Spirits and the Medical Mind

The linguistic devices by which we distinguish between a specialist in the laws of the behavior of matter, one who deals with the functions of the body, and still another who ministers to the body diseased, indicate that for human ends we must divide what in nature is joined. We call the one man a physicist, the second a physiologist, the third a physician. The names, like the pursuits, all begin alike, for they are but phases of a common nature. So when any doctrines come forward that threaten to overturn the common foundation of science, physicist, physiologist and physician are equally concerned, and with them in these days the psychologist, who shares somewhat of the habit of mind of all three. But so far as the psychologist has a special warrant to consider belief in spirit-agency or in telepathic or other unrecognized forces, he approaches the matter with the clinical sense congenial to the medical mind.
Source: JAMA - Category: General Medicine Source Type: research