A New Conception of Legal Insanity

ions are not at all that different from the personifications of the fairy tale" (p. 75). Statements about crazy behavior that ascribe agency to intrapsychic entities such as "impulses" or "internal pressures" are homologous to statements that the insane are ruled by demons. The anthropomorphisms of the former mode of explanation are more subtle and use terms that sound mechanical and impersonal, but compulsion still seems to imply some agent's doing the compelling. Although metaphoric explanations have had heuristic value in the elaboration of metapsychological theories, another mode of explanation may be better suited to the task of formulating precise legal standards. Rationality and Responsibility Conviction and punishment are justified only because a defendant deserves them. The law presumes that most people are responsible, i.e, liable and accountable for their c o n d ~ c t , ~ ~ , ~ ~ but the law has a strong moral interest in identifying individuals whose conditions or circumstances make them undeserving of criminal sanction.39 Among such individuals are those whose courses of action are for some reason not chosen freely and rationa l l ~ . ~ O . ~ ' In ordinary conversation, explanations for rational courses of action chosen freely refer to the agent's beliefs or desires. If I ask Bill why he is burning firewood, Bill might answer that he wants to keep his house warm tonight. or that burning wood is a good way to heat his house. Either way, he renders his action intelligible by giving the practical reasoning for what he does. Aristotle conceptualized these explanations as "practical syllogisms" of act i ~ n , ~ ~ a notion that emphasizes, according to Michael Moore,43 "the close connection between rationality and the idioms in which we understand ourselves and our fellow men in everyday life" (p. 3 18). A practical syllogism has two premises, one specifying what the agent desires and the other specifying the beliefs the agent has about the means available to satisfy the desire. The "conclusion" of a practical syllogism is the agent's actions. Ordinary speech offers the practical syllogism in an ellipsis, because from either premise one can construe the other. In asking Bill why he is burning wood, I anticipate that he will make his action comprehensible. In giving me as reason for his action a belief or desire, he implies that his action "makes Bull Am Acad Psychiatry Law, Vol. 16, No. 1, 1988 53