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29 Oct 2010, 21:19
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he following appeared in a medical magazine:
"Art and music have long been understood to have therapeutic effects for individuals who suffer from either physical or mental illnesses. However, most doctors rarely recommend to patients some form of art or music therapy. Instead, doctors focus almost all of their attention on costly drug treatments and invasive procedures that carry serious risks and side-effects. By focusing on these expensive procedures rather than low-cost treatments such as art and music therapy, doctors are doing a disservice to their patients and contributing to the rising cost of health care in the United States."
Discuss how well reasoned you find this argument. Point out flaws in the argument's logic and analyze the argument's underlying assumptions. In addition, evaluate how supporting evidence is used and what evidence might counter the argument's conclusion. You may also discuss what additional evidence could be used to strengthen the argument or what changes would make the argument more logically sound.
ARGUMENT
The author argues that both art and music long has been understood to have therapeutic effects for individuals who suffer from physical and mental illnesses. But most of the doctors rarely rely on cure based on art and music. Instead, they recommend expensive treatments to their patients. Hence, they are not only responsible for treating their patients badly but also responsible for increasing the health costs of the country. Stated in this way the claim doesn’t have substantial evidence and has a lot of flaws which need to be resolved before art and music can be considered as treatments for medical patients. I will discuss below all the reason.
First, the author claims that art and music have long been understood as having therapeutic effects. This statement is clearly an over simplification. The author fails to give any concrete examples of where art and music have actually helped patients. It is long known that art and music are useful for relieving mental stress. However, the author extends this idea into making us believe that music and art can actually cure physical and mental diseases. The author has not presented any medical case study where a patient got cured simply due to the benefits of enjoying are and music. It is entirely possible that music and art has a mild effect on a patients condition since it relieves stress.
Second, the statement assumes that Doctors try to use expensive and invasive procedures. Furthermore, these procedures carry serious risks and side effects. This is a far fetched thinking on the part of the author. The author fails to state the specific kinds of medical conditions. There are so many illnesses which do not use any kind of invasive procedures. For instance, these days the tumor in head can be taken out by a laser based non-invasive procedure where the excess growth is taken out through the nostrils. All for all the treatments, the law requires Doctors to tell patients about all the risks and side-effects associated with the procedure. Not only this, the patients always have the freedom to take multiple opinions. With the advent of internet, a lot of information about the diseases and their cures as well as personal experiences of the people are available and given that the patients are extremely well informed this reasoning is very weak.
Finally, the author puts the blame of rising cost of health care on to the doctors. Had the author thought a little more on the health care costs, the author would have concluded that the very reason for the high cost of health care is because it is important for the survival of the humans. Consider the scenario where the conventional medical treatment is replaced by therapeutic treatment by music and arts. Isn’t art and music already expensive ? Think how much it will cost people to enjoy art and music for treating themselves, think how much the cost of a music DVD be.
In conclusion, stated in this way, the author has missed on quite a few necessary points which would have been required to understand his argument. The arguments could have had been considerably strengthened if the author would have had provided some real case studies where the illnesses were cured due to art and music. The argument is clearly flawes and is more of a wishful thinking on the part of author.
"Art and music have long been understood to have therapeutic effects for individuals who suffer from either physical or mental illnesses. However, most doctors rarely recommend to patients some form of art or music therapy. Instead, doctors focus almost all of their attention on costly drug treatments and invasive procedures that carry serious risks and side-effects. By focusing on these expensive procedures rather than low-cost treatments such as art and music therapy, doctors are doing a disservice to their patients and contributing to the rising cost of health care in the United States."
Discuss how well reasoned you find this argument. Point out flaws in the argument's logic and analyze the argument's underlying assumptions. In addition, evaluate how supporting evidence is used and what evidence might counter the argument's conclusion. You may also discuss what additional evidence could be used to strengthen the argument or what changes would make the argument more logically sound.
ARGUMENT
The author argues that both art and music long has been understood to have therapeutic effects for individuals who suffer from physical and mental illnesses. But most of the doctors rarely rely on cure based on art and music. Instead, they recommend expensive treatments to their patients. Hence, they are not only responsible for treating their patients badly but also responsible for increasing the health costs of the country. Stated in this way the claim doesn’t have substantial evidence and has a lot of flaws which need to be resolved before art and music can be considered as treatments for medical patients. I will discuss below all the reason.
First, the author claims that art and music have long been understood as having therapeutic effects. This statement is clearly an over simplification. The author fails to give any concrete examples of where art and music have actually helped patients. It is long known that art and music are useful for relieving mental stress. However, the author extends this idea into making us believe that music and art can actually cure physical and mental diseases. The author has not presented any medical case study where a patient got cured simply due to the benefits of enjoying are and music. It is entirely possible that music and art has a mild effect on a patients condition since it relieves stress.
Second, the statement assumes that Doctors try to use expensive and invasive procedures. Furthermore, these procedures carry serious risks and side effects. This is a far fetched thinking on the part of the author. The author fails to state the specific kinds of medical conditions. There are so many illnesses which do not use any kind of invasive procedures. For instance, these days the tumor in head can be taken out by a laser based non-invasive procedure where the excess growth is taken out through the nostrils. All for all the treatments, the law requires Doctors to tell patients about all the risks and side-effects associated with the procedure. Not only this, the patients always have the freedom to take multiple opinions. With the advent of internet, a lot of information about the diseases and their cures as well as personal experiences of the people are available and given that the patients are extremely well informed this reasoning is very weak.
Finally, the author puts the blame of rising cost of health care on to the doctors. Had the author thought a little more on the health care costs, the author would have concluded that the very reason for the high cost of health care is because it is important for the survival of the humans. Consider the scenario where the conventional medical treatment is replaced by therapeutic treatment by music and arts. Isn’t art and music already expensive ? Think how much it will cost people to enjoy art and music for treating themselves, think how much the cost of a music DVD be.
In conclusion, stated in this way, the author has missed on quite a few necessary points which would have been required to understand his argument. The arguments could have had been considerably strengthened if the author would have had provided some real case studies where the illnesses were cured due to art and music. The argument is clearly flawes and is more of a wishful thinking on the part of author.
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