"Secularism is a religion...Atheism is a religion"

[eFestivals]

You said 'mental grip'. That's psychology. Who has and who has not got a mental grip Neil? What is a mental grip?

because you're determined to prove your stupidity, I'll help you do that.

A mental grip is a will to do something. Everyone has it, but for different things.

AA will not succeed in helping any addict without that addict having a mental grip on their addiction, just as self-treatment for addiction will not work without the same mental grip.,

It's the exact same 'truth' that psychology bases itself on, you utter tool. Only psychology would never be over-zealous and ignorant enough to call it a truth. It's just one succesful way of coping.

So what psychology says is that AA can cure people without them having that mental grip?

And so it proves itself worthless, because such a view is contrary to all proven facts. You know, truth.

[worm]

... and then once they've finished observing, they invent some bollocks out of nothing and claim what's happened is that bollocks

[worm]

A mental grip is a will to do something.

[AcademicPistol]

Enlighten me.

[eFestivals]

Much like physics with it's invisible forces and behaviours. It's called theory Neil. It's what we conjur after we've observed something. We then test it. If it is proven valid, we accept it. It happens in all of the sciences. It's called empiricism.

So by your own position, gravity is 'invented bollocks out of nothing'?

The idea of gravity is testable, and constant.

The ideas of psychology are neither.

[worm]

The idea of gravity is testable, and constant.

[eFestivals]

As are the ideas of psychology.

complete and utter bollocks.

A will is testable. An addiction is testable. Coping is testable.

these things in themselves are testable, but nothing around them is - yet that doesn't stop you.

Spiritual experience is testable.

But the idea of it being actually a spiritual experience is not - but it's called a spiritual experience, and a whole raft of ideas are placed around that 'spiritual'.

It might be a fear experience. Psychology does not know, but psychology has already labelled it as 'spiritual' and it won't be moved from that (as you'll now prove for us all )

Even 'a mental grip' is testable, though I think it's far too broad to define to any significant degree.

it's very deliberately broad, because we do not know what 'it' really is.

But that's not stopped psychobabblists from labelling it 'will' and giving it a whole load of characteristics from the idea of 'will'.

Until we know that 'will' is actually (what is defined as) 'will', then we only have hot air. We can test our idea of will, we can self-sustain that idea with the definition of 'will', but at no point do we actually know what is going on (such as whether it really is what we call 'will'), we only know that if someone chooses to do something they can (with caveats) do that something.

The caveats show its not a constant.

And you have nothing to show that 'will' is a "free choice", you only have the made up for that part. For all anyone knows there might be a little man sat in our heads pressing buttons to allow some things but not others.

You can repeat it as much as you like Neil, the fact remains that you're wrong. And also that you've indulged a glaring irony that you're too ignorant to notice.

the glaring irony is not the one you've recognised. Instead it's one that your 'academic discipline' it is designed to refuse to recognise, because otherwise it has nothing.

[AcademicPistol]

The idea of gravity is testable, and constant.

The ideas of psychology are neither.

Edited August 15, 2012 by AcademicPistol

[Yoghurt on a Stick]

An assembled tourbillon, clearly showing balance wheel, pallet fork and escape wheel.

Clearly!

[kaosmark2]

Psychology evidence isn't as strong as evidence for other sciences such as physics, because there is no possible way to have an appropriate control group, to truly eliminate the potential for other variables, etc. etc.

You can look at trends, you can draw statistics and conclusions, but psychological 'proof' is not the same as scientific proof.

To give an example, the recent 'faster than light neutrinos' thing. In psychology, because you cannot replicate and assess in the same way, that experiment could never be truly dismissed due to faulty equipment in the same way as it was in physics, and some of the psychologists who stood to gain from it would probably stand by their original findings and dismiss the latter attempts to replicate it. Sure that happens in the natural sciences, but there they could be absolutely proven wrong beyond any doubt. That just can't happen in psychology.

I still think psychology can offer a lot, both in assessing trends, suggesting links, and most importantly, trained professionals able and willing to help someone in need. But psychology is not as true as real science.

[feral chile]

But the mapping of psychological processes is the province of science though - are people saying that mental processes can't be traced to their physiological origin because they involve 'inner' processes?

[eFestivals]

Psychology evidence isn't as strong as evidence for other sciences such as physics, because there is no possible way to have an appropriate control group, to truly eliminate the potential for other variables, etc. etc.

whoaaaa!!! It's waaaay more than that!!

Psychology can, at best, only ever be as good as the language that's used for it. And our use of language is almost as dark-age as psychology is.

Physical sciences don't suffer from the same problem, cos no matter how good or bad the language, there's still a force acting on an object, and nothing of that is solely dependent on language for an understanding of it.

Psychology only has language. While there might still be actions and reactions, they're ultimately only able to be internalised.

Edited August 15, 2012 by eFestivals

[eFestivals]

But the mapping of psychological processes is the province of science though - are people saying that mental processes can't be traced to their physiological origin because they involve 'inner' processes?

That's exactly it!!

We can only guess about those inner processes, yet those guesses are the whole basis of psychology.

That's completely unlike the physical, because if all language is removed from the study the apple still falls on your head.

[worm]

complete and utter bollocks.

[worm]

Psychology evidence isn't as strong as evidence for other sciences such as physics

Edited August 15, 2012 by worm

[worm]

That's exactly it!!

We can only guess about those inner processes, yet those guesses are the whole basis of psychology.

That's completely unlike the physical, because if all language is removed from the study the apple still falls on your head.

[worm]

whoaaaa!!! It's waaaay more than that!!

Psychology can, at best, only ever be as good as the language that's used for it. And our use of language is almost as dark-age as psychology is.

Physical sciences don't suffer from the same problem, cos no matter how good or bad the language, there's still a force acting on an object, and nothing of that is solely dependent on language for an understanding of it.

Psychology only has language. While there might still be actions and reactions, they're ultimately only able to be internalised.

Edited August 16, 2012 by worm

[worm]

Retarded, unenlightened, idiocy!

[eFestivals]

Re your many replies above .... in the words of a man from Gateshead called Gateshead, "yeah yeah".

Neil, psychology is a logos. Exactly the same as biology. Do you have a problem with biology? We don't know of the inner workings of cancer. We don't know what it thinks. We do, however, know how it functions in the body.

yep, we do.

But we have no idea how - say - attraction functions in the body, all we know of it is what gets externalised of it. We only know we ARE attracted, not why or how. But does that stop psychology from saying why and how? Nope ... and so it talks about things of which it knows nothing. It guesses.

Same for 'will'. Same for thinking itself. Etc, etc, etc.

We know (but psychology tries to ignore) that instinct plays a big part in what we do, but we have not the faintest idea - and we probably never will - of where its effects start and end in what we think and do. We only know that we think and do.

Same with addiction. We know how it functions in the psyche. You can deny the concept of a psyche all you like, but the fact that addiction occurs in one person and not in another proves that there is one.

I don't deny the concept of a psyche. After all, any concept you choose to make up comes into existence.

But please do tell me - with something more than the guessed at - what it actually is, what it does, where it starts with what we do, and where it ends.

And so we don't have a fucking clue of how addiction functions in the concept called psyche, we only know that we have placed the concept of addiction within the concept of a psyche.

PS: for you to prove anything of that, you have to first define the limits of what is addiction.Humanity has chosen to say that things like fags and drugs are addictive, while at the same time ignoring the things we're no-less addicted to in real-life actions but which are considered to not be addictions because they're considered 'good for us' and not 'bad for us' ... so even the concept of addiction is as flakey and undefined as everything else.

Psychology was invented by Cadburys. It's a flake that crumbles with just the slightest pressure.

Edited August 16, 2012 by eFestivals

[eFestivals]

Retarded, unenlightened, idiocy!

says the man boxed in and unable to think by dogma.

[worm]

But we have no idea how - say - attraction functions in the body

Edited August 16, 2012 by worm

[worm]

says the man boxed in and unable to think by dogma.

Edited August 16, 2012 by worm

[eFestivals]

So reason is dogma now then.

There's no 'now'.

I've been saying the same thing for years,. and you've never once been able to address it.

The dogma you suffer from is your reliance on language as the be all and end all of everything. Language is only ever as good as its invention, and history shows its method of invention is beyond dreadful.

Just because there's a concept in thought doesn't prove anything of that concept in reality. Got it??

To demonstrate: there used to be a concept that the sky might fall in.

Unless you think language is now perfect () you know the problem. So why do you have such a problem recognising it?

[eFestivals]

What relevance is that? But yes we do. We become aroused. The pupils dilate. The sexual organs become enflamed. But this is physiology, not biology or psychology.

So what the balls are you talking about?

I'm talking about psychology, you're doing your utmost to try and divert things away from that. I wonder why?

What you mention there are the physical, of no relevance.

Psychology has a concept of what is attraction and how it works. Care to show me how it knows how it works?

It is what we do. That's what it refers to. It starts when we start and ends when we end. You refer to it when you say 'mental grip' and 'will' and 'addiction'. These are all things we do. They are all behaviours and psychology looks to understand (not make up) those behaviours, much like politics looks to understand the logic of policy.

Psychology might look to understand, but in that looking it has to resort to the made up out of nothing. Like the 'psyche'.

We know we think. Beyond that, everything is guesswork. There might be nothing at all like a 'psyche', just as the sky is now known to not ever be falling in.

[worm]

There's no 'now'.

I've been saying the same thing for years,. and you've never once been able to address it.

The dogma you suffer from is your reliance on language as the be all and end all of everything. Language is only ever as good as its invention, and history shows its method of invention is beyond dreadful.

Just because there's a concept in thought doesn't prove anything of that concept in reality. Got it??

To demonstrate: there used to be a concept that the sky might fall in.

Unless you think language is now perfect ( ) you know the problem. So why do you have such a problem recognising it?

Edited August 16, 2012 by worm