Let the scientists and theorists deal with their job and stop trying to make it political. 

Psychologists take it upon themselves to define “normal” for a given society and then demand that people “stop making [psychology] political?  There is no way to avoid making psychology political.  It scares the shit out of me when psychologists fail to see this.  If you’re going to play at being High Priest of Mental Health I think you need to engage in some serious reflection on your role in society and what it really means.

Also, not so sure about the “(mostly)” in “(mostly) scientific”. Compromise and say “half”?

It makes sense too, autism is a wide and diverse spectrum where m.  Asperger  was a randomly selected sub group.

I’m interested.

Ironically, you seem outraged.

That said, I do believe that there are certain impairments that are more biological in nature than others.  However, the vast majorities of depression and other ailments that MDs see are.  For some reason, they try to treat the things like this that they have no right to do so, and are willing to pass the real biological cases to specialists.  Minimizing the profession.

I wish there were more people studying the harder sciences of seeing how the biology fits the mental models.  It is exactly what I did.  To be a psychologist, one doesn’t need anatomy or neurobio or even much more than the basic chemistries.  I have a lot of complaint about my chosen field, but the comment was about MDs treating illnesses with meds and being lazy…

And from my experience, most physicians feel the same.

Beyond that, in the MD world, psychiatry is considered a fall back field like GP or pediatrics.  It is an area you go into if you are not qualified to do more.  Honestly, I think the only reason I got an acceptance letter was because when the admissions committee saw my background in psychology because my scores were not that good.  

But the big reason for MDs being lazy is that they approach mental disorders as physical ones.  Not all…but it is the prevailing belief.

That said, the whole argument about the general public being outraged against changing diagnoses still surprises me.  Honestly, the clinical diagnosis does very little for anyone except the clinician…people are either in worry about being labeled or wanting a label so they can continue unchecked.  For some reason, no one seems to be upset about the Schizo line being condensed and formally put on a spectrum.  I guess schizoaffective isn’t a politically correct classification that anyone cares about.  I find the general public commenting on changes in a (mostly) scientific field to be as relevant as rich conservative men telling poor liberal women what they can and can’t do with their bodies.  Let the scientists and theorists deal with their job and stop trying to make it political.  

It is quite useful for that, but I assume a good practitioner notes DSM codes as elements of diagnosis and rough reference points, not like a culture coming up positive for a specific bacteria.

Note that I specified a “good” practitioner. There are lots and lots of lazy doctors of all specialties, mental health no exception.

It was a strange day, the day I realised that many people view learning new things as a kind of burden, rather than an exciting opportunity.

But thanks for your criticism.