Mental Reduction of Illness

Let’s discuss the belief that all mental phenomena can be explained through biological or environmental causes. This is not a new idea; it is the bedrock of modern psychiatry, neuroscience, and psychology. To label something as “mental illness” is to place it within the realm of what can be measurably studied, diagnosed, and treated with visible and measurable intervention. There is nothing wrong with this in itself, and much good has come from these practices.

However, this framework thrives most with people on the promise of some absolute control: if we understand the cause, we can fix the problem. It assumes that every behaviour, no matter how complex, has a clear aetiology in the material world having to do with some combination of genes, upbringing, neurotransmitter imbalances, and environmental stressors. This is why therapies involving medication, cognitive behavioural techniques, and psychotherapy are so prevalent; they offer tangible solutions to perceivable deficiencies.

Yet, there is a danger here in the illusion of full understanding where it does not exist. When we reduce human experience to only biological and environmentally reactive processes, we miss the broader narratives to do with the carefully guarded secretive, emotional, spiritual, and social dimensions shaping human lives. A person’s obsession with power, for instance, may be inclusively diagnosed as part of “narcissistic personality disorder,” but it could also reflect a deeper yearning for validation or a response to unmet needs in terms of their spiritual understanding of self. To label it solely as a defect is to ignore the possibility that it might be an expression of something larger, whether a logically definable psychological struggle or spiritual conflicts.

Moreover, the materialist framework often overlooks the role of group and cultural dynamics. Mental illness is not an individual phenomenon; it exists within communities, shaped by cultural norms, societal pressures, and collective traumas. To view it through a purely materialist lens is to ignore the way these forces influence our thoughts and behaviours on levels beyond our measure. The same obsessions that drive one person may manifest differently in another, depending on their context, just as the same illness may have different symptoms across cultures as dependent upon perspectives and definitions. Biology plays a massive role, as does environment, but to privilege the measurable above all else reduces humanity to mere collections of robotic and mechanistic responses, absolving the mystery of human life.