Heresies"Heresy means to choose. The person who chooses 'wrongly' is a heretic; yet heretics, since the beginning of time, have existed in all societies. The result has been an endless conflict between holders of power, whose business it is to rule, and the individual, whose business it is to free himself from arbitrary authority. It is this personal human conflict -- between power and knowledge, authority and reason, the collective and the individual -- which noted psychiatrist Thomas Szasz explores in Heresies. In the same biting but often humorous vein as in The Second Sin, Dr. Szask illuminates the contractions and fallacies that make up our contemporary attitudes toward sex and marriage, freedom and punishment, law and morals, medicine and psychiatry. These aphorism expose many of our modern beliefs and practices to be as self-serving and inhuman as those of the medieval Christians, who, out of fear of the Devil, burned witches at the stake" -- Back cover |
Common terms and phrases
abuse actually American analyst assert authority become behavior believe blood body bread called cause child Christians claims communism considered create crime cure dangerous death define denial desire disease doctors drugs ethic example fact feel follows force former freedom Freud give hence heresy Host human husbands idea identified individual insane institution Jews justify killing language latter literal live madness marriage means medicine mental hospital mental illness metaphors mind moral murder nature object offer organic pain patient person physicians political practice priest problems prohibited protect psychiatrists psychoanalysis psychotherapy psychotic reason regard relations religion remain respect rule schizophrenia seek sexual short sick so-called social society someone speak stand suffering therapeutic thing tion Today treat treatment whereas women
References to this book
Bibliographic information
| Title | Heresies Anchor books |
| Author | Thomas Szasz |
| Publisher | Anchor Press, 1976 |
| Original from | the University of Michigan |
| Digitized | Sep 22, 2006 |
| ISBN | 0385111622, 9780385111621 |
| Length | 183 pages |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |