The intelligibility of delusion

The question of the intelligibility of delusion has recently been addressed from within empirical psychology, analytical philosophy, and existential phenomenology. The different presuppositions, aims and paradigms for understanding deployed by these several approaches have not always been clearly distinguished.

Psychological theories of delusion approach the delusional subject as a sense-maker labouring under various intelligible strains in their social world and in their emotional and cognitive constitution. Philosophically minded psychopathologists continue to urge that delusion reflects a deeper disturbance of mindedness that renders questionable the application of approaches which seek everyday forms of intelligibility.

Analytical philosophers have most clearly articulated the ways in which delusions cannot, whereas phenomenologists have best articulated the ways in which delusions can, be understood. As we become clearer about the diverse forms our understanding can take, and the different conditions in which such diverse forms may - and may not - each be deployed, a more nuanced answer to the question of the intelligibility of delusion becomes possible.