Psychiatry: The Science of Lies
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Synopsis
For more than half a century Thomas Szasz has devoted much of his career to a radical critique of psychiatry. His latest work, "Psychiatry: The Science of Lies", is a culmination of his life's work: to portray the integral role of deception in the history and practice of psychiatry.Szasz argues that the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness stands in the same relationship to the diagnosis and treatment of bodily illness that the forgery of a painting does to the original masterpiece. Art historians and the legal system seek to distinguish forgeries from originals. Those concerned with medicine, on the other hand - physicians, patients, politicians, health insurance providers, and legal professionals - take the opposite stance when faced with the challenge of distinguishing everyday problems in living from bodily diseases, systematically authenticating nondiseases as diseases. The boundary between disease and nondisease - genuine and imitation, truth and falsehood - thus becomes arbitrary and uncertain.There is neither glory nor profit in correctly demarcating what counts as medical illness and medical healing from what does not.Individuals and families wishing to protect themselves from medically and politically authenticated charlatanry are left to their own intellectual and moral resources to make critical decisions about human dilemmas miscategorized as 'mental diseases' and about medicalized responses misidentified as 'psychiatric treatments.' Delivering his sophisticated analysis in lucid prose and with a sharp wit, Szasz continues to engage and challenge readers of all backgrounds.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Dr Szasz presents yet another marvelous insight into what we are not being told about his profession. Iconoclastic, charismatic, wonderfully written and thrilling. Everything a good book should have but its based on real life! A fact which is more chilling than any horror/thriller I have read recently. The facts are presented in an accessible way and allow for a deeper understanding of the world of psychiatry, while not seeming unrealistic or like a wayward rant. Simply wonderful.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
10 reviews
60 of 67 people found the following review helpful
The Truth About Liars
1 Oct 2008
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
In this short, lean and eloquent brief of a book rich in historical analysis and lucid in deductive reasoning, Thomas Szasz makes the case that the professionals in the mental health field are "au fond" experts in pretending to be experts. He writes, "Being an expert in mental illness is like being an expert about ghosts and unicorns."
Mr. Szasz proves how the concept of mental illness is void of content. (In biological illness, there is some damage or lesion to the cell. In "psychological illness," there is only a diagnosis, nothing else.)
Mr. Szasz shows how real science, physical science, methodically and clinically works to resolve illnesses and he shows, by contrast, how the so-called behavioral sciences "treat" a so-called "mentally ill" individual merely by giving the "patient" a diagnosis.
Mr. Szasz names names and reveals their charlatanry and theatrical hocus-pocus, from Charcot and Freud to so-called psychotherapists of the present.
This book allows the reader to look afresh at what constitutes personal responsibility and feel refreshed from the burdens of a state-supported circus.
Mr. Szasz proves how the concept of mental illness is void of content. (In biological illness, there is some damage or lesion to the cell. In "psychological illness," there is only a diagnosis, nothing else.)
Mr. Szasz shows how real science, physical science, methodically and clinically works to resolve illnesses and he shows, by contrast, how the so-called behavioral sciences "treat" a so-called "mentally ill" individual merely by giving the "patient" a diagnosis.
Mr. Szasz names names and reveals their charlatanry and theatrical hocus-pocus, from Charcot and Freud to so-called psychotherapists of the present.
This book allows the reader to look afresh at what constitutes personal responsibility and feel refreshed from the burdens of a state-supported circus.
49 of 56 people found the following review helpful
A Liberating Read. Highly Recommended
9 Oct 2008
Format:Hardcover
Szasz provides a fascinating, brilliantly researched look at the historic origins of psychiatry's efforts to invent a medical role for itself. Examining the letters and papers of Freud, Charcot and many other late 19th century psychopathologists, up to the present, Szasz makes compelling arguments that psychiatry has been reassigning social nonconformity to the role of disease.
Individuals whose behaviors were once considered sinful, unconventional, or otherwise unwanted, can now be forced to undergo a "cure." In its role as "doctor," psychiatry functions to exert social control and dominance over its "patients--" many of whom are coerced and destroyed by what psychiatry pretends will heal them.
In a blackly humorous way, by its own standards of mental illness, psychiatry has arguably become a disease in itself. Its practitioners are marked by symptoms of grandiosity, narcissism, and excessive controlling behaviors to the point of psychotic obsession and delusions of power over other lives. One suspects that beneath the grandiosity lies an essential mediocrity and an overwhelming need to reduce others to a lowest common denominator, so as to assert the superiority of the psychiatrists, and thus overcome their own innate insecurities at having been so ordinary. To compensate for this insecurity, they punish what is different, and plow seeds of self doubt into the consciousness of their targets.
Individuals whose behaviors were once considered sinful, unconventional, or otherwise unwanted, can now be forced to undergo a "cure." In its role as "doctor," psychiatry functions to exert social control and dominance over its "patients--" many of whom are coerced and destroyed by what psychiatry pretends will heal them.
In a blackly humorous way, by its own standards of mental illness, psychiatry has arguably become a disease in itself. Its practitioners are marked by symptoms of grandiosity, narcissism, and excessive controlling behaviors to the point of psychotic obsession and delusions of power over other lives. One suspects that beneath the grandiosity lies an essential mediocrity and an overwhelming need to reduce others to a lowest common denominator, so as to assert the superiority of the psychiatrists, and thus overcome their own innate insecurities at having been so ordinary. To compensate for this insecurity, they punish what is different, and plow seeds of self doubt into the consciousness of their targets.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Psychiatry, Science Fiction
18 Mar 2011
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
This work is a hard critique to Freud from the beginning of his writings until his death, as well an analysis of Charcot's life and work.
The so-called pseudopatient study by Rosenham is described here with a profound analysis on the subject.
The author exposes the lies of psychiatry starting from an analysis of hysteria -malingering which Szasz called impersonation of the sick role by a healthy person- the imitation of a real disease by the so-called patient - and neurosis.
The author considers the professionals in the mental health field as impostors. This book shows the truth of psychiatry and the falsehood of this " science of lies and frauds ".
The so-called pseudopatient study by Rosenham is described here with a profound analysis on the subject.
The author exposes the lies of psychiatry starting from an analysis of hysteria -malingering which Szasz called impersonation of the sick role by a healthy person- the imitation of a real disease by the so-called patient - and neurosis.
The author considers the professionals in the mental health field as impostors. This book shows the truth of psychiatry and the falsehood of this " science of lies and frauds ".
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