[Knowing better, knowing the why, and knowing how to do: assumptions of depression in psychiatry].

Abstract

1) Empirical psychiatric research has failed to validate or verify the causes of depressive disorder. 2) Historically, psychiatry has been looking for many causes and is currently favoring a model of multi-causality, acting at various levels of interaction with diffuse limits. 3) Purely scientific psychiatry is based on the concept that a person is an "entity in itself" that presently suffers from a disorder caused by modifications in the impulses of the neurons in its brain. 4) The question that remains is whether depression is a real entity independent of human activities, a pragmatic entity employed for reasons of utility, or an entity constructed by the prevailing social forces in Western civilization. 5) The rationale for depression can be answered if we understand a human being as a being-in-the-world that a] is projected into the future to enact its existence, b] is placed in a condition that determines him and hinders his self-determination and c] lives among others that impel him to submit to the rules valid for "common people.