Dear Vaughan, I haven't looked at the programmes, but I mentioned the general drift of the categories discussion to my wife Dr Camilla Haw. She is a practising psychiatrist and has also done a lot of research with the Oxford Centre for Suicide Research. Her comments were (i) academics in general have a low suicide rate (high rates are for health professionals and agricultural workers), and (ii) 4 cases over a century or more don't in themselves add up to risk factor. Best wishes, Steve. Vaughan Pratt wrote:
Aren't artistic types alleged to be more prone to mental illness than say sales clerks, real estate agents, auto mechanics, farmers, lumberjacks, etc? More generally, creative people? On that basis would one expect a higher prevalence of mental disorders among theoretical physicists (Boltzmann) than experimental ones (Rutherford), or among mathematicians than engineers, or among top chefs than short order cooks?
Everyone seems to be a mental health expert today, just as everyone is an expert on evolution and global warming (but not quantum mechanics or ecology or anesthesiology, funny how that works). I'd be uncomfortable with any innuendos of this kind about theoreticians vs. practitioners, or creatives vs servants, or prima donnas vs. choristers, without some solid independent evaluation of this question by professionals with a substantial track record in mental health. Has any such evaluation been made?
Vaughan Pratt
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