The manual that must not be named

The American Psychiatric Association have used legal threats to force a critical blog to change its title because they didn’t like it being called ‘DSM Watch’.

The ‘DSM Watch’ website, now called ‘Dx Revision Watch‘, is one of the better websites keeping track and critiquing the upcoming changes to psychiatry’s diagnostic manual, the DSM-5.

On January 3rd the website owner reported receiving two cease and desist letters from the APA ordering the removal of all reference to the ‘DSM5 trademark’ from the site’s domain dsm5watch.wordpress.com

You might be wandering why the APA registered DSM-5 as trademark – which is a legal device to protect against other people making profit from your good name – and why they are using it to bully critics.

Firstly, DSM Watch was a non-commercial site and so was in no danger of profiting from referencing DSM-5 in its domain name, and secondly no-one for a moment would look at the site and think it was an official APA site – in part, because despite the great content, it does not have, shall we say, the most corporate of looks.

If the APA still didn’t think the distinction was clear enough a simple request to add a message saying ‘not an official DSM5 website’ (or maybe they’d prefer ‘product’, who knows?) would suffice.

Apparently though, we can now distinguish between official and non-official DSM websites because the non-official ones are those engaged in healthy and appropriate criticism of the manual that must not be named.

However, I do hope they’re going to clamp down on the punk band DSM-5 so no-one mistakenly buys a copy of the diagnostic manual when they actually wanted a ticket to a sweaty hardcore gig.

Imagine the disappointment.

Link to post on APA legal threats.

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The Effortless Life: A Manual for Contentment, Mindfulness, & Flow

I am very happy to share with you my new ebook, “The Effortless Life: A Concise Manual for Contentment, Mindfulness, & Flow.”

The book was meant to share ways to make life less of a struggle, to help you find contentment in a world where little exists, to instill a bit of mindfulness in an age of distractions.

If you’ve had problems with:

frustrationstruggledistractionangerimpatienceunhappinessrelationshipsgoalsworkbeing present

… this book was written for you.

A Public Book: And it wasn’t just written by me — I wrote this book publicly, as others watched, and then hundreds of others helped to write and edit the book. It was an amazing collaborative effort, and I was humbled by the contributions.

Pay Anything: As a token of gratitude, I’m selling this book on a pay-as-you-see-fit model. That means you decide what you want to pay, and although I suggest a $15.99 price, you can pay more or less depending on your ability and how much you think it’s worth. If you absolutely can’t pay, you can get it for free (I trust that you’ll be honest and pay even a dollar if you can). If you do get it for free, please pay it forward with kindness to strangers.

And as always, the work is uncopyrighted.

Loaded Value: This book is actually a full digital package that includes 3 ebooks and a couple bonuses:

The Effortless Life ebook, in three formats: PDF, epub (for the iPad/iPhone and others), and mobi (can be used on the Kindle).The Simple Guide to a Minimalist Life, another of my ebooks that I think goes really well with this new book, a $9.95 value, PDF format.Thriving on Less, an ebook that was a companion to my print book, The Power of Less. PDF format.The Simple Method for Creating Habits, a brief bonus PDF that contains my habit-creation method that I teach in The Habit Course.The Effortless Life Q&A video, which I’ve recorded to answer common reader questions. It’s 31 minutes, online for buyers of this book only, downloadable to your computer if you wish.

This package could easily be worth $35-50. But you can decide what you see fit to pay. (You can edit the suggested price once you click “Add to cart” … just click “Update Cart” after you’ve changed the price.

Note: iPad and iPhone users … please see the Q&A below!

The book is also available in the Kindle store, but without the other ebooks, bonuses or video.

IntroductionWhat is an Effortless Life?Guidelines for an Effortless LifeWu Wei and Doing NothingTrue Needs, Simple NeedsReduce Your NeedsCause No Harm & Be CompassionateHave No Fixed Goals or PlansHave No ExpectationsThe Illusion of ControlLiving with ChaosLiving Daily without PlansWhy Plans are an IllusionBe Open to the Unfolding MomentDon’t Create False NeedsBe Passionate & Do Nothing You Hate DoingDon’t Rush, Go Slowly, & Be PresentCreate No Unnecessary ActionsFind ContentmentLet Go of Success & the Need for ApprovalPrefer SubtractionChanging Your Mindset & Getting Rid of GuiltMy Experiments with an Effortless LifeBe Like WaterEqual Weight to Every ActionEating SimplyEffortless ParentingEffortless RelationshipsEffortless WorkTurning Complaints Into GratitudeLetting Go of StruggleDealing with OthersYou’re Already PerfectPutting This Book Into PracticeEffortless Writing & This Very Book

Q: I bought the book and downloaded it to my iPad/iPhone but can’t open it!

A: The package comes in a .zip file, which is a compressed file. Download it first to your computer, then unzip it, then you can read it on your computer or read the epub version on the iPad/iPhone in the iBooks app.

Q: How do I read it on my iPad/iPhone?

A: Unzip the package on your computer, then drag the epub version into iTunes on your computer. Then sync the iPad or iPhone with iTunes on your computer, and the book should now appear in the iBooks app on your iPad/iPhone. Detailed instructions.

View the original article here

The war of the manual of mental illness

Wired covers the battle raging over the next version of the ‘manual of mental illness’ – the American Psychiatric Association’s DSM-5.

The piece discusses how the chief editors of two previous version of the manual, Robert Spitzer and Allen Frances – who edited the DSM-III and DSM-IV, have heavily criticised the proposed new manual for lack of transparency in development (non-disclosure agreements are required) and for ever-widening categories.

We’ve covered the (surprisingly personal ) battle on a couple of occasions but the Wired piece does a great job of getting into the nitty gritty of the arguments.

What the battle over DSM-5 should make clear to all of us—professional and layman alike—is that psychiatric diagnosis will probably always be laden with uncertainty, that the labels doctors give us for our suffering will forever be at least as much the product of negotiations around a conference table as investigations at a lab bench. Regier and Scully are more than willing to acknowledge this.

As Scully puts it, “The DSM will always be provisional; that’s the best we can do.” Regier, for his part, says, “The DSM is not biblical. It’s not on stone tablets.” The real problem is that insurers, juries, and (yes) patients aren’t ready to accept this fact. Nor are psychiatrists ready to lose the authority they derive from seeming to possess scientific certainty about the diseases they treat. After all, the DSM didn’t save the profession, and become a best seller in the bargain, by claiming to be only provisional.

My only gripe with the article is it seems a little star-struck by the idea that mental illness could be validated or even wholly defined by reference to neuroscience, which is a huge category error.

How would we know which aspects of neuroscience to investigate? Clearly, the ones associated with distress and impairment – mental and behavioural concepts that can’t be completely substituted by facts about the function of neurons and neurotransmitters.

That’s not to say that neuroscience isn’t important, essential even, but we can’t define disability purely on a biological basis.

It would be like trying to define poverty purely on how much money you had, without reference to quality of life. We need to know what different amounts of money can do for the people in their real-life situations. Earning $5 a day is not the same in New York and Papua New Guinea.

Not even physical medicine pretends to have completely objective diagnoses, as, by definition, a disorder is defined by the impact it has.

An infectious disease is not solely defined by whether we have certain bacteria or not. First, it must be established that those bacteria cause us problems.

The urge to try and define all mental illnesses in terms of neuroscience is, ironically, more an emotional reaction to criticisms about psychiatry’s vagueness than an achievable scientific aim.

Link to article ‘Inside the Battle to Define Mental Illness’.

View the original article here