Blind Men and Elephants

Genetic and Other Perspectives on Schizophrenia
  • Irving I. Gottesman
Chapter

Abstract

I must apologize for invoking the timeworn but apt Indian legend of probing blind men and an elephant, each persuaded of his superior grasp of the pachyderm and the others’ conceptual errors; they cannot imagine that each one of them is wrong while at the same time each one is right from their own very limited perspective. The tail is like a rope, the side is like a wall, and the leg is like a tree, but the elephant, like schizophrenia, is all of these, none of these, and much, much more. Indeed, schizophrenia may comprise more than one elephant.

Keywords

Twin Study Identical Twin Subacute Sclerosing Panencephalitis Discordant Pair Psychiatric Genetic 
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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media New York 1996

Authors and Affiliations

  • Irving I. Gottesman
    • 1
  1. 1.Department of PsychologyUniversity of VirginiaCharlottesvilleUSA

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