Doctor Who Uploaded Rorschach Images Now Being Investigated
from the can-we-look-up-witch-hunt dept
A few weeks back, we wrote about the argument over whether or not it was okay that a doctor had uploaded the public domain (and available in pretty much any library) original Rorschach ink blots to Wikipedia. The whole thing was perfectly legal and reasonable in the view of many. But some strong believers in the ink blots seem to think that even though the images are in the public domain, they have some sort of right over them. The thinking, on their part, is that keeping the ink blots secret protects the integrity of the test -- which totally ignores the fact that these ink blots are already widely available (and the fact that it seems rather unlikely that all that many people are going to "study up" for their Rorschach tests.But, it hasn't stopped a witch hunt against the guy who uploaded the images. Apparently, he's being investigated by his local doctors' organization for "unprofessional" actions. The complaints against him are equally ridiculous. They say that this is "serious misconduct" because he "shows disrespect to his professional colleagues in psychology and disparages them in the eye of the public."
So apparently no doctor is ever allowed to question any methods used by psychologists? Yikes. Talk about a chilling effect.
Even more to the point, I fail to see how sharing public domain knowledge with the world can be unprofessional or an ethical breach. It seems like the exact opposite. I would think it's a hell of a lot more unethical to trump up bogus ethics charges and investigations against the doctor who actually put that content on Wikipedia.
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Filed Under: rorschach, wikipedia, witch hunt
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The only one performing "unprofessional actions" is the organization conducting the investigation. This should not be necessary at all.
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Oh no Oh no you cant do that .....
Just googled on "Rorschach Images and test" I ended up with 118,000 results..... They were mentioned something about the test's secrecy.... What secrecy?
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Re: Oh no Oh no you cant do that .....
What is this "Rorschac" of which you people are speaking...? hehehe
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Hoodoo Voodoo
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Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
It's not the science that's pretend, it's the medicine and the good intent. Psychology has a long and sordid history, particularly with regards to drugs and it's uses and ties to some seedy characters in Europe.
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Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
How long until we can dump it in the pile with other useless garbage (phrenology, anyone?) and move on to something useful?
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Re: Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
Well, I was recently yelled at in a separate thread for my conspiratorial talk, but many people think that to varying degrees there IS indeed a science behind it. And for a long, long time the CIA/FBI/NSA, and probably some of the other alphabet agencies thought so as well. They made attempts at varying levels of mind-control, from developing simple truth serums, to experimenting with mind-altering drugs mixed with psychological attacks for interrogation and torture purposes, to some contentions that they even tried to develop brainwashing techniques for use with assassins (a la The Manchurian Candidate). And after all, what are all those things if not aspects of psychology and psychological warfare?
Now, I'm not so sure about that last one, but the rest are declassied projects like MKULTRA that not only put to rest the "your just crazy conspiracy theorists" argument, but also the idea that psychology isn't used in warfare.
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Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
PSYCHIATRY is the medical "profession" commonly whose practitioners are commonly called "shrinks"
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Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
And they never resorted to nefarious means of trying to cure people.
*cough* *cough* electric shock "therapy" *cough* *cough*
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Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
There's no medicine with psychology, another reason why psychologists can't write prescriptions and why their svcs aren't ever covered by any insurers, amongst other things.
VRP
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Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
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Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
The problem is, we don't have enough understanding of how the physical make-up of the brain directly leads to things like consciousness, memory, and personality.
There is science, but it's incomplete. We know we can fiddle with certain parts, and in certain people get certain results. But we don't understand enough to have solid theories and laws that explain what's going on.
I'm not talking about things like ESP, telekinesis, etc, but in terms of being able to control moods, improve memory & concentration, etc. I know the introduction of THC into my body chemistry alters my psyche leveling out my moods to keep manic depressive tendencies from getting too severe, improves concentration, harms short-term memory, etc. It's not pretend, it's science.
But to say that since we don't understand the causes and effects and there still exists lots of guess work that there is no science at all to psychology (or its "pretend") is a gross over exaggeration. At one time, the concept of microscopic germs making people sick was ridiculed and brushed off as non-sense ... and as we learn, we refine.
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Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
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Re: Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
Since I am a patient, and regularly see a psychiatrist, I have to say this is science. Incomplete? Yes. A lot of plain guess work? Sure. But it helps me.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
But the idea that someone should spend YEARS going back and talking out all their childhood problems is bunk. No other medical profession has people coming back year after year. If fact, I think it is harmful to obsess about ones past, and psychiatry just enables people to stop moving forward with their lives.
Most times, people are unhappy because they have problems they don't deal with. So instead of dealing with the problem, they just go complain about it to someone who doesn't challenge them on it.
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Re: Re: Hoodoo Voodoo
Since when has psychology been regarded as a science?
Is Psychology a Science?
Choice quotes
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ethics
slashie discussion: http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1302475&cid=28695939
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This test is already blown
Bats = your Evil
Butterflies = your Good
anything else = your insane
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Re: This test is already blown
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Re: Re: This test is already blown
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And the disease
Yes, there is a science behind Psychology. But it's more of a 'soft' science. While the brain can work like a computer, it is not a purely empirical manifestation that is identical in all ways to every other person's brain. Genetics has something to do with it, environment has an effect, what schooling the person has done, has an effect. In many ways it works on a simple cause-effect. If something scares you bad enough, you will tend to fear it in the future. If certain patterns work every time you use them. It's a learned skill, knowledge, etc.
Doctors fear the general public knowing more about Psychology because it can suddenly invalidate the ridiculous amounts of money they pay for their schooling, as well as the insurance payments that keep so many medical costs ridiculously high.
Much as Hypnosis is feared by so many medical practitioners, even though they USE the base idea of the 'skill'. Anyone ever heard of a placebo? There's hypnosis right there in short. The power of suggestion. 'yes, this pill will make you feel better'.
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Re: And the disease
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Re: Re: And the disease
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Paranoia will destroy ya
The more one plunges into victim mode and uses false basis claims (protect the secrecy) then casts a shadow upon their own ability to maintain rational thought, and is clearly showing signs that they themselves need psychological treatment.
Dumbasses
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The Doctor
It reminds me of a Québécois client i had a few years back who kept complaining about how we damned Anglais kept Capitalizing Every Word In A Sentence.
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Re: The Doctor
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Re: The Doctor
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Re: Re: The Doctor
Can't wait for the new series and was looking for more story insight.
Maybe the ink blots appear on psychic paper. That would make a fun story.
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Re: Re: Re: The Doctor
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Doctor Who?
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Re: Doctor Who?
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As to the issue in the article, this is absolutely ridiculous. There are many many sites that release the actual images of the test.
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Re:
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Re: Re:
i.e. Anthropology, archaeology, geology, biology, reflexology, sexology, zoology, etc.
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Not Doctor Who :-(
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Re:
The secrets of the test are already out. They're public domain. The People of the United States own the rights to the ink blot test, not the psychologists.
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Re:
That's besides the point.
These investigators need to show that they're actually alive and capable of reacting...
Brains not necessary.
VRP
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Appalling
While I find this appalling, I can't say I'm surprised. Anyways, if his local doc association goes through with it, the resultant legal bitchslap the doc could file in response, if filed, will be heard around the world.
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Pirates!
WIRRRRRRMMMM
WIRRRRrrrmmm
Wirrrrrrrmmm
wrrrrrrrr
wrrr
wrr
wiiiii
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Sacred Ink Blot Tests?!
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Dr. Who?
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well
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Re: well
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Know your audience, Mike!
As for the actual content of the article, yeah just another misuse of copyright law in order to "protect" something that doesn't need or deserve protection to begin with. Sadly unsurprising, though I hope that some sense does come into play on the part of those actually investigating.
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questioning you
So lets question this post. You write "some strong believers in the ink blots..." - aha, so they are just believers, right? You ignore load of research and evidence and you label them like believers. Labeling is just discussion fail... you get yellow card.
And you say "which totally ignores the fact that these ink blots are already widely available"... where are they widely available? When I was a psychology student it was not available anywhere and they were really careful about it - only advanced students enrolled in Rorschach seminar were allowed to study it - and those test sets were borrowed to them against signature and they could not take it out of the study room. No chance it would be in any public library. So I am not so sure about your "widely available" argument.
And you say "witch hunt... complaints against him are equally ridiculous...bogus ethics... " again - these are negative labels, not arguments. WHY is it a which hunt, WHY is it ridiculous, WHY are they bogus?
"So apparently no doctor is ever allowed to question any methods used by psychologists? Yikes. Talk about a chilling effect."
What? What does this have to do with questioning? Write a paper about Rorschach and talk about it on a conference and question as much as you want - there is no problem about it. This problem has nothing to do with questioning Rorschach... at all. So it seems that you are just using another negative sticker (they forbid questioning things which is bad) but the problem is that the sticker does not fit at all.
"Even more to the point, I fail to see how sharing public domain knowledge with the world can be unprofessional or an ethical breach." Yes, obviously you do fail. I tried to explain this last time and you just ignored it. So again - it is questionable because Rorschach is (believed to be... if you wish) tool that can be used to help people who suffer. This help will not be available to those who have seen pictures before the test. You publish the test - you destroy one tool to help to those who see it. That simple. If this is not unethical then I don't know what is.
The fact that you don't believe Rorschach works does not matter at all. Do you believe in vaccination? I don't. How would you feel if I said vaccination is nonsense and destroyed them to you so your kid would not get the shot?
The fact that it is public domain does not matter either. As a patient I need my therapist to have tools to help me. I am not obsessed with free information - if it's better for me to never see this before the test - I don't want to see it. They should at least put huge spoiler warning over it when they decided to publish it.
Please take this as a friendly warning. Yes, you are smart and you know a lot. But don't stop question yourself. I read all your articles and I think that more and more you are just using negative stickers and of_course_I_am_right "arguments" instead of real arguments. Soon you will be too narcissistic and you will end up exactly like those RIAA people you like to ridicule - so self absorbed that you will not be able to notice that the world has changed... because you are always right without arguments and everybody who disagrees is just "ridiculous", right?
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Re: questioning you
Hmm? No, there was no labeling problem here that I can see. The people who complained were those who were "believers" in the test. I couldn't think of a better way to describe them. Who is complaining? Those who support the test. It was accurate, right?
And you say "which totally ignores the fact that these ink blots are already widely available"... where are they widely available? When I was a psychology student it was not available anywhere and they were really careful about it - only advanced students enrolled in Rorschach seminar were allowed to study it - and those test sets were borrowed to them against signature and they could not take it out of the study room. No chance it would be in any public library. So I am not so sure about your "widely available" argument.
As many others have pointed out here, they are widely available online. They may not have been widely available in the past, but they are now.
And you say "witch hunt... complaints against him are equally ridiculous...bogus ethics... " again - these are negative labels, not arguments. WHY is it a which hunt, WHY is it ridiculous, WHY are they bogus?
That's what the rest of the post explains.
What? What does this have to do with questioning? Write a paper about Rorschach and talk about it on a conference and question as much as you want - there is no problem about it. This problem has nothing to do with questioning Rorschach... at all. So it seems that you are just using another negative sticker (they forbid questioning things which is bad) but the problem is that the sticker does not fit at all.
You took my words out of context there. It was a response to the claim that it was unetheical to "show disrespect to his professional colleagues in psychology and disparages them in the eye of the public."
So, again, I believe my statement was accurate.
And to claim that the only way to criticize is in writing a paper is silly. If someone has a criticism of psychology, they should be allowed to state it publicly without fear of an investigation. It may not be right -- but psychologists should be able to respond and point out his errors, not sic an investigation on him.
Yes, obviously you do fail. I tried to explain this last time and you just ignored it. So again - it is questionable because Rorschach is (believed to be... if you wish) tool that can be used to help people who suffer. This help will not be available to those who have seen pictures before the test. You publish the test - you destroy one tool to help to those who see it. That simple. If this is not unethical then I don't know what is.
Yes, I saw this last time, and I have to admit that it's wholly uncompelling. It didn't seem to warrant a response, but if you insist:
1. I don't deny that Rorschach tests may work, but that's no excuse. The info is public domain. There is nothing unethical about sharing public domain knowledge. Ever.
2. If the test fails if someone's seen it before, the PROBLEM IS WITH THE TEST. Develop a better test.
3. As I said earlier, the idea that people will suddenly run out and prepare for the test seems quite unlikely in most scenarios, so what's the problem?
The fact that you don't believe Rorschach works does not matter at all. Do you believe in vaccination? I don't. How would you feel if I said vaccination is nonsense and destroyed them to you so your kid would not get the shot?
I never said I don't believe Rorschachs don't work. I don't know where you got that from.
But, please, get a grip. Revealing public domain knowledge is not "destroying" anything.
Soon you will be too narcissistic and you will end up exactly like those RIAA people you like to ridicule - so self absorbed that you will not be able to notice that the world has changed... because you are always right without arguments and everybody who disagrees is just "ridiculous", right?
Point taken, though I still believe this is ridiculous. I'm always open to being proven wrong -- it's why I allow comments and let anyone say what they want.
But you have not convinced me my initial assessment was incorrect.
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Re: Re: questioning you
I am sorry if my English is not OK enough to understand but I think the word "believe" is used mostly for cases where I believe because I don't know or even cannot know - for example when it is related to religion. Experts supporting Rorschach test don't need to believe - they have evidence, they know. Your use of word believers is implying exactly the opposite - that is why I think it's negative labelling.
I did not know that and I am sorry about that. I have to admit that this is very bad news for me.
I never claimed that the only way to criticize is in writing a paper - those were just examples. The point is - you can criticize all you want - but the problem with publishing Rorschach was not that it questions Rorschach. The problem is that some experts think that revealing Rorschach to wider public may hinder its ability to be used as a diagnostic tool. That is why I think that you were wrong when you wrote statement that could be understood as accusation that they are suppressing criticism ("So apparently no doctor is ever allowed to question any methods used by psychologists? Yikes. Talk about a chilling effect."). If you disagree on this one please show me where is any doctor investigated for questioning any methods used by psychologists, not for revealing the test?
That is a very strong statement. How do you support this claim? Yes, it may be legal. But that does not necessarily mean it is not unethical.
BTW - I am not sure about this but are those pictures public domain just because they are so old that copyright run out? Can copyright run out? Does this mean that after 70 years I can publish private photos of my girlfriend - and it will be legal? And ethical? I am not sure about this... just kindly asking.
Again... very strong statement. Yes... the test has the vulnerability. But it is not that easy to develop a better test. I am not even sure it is possible - psychology is a very specific science and projective tests are all vulnerable to this - they are also very valuable. Which is better - to get rid of very valuable tool or to try to keep this tool alive using professional ethic - some kind of agreement that we want to help people so we will not use the vulnerability of the test?
Unlikely? You have to do Rorschach tomorrow and you are curious about it so you look it up - and oops, you have seen those pictures. Why is this unlikely?
That was just rhetorical - I was just trying to make a point. I also made up that I don't believe in vaccination. Apparently I should be more careful with my made up examples (I also know you don't have to do Rorschach tomorrow). I am sorry.
I admit that I may have misunderstood some of your arguments - I am sorry about that. But I still believe that you would be better off using the word "ridiculous" less... you know what I mean? The more offensive your arguments sound the less likely your opponents are to change their (sometimes really ridiculous) views - and I bet that is not what you want. I have written this because I highly respect you and I want you to be as successful as possible - you are my defender against IP craziness.
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Re: Re: Re: questioning you
Why don't you go back to where you came from, where you won't have to worry about your English, nor your lack of intelligence. And take a few million of your contrymen with you for the trip...
Use a fleet of ocean liners (freighters) and Bon Voyage!
VRP
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Re: Re: questioning you
VRP
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Re: questioning you
You failed to comprehend intelligence posted by others already, prior to yours; or you would have known where and how these so-called tests are readily and easily available. Repeating it to someone like you MIGHT do some good to get the point across but I'm not into repetition and besides, in the end you'd be just as dense anyway...
Are you one of those Paki ragheads we're stuck with in NA, pretending to practice medicine?
VRP
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Re: questioning you
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Re: Re: questioning you
This is why I have very little respect for the scientific consensus.
First of all, and I want to make this very very clear, TRUTH nor science nor logic and reasoning are based on unanimous consensus. PERIOD. Anytime someone tries to argue their viewpoint and the ONLY thing they have to show for it is the alleged consensus (ie: no evidence, no logic and reasoning) then I find it difficult to take them seriously.
Anytime someone tries to argue against the consensus the attitude is, "every scientist believe such and such, it's the consensus, it's just that the ordinary citizen is ignorant." But if you punish scientists that disagree with you and deny them the means to communicate their message of course there will be no scientific dissent. and why would they try to expose this doctor's identity if not to punish him? After all, just the lawsuit and the time and money he must spend to fight it is punishment and punishment defeats the purpose behind freedom of speech.
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Re: Re: Re: questioning you
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Where are they ?
Amusingly just last night I googled 'ink blot test' because I couldn't remember how to spell Rorschach.
I would have presumed the *interpretation* of the testee's views on the blots may have some 'copyright' but the images themselves should not.
Same as if I take a photo of my motorbike and upload it to Wikipedia on the relevant page, I would not expect to get sued by the manufacturer. The legal rights are on the whole thing, not just what you can see.
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Are they going to get them all?
Results 1 - 10 of about 233,000 for rorschach test images. (0.23 seconds)
Looks like they have about 233,000 other people to go after as well. Good luck with the witch hunt!
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Hey, they have a right to know, right? So what if you would totally destroy the integrity of the trial?
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Re:
VRP
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Defamation!!!! :)
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Re:
In all seriousness, this is a freedom of speech issue. Doctors and anyone should have the right to publicaly criticize a viewpoint.
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