ABSTRACT
The effects of schizophrenia are so devastating that the need for clear answers concerning etiology and treatment is urgent. At the same time, our knowledge of schizophrenia today is limited and open to doubt. These two factors, in combination, produce a rather fertile ground for extreme statements. Claims of a purely physiological cause and the need for a purely physiological treatment stand side by side with claims of purely experiential causes and the value of purely experiential treatment, and such polarized models of causes and treatments continue to be rediscovered and reinvented periodically. Those who work or live with schizophrenia are confronted continually with the question, How do we best proceed in a context of uncertainty? Dogmatism, pseudocertainty, and delusional optimism have no more place than anomie, hopelessness, apathy, and nonintervention. To Adlai Stevenson's relevant aphorism, "Light a candle rather than rail against the darkness," we should add, But do not shine it so brightly or so selectively that you cannot see the whole picture.
