lol. no, its a gun. i was a little concerned some people might feel a bit disturbed by it (my mother had this thing about guns being pointed at her on tv) but if people think its a horse...

;-)

with respect to my last rant... sigh... i am starting to struggle with the arguments.

i guess it is just that i don't see what facts about the world could determine which things are functioning and which things aren't.

we construct models of the world (in order to model phenomena that we find interesting). notions like 'function' (and 'malfunction') 'rational' (and 'irrational') are built into the model in virtue of our interests.

there are facts about our interests.
there are facts about the models we construct in virtue of our interests.
there are facts about whether things in the world are functioning or malfunctioning relative to (or compared to) the models we have constructed in virtue of our interests.

so i think that the facts about function / malfunction are determined crucially by our interests (together with the world to be sure). there is no human interest independent (objective) fact of the matter as to whether something is functioning or not.

the world doesn't care. the world doesn't have interests. it just is. just like it is a mistake to look for meaning in the mind independent world it is a mistake to look for function in the mind independent world.

if there is a god to bestow meaning and function then things are of course different...

but then the issue arises whether human interests are similar enough in relevant respects such that we can construct a single model of psychological, social, and biological function.

i guess i think that our interests diverge enough that... there always will be controversy.

maybe that just means that there always will be funny borderline cases where it is indeterminate whether there is malfunction or not.

sigh.

i'm giving myself a headache...

i just get pissed off that the issue seems to be determined (in practice) by lobby groups and political pressures and the interests of the pharmacutical industry and the health insurance system. the US health insurance system is such a force behind the DSM and the DSM is adopted by other countries (where there simply aren't comperable forces). the science is being comprimised :-( scientists don't need the malfunction assumption in order to discover inner causes. but they might well need it in order to obtain research funds :-(

and people are encouraged to adopt the malfunction assumtion so as to obtain health insurance funding. they are encouraged to adopt the malfunction assumption so as to not blame themselves for their condition (where you don't need the malfunction assumption to be absolved from blame). the importance of the malfunction assumption as a causal mechanism for people REMAINING UNWELL is downplayed considerably. the importance of the malfunction assumption for the expectations (or lack thereof) that psychiatrists and the media and the government and the family and the individuals have of the individuals behaviour that actually CAUSES the individual to come into line... grr... grr... grr... (end rant)