Neural Darwinism and consciousness

Neural Darwinism (ND) is a large scale selectionist theory of brain development and function that has been hypothesized to relate to consciousness. According to ND, consciousness is entailed by reentrant interactions among neuronal populations in the thalamocortical system (the 'dynamic core'). These interactions, which permit high-order discriminations among possible core states, confer selective advantages on organisms possessing them by linking current perceptual events to a past history of value-dependent learning. Here, we assess the consistency of ND with 16 widely recognized properties of consciousness, both physiological (for example, consciousness is associated with widespread, relatively fast, low amplitude interactions in the thalamocortical system), and phenomenal (for example, consciousness involves the existence of a private flow of events available only to the experiencing subject). While no theory accounts fully for all of these properties at present, we find that ND and its recent extensions fare well.     

Psychoanalytische Therapie

A statement of the professional umbrella society DGPT is presented that was formulated in cooperation with the various professional societies and with the German Society of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy and the Society of Child and Adolescent Therapy. The statement is a reaction to the public claim for effective evidence of psychotherapy and takes the opportunity for a comprehensive presentation of this field. In the introduction Alf Gerlach, as chairman of the umbrella society at the time of the formulation of this statement and now executive chairman responsible for coordinating research, describes the history of the development of the statement.There were two particular moments prompting this statement. On the one hand the Scientific Advisory Board for Psychotherapy as an advisory committee based on the law of psychotherapy, has presented demands for effective evidence that are incompatible with psychoanalysis. Thus, the recognition of psychoanalysis as a treatment method for illnesses was put in doubt. On the other hand, a suggestion was put forward to the Board to recognize psychodynamic psychotherapy as an independent entity. This questioned the unity of the psychotherapeutic field.The statement was passed onto the Scientific Advisory Board last autumn. It is intended for a professional audience and includes answers to important issues of this field. It will have an important role to play in future discussions about professional politics. For this reason, we have decided to begin the present issue of our journal with this statement and thus to open a wide discussion forum.

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Deutsche Gesellschaft für Psychoanalyse, Psychotherapie, Psychosomatik und Tiefenpsychologie e.V. (DGPT)In Verbindung mit:Deutsche Gesellschaft für Analytische Psychologie (DGAP)Deutsche Gesellschaft für Individualpsychologie (DGIP)Deutsche Gesellschaft für Psychotherapeutische Medizin (DGPM)Deutsche Psychoanalytische Gesellschaft (DPG)Deutsche Psychoanalytische Vereinigung (DPV)Vereinigung Analytischer Kinder- und Jugendlichen-Psychotherapeuten (VAKJP)Redaktion: Stephan Hau und Marianne Leuzinger-Bohleber

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Die Geschichte der „Stellungnahme zur psychoanalytischen Therapie“

Ohne Zusammenfassung

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Self-experimentation as a source of new ideas: ten examples about sleep, mood, health, and weight

Little is known about how to generate plausible new scientific ideas. So it is noteworthy that 12 years of self-experimentation led to the discovery of several surprising cause-effect relationships and suggested a new theory of weight control, an unusually high rate of new ideas. The cause-effect relationships were: (1) Seeing faces in the morning on television decreased mood in the evening (> 10 hrs later) and improved mood the next day (> 24 hrs later), yet had no detectable effect before that (0-10 hrs later). The effect was strongest if the faces were life-sized and at a conversational distance. Travel across time zones reduced the effect for a few weeks. (2) Standing 8 hours per day reduced early awakening and made sleep more restorative, even though more standing was associated with less sleep. (3) Morning light (1 hr/day) reduced early awakening and made sleep more restorative. (4) Breakfast increased early awakening. (5) Standing and morning light together eliminated colds (upper respiratory tract infections) for more than 5 years. (6) Drinking lots of water, eating low-glycemic-index foods, and eating sushi each caused a modest weight loss. (7) Drinking unflavored fructose water caused a large weight loss that has lasted more than 1 year. While losing weight, hunger was much less than usual. Unflavored sucrose water had a similar effect. The new theory of weight control, which helped discover this effect, assumes that flavors associated with calories raise the body-fat set point: The stronger the association, the greater the increase. Between meals the set point declines. Self-experimentation lasting months or years seems to be a good way to generate plausible new ideas.     

Diagnosticity and prototypicality in category learning: a comparison of inference learning and classification learning

Category knowledge allows for both the determination of category membership and an understanding of what the members of a category are like. Diagnostic information is used to determine category membership; prototypical information reflects the most likely features given category membership. Two experiments examined 2 means of category learning, classification and inference learning, in terms of sensitivity to diagnostic and prototypical information. Classification learners were highly sensitive to diagnostic features but not sensitive to nondiagnostic, but prototypical, features. Inference learners were less sensitive to the diagnostic features than were classification learners and were also sensitive to the nondiagnostic, prototypical, features. Discussion focuses on aspects of the 2 learning tasks that might lead to this differential sensitivity and the implications for learning real-world categories.     

Introducing ethics and engineering: the case of Delft University of Technology

This article focuses mainly on (1) the policy of Delft University of Technology since 1992 as regards the university-wide introduction of a compulsory course on ethics and engineering, and (2) the ideal structure of such a course, including the educational goals of the course. Dr. G. J. Scheurwater is Senior policy-advisor to the Board of Delft University of Technology. Prof. S. J. Doorman is Chairman of the Advisory Committee on Ethics of Delft University of Technology.     

The ‘redefinition of death’ debate: Western concepts and western bioethics

Biomedicine is a global enterprise constructed upon the belief in the universality of scientific truths. However, despite huge scientific advances over recent decades it has not been able to formulate a specific and universal definition of death: In fact, in its attempt to redefine death, the concept of death appears to have become immersed in ever increasing vagueness and ambiguity. Even more worrisome is that bioethics, in the form of principlism, is also endeavouring to become a global enterprise by claiming neutrality. It appears that the discourse within both disciplines have similarly manipulated the boundaries of death to include the “dying”. This paper argues that the redefinition of death debate in biomedicine reveals a concept of personhood which is profoundly western in origin and which is in accordance to the concept adhered to within principlism. Biomedicine and bioethics do not appear to acknowledge the limitations of their own world view and hence lack an understanding of their applicability and appropriateness in diverse social and cultural contexts; a situation which adds credence to claims as to the hegemonic and imperialistic nature of all such global enterprises. Ms. Jones is an intensive care clinical nursing specialist. Dr. Kessel is a public health physician and medical ethicist.     

Single-gender group psychotherapy: A “women's group” for adolescent inpatients

This paper describes an attempt at forming and conducting a unique single-gender psychotherapy group with severely disturbed female adolescents on a long-term, psychotherapeutically oriented co-ed inpatient unit. The focus of this group was assisting the female patients in negotiating the tasks and conflicts specific to their gender and developmental stage. The therapeutic approach and the role of female coleaders are described, emphasizing particular modifications made to meet the needs of this group. Clinical examples are offered to high-light salient group themes of identity formation and separation and individuation. Finally, group therapeutic factors specifically enhanced by single gender membership are discussed and observations regarding the group/milieu interface are explored.