Against Against Pseudoaddiction

A rigorous, morally-urgent contrarian defense: 'pseudoaddiction' — the idea that a patient showing 'drug-seeking behavior' may simply be under-treated and in genuine pain — is obviously real, and the media/academic/Congressional consensus that it's a debunked pharma swindle is a failure of national epistemics. Built on seven devastating clinical cases from Scott's own practice (the suicidal post-op grandmother denied 4-hour dosing, the ex-miner who shot himself after being cut off, plus non-addictive-drug cases — insulin, Geodon, benzos, trazodone — where patients were STILL treated as drug-seekers), showing every listed 'warning sign of addiction' is also just what a suffering patient does. Dismantles Greene & Chambers' 'you can't empirically prove pain exists' category error, then draws the epistemics lessons: in a moral panic arguments become soldiers, be wary of bias arguments, trust medical reporting near-zero. Excellent tier.

Quality 79 · Excellent. Excellent (79): unforgettable clinical cases marshalled into an important, well-argued correction of a settled-but-wrong narrative, plus transferable epistemics; just below the top culture-war/EA classics, held at 79 as a targeted debunk rather than a field-defining frame.

Claude’s paradigm shift 56 · Moderate. Major-shift floor (56): a fresh, forceful contrarian reframe of a consensus 'debunking' plus the arguments-as-soldiers lesson; builds on his own prior epistemics work.

Real-world impact 4 · Moderate. Moderate (4): widely cited within medical/rationalist discourse on opioid-crisis epistemics; discourse-level influence, no institutional/policy change.