Hi Ted.

Thanks for your response.

I accept that it is a “fairly well-accepted theory that our minds pretty much make up what we perceive of reality”. But that is much more to do with quantum physics and the nature of consciousness. If that was your subject, then you could have found a much better title than The Natural Origin of the Supernatural. And your content followed on from your title. I was responding to this, since I think that the denial of the supernatural is very dangerous, for the reasons I’ve outlined so far.

If you accept that the concept of identified patient is almost universal, and that, as Peck says, the parents are often the problem, then it is hard to see why you dismiss Laing, since that is what he was saying.

The question you raise regarding drugs and demons is very interesting and relevant, and would require much study. I’m not, of course, saying that all mental health/illness cases are attributable to demonic influence, merely that this does appear to be true in some cases. As Peck says, this may occur at the end of a long process of ‘selling out’.

On drugs:

If the assumption is that a mental health problem, e.g. depression, is the consequence of some brain imbalance or misfunction, then it would be logical to seek to find a drug to address the problem. And some drugs seem to achieve this. If there is some deeper cause of the problem, however, the drugs would merely be relieving the symptoms, in order to restore the semblance of normality. If so, wouldn’t it be better to try to find the underlying cause? As I’m sure you know, Laing was very much interested in this problem, but you dismiss his ideas, I think mistakenly.

Best wishes.