The Corruption of Reality: A Unified Theory of Religion, Hypnosis, and Psychopathology

Sure to be labeled immoral by some organized-religion enthusiast, balderdash by some ultrarational pragmatist, Schumaker’s book makes a case for the essential sameness of religion, hypnosis, and psychopathology. Cogently reasoned, laboriously constructed, its arguments are obviously not for everyone, but they will inspire and animate adherents and opponents alike. Are these three areas of human behavior merely different manifestations of the desire, conscious or unconscious, to bend reality and the perception of it to personal ends? Schumaker deals with reality, sanity, culture, dissociation and suggestion, and the roles and interactions of society and the individual, reducing each to its essence and examining and evaluating it individually and in concert with the others. Citing noted researchers and observers, he demonstrates how humans generally are inclined to construct “insane” realities that distance them from objective but possibly undesirable reality. Furthermore, Schumaker’s views and findings on the roles of ritual and perception in our lives and in our views of reality are fascinating.

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