Counterintuitive Fall 2024

PTSD Claims — USERNAME

My personal and unnecessary opinion on the subject of PTSD being contagious: I was not exactly sure if I was sold on the idea of PTSD being contagious at first. I chewed on it and thought of alternatives or factors that were not considered. I considered maybe some caretaker jobs are just objectively stressful. I even passed the story around at work for opinion, and although admittedly interesting to discuss for 10 minutes, no one believed it could happen. They all came to the same conclusion as I originally did, it’s probably just stressful to take care of someone with a lot of issues; it’s demanding. Inevitably someone made a joke about the wife being demanding, then the highly scientific & academic discussion dissolved into humorous banter. It was not till a few days later that I was talking to someone else, and they decided to google it, and they found a handful of websites and a scientific publication that said it was possible to get PTSD from someone else. That was when thought I should reconsider my stance. I have warmed up to the idea that perhaps “Catching PTSD is possible”.

In addition to evaluating claims, I also try to evaluate for technique, relevance, sufficiency, logic. You can tell when I am trying, because I will highlight with the word “sentence”. Emphasis on try, as I found my lot drawn to be lacking in biased/ charged language, subtle suggestions, logical fallacies, rambling, or otherwise things I can point out besides being “normal”. It seems, in my opinion, this 14th section to be rather straightforward, concise, and factual for the most part. On the other hand, when I am trying to parse claims, you will notice the use of “claims” instead. This is much more intuitive and focused on.

I have broken the 14th section of the podcast read into 14 separate sections. I stuck to the basic claim types for brevity (even though I went over the 2-hour mark by a lot.), avoiding scope creep, and simply getting something tangible to out the door so I can move on to other things.

Critical Reading:
“Is PTSD Contagious?”

14

1.) Meanwhile people like James Peterson, husband of Kateri of the Olive Garden breakdown, are signing up for experiments.

This is rather straightforward. If we want to dig, we could use “meanwhile” to argue that this is a comparative claim; in this case comparing different couples.

2.) James was so anxious and so suicidal that he couldn’t even muster the self-preservation to get into inpatient treatment.

This is also a rather vanilla sentence. I would say that the use of the world “could” make this claim a proposal claim or causal claim. “X was so bad he could not Y”. If there was a professor involved, I would also label it as evaluative as well. “How bad was it? It was to the point that X could not bring himself to do Y”

3.) With three kids, eight, five, and two, and Kateri’s full-time job—as a VA nurse, actually—she could no longer manage his emotional plus physical problems: rheumatism consults, neuro consults for TBI, plus a burning rash on both feet he got in Fallujah in 2004.

This was rather weird to read, however I am sure it comes across much more natural in a podcast or informal chat format. It does a good job emphasizing the burden that Kateri faces. Then it breaks off into the specifics of James’ emotional and physical problems. We can see here that it tries to come across as a factual claim in the first half, it is rather difficult to prove if something is “bearable” or not. I would say it gets a proposal or evaluative claim type attached to it.

4.) Chemical exposure, stress reaction, no one knows, but the skin cracks and opens up raw with lesions sometimes.

Sentence-wise it is another straightforward one. Fine succinctness. Relevant as connecting to the previous sentence strongly. This is obviously a categorical claim. It lists ailments that literally in no specific categorical forms, at least till we get to the specifics of “lesions” appearing. I would say somewhat abstractly it could also be of the Attributive claim. Although Attributive claims are usually spotted by a person saying something that you quote, in this case the use of no one knows, is used in such a way, is to infer that many people have been asked and they all have responded with some variation of “I do not know”.

5.) Finally they enrolled him in a private clinical trial to get a needleful of anesthetic injected into a bundle of nerves at the top of his collarbone.

The sentence reads somewhat funny. It is very relevant, as it relies upon previous to make its claim. “Finally” is used here to imply that there is an ethical claim. The author is trying to imply getting this man into a clinical trial was of moral importance due to previous claims of disease or aliments.

6.) Kateri writes me that just moments after the injection, he “went from balls-to-the-wall PTSD to BOOM chill.”

Another awkward to read, but normal in conversation type of sentence. It could be argued that there is a logical progression from the previous sentence to this sentence. X caused Y, which is I might mention a Causal Claim.

7.) That’s when her symptoms got worse, precipitating another meltdown, this time at a steak house where she took him to celebrate his newfound calm.

A normal sentence, but one that causes intrigue. What happens next is the obvious question in the audience’s mind. “Her symptoms got worse”. This is perhaps more vexing to me because there is not much to go on to identify it. A definition claim? A factual claim? A causal claim? At the very least I would venture to guess it is a causal claim when paired with the previous claim. Something cause something, or in her case something from the previous claim caused the future to happen where Kateri has a meltdown.

8.) They’d “assumed the normal positions,” she with her back to the restaurant, he facing it so he could monitor everyone, and suddenly, a server dropped a tray out of her periphery, setting her circulatory system off at a million miles a minute.

A sentence with a very good cadence to it with the use of commas. It flows with the logic of a storyteller. Its relevance is that of fleshing out how the meltdown came to be as inferred by previous claims. Although storyteller-like, I would say this would go under the Factual claim type. There is something objective about how the author simply states what happens at each interval comma. I would also say it is a causal claim as it asserts that Kateri’s circulatory system was set off because of the dropped tray.

9.) “He just ate his steak like nothing,” she says.

This is an attributive claim, nothing fancy.

10.) “When you’ve become hypervigilant, the place you are most functional is on the battlefield,” McGill’s Brunet explains.

McGill’s Brunet explains is referring to a person. This shows that line 10 is an Attributive Claim. If we zoom out, we notice that When Brunet is first introduced in paragraph 13, Brunet is introduced as “Alain Brunet, vice president of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies and director of the Traumatic Stress Laboratory at McGill University in Canada”. Although not explicitly invoking credentials in paragraph 14, I still think any reference to Brunet, is to refer to him precisely because he has credentials, which can then be used to add weight and credibility to a claim. Therefore sentence 10 is also a Credibility Claim. Now, Brunet’s exact words are an Evaluative Claim. Brunet is saying something is “best” when he says “[the] hypervigilant…are most functional…on the battlefield”.

11.) Caleb, despite his injuries and his admission that war was pretty excruciatingly awful, told me he wishes he could go back.

This sentence is somewhat emotionally evoking from the author. The idea that someone is suffering so much they rather go back to war, is sobering. It makes an attributive claim even though it is paraphrased instead of quoted. Someone said something is how attributive claims work.

12.) Kateri, despite wishing her system hadn’t learned to run at a heightened state, at this point is like a drug addict, needing stimulation to maintain it.

Here in sentence 12 we see a few things going on. We see an illustrative claim when using “like a drug addict”. We know Kateri is not actually on drugs, however such a phrase brings very vivid images to our head of a stereotypical drug addict. This helps to once again sober the audiences and bring seriousness to the meltdowns Katari suffers from. Once again, there no credible university or scientist attached to this, but I feel as if it might also be an evaluative claim but by the author directly.

13.) For the first time since Iraq, her husband felt at peace, and was able to enjoy a steak dinner with his wife.

Such a reassuring and succinct sentence. It feels like a 180 degree turn from the previous sentence pivoting from one person’s panic attack to another’s peace. The intent is of course to show contrast. This claim specifically is not a contrast or casual claim unless we merge it with the previous sentence. Although proving someone it at peace is like trying to prove someone has meditated so long they have achieved enlightenment. It can be somewhat subjective, so I am hesitant to label it as factual claim, however I do not have anywhere else to place it.

14.) “He just sat there,” Kateri says. His normalcy “was so distressing to me that I wanted to stab him.”

An attributive claim, one that portrays a distressing hostility for the audience to see. The specific words of Kateri are a causal claim. The classic “He made me (want to) do it”, is placing the actions of one person at the effect of another.