Of course, "pain" is an experience, and is already mental. The distinc- tion between "mental" and "physical" pain may indulge a merely metaphoric use of the term, pain, in such a contrast. Nevertheless, the dis- tinction still has a commonsense validity: A headache is not the same kind of "pain" as loneliness. A good collection of articles on this issue as it appears in psychosomatic disorders is found in Finell ( 1997).
I am of course aware that various "language games" or specialized jar- gons create many conceptual frameworks and discursive realms. I single out mental and physical because they are each very elaborate, coercive, and essential in modern (meaning the last three or four centuries) life, unlike other specialized discourses. These two also are particularly invisible insofar as they both have been reduced to common sense, and people have become adept at living simultaneously within the reach of both discourses without noting that they tack back and forth, nearly every minute of every day.
For I one of a number of critiques of current diagnostic practice, see Sarbin and Keen ( 1998).
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Publication Information: Book Title: Chemicals for the Mind: Psychopharmacology and Human Consciousness. Contributors: Ernest Keen - author. Publisher: Praeger. Place of Publication: Westport, CT. Publication Year: 2000. Page Number: xviii.
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