D Dickenson, Bill (KWM) Fulford. Oxford University Press, 2000, £27.50, pp 382. ISBN 0–19–26–28–58–5

• Dickenson D
• Fulford B (KWM). In Two Minds: A Casebook of Psychiatric Ethics

Although the title describes this as a “casebook”, it is much more than that. The casebook format entices the reader into a series of readily accessible discussions of increasing complexity and erudition until a vast landscape of medical ethics is evoked and in many instances the very bedrock of morality exposed. The authors seem effortlessly to introduce complex philosophical ideas, including sections on the philosophy of science and the philosophy of mind (rationality, meaning, agency, identity etc). The centrepiece of the book is undoubtedly a series of well-chosen cases (thematically progressing from diagnosis to management and prognosis), each followed by an extensive analysis of the ethical issues, including contrasting arguments from different vantage points. There then follows a commentary by a practitioner with relevant experience—in some cases this …