The ever-informative Andrew Gelman asks how we statistically evaluate some of the rather improbable claims from recent studies.
Speaking of improbable claims, Ed Yong deconstructs the latest on Google ruining your mind.
Peter Kramer defends antidepressants in the New York Times.
Neuroethics at the Core has a nice discussion of the issues involved in pharmacologically enhancing soldiers.
The New York Times education section has a special issue on grad school for all of your bitter academic ranting. I especially like these infographics.
Read the Kramer article. He focuses on whether or not antidepressants are effective. The real debate, however, should be about whether all 10% of the population needs them.
ReplyDeleteM
That's a tough question that depends on your interpretation of the Hippocratic oath. (Assuming for the moment that antidepressants both work, and make everyone a little happier). Does "do no harm" end with treating illness, or with getting people up to their full potential? It is not difficult to find examples of medicine's role in the later - plastic surgery is an obvious example, but so too is contraception.
ReplyDeleteOf course, messing with your neural chemistry is not to be taken lightly, but I do wonder how much of the discomfort you express is out of the very (North) American notion that suffering builds character.
The bit about the hippocratic oath is a fair one, I suppose. But how can it be an exclusively American perspective that suffering builds character? Last I checked, our culture was all about avoiding personal suffering in any form, even the northern part of it... ;)
ReplyDeleteM
What I meant is the following... there is a certain stigma against receiving pharmaceutical treatment for mental illness such as depression. Part of it is due to rational issues such as concerns over safety, side effects, etc. But some of the rest of it seems to be the belief that someone getting better without pharmaceuticals is morally superior to the one using Prozac.
ReplyDelete