Stupid Tuesday questions, DSM-IV edition

The other day, I was sitting and waiting with a co-worker for a meeting to start.  As I spoke with her, she started singing short snippets of songs that sprang into her mind, plucked at random from words I had just been saying.  After a couple of rounds of this, I told her that she was like a “clang association jukebox.”

A clang association, you see, is a kind of speech pattern that often accompanies thought disorders, typified by the speaker stringing words together because they sound alike.  When, in a classic episode, a stimulant-addled Lisa Simpson mutters “pep pills, pep pills, Beverly Sills” under her breath, that is an example of a clang association.

Anyhow, my colleague and I agreed that “Clang Association Jukebox” would be a great name for a rock album.  And that got me thinking that a lot of psychiatric terms would make good names for rock bands.  In addition to The Clang Association (still my favorite), who could resist albums by Word Salad or Flight of Ideas?  (I see from Wikipedia that someone has already had this idea.)

HypomaniaReptilian StareCyclothymic.  So many choices.

So here’s this week’s question — what jargon from your work or profession would make a kick-ass rock band name?  The more divorced from common parlance, the better.

[Lame aside for attorneys — I’ve always thought Ray’s Ipsa Loquitur would be a great name for a bar across the street from a courthouse.]

Russell Saunders

Russell Saunders is the ridiculously flimsy pseudonym of a pediatrician in New England. He has a husband, three sons, daughter, cat and dog, though not in that order. He enjoys reading, running and cooking. He can be contacted at blindeddoc using his Gmail account. Twitter types can follow him @russellsaunder1.

8 Comments

  1. Ooooo, we have lots! Brain in a Vat, Repugnant Conclusion, Forms of Purposiveness, Akrasia, Inverted Spectrum, Backward Causation, A Fortiori, Emergent Properties, Propositional Attitudes, Conceivability of Zombies

  2. For a philosophy movement band name, I think I would have to put my money on the Logical Positivists – or maybe the Vienna Circle.

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