Masters of the Mind - Exploring the Story of Mental Illness from Ancient Times to the New Millennium

An enlightening study of how philosophers and clinicians throughout history have understood the mind and mental illness What is thought? What are dreams? Do thoughts and dreams lead us to do the things we do, or are there unknown factors that shape our behavior? If a person's actions are aberrant or disturbing, does the cause lie in their mental state, their cultural environment, the brain? What in fact causes these disorders? Such questions regarding the mind, its maladies, and its health have fascinated thinkers around the world since-and no doubt before-the beginning of recorded thought. A dazzling piece of intellectual, scientific, and medical history, Theodore Millon's Masters of the Mind takes you on a grand tour of humankind's attempts to understand itself. Millon, a major figure among today's psychological experts, considers the full scope of mental science, from its precedents in early thought, through the rise of its disciplines in the twentieth century, and on to the newest paradigms at work in the twenty-first century. You'll discover how some of the world's first civilizations regarded mental illness, from Chinese descriptions of "diseases of the wind," to the ancient Egyptian characterization of hysteria, to Greek ideas of divine retribution. Moving easily through the centuries, Millon traces the rise of rationality in philosophy and the beginnings of scientific diagnosis and treatment. In clear, vibrant prose, accompanied by original illustrations, he introduces a cast of characters that includes the great contributors as well as the minor yet fascinating figures who too often are excluded from large-scale histories. Neither an endless catalogue of central thinkers nor a plodding parade of clinical theories, Masters of the Mind is instead a layered work, deftly tracing the different intellectual strands modern psychology and psychiatry have drawn on and woven together. In doing so, it reveals a field humming with an a