Holding Hume's Toe

From Head to Toe

Cogito ergo sum.

The mind is distinct from the body.The body works like a machine with material properties. The mind (or soul), is non-material and does not follow

the laws of nature.

We are all patients

Ken Wilber

“The “Cartesian” problem in the conventional practice of medicine is simply that you are basically forced to treat a patient as if he or she were a physical machine, when both of you know otherwise.”

Reason is, and ought to be, the slave of the passions....reason alone can never oppose passion in the direction of the will.

“There is compelling evidence that the state of your mind affects the state of your body and more specifically, that emotions influence physiology and therefore health.”

Prof. Richard Davidson, University of Wisconsin, 'The Emotional Life of your Brain'

We have emotional states and emotional styles

Our knowledge of the role of emotions in health suggest that ignoring patients as people, even in the interest of some vaunted efficiency, causes us to forget a potential biological ally: feeling human concern.

If we are to shift to more humane organisations, change will be required at two levels: within the hearts and minds of those who provide the care , and in the ground rules, both explicit and hidden, of the institution.

Daniel Goleman

In the end it comes down to me.