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CAN BEING TOLD YOU'RE ILL MAKE YOU ILL? A DISCUSSION OF PSYCHIATRY, RELIGION AND OUT OF THE ORDINARY EXPERIENCES

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 May 2018

Tasia Philippa Scrutton
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Abstract

What would you think if someone told you they heard voices when no one was there, or could sense the presence of the dead? In some historical periods and in some societies today these experiences are made sense of positively in religious or spiritual terms, but in modern western societies they tend to be regarded as symptomatic of mental illnesses such as schizophrenia. I argue that interpreting these experiences in terms of illness can negatively affect them, turning them into something pathological when they needn't necessarily be so. I also discuss wider issues regarding illness, medicine, authority, interpretation and meaning.

Type
Research Article
Information
Think , Volume 17 , Issue 49 , Summer 2018 , pp. 87 - 101
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 2018 

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References

Notes

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