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Madness Explained. Psychosis and Human Nature By Bentall Richard P. London: Penguin Books. 2003. 640 pp. $25.00 (hb). ISBN 0 713 99249 2
This is a maddening book. The author is determined to flatten the neo-Kraepelinians, as he calls them, with knock-down arguments that occupy the first 145 pages. He presents his fundamental principle in these words: ‘We should abandon psychiatric diagnoses altogether and instead try to explain and understand the actual experiences and behaviours of psychotic people’. But wait a minute, Bentall, isn't the term ‘psychotic’ a diagnosis? In addition to this obvious bloomer, he misunderstands the nature and present status of diagnosis in psychiatry. Terms such as ‘schizophrenia’, ‘mania’...