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is this true?

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gepr

is this true?

From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
> After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.

Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.

============================================================
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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
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pEpkey.asc (2K) Download Attachment

uǝʃƃ ⊥ glen

Prof David West

Re: is this true?

ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.

An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅ wrote:

From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
> After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.

Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Attachments:
pEpkey.asc

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Frank Wimberly-2

Re: is this true?

Therapy and drugs can certainly change a life. I had a friend who worked for a research organization at the University of Pittsburgh. He had a Ph.D. in psychology. At the time I worked in the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon. He became interested in my work and wondered if there were opportunities for him there. He investigated and was offered a position. As a faculty member your job was to find a problem solve it and publish the results and then seek funding for further work but usually you had the freedom to pursue whatever problem you wanted to within reason. He was not used to this lack of structure and he became unhappy. One night he called me and was in desperate straits. I did what it could to encourage him. He entered therapy with a psychiatrist. Over the months he became more productive. After making some contributions in scheduling and planning software as I recall, he went to work for a startup and did some excellent work developing visualization tools. He was head of a group of a dozen or more developers and scientists. The group became a separate business. After a couple of years it was bought by a fortune 50 company and he was made head of the division it became.

I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.

Frank

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email]> wrote:

ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.

An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅ wrote:
From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
> After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.

Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Attachments:
pEpkey.asc

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Frank Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz
Santa Fe, NM 87505
505 670-9918

Nick Thompson

Re: is this true?

Of course therapy alters the brain. How on earth else could it work? So, the question wouldn’t come up if people didn’t suppose that some brain alterations and not REALLY brain alterations. I don’t know how those people make that distinction.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Frank Wimberly
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 6:20 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] is this true?

I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.

Frank

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email]> wrote:

ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.

An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅ wrote:
From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
> After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.

Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Attachments:
pEpkey.asc

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Frank Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz
Santa Fe, NM 87505
505 670-9918

Nick Thompson

Re: is this true?

In reply to this post by Frank Wimberly-2

Sorry. See correction, below. The point is, if the therapist convinces the patient, by rational argument, to do the Right Thing, whatever the right thing would be, we don’t tend to think of this as a brain change. But of course it is. So, what is this odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes, and some are not? Thus, we see again, as we must always see, (};-)] that brain state materialism is a crock.

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Nick Thompson [mailto:[hidden email]]
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 8:30 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <[hidden email]>
Subject: RE: [FRIAM] is this true?

Of course therapy alters the brain. How on earth else could it work? So, the question wouldn’t come up if people didn’t suppose that some brain alterations ~~and~~ [NST==>are<==nst] not REALLY brain alterations. I don’t know how those people make that distinction.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Frank Wimberly
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 6:20 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] is this true?

I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.

Frank

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email]> wrote:

ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.

An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅ wrote:
From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
> After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.

Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Attachments:
pEpkey.asc

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Frank Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz
Santa Fe, NM 87505
505 670-9918

gepr

Re: is this true?

To be clear, my question was whether therapy changed the brain in similar ways to how antidepressants change the brain, which was the (unjustified) claim made in the article. It just seems like a fantastical claim to me, if for no other reason than that there are different types of antidepressant. So, I might be able to justify saying "Different antidepressants don't even change the brain in similar ways to each other, much less to other, non-antidepressant drugs."

So, therapy changes the brain and antidepressants change the brain. Fine. Are those changes similar? And if so, how are they similar?

On 3/7/19 8:41 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Sorry. See correction, below. The point is, if the therapist convinces the patient, by rational argument, to do the Right Thing, whatever the right thing would be, we don’t tend to think of this as a brain change. But of course it is. So, what is this odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes, and some are not? Thus, we see again, as we must always see, (};-)] that brain state materialism is a crock.
>
>
> Of course therapy alters the brain. How on earth else could it work? So, the question wouldn’t come up if people didn’t suppose that some brain alterations and */[NST==>are<==nst] /*not REALLY brain alterations. I don’t know how those people make that distinction.
>

> *From:*Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] *On Behalf Of *Frank Wimberly
> *Sent:* Thursday, March 07, 2019 6:20 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email] <mailto:[hidden email]>>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] is this true?
>
>
>
> Therapy and drugs can certainly change a life. I had a friend who worked for a research organization at the University of Pittsburgh. He had a Ph.D. in psychology. At the time I worked in the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon. He became interested in my work and wondered if there were opportunities for him there. He investigated and was offered a position. As a faculty member your job was to find a problem solve it and publish the results and then seek funding for further work but usually you had the freedom to pursue whatever problem you wanted to within reason. He was not used to this lack of structure and he became unhappy. One night he called me and was in desperate straits. I did what it could to encourage him. He entered therapy with a psychiatrist. Over the months he became more productive. After making some contributions in scheduling and planning software as I recall, he went to work for a startup and did some excellent work developing visualization
> tools. He was head of a group of a dozen or more developers and scientists. The group became a separate business. After a couple of years it was bought by a fortune 50 company and he was made head of the division it became.
>
> I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.
>
> Frank
>
> On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email] <mailto:[hidden email]>> wrote:
>
> ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.
>
> An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.
>
> davew
>
> On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅wrote:
>
> From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
>
> > After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.
>
>
>
> Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.
>

pEpkey.asc (2K) Download Attachment

uǝʃƃ ⊥ glen

Frank Wimberly-2

Re: is this true?

I am using pice to text for this so there will be errors.

dysregulation with Central mono and energy systems is believed to underlie the pathology of depression. Drugs that selectively inhibit the reuptake of central monoamines have been used clinically to alleviate symptoms of depressive illness Duloxetine a novel compound currently under investigation for the treatment of depression buying selectively with high affinity to both norepinephrine and serotonin transporters and lacs affinity for Mon Ami receptors within the central nervous system it has been suggested that dual inhibition of Moana ome reuptake processes may offer advantages over other antidepressants currently in use in preclinical studies Duloxetine mimics many physiologic effects of antidepressants consistent with other antidepressants Duloxetine by a cute administration elevates extracellular how do I have any levels well by chronic administration is does not it does not

Duloxetine has brand name Cymbalta.

Maybe you could search for does psychotherapy do.... ?

Frank

-----------------------------------
Frank Wimberly

My memoir:
https://www.amazon.com/author/frankwimberly

My scientific publications:
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Frank_Wimberly2

Phone (505) 670-9918

On Fri, Mar 8, 2019, 3:07 AM glen ∅ <[hidden email]> wrote:

To be clear, my question was whether therapy changed the brain in similar ways to how antidepressants change the brain, which was the (unjustified) claim made in the article. It just seems like a fantastical claim to me, if for no other reason than that there are different types of antidepressant. So, I might be able to justify saying "Different antidepressants don't even change the brain in similar ways to each other, much less to other, non-antidepressant drugs."

So, therapy changes the brain and antidepressants change the brain. Fine. Are those changes similar? And if so, how are they similar?

On 3/7/19 8:41 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Sorry. See correction, below. The point is, if the therapist convinces the patient, by rational argument, to do the Right Thing, whatever the right thing would be, we don’t tend to think of this as a brain change. But of course it is. So, what is this odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes, and some are not? Thus, we see again, as we must always see, (};-)] that brain state materialism is a crock.
>
>
> Of course therapy alters the brain. How on earth else could it work? So, the question wouldn’t come up if people didn’t suppose that some brain alterations and */[NST==>are<==nst] /*not REALLY brain alterations. I don’t know how those people make that distinction.
>

> *From:*Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] *On Behalf Of *Frank Wimberly
> *Sent:* Thursday, March 07, 2019 6:20 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email] <mailto:[hidden email]>>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] is this true?
>
>
>
> Therapy and drugs can certainly change a life. I had a friend who worked for a research organization at the University of Pittsburgh. He had a Ph.D. in psychology. At the time I worked in the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon. He became interested in my work and wondered if there were opportunities for him there. He investigated and was offered a position. As a faculty member your job was to find a problem solve it and publish the results and then seek funding for further work but usually you had the freedom to pursue whatever problem you wanted to within reason. He was not used to this lack of structure and he became unhappy. One night he called me and was in desperate straits. I did what it could to encourage him. He entered therapy with a psychiatrist. Over the months he became more productive. After making some contributions in scheduling and planning software as I recall, he went to work for a startup and did some excellent work developing visualization
> tools. He was head of a group of a dozen or more developers and scientists. The group became a separate business. After a couple of years it was bought by a fortune 50 company and he was made head of the division it became.
>
> I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.
>
> Frank
>
> On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email] <mailto:[hidden email]>> wrote:
>
> ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.
>
> An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.
>
> davew
>
> On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅wrote:
>
> From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
>
> > After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.
>
>
>
> Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.
>

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Frank Wimberly-2

Re: is this true?

Also articles like this: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0010440X74900467

On Fri, Mar 8, 2019 at 7:41 AM Frank Wimberly <[hidden email]> wrote:

I am using pice to text for this so there will be errors.

dysregulation with Central mono and energy systems is believed to underlie the pathology of depression. Drugs that selectively inhibit the reuptake of central monoamines have been used clinically to alleviate symptoms of depressive illness Duloxetine a novel compound currently under investigation for the treatment of depression buying selectively with high affinity to both norepinephrine and serotonin transporters and lacs affinity for Mon Ami receptors within the central nervous system it has been suggested that dual inhibition of Moana ome reuptake processes may offer advantages over other antidepressants currently in use in preclinical studies Duloxetine mimics many physiologic effects of antidepressants consistent with other antidepressants Duloxetine by a cute administration elevates extracellular how do I have any levels well by chronic administration is does not it does not

Duloxetine has brand name Cymbalta.

Maybe you could search for does psychotherapy do.... ?

Frank

-----------------------------------
Frank Wimberly

My memoir:
https://www.amazon.com/author/frankwimberly

My scientific publications:
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Frank_Wimberly2

Phone (505) 670-9918

On Fri, Mar 8, 2019, 3:07 AM glen ∅ <[hidden email]> wrote:
To be clear, my question was whether therapy changed the brain in similar ways to how antidepressants change the brain, which was the (unjustified) claim made in the article. It just seems like a fantastical claim to me, if for no other reason than that there are different types of antidepressant. So, I might be able to justify saying "Different antidepressants don't even change the brain in similar ways to each other, much less to other, non-antidepressant drugs."

So, therapy changes the brain and antidepressants change the brain. Fine. Are those changes similar? And if so, how are they similar?

On 3/7/19 8:41 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> Sorry. See correction, below. The point is, if the therapist convinces the patient, by rational argument, to do the Right Thing, whatever the right thing would be, we don’t tend to think of this as a brain change. But of course it is. So, what is this odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes, and some are not? Thus, we see again, as we must always see, (};-)] that brain state materialism is a crock.
>
>
> Of course therapy alters the brain. How on earth else could it work? So, the question wouldn’t come up if people didn’t suppose that some brain alterations and */[NST==>are<==nst] /*not REALLY brain alterations. I don’t know how those people make that distinction.
>

> *From:*Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] *On Behalf Of *Frank Wimberly
> *Sent:* Thursday, March 07, 2019 6:20 PM
> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email] <mailto:[hidden email]>>
> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] is this true?
>
>
>
> Therapy and drugs can certainly change a life. I had a friend who worked for a research organization at the University of Pittsburgh. He had a Ph.D. in psychology. At the time I worked in the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon. He became interested in my work and wondered if there were opportunities for him there. He investigated and was offered a position. As a faculty member your job was to find a problem solve it and publish the results and then seek funding for further work but usually you had the freedom to pursue whatever problem you wanted to within reason. He was not used to this lack of structure and he became unhappy. One night he called me and was in desperate straits. I did what it could to encourage him. He entered therapy with a psychiatrist. Over the months he became more productive. After making some contributions in scheduling and planning software as I recall, he went to work for a startup and did some excellent work developing visualization
> tools. He was head of a group of a dozen or more developers and scientists. The group became a separate business. After a couple of years it was bought by a fortune 50 company and he was made head of the division it became.
>
> I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.
>
> Frank
>
> On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email] <mailto:[hidden email]>> wrote:
>
> ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.
>
> An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.
>
> davew
>
> On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅wrote:
>
> From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
>
> > After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.
>
>
>
> Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.
>

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

Frank Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz
Santa Fe, NM 87505
505 670-9918

gepr

Re: is this true?

Excellent! Thanks.

The stuff I've found so far seems a bit motivated. For example, this article:

https://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/27/health/behavior-like-drugs-talk-therapy-can-change-brain-chemistry.html

Talks about functional reduction of activity in brain regions (one for OCD and a different region for depression), where either the drug or the therapy were used. I couldn't find the original studies, but haven't looked very hard. The thing that worries me is the way they worded this article. Did they only saw the basic brain activity change in those patients who responded? If so, it seems like the result is baked into the experiment to some extent. I'm left wondering how/if the drug and therapy changed the brains of the non-responders. Did the drugs and talk therapies change the brains of the non-responders in similar ways? Or is the only similarity in these 2 cases *that* the responders exhibited similar changes?

This article was more circumspect, I think:

Brain serotonin synthesis capacity in obsessive-compulsive disorder: effects of cognitive behavioral therapy and sertraline
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41398-018-0128-4

"These observations suggest that, for some patients, successful remediation of OCD symptoms might be associated with greater serotonergic tone."

I suppose the idea being any intervention that modifies seratonergic tone (drugs, talk, whatever) may be viable.

This article helps justify my worry that the brain changes in non-responders aren't considered:

A RANDOMIZED, CONTROLLED TRIAL OF MEDICATION AND COGNITIVE BEHAVIOR THERAPY FOR HYPOCHONDRIASIS
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5957509/

"This study supports the safety, tolerance, and efficacy of fluoxetine for hypochondriasis. Joint treatment provided a small incremental benefit. Because approximately 50% of patients did not respond to the study treatments, new or more intensive approaches are needed."

On 3/8/19 7:11 AM, Frank Wimberly wrote:

> Also articles like this: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0010440X74900467
>
> On Fri, Mar 8, 2019 at 7:41 AM Frank Wimberly <[hidden email] <mailto:[hidden email]>> wrote:
>
> I am using pice to text for this so there will be errors.
>
> dysregulation with Central mono and energy systems is believed to underlie the pathology of depression. Drugs that selectively inhibit the reuptake of central monoamines have been used clinically to alleviate symptoms of depressive illness Duloxetine a novel compound currently under investigation for the treatment of depression buying selectively with high affinity to both norepinephrine and serotonin transporters and lacs affinity for Mon Ami receptors within the central nervous system it has been suggested that dual inhibition of Moana ome reuptake processes may offer advantages over other antidepressants currently in use in preclinical studies Duloxetine mimics many physiologic effects of antidepressants consistent with other antidepressants Duloxetine by a cute administration elevates extracellular how do I have any levels well by chronic administration is does not it does not
>
> Duloxetine has brand name Cymbalta.
>
> Maybe you could search for does psychotherapy do.... ?
>

pEpkey.asc (2K) Download Attachment

uǝʃƃ ⊥ glen

Prof David West

Re: is this true?

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Not necessarily "a crock."

Pretend, anthropomorphize a bit, that the brain is an entity with at least three observable behaviors: 1) establishing and/or modifying physical 'circuits' in response to stimuli of category A; 2) 'activating' specific subsets of the overall circuitry in response to stimuli of category B; and 3) 'emitting' electromagnetic wave forms in response to stimuli of category C.

Ignore for a moment the fact that all three categories of stimuli and all three behavioral responses probably occur simultaneously in most cases. [Maybe not the rewiring, as that seems to have multiple unique constraints.]

We then collect a lot of data of the sort, stimulus X(n) evoked behavior Y, with Behavior Y being an instance of 'rewiring' (p), 'local activation' (q), or 'emission' (r).

If we observe that stimulus X(1) and stimulus X(6) evoke an instance of (p) we might, being a bit careless with our language, state that the two different stimuli "change the brain in the same way." Being a bit more careful, we might say only that Stimuli X(1) and X(6) belong in the same category A, B, or C.

Given this framework, I would venture a guess that Therapy and Drugs, as stimuli, would not evoke the same behavior. I would expect Therapy to result in behaviors of the 'rewiring' type while Drugs evoke 'activation' type.

This would allow me to address Nick's concern, "odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes and some are not" by asserting that there is no 'real/unreal' dualism, but there is a useful category distinction to be made.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 9:41 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Sorry. See correction, below. The point is, if the therapist convinces the patient, by rational argument, to do the Right Thing, whatever the right thing would be, we don’t tend to think of this as a brain change. But of course it is. So, what is this odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes, and some are not? Thus, we see again, as we must always see, (};-)] that brain state materialism is a crock.

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Nick Thompson [mailto:[hidden email]]
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 8:30 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <[hidden email]>
Subject: RE: [FRIAM] is this true?

Of course therapy alters the brain. How on earth else could it work? So, the question wouldn’t come up if people didn’t suppose that some brain alterations ~~and~~ [NST==>are<==nst] not REALLY brain alterations. I don’t know how those people make that distinction.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Frank Wimberly
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 6:20 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] is this true?

Therapy and drugs can certainly change a life. I had a friend who worked for a research organization at the University of Pittsburgh. He had a Ph.D. in psychology. At the time I worked in the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon. He became interested in my work and wondered if there were opportunities for him there. He investigated and was offered a position. As a faculty member your job was to find a problem solve it and publish the results and then seek funding for further work but usually you had the freedom to pursue whatever problem you wanted to within reason. He was not used to this lack of structure and he became unhappy. One night he called me and was in desperate straits. I did what it could to encourage him. He entered therapy with a psychiatrist. Over the months he became more productive. After making some contributions in scheduling and planning software as I recall, he went to work for a startup and did some excellent work developing visualization tools. He was head of a group of a dozen or more developers and scientists. The group became a separate business. After a couple of years it was bought by a fortune 50 company and he was made head of the division it became.

I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.

Frank

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email]> wrote:
ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.

An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅ wrote:
From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
> After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.

Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.

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--
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140 Calle Ojo Feliz
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505 670-9918
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Steve Smith

Re: is this true?

Glen -

Another interesting question to speculate around (as usual)!

On the face of it, the question of whether there are brain changes in response to therapy or pharmaceuticals, would seem to be very trite or another form of the mind/body (mind/brain) question. My trite answer to the implied trite question would be a simple "yes".

I think you are asking something more sophisticated though? If we believe that there are *some* kinds of changes to the brain (such as Dave's examples below) when we "change our minds" or "see things differently" then in fact there is a "plastic" change which persists past the direct effect of the drugs or the therapy session.

I think you are asking *what* the specific brain changes are that might be effected through A) Therapy and B) Antidepressants/??? and C) a) supported/enhanced/accelerated by b).

I have no personal experience with B (excepting of course, the self-medication with alcohol, fats, carbs and mood-alterations that come with their timely application). The experiences I have with A) ranging from a good bartender to a good life-partner to a good friend to a licensed therapist, suggest that significant changes *can* be made.

Those made with a "casual" conversational partner under the influence of alcohol tend to be a lot more elastic. I've never worked as a bartender but can imagine how much mood-swinging, life-change-claiming experiences they observe in their customers. I've observed angry as well as sloppy drunks who seem to resolve their angst while "under the influence" only to return to roughly the same position with their angst the next day/weekend and go through the same alcohol/rant/rave induced denoument over (and over and over). From what I've observed (less frequently) pot smokers, binge-eaters, binge-shoppers and gamblers go through a similar cycle.

if/since the goal is often to effect more plastic change, then it is natural to seek mechanisms that support that. I personally have tried some therapy and had mixed results. I wasn't specifically seeking relief from depression as such, but depression was surely part of the complex of symptoms I was feeling. I was seeking to make some "changes in perspective" which I hoped would lower the cognitive/emotional burden I was feeling from navigating my life as it was structured. I was stuck in not wanting to change the structure of my life, finding aspects of it hard/tiring/confronting to endure, and wanting to "adjust my attitude" to fit my circumstances "more better". Of course, the net result included recognizing that *some* of the aspects of my life *would change* as I changed my attitude toward them. This included primary and secondary relationships, and work/career as well as my relationship with the larger social sphere as I apprehend it.

Both therapists asked me when I interviewed them if I was seeking anti-depressant medication. I didn't know if that was A) them observing/diagnosing me as "depressed" on first meeting; B) vetting me for someone who also needed a consult with a licensed psychiatrist who could make such prescriptions; C) doing triage to see if my self-proclaimed reasons (which didn't include acknowledging depression) for seeking therapy were misleading (in that specific way); D) vetting me for someone who was seeking a "quick fix".

The second therapist DID offer and provide me with some EMDR treatment (eye movement desensitization and reprocessing). I was skeptical, but approached it as a mild form of hypnosis. She was relatively new to the method and I was also perhaps "indulging her" in getting some practice while I got to experiment with whether such things *could* have an effect. My (very subjective) answer was that it could absolutely be effective. When it worked, I swear I felt an immediate (and mostly plastic) shift in my larger mental state. It seemed to work as advertised in breaking some kinds of persistent beliefs I held about myself or the world. One important caveat that is fundamental to the psychotheraputic model... it only worked when I really wanted it to. The trick (not unlike some of my recent rants here about "asking the right question") seemed to be to frame the problem/question/belief at hand properly before we could actually effectively make any headway. We often spent an entire session trying to agree on what the underlying "belief" I wanted/need to change *was* and then do the actual EMDR (including some pre and post analysis) in a subsequent session. My therapist seemed a little frustrated at how much time/energy we expended narrowing it all down to "the right question" and we agreed this was at least *partly* a consequence of me living so strongly (belligerently?) in my head. I think she also *learned* from my example that "getting the question right" was key. It felt to me that the few successful EMDR sessions we had (small handful) DID help to unkink some of my deeper beliefs and I DID obtain some immediate and persistent relief in my life from it. It may also be the case that since I wasn't seeking relief from any specific identifiable events or circumstances, that EMDR wasn't the perfect fit.

I brought up EMDR because I felt that it's mechanism (which is a little under-understood I think) may not be that dissimilar to conventional anti-depressant or complementarily? microdosing of psi drugs in that it helped me get *past* the built-in (ego?) defenses that were holding various beliefs in a sacred place. From what I hear with conventional anti-depressants, they can relieve the psychic anxiety or increase the energy to a level that allows the individual to proceed to change habits which they might otherwise be unable to due to under/overproduction of neurochemistry. I would suggest that the anti-depressant mechanisms change the *dynamics* of the brain which *allows* the function to shift enough that the *structure* can become changed through some amount of repetition (shift in habits of being/thinking) which would reflect the "change to the brain" you are suggesting. I assume the same thing (through different mechanisms?) applies to psi microdosing. Instead of adjusting the *gross* or *familiar* neurochemistry, they tweak more subtle (or lesser known?) mechanisms which allow for/induce behavioral (thought as well as activity) changes in a way that can lead to the brain-function/structure changes you are suggesting.

On reflection, the EMDR experience I had *felt* like something shifted physically/biochemically very abruptly and plasticly. I don't remember ever feeling like the beliefs I had "changed" were at risk of reverting. In that way it felt like I'd achieved a denoument of some kind which I suppose doesn't have to represent significant physical changes?

Mumble,

- Steve

On 3/8/19 9:36 AM, Prof David West wrote:

Not necessarily "a crock."

Pretend, anthropomorphize a bit, that the brain is an entity with at least three observable behaviors: 1) establishing and/or modifying physical 'circuits' in response to stimuli of category A; 2) 'activating' specific subsets of the overall circuitry in response to stimuli of category B; and 3) 'emitting' electromagnetic wave forms in response to stimuli of category C.

Ignore for a moment the fact that all three categories of stimuli and all three behavioral responses probably occur simultaneously in most cases. [Maybe not the rewiring, as that seems to have multiple unique constraints.]

We then collect a lot of data of the sort, stimulus X(n) evoked behavior Y, with Behavior Y being an instance of 'rewiring' (p), 'local activation' (q), or 'emission' (r).

If we observe that stimulus X(1) and stimulus X(6) evoke an instance of (p) we might, being a bit careless with our language, state that the two different stimuli "change the brain in the same way." Being a bit more careful, we might say only that Stimuli X(1) and X(6) belong in the same category A, B, or C.

Given this framework, I would venture a guess that Therapy and Drugs, as stimuli, would not evoke the same behavior. I would expect Therapy to result in behaviors of the 'rewiring' type while Drugs evoke 'activation' type.

This would allow me to address Nick's concern, "odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes and some are not" by asserting that there is no 'real/unreal' dualism, but there is a useful category distinction to be made.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 9:41 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Sorry. See correction, below. The point is, if the therapist convinces the patient, by rational argument, to do the Right Thing, whatever the right thing would be, we don’t tend to think of this as a brain change. But of course it is. So, what is this odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes, and some are not? Thus, we see again, as we must always see, (};-)] that brain state materialism is a crock.

N

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Nick Thompson [[hidden email]]
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 8:30 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' [hidden email]
Subject: RE: [FRIAM] is this true?

Of course therapy alters the brain. How on earth else could it work? So, the question wouldn’t come up if people didn’t suppose that some brain alterations ~~and~~ [NST==>are<==nst] not REALLY brain alterations. I don’t know how those people make that distinction.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Frank Wimberly
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 6:20 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] is this true?

Therapy and drugs can certainly change a life. I had a friend who worked for a research organization at the University of Pittsburgh. He had a Ph.D. in psychology. At the time I worked in the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon. He became interested in my work and wondered if there were opportunities for him there. He investigated and was offered a position. As a faculty member your job was to find a problem solve it and publish the results and then seek funding for further work but usually you had the freedom to pursue whatever problem you wanted to within reason. He was not used to this lack of structure and he became unhappy. One night he called me and was in desperate straits. I did what it could to encourage him. He entered therapy with a psychiatrist. Over the months he became more productive. After making some contributions in scheduling and planning software as I recall, he went to work for a startup and did some excellent work developing visualization tools. He was head of a group of a dozen or more developers and scientists. The group became a separate business. After a couple of years it was bought by a fortune 50 company and he was made head of the division it became.

I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.

Frank

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email]> wrote:

ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.

An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅ wrote:

From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html

> After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.

Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.

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140 Calle Ojo Feliz

Santa Fe, NM 87505

505 670-9918

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Nick Thompson

Re: is this true?

In reply to this post by Prof David West

Thanks, David,

I would, of course, agree with your conclusion. Where I might fuss is where I might suspect you of confounding events within the brain with things the brain does. Now that’s a wildly tricky distinction because in some sense is everywhere in the body. I might find myself insisting, if we argued over this, that in fact we have to take the body as a unit therefore “behavior of the brain” is a nonstarter, but I am not yet prepared to take that position.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Prof David West
Sent: Friday, March 08, 2019 9:37 AM
To: [hidden email]
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] is this true?

Not necessarily "a crock."

We then collect a lot of data of the sort, stimulus X(n) evoked behavior Y, with Behavior Y being an instance of 'rewiring' (p), 'local activation' (q), or 'emission' (r).

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 9:41 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Sorry. See correction, below. The point is, if the therapist convinces the patient, by rational argument, to do the Right Thing, whatever the right thing would be, we don’t tend to think of this as a brain change. But of course it is. So, what is this odd dualism by which some brain changes are REALLY brain changes, and some are not? Thus, we see again, as we must always see, (};-)] that brain state materialism is a crock.

N

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Nick Thompson [[hidden email]]
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 8:30 PM
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group' <[hidden email]>
Subject: RE: [FRIAM] is this true?

Of course therapy alters the brain. How on earth else could it work? So, the question wouldn’t come up if people didn’t suppose that some brain alterations ~~and~~ [NST==>are<==nst] not REALLY brain alterations. I don’t know how those people make that distinction.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

From: Friam [[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Frank Wimberly
Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2019 6:20 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] is this true?

Therapy and drugs can certainly change a life. I had a friend who worked for a research organization at the University of Pittsburgh. He had a Ph.D. in psychology. At the time I worked in the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon. He became interested in my work and wondered if there were opportunities for him there. He investigated and was offered a position. As a faculty member your job was to find a problem solve it and publish the results and then seek funding for further work but usually you had the freedom to pursue whatever problem you wanted to within reason. He was not used to this lack of structure and he became unhappy. One night he called me and was in desperate straits. I did what it could to encourage him. He entered therapy with a psychiatrist. Over the months he became more productive. After making some contributions in scheduling and planning software as I recall, he went to work for a startup and did some excellent work developing visualization tools. He was head of a group of a dozen or more developers and scientists. The group became a separate business. After a couple of years it was bought by a fortune 50 company and he was made head of the division it became.

I don't know whether or how his brain changes but his life certainly did.

Frank

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 4:58 PM Prof David West <[hidden email]> wrote:
ketamine would not be the first drug that was utilized to augment therapy. MDA, MDMA, even LSD were all studied as ways to enhance, optimize, therapy.

An therapy, some kinds of it anyway, have also been demonstrated to produce very mild altered states of consciousness — somewhat less than hypnosis, somewhat greater than attending an old fashioned Catholic Mass.

davew

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019, at 3:25 PM, glen ∅ wrote:
From https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/opinion/ketamine-depression.html
> After all, therapy and prescription drugs like antidepressants change the brain in surprisingly similar ways.

Does therapy exhibit changes in the brain similar to drugs (like antidepressants or not)? I wish the author had provided a citation or 2.

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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archives back to 2003: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
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--
Frank Wimberly
140 Calle Ojo Feliz
Santa Fe, NM 87505
505 670-9918
============================================================
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gepr

Re: is this true?

In reply to this post by Steve Smith

Well, as I tried to make clear earlier, my question isn't about the changes either therapy makes to the brain so much as whether or not the changes from one therapy are _similar to_ the changes from the other therapy. The evidence that the two therapies change the brain in the same or similar ways seems pretty sketchy to me.

On 3/8/19 10:34 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
> I think you are asking something more sophisticated though? If we believe that there are *some* kinds of changes to the brain (such as Dave's examples below) when we "change our minds" or "see things differently" then in fact there is a "plastic" change which persists past the direct effect of the drugs or the therapy session.
>
> I think you are asking *what* the specific brain changes are that might be effected through A) Therapy and B) Antidepressants/??? and C) a) supported/enhanced/accelerated by b).

--
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uǝʃƃ ⊥ glen

Frank Wimberly-2

Re: is this true?

These days it would be difficult to sort this out. Psychiatrists who do psychotherapy (not all) almost all use meds too. Psychoanalysts are now rare but they traditionally wouldn't prescribe an aspirin for a patient's headache.

On Fri, Mar 8, 2019, 4:14 PM uǝlƃ ☣ <[hidden email]> wrote:

Well, as I tried to make clear earlier, my question isn't about the changes either therapy makes to the brain so much as whether or not the changes from one therapy are _similar to_ the changes from the other therapy. The evidence that the two therapies change the brain in the same or similar ways seems pretty sketchy to me.

On 3/8/19 10:34 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
> I think you are asking something more sophisticated though? If we believe that there are *some* kinds of changes to the brain (such as Dave's examples below) when we "change our minds" or "see things differently" then in fact there is a "plastic" change which persists past the direct effect of the drugs or the therapy session.
>
> I think you are asking *what* the specific brain changes are that might be effected through A) Therapy and B) Antidepressants/??? and C) a) supported/enhanced/accelerated by b).

--
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gepr

Re: is this true?

And I suppose it might be a bit unethical to approach such things purely objectively. Both Renee' and my oncologist seemed quite happy I was assigned to the arm of my cancer study that used the new antibody (obinutuzumab). The control was the old antibody (rituxumab). I suppose it was justified that nobody was assigned to a placebo group because ... well, I guess it seems a bit unethical to give placebo to stage 4 cancer patients. But I consistently looked around at my fellow patients, sitting in their infusion chairs for hours on end and wondering which ones got the "old" therapy. Of course, they still benefited to some extent because the PI's budget paid for their rituxumab, lowering their out of pocket by ... like ... a lot.

Scott Alexander expressed this fairly well, though I can't find the particular post now. It went something like "My purpose is to improve my patients' lives, not discover objective truths."

On 3/8/19 3:25 PM, Frank Wimberly wrote:
> These days it would be difficult to sort this out. Psychiatrists who do psychotherapy (not all) almost all use meds too. Psychoanalysts are now rare but they traditionally wouldn't prescribe an aspirin for a patient's headache.

--
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uǝʃƃ ⊥ glen

Steve Smith

Re: is this true?

In reply to this post by gepr

Ok...

Then I think the assertion that *either* changes the brain in any
*plastic* manner is sketchy. I believe that plastic changes occur
through changes in behaviour (i.e. habits) and/or perhaps changes in
body chemistry/biome.

I don't have any evidence or references at this time.

On 3/8/19 4:14 PM, uǝlƃ ☣ wrote:
> Well, as I tried to make clear earlier, my question isn't about the changes either therapy makes to the brain so much as whether or not the changes from one therapy are _similar to_ the changes from the other therapy. The evidence that the two therapies change the brain in the same or similar ways seems pretty sketchy to me.
>
> On 3/8/19 10:34 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
>> I think you are asking something more sophisticated though? If we believe that there are *some* kinds of changes to the brain (such as Dave's examples below) when we "change our minds" or "see things differently" then in fact there is a "plastic" change which persists past the direct effect of the drugs or the therapy session.
>>
>> I think you are asking *what* the specific brain changes are that might be effected through A) Therapy and B) Antidepressants/??? and C) a) supported/enhanced/accelerated by b).
>

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Nick Thompson

Re: is this true?

Wait a minute, folks. How could there be any change in behavior without some change in the brain? Spell that out for me.

Nick

Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology
Clark University
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

-----Original Message-----
From: Friam [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Steven A Smith
Sent: Friday, March 08, 2019 9:09 PM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[hidden email]>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] is this true?

Ok...

Then I think the assertion that *either* changes the brain in any
*plastic* manner is sketchy. I believe that plastic changes occur through changes in behaviour (i.e. habits) and/or perhaps changes in body chemistry/biome.

I don't have any evidence or references at this time.

On 3/8/19 4:14 PM, uǝlƃ ☣ wrote:
> Well, as I tried to make clear earlier, my question isn't about the changes either therapy makes to the brain so much as whether or not the changes from one therapy are _similar to_ the changes from the other therapy. The evidence that the two therapies change the brain in the same or similar ways seems pretty sketchy to me.
>
> On 3/8/19 10:34 AM, Steven A Smith wrote:
>> I think you are asking something more sophisticated though? If we
>> believe that there are *some* kinds of changes to the brain (such as Dave's examples below) when we "change our minds" or "see things differently" then in fact there is a "plastic" change which persists past the direct effect of the drugs or the therapy session.
>>
>> I think you are asking *what* the specific brain changes are that
>> might be effected through A) Therapy and B) Antidepressants/??? and C) a) supported/enhanced/accelerated by b).
>

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Steve Smith

Re: is this true?

Nick -

A) Autonomic bodily function. Biomechanical body changes. We can walk with a limp (or choose not to walk) because our leg is damaged without any change to the brain. Perhaps our brain WILL change in response to our constant limping (or not leaving our chair/bed), but it isn't a brain change that changes our behaviour. IN the small, the signals to the brain that something is wrong might not even get there, or be scrambled, trusting/deferring to the autonomic system to "do the right thing" and at best "keep the brain informed of changes".

B) Bio/Neurochemistry. Changes in blood glucose, hormones, introduced mood-altering substances. Misbehaving glands (thyroid, pancreas, etc.) can trigger all kinds of mood/behaviour changes. Glen reminds us that our microbiome can change our behaviour/mind/mood as well... people have had huge shifts in mood/behaviour after overzealous use of antibiotics or a failure of the GI tract. You can call these brain (chemistry) changes, but the change in mind/mood/behaviour is more the way the brain function changes in response to the changed chemical milieu than changes *to* the brain.

B) Plastic vs elastic changes. A shot of coffee or juice (or mood-altering substance of choice) can shift the *brain metabolism* in ways that radically and quickly change behavior. As the neurochemistry returns to "normal" (alcohol leaves the system (sober up) and we rehydrate (recover from hangover)), the enduring changes to the brain are minimal (thought they can endure/accrue over time). Similarly a therapy session, some deep prayer, or a new years resolution can lead us to a "change of heart/mind" but it is unlikely to LAST unless there are attendant changes in habits and relationships. It is those changes in behaviour, related to the "habits and relationships" that I contend *change the brain* and that a great deal of the long-lasting change doesn't even happen IN the brain, though it may be that the brain's interaction with/response to changes in biochemistry (and biomechanics?) lead to changes in brain (and mind) function. Put the weight back on, crash your gut bacteria, go off your meds, and by golly you may end up right back where you were before you made those bodily/environmental changes in the first place. If your *brain changed* when you made those other changes in habit/behaviour, why did it change back so precisely? Had it ever really *changed* at all? Or was it just responding differently to a different milieu/stimulus?

- Steve

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Eric Charles-2

Re: is this true?

Nick, et al,

Reinforcing Steve's message: This conversation is hard because, in humans, doing humaney things, it is the case, factually, that most changes in behavior that we are wont to discusses entail changes in the brain. However, as a good student of animal behavior, you (Nick) are of course aware that behavioral changes can result from bodily changes in non-brain areas. This is especially obvious when we generate behavioral change in organisms without brains at all :- P Even if we stick with humans, the recent explosion of research on the importance of gut bacteria in mental health speaks to this. In many of the human cases we are wont to discuss there are "interactions" between "body" and "brain" changes (ugh, a false dualism if ever there was one), for example, we might discuss the numerous changes in the brain that occur after removal of testes or ovaries, due to the changes in circulating hormones and hormone responsivity. Or take the leg injury Steve mentions: To some extent, I limp because my leg is injured. However, if you track my limp from the moment of the break forward, you will find that the particular limp I display a month out is, in a large part, the result of some optimization problem for walking-with-such-and-such-injuries that certainly involves adjustments somewhere in my brain. (Not all animals do this mind you, but most people do. I've seen no detectable change in the limps of injured lizards, for example, after very long stretches of time.)

Back to the very beginning of this thread... there has been research for a long time about therapy and neurochemistry. Let's examine 3 research findings: 1) Depressed people (as a group) have lower dopamine, on average, than non-depressed people. 2) Depressed people (as a group) who are given dopamine are, on average, less depressed later. 3) Depressed people (as a group) who undergo behaviorist therapy to replace the behaviors-patterns-that-are-depression with other behavior patterns (with no mind-diving involved) are later found (on average) to have higher dopamine than when they started the therapy. Ditto those that are successful (as a group) with mind-oriented therapeutic approaches.

So, do drugs cause the same changes in the brain as therapy? I'm not sure. However, successful therapy seems to causes the same changes in the brain that the drugs are intended to produce. Note the implications of this for causal attributions regarding neurotransmitter levels and mental illness.

Best,

Eric

-----------
Eric P. Charles, Ph.D.
Personnel Psychologist

Drug Enforcement Administration

[hidden email]

On Sat, Mar 9, 2019 at 12:33 PM Steven A Smith <[hidden email]> wrote:

Nick -

A) Autonomic bodily function. Biomechanical body changes. We can walk with a limp (or choose not to walk) because our leg is damaged without any change to the brain. Perhaps our brain WILL change in response to our constant limping (or not leaving our chair/bed), but it isn't a brain change that changes our behaviour. IN the small, the signals to the brain that something is wrong might not even get there, or be scrambled, trusting/deferring to the autonomic system to "do the right thing" and at best "keep the brain informed of changes".

B) Bio/Neurochemistry. Changes in blood glucose, hormones, introduced mood-altering substances. Misbehaving glands (thyroid, pancreas, etc.) can trigger all kinds of mood/behaviour changes. Glen reminds us that our microbiome can change our behaviour/mind/mood as well... people have had huge shifts in mood/behaviour after overzealous use of antibiotics or a failure of the GI tract. You can call these brain (chemistry) changes, but the change in mind/mood/behaviour is more the way the brain function changes in response to the changed chemical milieu than changes *to* the brain.

B) Plastic vs elastic changes. A shot of coffee or juice (or mood-altering substance of choice) can shift the *brain metabolism* in ways that radically and quickly change behavior. As the neurochemistry returns to "normal" (alcohol leaves the system (sober up) and we rehydrate (recover from hangover)), the enduring changes to the brain are minimal (thought they can endure/accrue over time). Similarly a therapy session, some deep prayer, or a new years resolution can lead us to a "change of heart/mind" but it is unlikely to LAST unless there are attendant changes in habits and relationships. It is those changes in behaviour, related to the "habits and relationships" that I contend *change the brain* and that a great deal of the long-lasting change doesn't even happen IN the brain, though it may be that the brain's interaction with/response to changes in biochemistry (and biomechanics?) lead to changes in brain (and mind) function. Put the weight back on, crash your gut bacteria, go off your meds, and by golly you may end up right back where you were before you made those bodily/environmental changes in the first place. If your *brain changed* when you made those other changes in habit/behaviour, why did it change back so precisely? Had it ever really *changed* at all? Or was it just responding differently to a different milieu/stimulus?

- Steve

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doug carmichael

Re: is this true?

what seems left out of the cause-effect connection js that depressed people have a reason to be depressed. certainly,y if someone is depressed because they lost a job or a child, we expect brain changes that are a natural part of the depression. (i think there are changes in brain chem after a vigorous workout or intense movie)Talk or drugs can alter the depression but the talk therapy has the additional benefit of dealing with the cause of the depression. and adding the relationship with the therapist which bas more brain consequences.

doug

dougcarmichael.com

On Mar 13, 2019, at 7:58 AM, Eric Charles <[hidden email]> wrote:

Nick, et al,
Reinforcing Steve's message: This conversation is hard because, in humans, doing humaney things, it is the case, factually, that most changes in behavior that we are wont to discusses entail changes in the brain. However, as a good student of animal behavior, you (Nick) are of course aware that behavioral changes can result from bodily changes in non-brain areas. This is especially obvious when we generate behavioral change in organisms without brains at all :- P Even if we stick with humans, the recent explosion of research on the importance of gut bacteria in mental health speaks to this. In many of the human cases we are wont to discuss there are "interactions" between "body" and "brain" changes (ugh, a false dualism if ever there was one), for example, we might discuss the numerous changes in the brain that occur after removal of testes or ovaries, due to the changes in circulating hormones and hormone responsivity. Or take the leg injury Steve mentions: To some extent, I limp because my leg is injured. However, if you track my limp from the moment of the break forward, you will find that the particular limp I display a month out is, in a large part, the result of some optimization problem for walking-with-such-and-such-injuries that certainly involves adjustments somewhere in my brain. (Not all animals do this mind you, but most people do. I've seen no detectable change in the limps of injured lizards, for example, after very long stretches of time.)

Back to the very beginning of this thread... there has been research for a long time about therapy and neurochemistry. Let's examine 3 research findings: 1) Depressed people (as a group) have lower dopamine, on average, than non-depressed people. 2) Depressed people (as a group) who are given dopamine are, on average, less depressed later. 3) Depressed people (as a group) who undergo behaviorist therapy to replace the behaviors-patterns-that-are-depression with other behavior patterns (with no mind-diving involved) are later found (on average) to have higher dopamine than when they started the therapy. Ditto those that are successful (as a group) with mind-oriented therapeutic approaches.

So, do drugs cause the same changes in the brain as therapy? I'm not sure. However, successful therapy seems to causes the same changes in the brain that the drugs are intended to produce. Note the implications of this for causal attributions regarding neurotransmitter levels and mental illness.

Best,
Eric

-----------
Eric P. Charles, Ph.D.
Personnel Psychologist
Drug Enforcement Administration
[hidden email]

On Sat, Mar 9, 2019 at 12:33 PM Steven A Smith <[hidden email]> wrote:

Nick -

A) Autonomic bodily function. Biomechanical body changes. We can walk with a limp (or choose not to walk) because our leg is damaged without any change to the brain. Perhaps our brain WILL change in response to our constant limping (or not leaving our chair/bed), but it isn't a brain change that changes our behaviour. IN the small, the signals to the brain that something is wrong might not even get there, or be scrambled, trusting/deferring to the autonomic system to "do the right thing" and at best "keep the brain informed of changes".

B) Bio/Neurochemistry. Changes in blood glucose, hormones, introduced mood-altering substances. Misbehaving glands (thyroid, pancreas, etc.) can trigger all kinds of mood/behaviour changes. Glen reminds us that our microbiome can change our behaviour/mind/mood as well... people have had huge shifts in mood/behaviour after overzealous use of antibiotics or a failure of the GI tract. You can call these brain (chemistry) changes, but the change in mind/mood/behaviour is more the way the brain function changes in response to the changed chemical milieu than changes *to* the brain.

B) Plastic vs elastic changes. A shot of coffee or juice (or mood-altering substance of choice) can shift the *brain metabolism* in ways that radically and quickly change behavior. As the neurochemistry returns to "normal" (alcohol leaves the system (sober up) and we rehydrate (recover from hangover)), the enduring changes to the brain are minimal (thought they can endure/accrue over time). Similarly a therapy session, some deep prayer, or a new years resolution can lead us to a "change of heart/mind" but it is unlikely to LAST unless there are attendant changes in habits and relationships. It is those changes in behaviour, related to the "habits and relationships" that I contend *change the brain* and that a great deal of the long-lasting change doesn't even happen IN the brain, though it may be that the brain's interaction with/response to changes in biochemistry (and biomechanics?) lead to changes in brain (and mind) function. Put the weight back on, crash your gut bacteria, go off your meds, and by golly you may end up right back where you were before you made those bodily/environmental changes in the first place. If your *brain changed* when you made those other changes in habit/behaviour, why did it change back so precisely? Had it ever really *changed* at all? Or was it just responding differently to a different milieu/stimulus?

- Steve

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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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