Book contents
- Levels of Analysis in Psychopathology
- Advance Praise for Levels of Analysis in Psychopathology
- Levels of Analysis in Psychopathology
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Preface
- General Introduction
- Part I Neuroscience, Mechanisms, and RDoC
- Part II Phenomenology, Biological Psychology, and the Mind–Body Problem
- Part III Taxonomy, Integration, and Multiple Levels of Explanation
- Section 8
- Section 9
- Section 10
- Section 11
- Section 12
- Section 13
- Section 14
- 40 Introduction
- 41 Psychiatric Discourse: Scientific Reductionism for the Autonomous Person
- 42 Commentary on Stephan Heckers, ‘Psychiatric Discourse: Scientific Reductionism for the Autonomous Person’
- Section 15
- Index
- References
42 - Commentary on Stephan Heckers, ‘Psychiatric Discourse: Scientific Reductionism for the Autonomous Person’
from Section 14
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 April 2020
- Levels of Analysis in Psychopathology
- Advance Praise for Levels of Analysis in Psychopathology
- Levels of Analysis in Psychopathology
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Contributors
- Preface
- General Introduction
- Part I Neuroscience, Mechanisms, and RDoC
- Part II Phenomenology, Biological Psychology, and the Mind–Body Problem
- Part III Taxonomy, Integration, and Multiple Levels of Explanation
- Section 8
- Section 9
- Section 10
- Section 11
- Section 12
- Section 13
- Section 14
- 40 Introduction
- 41 Psychiatric Discourse: Scientific Reductionism for the Autonomous Person
- 42 Commentary on Stephan Heckers, ‘Psychiatric Discourse: Scientific Reductionism for the Autonomous Person’
- Section 15
- Index
- References
Summary
I very much admire Stephan Heckers’ framing of ‘four forms of scientific reductionism in psychiatry’ and their relation to the autonomy of the patient.Stephan seems to be using ‘reductionism’ in a legitimate, but perhaps non-standard way.‘Reduction’ in his sense has to do with loss of information.There is, first, the ‘clinical encounter’ in which the patient’s lived experience is translated into the third-person account given by the therapist.Then there is classification, identification of a biological problem, and causal implications.Each of these steps misses out something about the ‘lived experience’ of the patient.I find the discussion somewhat tantalizing, and suggest the real reason for acknowledging autonomy may be the need for a ‘Jaspersian engagement’ with the patient, which identifies the one-off idiosyncracies of the patient’s mental life, rather than merely those aspects that fall under generalizations.
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- Information
- Levels of Analysis in PsychopathologyCross-Disciplinary Perspectives, pp. 510 - 516Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2020