Is Madness an Evolved Signal? – Justin Garson on Strategy Versus Dysfunction

Mad in America: Rethinking Mental Health

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4.8 • 201 Ratings

🗓️ 28 February 2024

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Justin Garson is a Professor of Philosophy at Hunter College and The Graduate Center, City University of New York, and a contributor for Psychology Today and Aeon. He writes on the philosophy of madness, the evolution of the mind and purpose in nature. His most recent book is Madness: A Philosophical Exploration, published by Oxford University Press in 2022. He is also the author of the forthcoming The Madness Pill: The Quest to Create Insanity and One Doctor’s Discovery that Transformed Psychiatry, which will be published by St. Martin’s Press.

In this interview, Justin joins us to talk about the ways in which society has attempted to explain or categorize madness over the years. We also discuss the value of looking at madness, not as disease or defect, but as a designed feature.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Madden America podcast, your source for science, psychiatry and social justice.
0:13.5	Hello, this is James and welcome to the podcast. Thank you for joining us today. And our guest for this
0:19.6	episode is Justin Garson.
0:22.1	Justin is a professor of philosophy at Hunter College and the Graduate Center City University
0:27.3	of New York and a contributor for psychology today and Eon. He writes on the philosophy of madness,
0:33.8	The Evolution of the Mind and Purpose in Nature. His most recent book is Madness, a Philosophical
0:40.3	Exploration published by Oxford University Press in 2022. He is also the author of the forthcoming,
0:47.6	The Madness Pill, The Quest to Create Insanity and One Doctor's Discovery that transformed
0:53.0	psychiatry, which will be published by St. Martin's
0:56.2	Press. In this interview, Justin joins us to talk about the ways in which society has attempted to
1:01.4	explain or categorize madness over the years. We also discussed the value of looking at madness,
1:07.1	not as disease or defect, but as a designed feature.
1:16.0	Justin, welcome. Thank you so much for joining me today for the Mad at America podcast.
1:22.0	And I say I'm delighted to get to chat with you about your work and your latest book.
1:23.3	So, so welcome.
1:27.4	Yeah, thank you so much, James. I'm really, really happy to be here.
1:34.5	Great. Thank you. So to get us underway, we'll come on in a little bit to talk about your latest book, if that's okay.
1:47.0	But to begin with, I'd like to ask a little bit about you. So you're a professor of philosophy at Hunter College in New York, and you have a particular interest in studying madness, the evolution of mind and purpose in nature. You're also an author and you've written on topics such as aging,
1:52.5	genetics, mental representation, biological functions, mechanisms in science and the concept of
1:58.7	information in neuroscience. So your work is often at the intersection of philosophy, madness, and biological function.
2:06.4	So what was it that led to your interest in these subjects?
2:09.7	Well, my interest in psychiatry and madness is really lifelong.
	...

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