Monthly Archives: March 2016

Book Review: My Brother Ron

[Content warning: mental illness, forced institutionalization, anorexia. As always all patient anecdotes are obfuscated composites of multiple cases with all the details changed in order to protect people’s privacy] I. After I wrote about Prison And Mental Illness, a reader … Continue reading

OT46: Open Rebellion

This is the bi-weekly open thread. Post about anything you want, ask random questions, whatever. Also: 1. Some corrections and clarifications about Saturday’s links thread: Fort Galt isn’t that cheap (2), some reasons male toddlers might by deadlier, debate on … Continue reading

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Links 3/16: Klapaucius And URL

“All infinite regresses are at most three levels deep”, versus the US military’s R4D program to build a radar detector detector detector detector. Jury fines Gawker $115 million + for releasing a sex tape taken of wrestler Hulk Hogan without … Continue reading

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The Price Of Glee In China

[Epistemic status: Overly simplistic treatment of a horrifyingly complex topic; I can only hope I haven’t missed enough to completely embarrass myself] I. Noah Smith reviews recent economic research suggesting that globalization was a net harm to working class people … Continue reading

Book Review: The Art Of The Deal

I. Many of my friends recommend Robert Cialdini’s Influence, a book about how to be persuasive and successful. I read it most of the way through, and it was okay, but I didn’t have it in me to finish the … Continue reading

Non-Shared Environment Doesn’t Just Mean Schools And Peers

[Epistemic status: uncertain. Everything in here seems right, but I haven’t heard other people/experts in the field talk about this nearly as much as I would expect them to if it were true. Obviously amount of variability attributable to environment … Continue reading

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OT45: Opal Thread

This is the bi-weekly open thread. Post about anything you want, ask random questions, whatever. Also: 1. I’m going to be running a psychiatry journal club at my clinic in a few weeks. Any suggestions for interesting or surprising recent … Continue reading

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Links 3/16: Rulink Class

New research: toxoplasma’s effects on cats and animals are as creepy as ever, but it probably doesn’t affect human behavior. New drug nilotinib looks very promising for Parkinson’s disease, may clean up proteins associated with death of dopamine-producing cells. Good … Continue reading

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Reverse Voxsplaining: Prison and Mental Illness

I. German Lopez of Vox writes that “America’s criminal justice system has in many ways become a substitute for the US’ largely gutted mental health system”. He says that starting in the 1970s the US “began locking up a lot … Continue reading

Against Interminable Arguments

[Epistemic status: something I’ve been thinking about recently. There’s a lot of complication around these issues and this is more to start a discussion than to present any settled solution] There’s a scene in Fiddler on the Roof where Tevye … Continue reading