Episode 95: Sam Fellowes

On Episode 95, Nick chats with Sam Fellowes, Senior Lecturer at Lancaster University, about drawing on his own experience being diagnosed with autism at the age of 24 to motivate his research into methodological issues in psychiatric diagnoses, the challenge of establishing accuracy with self-diagnosis in psychiatry, psychiatric diagnoses as models, neurodiversity, the importance of including what he terms “experts-by-experience” in psychiatric research, and his upcoming book, “In Defense of Psychiatric Diagnoses.” Timestamps: (0:00) - Introduction (1:56) - Sam’s new book (8:34) - Sam’s life growing up, his background and early interests (14:56) - Sam’s introduction to philosophy (22:43) - Sam’s Dissertation (30:57) - Generalizations of autism in diagnoses (38:23) - Sam’s advice for thinking about autism (45:10) - Sam’s new work in philosophy of psychiatry, including “expert-by-experience” (51:47) - Philosophically and epistemology examining self-diagnoses in both autism and substance abuse (1:10:53) - The greatest challenge that philosophy of science faces today (1:17:05) - Sam’s YouTube and potential future podcast