I'm going to repeat what I posted previously and add some questions:
Here is what I initially wrote:
TWO QUESTIONS:
1. Is the brain "psychological" or "physiological"?
2. Do you think, based on valid, well replicated scientific research, that the brain plays even an infinitesimal part in Long COVID?
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Ok, now I'm going to see if I can help clarify what I think are some mistaken assumptions in the article. I offer this with much love and compassion, as i think getting clear about this would immensely help in finding treatments for this and all diseases.
What, quite justifiably, makes people so angry when they hear someone suggest 'your condition is primarily psychology'?
This generally implies something like the following;
1. You're not "really" sick. It's all in your head.
2. whatever is going on, it's primarily due to your emotions, and if not for this, you wouldn't have such severe symptoms (implying, even more obnoxiously, that you're being "hysterical" - with its implications of a problem more common among women)
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Ok, this is the problem with the misunderstanding of the word "psychological."
i think it was in the 1990s, when I was a doctoral student, that the DSM removed the term "organic" disorders - because ALL disorders, in the common scientific understanding, are organic.
There IS no distinction between psychological and physiological, in this view, because everything is physiological. So the person saying "your condition is only psychological" AND your interpretation of this as meaning they think 'i'm not really sick" are both due to misunderstandings.
For example, the field of psychoneuroimmunology took off in the 1980s, yet even today, when someone suggests brain activity (ie "psychology) affects the immune system, people get angry thinking this means they're being blamed for a condition which is "only in their head."
But if we GET that everything is physiological, then neurotransmitters and hormones controlled by the brain affect every cell in the body AND every system of the body. So of course the brain is implicated to some extent in all illnesses and health challenges.
now, wouldn't you want to know ALL of the ways we can change the brain to make it function more effectively?