The medicalisation of madness in our physicalist age has consequences. Once upon a time the mad were thought to have access to divine truth, but now madness is just a symptom of unhealthy neurobiology and any realisations come to in altered states are ignored. Of course, madness can be dangerous and damaging. But from Wittgenstein to Nietzsche, some of our greatest philosophers have experienced periods of madness and yet, their philosophy is just as vital in spite of, or possibly because of, this madness, writes Wouter Kusters.
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