International Journal of Philosophical Practice

Volume 7, Issue 1, Spring 2021

Peter Raabe
Pages 127-143

No Mind is an Island

This essay disputes the approach to so-called 'mental illness' in which the individual patient is presumed to be the locus of hi or her 'disorder,' and should therefore be treated with brain-altering drugs. My position is predicated on the conviction that no one's mind is identical to their brain. Nor is anyone's mind a totally isolated island in the dynamic sea of human interactions and cognitions, and should not be treated as such.