You Can Catch Madness

Two ordinary people suddenly go insane together. It’s a premise we enjoy from a safe distance—because surely it could never be us. I’m not so sure. Shared madness isn’t rare, it isn’t aberrant, and it sits a lot closer to ordinary love than we’d like to think. Strip away the spectacle and what’s left is the most common thing in the world: two lonely people who found a home in each other. Show notes Further reading Folie à deux: the madness of two — the article that inspired this lecture. Four models of psychopathology — how we decide what counts as “abnormal”, and why a benign shared delusion slips past all of it. The loneliness epidemic and Explaining group dynamics — why social isolation is so dangerous for us. It’s Not Social Media, Life Is Just Worse — a companion lecture on modern isolation. Successful Prophets — the same connection mechanism scaled from the pair to the group. References Ursula and Sabina Eriksson (the Swedish sisters). Folie à deux; Jules Baillarger, Charles Lasègue and Jean-Pierre Falret. Shared psychotic disorder (the undiagnosis quote), and the intimacy-in-isolation qualification. The Japanese family case (shared delusional hallucination); delusional parasitosis; shared pseudocyesis. The Tromp family (BBC, Mamamia). Theranos: Elizabeth Holmes, Sunny Balwani, and Bad Blood. Group polarisation and risky shift. Gang-stalking, Morgellons, and mass psychogenic illness.