Meaning of Mind: Language, Morality, and Neuroscience

With The Myth of Mental Illness (1961), Szasz began his crusade against forced commitment to mental institutions, enforced psychotropic medication and the official definition, indeed the very concept, of schizophrenia. He has published more than 20 books since then, expounding his controversial theories. Here, he takes issue with theorists such as John Searle, for whom consciousness is a physical entity and who believes the mind is the brain. For Szasz, the mind is minding: observing one's environment, formulating observations that are then articulated with others and with oneself. Thus self-conversation is normal and hearing voices a universal phenomenon. So-called schizophrenics practice ""disavowed"" self-conversation, attributing to others their internal conversation. According to Szasz, psychiatrists and neuroscientists have conspired to produce an erosion of personal responsibility, making people unaccountable for their thoughts and actions. He himself lays the blame for ""illness"" squarely on the afflicted person. Szasz is an original thinker whose theories, though open to challenge, are daring and profound. His new book should appeal not only to those interested in mental illness but to anyone caught up in the ongoing debate about the origin and nature of mind. (Oct.)