insanity

insanity
I
(New American Roget's College Thesaurus)
Lack of mental soundness
Nouns
1. insanity, lunacy, derangement, craziness, feeblemindedness; abnormal behavior, pathology; affective disorder; nervous breakdown; antisocial, compulsive, cyclothymic, passive-aggressive, or psycopathic personality, character disorder; manic depression, bipolar disorder; neurosis, anxiety; hypochondria, psychosis, psychopathy, schizophrenia, hebephrenia, split or multiple personality, paranoia, dementia praecox, psychosexual disorder; autism; madness, mental illness, abnormality, aberration; posttraumatic stress disorder, battle or combat fatigue; seasonal affective disorder, SAD; dementia, frenzy, raving, delirium, hallucination; mass hysteria; lycanthropy; rabies, hydrophobia; Oedipus or Electra complex; disordered reason or intellect; diseased, unsound, or abnormal mind; idiocy, imbecility; anility, senility, dotage (see age). Slang, blue devils. See unconformity, folly.
2. (symptoms) vertigo, dizziness, swimming, disorientation; sunstroke, moon-madness; [nervous] breakdown, collapse; euphoria, mania, hysteria; paranoia, fixation; amnesia, fugue; delusion, hallucination; infantilism; insomnia; melancholia; koro; malaise; persecution complex; defense mechanism, denial, displacement, negation, procrastination, projection, rationalization, reaction formation, regression, repression, substitution.
3. (obsession) mania; monomania, megalomania, nymphomania, satyriasis, bibliomania, pyromania, logomania, theomania, kleptomania, dipsomania, Anglomania; delirium tremens; hypochondriasis, melancholia, hysteria (see dejection); obsession, fixation; shell shock; phobia (see fear). Slang, hangup.
4. (insane person) madman, madwoman, maniac, bedlamite, lunatic; demoniac, dipsomaniac, megalomaniac; neurotic, psychotic, psychopath, schizophrenic, catatonic, paranoiac; idiot, imbecile, cretin, moron, lunatic; Jekyll and Hyde. Informal, couch case, lunatic fringe. Slang, nut, crank, loon[y], bat, bug, screwball, oddball, case, crackpot, fruitcake, mental, space cadet, wacko, loony tune.
5. (hospital for the insane) [insane or lunatic] asylum, sanitarium, sanatorium, mental hospital or institution, [mental] home, bedlam (archaic), madhouse; psychiatric ward; halfway house; straitjacket, padded cell. Slang, nuthouse, nut factory, nuthatch, bughouse, loony bin, booby hatch, funny farm, psycho ward, snake pit, nuttery.
6. (doctor who treats insanity) psychiatrist, alienist (see intellect).
7. psychology, psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, bioenergetics, metapsychology, parapsychology, psychobiology, psychopathology, psycho-physics, psychophysiology, somatopsychology; associationism, behaviorism, cultural relativism, functionalism, gestalt, nativism, personality theory, transactional analysis, structuralism.
Verbs
1. be insane, be out of one's mind; lose one's senses or reason; lose one's faculties or wits; go mad, run mad or amuck, rave, rant, dote, ramble, wander; drivel; take leave of one's senses, go into a tailspin or nosedive, break or crack up, go to pieces; lose one's head. Informal, come apart at the seams. Slang, have a screw loose, have bats in the belfry, not have all one's marbles or buttons; go off one's nut or rocker, go postal, see things, flip [one's lid], flip or freak out, wig out.
2. drive mad or crazy, craze, distract, shatter, unhinge, madden, dement, addle the wits of, derange; infatuate, obsess, turn the brain, turn one'shead, go to one's head.
3. commit, put away, institutionalize, lock up (see restraint); certify.
Adjectives
1. insane, mad, lunatic; crazy, crazed, non compos mentis, unhinged, unbalanced, disturbed; paranoid, manic; criminally insane, psychopathic, psychotic, psychoneurotic, manic-depressive; not right, touched; bereft of reason; unhinged, unsettled in one's mind; insensate, reasonless, beside oneself, demented, daft; frenzied, frenetic; possessed [of a devil]; far gone, maddened, moonstruck; scatterbrained, crack-brained, off one's head; maniacal; delirious, irrational, light-headed, incoherent, rambling, doting, wandering; amuck, frantic, raving, stark mad, staring mad. Slang, overdrawn, crazy as a bedbug or a loon, loco, psycho, nutty [as a fruitcake], screwy, gonzo, meshugga, out to lunch, kooky, wacky, wacko, whacked out, dementoid, gomer, loony tunes, bananas, off the wall, ape[shit], around the bend, off one's trolley or rocker, freaky, bonkers; tetched, pixilated, bughouse; mental (Brit.).
2. (acting as if insane) rabid, giddy, dizzy, cuckoo, daft, vertiginous, wild, slap-happy; mazed, flighty; distracted, distraught; mad as a hatter or March hare; of unsound mind; touched [in one's head], not in one's right mind; in a fog or haze; out of one's mind, head, senses, or wits; on the ragged edge. Informal, daffy. Slang, off one's nut, haywire, barmy, balmy, zoned.
3. (obsessive) fanatical, obsessed, infatuated; odd, eccentric (see unconformity); hipped; hypochondriac; idiot, imbecile, silly.
4. monomaniacal, kleptomaniacal, etc. (see Nouns 3).
Adverbs — insanely; like one possessed; maniacally, etc.
Phrases — whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad.
Quotations — There is a pleasure sure, in being mad, which none but madmen know! (John Dryden), Is there no way out of the mind? (Sylvia Plath), Even paranoics have enemies (Delmore Schwartz), When we remember that we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained (Mark Twain), We are all born mad. Some remain so (Samuel Beckett), There is no great genius without some touch of madness (Seneca), Sanity is very rare (Emerson), Sanity is madness put to good uses (George Santayana), If you talk to God, you are praying. If God talks to you, you have schizophrenia (Thomas Szasz).
Antonyms, see sanity.
II
(Roget's IV) n.
1. [Mental derangement]
Syn. mental illness, mental disorder, derangement, psychopathy, madness, dementia, amentia, lunacy, psychosis, alienation, neurosis, psychoneurosis, phobia, mania, craziness, aberration; see also complex 1 , disease .
Mental illnesses and disorders include: schizophrenia, dementia praecox, catatonia, paranoia, hysteria, catalepsy, manic-depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, depression, melancholia, cyclothymia, delusion, hallucination, delirium, amnesia, split personality, multiple personality, autism, mental retardation, senile dementia, obsession, fixation, compulsion, obsessive-compulsive disorder, mania, phobia; nervous breakdown*. Disorders usually accompanied by impaired mental functioning include: Down syndRome, Mongolism*, cretinism, microcephaly, hydrocephaly, Alzheimer's disease.
Ant. sanity*, reason, normality.
2. [Utter folly]
Syn. senselessness, foolishness, foolhardiness; see stupidity 2 .
Syn.- insanity , current in popular and legal language but not used technically in medicine, implies mental derangement in one who formerly had mental health; lunacy specifically suggests periodic spells of insanity, but is now most commonly used in its extended sense of extreme folly; dementia is the general term for an acquired mental disorder, now generally one of organic origin, as distinguished from amentia (congenital mental deficiency); psychosis is the psychiatric term for any of various specialized mental disorders, functional or organic, in which the personality is seriously disorganized
III
(Roget's 3 Superthesaurus) n.
mental illness, psychosis, derangement, dementia, schizophrenia, paranoia, madness, lunacy, craziness, unbalance, psychopathy, diseased mind, loss of reason. ''A perfectly rational adjustment to the insane world.''—R.D. Laing.
WORD FIND
alcoholic’s: delirium tremens, hallucinosis, Korsakoff’s psychosis
amnesic flight from reality: fugue state
brain lobe removal treatment: prefrontal lobotomy
conscience, without: antisocial personality, sociopathic
corpse, sexual attraction to: necrophilism
delusion that one is great or powerful: delusions of grandeur
deteriorating behavior due to long-term stress: decompensation
emotional agitation, extreme: hysteria
excessive, irrational talking: logorrhea
hands, delusion one has lost one or both: achiria
memory loss, profound: amnesia
mood swings disorder: manic-depressive psychosis
multiple personality: multiple personality, split personality
nonstop talking: logomania
odor hallucination: phantosmia
overeating, pathologic: hyperphagia
perception of sights, sounds, smells that aren’t there: hallucination
persecution, delusions of: paranoia
pregnant, delusion that one is: pseudocyesis
primitive behavior, reverting to: atavism
psychosis involving thought processes, moods, emotion: schizophrenia
schizophrenia marked by constant silly grin: hebephrenia
shock therapy: electroconvulsive therapy
stupor marked by muteness, motionlessness: catatonia
unstable or rapidly changing moods: lability
IV
(Roget's Thesaurus II) noun 1. Serious mental illness or disorder impairing a person's capacity to function normally and safely: brainsickness, craziness, dementia, derangement, disturbance, insaneness, lunacy, madness, mental illness, psychopathy, unbalance. Psychiatry: mania. Psychology: aberration, alienation. See SANE. 2. Foolish behavior: absurdity, folly, foolery, foolishness, idiocy, imbecility, lunacy, madness, nonsense, preposterousness, senselessness, silliness, tomfoolery, zaniness. Informal: craziness. See ABILITY.

English dictionary for students. 2013.

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  • Insanity — In*san i*ty, n. [L. insanitas unsoundness; cf. insania insanity, F. insanite.] 1. The state of being insane; unsoundness or derangement of mind; madness; lunacy. [1913 Webster] All power of fancy over reason is a degree of insanity. Johnson.… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • insanity — insanity, lunacy, psychosis, mania, dementia are the leading general terms denoting serious mental disorder. Insanity as a technical term belongs to law rather than to medicine. It is used to cover a wide variety of mental disorders, all of which …   New Dictionary of Synonyms

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  • insanity — 1580s, state of being insane, from L. insanitatem (nom. insanitas) unhealthfulness, noun of quality from insanus (see INSANE (Cf. insane)). Meaning extreme folly is from 1844 …   Etymology dictionary

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  • Insanity — For other uses, see Insanity (disambiguation). Insane redirects here. For other uses, see Insane (disambiguation). Engraving of the eighth p …   Wikipedia

  • insanity — The term is a social and legal term rather than a medical one, and indicates a condition which renders the affected person unfit to enjoy liberty of action because of the unreliability of his behavior with concomitant danger to himself and others …   Black's law dictionary

  • insanity — The term is a social and legal term rather than a medical one, and indicates a condition which renders the affected person unfit to enjoy liberty of action because of the unreliability of his behavior with concomitant danger to himself and others …   Black's law dictionary

  • insanity — /in san i tee/, n., pl. insanities. 1. the condition of being insane; a derangement of the mind. 2. Law. such unsoundness of mind as affects legal responsibility or capacity. 3. Psychiatry. (formerly) psychosis. 4. extreme folly; senselessness;… …   Universalium

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