Elsevier

Comprehensive Psychiatry

Volume 27, Issue 2, March–April 1986, Pages 101-114
Comprehensive Psychiatry

Logical empiricism and psychiatric classification

https://doi.org/10.1016/0010-440X(86)90019-2Get rights and content

Abstract

Nosology has become a widely discussed topic in psychiatry with the appearance of DSM-III. Most current treatments of diagnostic categorization, however, presuppose a particular philosophy of science: logical empiricism. Ideas of Carl G. Hempel, a leading proponent of logical empiricism. can be shown to illuminate the contemporary classification of mental disorders. Moreover, the importance attached by many prominent psychiatrists to operational definitions in nosology can be seen to grow from logical empiricist roots. Even the etiology of mental disorders can be placed within a logical empiricist framework. We describe this logical empiricist position in order to prepare for alternative approaches to classification.

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