the past.

We use metaphors to make the unseen and unseeable feel real, so we can handle it and talk about it. However, metaphors can just as easily be deceptive and misleading as they can be illuminating: it depends on the integrity and intent of the creator of the metaphor.

Psychologists try to take on metaphor - with, of course, the tools of their own metaphors. You end up with towers constructed of layers of metaphors. These are often termed "theories."

Rescuing types, and loyal, good-hearted - if somewhat tolerant and often obsessional Boy Scout types of guys are often attracted to Borderline and Narcissistic women. These gals are often sexy, smart, exciting and romantic, and will idealize a fellow - until they don't anymore. That's when the s hits the f, and their hero begins to look like either a monster or a poisonous worm to them.

They split, project, and externalize in order to maintain some sort of acceptable and coherent sense of themselves. Broken and destructive people with lots of anger, through no fault of their own. Bad genes, bad life, bad luck, or whatever.

From Dr. Helen's post, her excellent interview with the author of Walking on Eggshells: Advice on how to cope with the Borderline in your life.

One of the most common consultations I see with men is about marriages with women with significant personality disorders. My usual first impulse is to say "Save yourself." My second is to want them to not take any sh-t from them. Then things get more complicated - especially when there are young kids.

My general advice to young men: Feel free to date them, but do not marry a Borderline or pathologically Narcissistic woman, unless you plan on its being only a temporary connection, because they will crush you and your spirit (unless they get good help - and learn to love instead of to idealize and split, destroy, and hate. It is tough, though, for anybody to acknowledge their grievous flaws).

Thanks to Dr. H for this good and useful (I will use it) video.

Borderline men are a whole different topic, which I will not get into now.

(Photo is flocking blackbirds. I do not know where BD found that image.)

A while ago, we posted some throw-away comment about human tribalism and the relative comfort most people fell, most of the time, with their own peeps. Ah, here is was:

Skin and ethnic diversity damages "social capital," harms society. Yes, OK, but it's not the skin or the ethnic: it is the different cultures that cause the issues with trust, familiarity, and comfort. Everybody is more comfortable around their own peeps, because they know what to expect and know where they're coming from. We consider that to be wholesome, natural, and intelligent tribalism.

Birds of a feather flock because they can interpret and understand what is going on - mainly the non-verbal messages. I participated in a medical conference in Japan about ten years ago, and I found it uncomfortable. The translators were excellent (I think) but I could not gauge the Japanese docs' reactions. Were they bored? Amused? Interested? Did they get my little jokes?  Most of them spoke some or a lot of English, but the verbal is just one piece of communication and signaling - and verbal communication is the most dishonest.

Knowing how and what to trust in others may be the most important interpersonal issue. Of course, one cannot automatically trust one's own peeps, but one can at least take their measure. That's what made me think about IFF.

IFF is the technological version of Stranger Anxiety. Clearly some stranger anxiety and wariness is necessary in life, unless one wants to go through life like Candide.

I remember once being told by somebody who "interviewed" kids for Kindergarten for a fancy private school that the kids who jumped right into the class (they brought them into a pre-K classroom) were the lower IQ, overly-social kids. The bright kids held back, watched, got the lay of the land beore they made a move. (There is probably a bell curve distribution of such traits, as in most things.)

Survival is difficult, but social interactions are maybe even more difficult. Early humans, we know, were not only violently territorial but also cannibals. 

Here's some hard evidence for the idea that the human brain grew powerful in order to deal with other human brains. It reminds me of how computerized trading programs which use automated arbitrage tactics to compete with the programs from other companies, seek constantly improving advantages in speed and subtlety. Brain vs. brain and, indeed, a form of virtual cannibalism.

Medical technology has confused the simplicity of death. One quote from the piece at New Atlantis:

...as long as the ventilator remains, that body does not look like a corpse. It remains warm, like the living, and the organs continue to do the work they have always done, albeit with the assistance of chemical interventions. Most significant and most challenging, from the point of view of common sense, is the fact that the heart still beats. The injury to the brain has destroyed the centers in the brainstem that regulate breathing—thus the perpetual need for the ventilator. But the heart of an animal—even one profoundly injured—has its own “inherent rhythmicity,” its own originative source of motion. This means that heartbeat and circulation have no absolute dependence on the brain in the way that respiration has. The heart, without any input from the brain, can continue to beat as long as its own tissue is intact.

The characteristic puzzle of the total brain failure condition, then, is this: the body remains warm and pink as blood courses through the vessels; the vital organs continue performing their work; but the human being as a whole, permanently unconscious and permanently and profoundly disengaged from his surroundings—eyes closed, making no response to pain, making no effort to breathe—seems something short of alive.

Regular readers know how much I love Stats. Peter Donnelly is wonderfully fun here: How Stats fool Juries. I don't think the lawyers understand the stats either, but you can in a few minutes. (H/t Bird Dog via the Right Wing Prof)

A quote from a fine editorial by Dr. Glenn Treisman in American Psychiatry News (free subscription needed) about psychotherapy and the problems with government medical treatment.

We live in a time when a great emphasis has been placed on individual expression and self-discovery. Neil Young once sang that “We are what we feel.” In fact, to other people we are mostly what we do, and we experience other people through their behavior toward us. The emphasis placed on feelings can easily mislead vulnerable people into believing that all behavior is acceptable if driven by feelings. My patients on the addiction treatment unit say they can’t get out of bed, when what they really mean is that they don’t feel like getting out of bed, a difference that is critically important in rehabilitation of patients with addiction(s). In order to live in a world with maximal liberty, we need a system that helps vulnerable people handle maximal liberty. This is not an unreasonable expenditure given the cost of ignoring the problem. Crime, addiction, wasted lives and untold misery are the results of ignoring the “special needs” of people with a generous endowment of feelings who have not yet learned to cope with that endowment.

Psychotherapy has been shown to help patients with many types of problems (yes, evidence-based medicine), including the one this patient had. Yet, he had not been prescribed psychotherapy of the type I gave him. Instead, he had been convinced that he could not prevent his behaviors and needed to be medicated to tolerate the stresses of life. He was persuaded that he needed to be on disability so that he would not have to be uncomfortable at work. Oddly, this works against the very premise of self-expression and self-discovery. With psychotherapy, he was able to develop and put his talents to work.

What happened? The forces at work in public sector psychiatry place pressure on clinicians to provide the kind of care this patient received. The checklist diagnostic method of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders allowed this patient to “make criteria” for all types of problems, depending on how he felt at each interview. Each checklist diagnosis generates an algorithm of treatments that leads to one drug trial after another. The psychiatrist sees the patient for a few minutes, and then a therapist sees the patient with a set of goals for the therapy based on the psychiatrist’s checklist diagnosis. Financial pressures push the staff to spend as little time as possible on patients who require more time and skill than the average. By giving a diagnosis like bipolar disorder, the psychiatrist narrows the focus of treatment, which becomes less expensive.

Moreover, the quality of public sector health care is now based on ratings by patients, and patient complaints generate aggravation. The easiest out is to allow patients to choose both their diagnosis and their treatments. This leads to satisfied customers on the surveys. Finally, disability leads to more used resources for both the patient and the treatment system; therefore, finding a diagnosis that might establish disability, with the attendant Medicare coverage and resources, is desirable for the patient and the clinician. Unfortunately, life continues to beat the patient up, and the real satisfactions of life that come from successful relationships, rewards for productivity and admiration from others remain elusive.

The term psychotherapy includes a broad range of practices, including the cognitive-behavioral and supportive forms I used with this patient. Unfortunately, we are seeing these therapies lumped together and delivered as if they are all the same. Expert diagnosis and treatment are needed for the most difficult patients. Surgical textbooks describe standard approaches to performing particular operations. Technically, people with modest medical education could be trained to do these procedures, but if the diagnosis is wrong or if something unexpected happens during the procedure, things will turn out badly. Surgeons spend years in training to ensure an accurate diagnosis and to prepare for unexpected problems during surgery. They need to be able to feel the difference between healthy and unhealthy tissue. The same standard needs to be applied to mental health. Mental health parity should mean not only parity of reimbursement for expert treatment, but also parity of health care quality for the patients.

Is it possible for a guy to talk to a lady without checking out her boobs - or her legs?

Is it possible for a gal to talk to a man without checking out his crotch?

Are all humans sex addicts? I need answers!

People hate it when I burst their bubbles about eating habits, but facts are facts. Everybody likes to imagine that they can control their health by what they eat, but there is no real evidence for that unless you are starving to death or fat as a pig. (Ordinary American fatness has minimal health effects, but major aesthetic effects).

Here are some real facts for readers who fuss about their food. In my view, unless you are on a serious diet, anybody who fusses overly much about what and when they eat has an eating symptom. Harmless enough, but a symptom.

(Everybody has his share of neurotic symptoms. It's human.)

I will say it again: the only reason to fuss with your food is to make it taste good - and to stay skinny and fit so you look good, have endurance, and do not offend others with your unpleasant appearance.

Hey, honey. Get that beer man over here. I need a cold one or two to go with my Sabrett's.

One quote from the non-technical post at Neurophilosophy:

A comparison of the DNA sequences from the 36 sea sponge genes with the homologous sequences from humans, Drosophila melanogaster (fruit flies) and Nematostella vectensis (a cnidarian with a simple nervous system consisting of a loose network of nerves) revealed striking similarities between the genes in all four species. One gene, called dlg, encodes a crucial component of the post-synaptic density scaffold. The protein product of that gene contains a number of regions that form the protein-protein bonds that hold the scaffold together. The segment of the dlg gene encoding these binding regions was found to be highly conserved - the DNA sequences in the sea sponge gene were identical to the human sequences. This suggests that in the sea sponge these proteins interact in exactly the same way as they do in the human postsynaptic density.

A re-post from 2007 -

A quote from a piece by Shrinkwrapped entitled The Mental Health Industry's Dirty Little Secret, with which I entirely agree (my bold):

The primary misunderstanding of Freud and Psychoanalysis, a misunderstanding that continues to be propagated by the forces of Therapism, concerns the locus of responsibility for our behavior.  Freud's greatest insight was that to a large extent our manifest behavior is the outcome of compromises among many impulses and inhibitions, most of them unconscious, which sum and move us to action.  As such, the goal of Psychoanalysis has always been to make us more aware of our hitherto unconscious motivations so that we can take more responsibility for our behavior.  Therapism does the exact opposite; it attempts to relieve us of responsibility by assigning motivation and blame to all sorts of agencies (parents, society, brain chemistry) which are by definition outside the realm of our moral agency. 

It is a small step from such thinking to enabling and encouraging the government to tell people how to live, how to raise their children, and how to think.  As Neuroscience enlarges our understanding of the biochemical and physiological underpinnings of behavior, those who have done so much to diminish moral responsibility will be in a powerful position to mandate proper thought.  The dangers are real and growing.

He goes on to quote Christina Hoff Summer and Sally Satel's Therapy Nation:

We reject the presumption of fragility and challenge the dogma of self-revelation; it exposes the folly of replacing ethical judgment with psychological and medical diagnosis, save for instances where individuals are severely mentally ill. We believe, in other words, that human beings, including children, are best regarded as self-reliant, resilient, psychically sound moral agents responsible for their behavior. For, with few exceptions, that is what we are.

Read the whole thing. Also, good comments on that essay at Dr. X.

As for myself, I have grown weary of trying to explain how psychoanalytic theories have been misunderstood, and how superficial understandings of analytic theories have been misapplied. Yes, psychotherapy can be a very useful tool - sometimes a life-saving tool - but it is neither a religion nor a cure-all.

On the same topic, SC&A asks whether we are all nuts in discussing One nation, Under Therapy.

The women of the world owe a giant debt of gratitude to Hungarian physician Dr. Ignaz Semmelweiss.

Mocked and ridiculed by the experts, he was correct that puerperal fever, which killed many mothers, was somehow spread by doctors and nurses who did not disinfect their hands.

The germ theory of infectious disease had yet to be explained in the 1840s, but he was a practical doc, not a theorist.

The story of Puss in Boots - the masterful servant.

Charles Perrault (1628-1703) wrote, or re-wrote, this tale, and from this tale of the deceitful, tricksy, power-seeking cat came the Mother Goose collection.

Great tales, and not just for the nursery at all.

A re-post from 2007 -

A brief break from my vacation in Dark Harbor on Islesboro on Penobscot Bay (there is no cable out here, and happily no TV either. Primitive dial-up internet, but once a week is plenty for that hassle) to highlight this piece by Jonah Goldberg at NRO called "Isn't that Special?" 

I am always pleased to see folks knock the concept of "self esteem." What we humans need to aspire to is Self Respect. Self respect is hard-earned, or never fully-earned, but a worthy goal. A quote from the Goldberg piece:

These investments in self-esteem paid off royally, according to a report, “Egos Inflating Over Time.” Jean Twenge of San Diego State University and a team of psychologists combed through the answers of 16,475 college students nationwide who took the Narcissistic Personality Inventory survey between 1982 and 2006. Their conclusion: Today’s American youth are the most self-absorbed since we’ve studied the subject. “We need to stop endlessly repeating, ‘You’re special,’ and having children repeat that back,” Twenge told the Associated Press. “Kids are self-centered enough already.”

Read the whole thing - link above.

Meanwhile, we will assemble the routine lobster, corn, potato and steamer clam dinner, but with a giant pot of hand-plucked Maine mussels also, cooked Italian-style in the kitchen, with garlic bread on the side.

We'll do the lobsters, cod, potato and clams on the beach, in a sand hole on hot rocks and coals under a pile of seaweed and sand - a true clambake. We wrap the hunks of cod (salt and pepper first) in rockweed (our main seaweed up here), and it tastes much better than lobster, in my opinion.

Family-picked Blueberry cobbler for dessert. Yes, we did bring a mini wine cellar with us, and plenty of fine champagne too.

The drinks provide that instant and unearned self-esteem; the harvesting of the fine wild foods provides the self respect, Maine-style. Yes, we fished at 4 am this morning, and fetched some fine cod with clam as bait. Saw a whale, too.

Images: Upper photo is of Islesboro. Lower borrowed from our friend neoneo, because I do not do cameras on vacation.

When somebody collapses and stops breathing, make sure you remember how to do CPR. Just make sure you don't do it to some person who simply fainted, because you can be sued if you break a rib. Legal protection for Good Samaritans in the US is fading fast. Still, every citizen ought to know how to do this.

I have had to do it twice, once in a parking lot and once in church. One lived, one died.

"Positive Psychology," an intellectual fad for the masses. These people talk about "happiness interventions." It's nuts, if you ask me, but I guess it attracts research grant money. Nobody has the wisdom to tell anyone else how to be happy, and anyone who purports to do so is a fool. A commenter to that article posted this:

A lifetime of happiness no man alive could bear it, it would be hell on earth. Bernard Shaw.
Happiness is nothing more than good health and bad memory. Albert Schweitzer
To be stupid, selfish and have a good health are three requirements for happiness, though if stupidity is lacking all is lost. Flaubert

I have posted on the subject here and here and also our Do Americans expect too much from marriage? (and I still think happiness is a dumb subject. It's what I call "psycho-utopianism"). 

Funny how disparate posts can seem to come together. Our Sowell quote yesterday captured it: The universe, or reality, was not designed to make people happy. But if you are one of those people who view happiness as a sociological phenomenon, see neoneo today on dystopias.

I am more inclined to the negativity proposed in our link to Nyquist this morning. One quote from him:

Chapter 3 should be titled “The Virtue of Guilt.” If you haven’t done anything bad in recent weeks or months, consider what you presently have in mind. You are wicked by nature, so you are guilty by nature. Therefore, it is appropriate to feel guilty. Don’t let yourself off the hook. Don’t be slipshod and weak. Suck in your gut and make a new start. Guilt is the stick across your back sent to make you better. Is guilt unpleasant? It’s supposed to be, and it better be. Feel guilty often, and have plenty of regrets. People who have no regrets are dangerous. They will suck you in and suck you down.

I do not know much about what Psychologists do or study. I do know what Psychiatrists try to do, which is to relieve disability and unreasonable pain. That can be difficult enough. Worrying about "happiness" isn't my problem. I happen to be reasonably happy right now, but I will not be in ten minutes when I attack my pile of bills and paperwork.

Heather MacDonald's fascinating report on American jails (as opposed to prisons) of today, with a cheerful visit to Riker's Island.

One of my life goals is to stay out of jail despite my dark and evil side.

Diagnostic madness in the DMS-5.

I knew they went over the edge when they began talking about Sex Addiction. Who gets to define that? These are the sorts of thing that makes people think shrinks are nuts, and damage their reputations as serious Docs. You cannot pathologize every human idiosyncrasy, desire, hobby, or preoccupation, because these are the things that make people interesting, unique, and colorful.

But for some sanity, making things out of wood leads to happiness. I have no doubt.

No signs of Wood-Working Addiction Disorder yet, but it's probably coming - right after Book-Worm Disorder, TV-Watching Disorder, Stamp Collecting Disorder, Bird Watching Disorder, and Diagnosis-Inventing Disorder.

It looks like we are on the subject of health freedom today. What I have observed over the past ten years is that people increasingly equate insurance coverage with medical care. That's sad.

In my view, it's a pathologically infantile sense of entitlement when people expect others to take care of them. Sad, indeed when Americans can afford their cars and car insurance and computers and iPods and cell phones etc. but expect somebody else to pay their bills if they get sick.

My view is that every responsible adult needs cheap catastrophic medical coverage - what used to be called Major Medical, with the deductible of your choice. Budget into your life the costs of your kid's broken arm and annual $120 camp physical - or don't have kids. If there's a big problem, the Major Medical will cover you. Like if you have a heart attack, break your back falling off a ladder, or if your kid gets shot in the eye with a BB gun.

I want to know what the Dems want to cover with their grand plan to "reduce" medical costs:

Will they cover Reike, massage therapy, homeopathy, acupuncture, chiropractic, crystal therapy, therapeutic touch, late-term abortion, breast enhancement, plastic and cosmetic surgery, hopeless chemotherapy and radiation therapy, eye movement therapy, light therapy, Chinese herbal medicine, hypnosis, social workers, bunion removal, in vitro fertilization, elective Psychoanalysis, alcohol rehab, penile implants, heart transplants, high colonic cleansings, liposuction, ingrown toenails and toenail fungus, Native Indian Soul Renewal, and liver transplants?

And do you want politicians making these decisions for you?

Me? I want the government 100% out of medical care and medical choices, because they have no idea what they are doing. No more of a clue than they know how to run GM - or the corner candy shop. I know what my private family policy covers. I chose it, I pay for it, and it's cheaper than the family's car insurance.

What the heck does the government have to do with these decisions, anyway?

This is what's on my "serious book" pile this summer. A gold star for me if I finish it all:

Telling Lies: Clues to Deceit in the Marketplace, Politics, and Marriage, Third Edition - Paul Ekman

Aristotle's Poetics for Screenwriters: Storytelling Secrets From the Greatest Mind in Western Civilization - Michael Tierno

Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self: The Neurobiology of Emotional Development - Allan N. Schore

From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life 1500 to the Present - Jacques Barzun. It's like 1/4 of a Columbia undergrad education in one book.

The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil - Philip Zimbardo

Plea For A Measure Of Abnormality - Joyce McDougall

There is no convincing evidence that "healthy eating" - whatever that is (eating "organic" vegetables?) - or a "healthy lifestyle," eg exercising daily or whatever - has any beneficial effect on your long-term medical future. 

Those things might - or will - make you feel better, happier, and more functional, and nobody likes to carry 30 lbs. of unecessary lard around with them, looking like a muffin-top or worse. Nothing to do with health, though. And that is why "Lifestyle Medicine" is quackery which has been foisted on a credulous public.

One quote:

...it’s little wonder, then, that the results of every major randomized, controlled clinical trial of healthy eating and lifestyles to date have been ignored, downplayed, or explained away... or their benefits greatly overstated. As incredible as it seems, they have failed to demonstrate significant benefit in preventing chronic diseases of old age, like the big three diabetes, heart disease or cancers, or in living longer. Nor has any healthy eating intervention been credibly shown to give everyone a government-approved BMI.

Other than avoiding smoking and substance abuse, and taking our medicines, our fates are sadly not in our hands.

Carpe diem: every day could be your last.