Bryan Caplan on Thomas Szasz and The Myth of Mental Illness

Bryan Caplan and I discuss the ideas of the iconoclast social critic and psychiatrist Thomas Szasz. Dr. Caplan won the Thomas Szasz award in 2005 for his paper, The Economics of Szasz: Preferences, Constraints, and Mental Illness. We have a wide-ranging conversation about Szasz, his ideas, and how to help ourselves and others when struggling with life. Dr. Caplan shares some of his personal experiences with depression during Covid and how he got out of it.

Related Episodes

Bryan Caplan on Parenting: https://youtu.be/JM0dGLRgko0

Anthony Stadlen on Szasz: https://youtu.be/wzVVLgpgLBA

Jeffrey Schaler on Szasz: https://youtu.be/7wySu4S1w14

Christopher Lane on Shyness: https://youtu.be/GrV46aVkNvM

Irvin Kirsch on Antidepressants: https://youtu.be/PtubmyA3BgU

Related Videos

John Nash on Schizophrenia: https://youtu.be/SizS1nOOeJg

Take These Broken Wings (Documentary about Schizophrenia): https://youtu.be/EPfKc-TknWU

Titicut Follies (Mistreatment of Involuntary Patients): https://youtu.be/e-wVwtN5f-U

Crazywise Film: https://youtu.be/IXnmBIYaIZE

Jim Van Os on Schizophrenia: https://youtu.be/sE3gxX5CiW0

Chapters:

00:00 Intro to Bryan Caplan https://twitter.com/bryan_caplan

00:35 Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids https://amzn.to/3NZcxQg

00:56 How did you discover Thomas Szasz?

01:33 The Untamed Tongue https://amzn.to/3NYtTwI

02:07 Insanity: The Idea and Its Consequences https://amzn.to/3aAp3bn

02:34 Myth of Mental Illness https://amzn.to/3ANgIvp

02:57 Ceremonial Chemistry https://amzn.to/3P4IBU5

03:25 How long did it take you to understand Szasz?

06:13 What do you think most people misunderstood about Szasz?

08:14 Heavy drinkers respond to incentives https://wp.me/p8ReVr-1i5

10:55 How homosexuality got declassified as a disease

11:41 Transvestism

12:34 The Useful Lie https://wp.me/p8ReVr-1eT

12:56 Responsibility

14:34 Criticisms of Szasz

15:42 Szasz as a philosopher of mind https://wp.me/p8ReVr-rs

16:34 Scott Alexander https://slatestarcodex.com/2015/10/07/contra-caplan-on-mental-illness/

17:53 Drapetomania https://g.co/kgs/5qVtCe

18:06 What was it like to meet Szasz? https://www.econlib.org/archives/2012/09/thomas_szasz_a.html

19:29 Suicide https://amzn.to/3RuQS5w

20:05 Why do you think Szasz wrote so much?

21:00 Did you get pushback when writing your paper on Szasz?

22:19 Shakespeare and Szasz

23:24 Has Szasz helped you in your personal life?

27:12 Brittany Spears

28:27 Addiction is a Choice https://wp.me/p8ReVr-9U

29:05 Karl Kraus https://wp.me/p8ReVr-1hz

29:51 Szasz's political beliefs

31:13 Suicide

32:29 Epicurus https://epicurus.net/en/menoeceus.html

32:54 Julian Simon https://amzn.to/3P4Kct3

35:17 Surround yourself with friends

36:11 How do you stay productive?

37:51 Lucretius http://classics.mit.edu/Carus/nature_things.html

39:01 How do you deal with depression during Covid?

41:16 Faith in Freedom https://amzn.to/3caLvIq

41:38 Free will https://econfaculty.gmu.edu/bcaplan/freewill

43:38 Writing advice

44:45 The Baader Meinhof Complex https://youtu.be/2UPrDdb0r70

46:43 Economics of Szasz http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/bcaplan/pdfs/szasz.pdf

49:50 Rational vs. Irrational

52:53 Schizophrenia https://amzn.to/3AK5yb3

56:10 Biographies of schizophrenics https://amzn.to/3IBtJu0

59:15 Hearing voices https://youtu.be/sE3gxX5CiW0

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