Psychical medicine
(gcide) | Psychic \Psy"chic\, Psychical \Psy"chic*al\, a. [L. psychicus,
Gr. ?, fr. psychh` the soul, mind; cf. ? to blow: cf. F.
psychique.]
1. Of or pertaining to the human soul, or to the living
principle in man.
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Note: This term was formerly used to express the same idea as
psychological. Recent metaphysicians, however, have
employed it to mark the difference between psychh` the
living principle in man, and pney^ma the rational or
spiritual part of his nature. In this use, the word
describes the human soul in its relation to sense,
appetite, and the outer visible world, as distinguished
from spiritual or rational faculties, which have to do
with the supersensible world. --Heyse.
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2. Of or pertaining to the mind, or its functions and
diseases; mental; -- contrasted with physical.
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Psychical blindness, Psychical deafness (Med.), forms of
nervous disease in which, while the senses of sight and
hearing remain unimpaired, the mind fails to appreciate
the significance of the sounds heard or the images seen.
Psychical contagion, the transference of disease,
especially of a functional nervous disease, by mere force
of example.
Psychical medicine, that department of medicine which
treats of mental diseases.
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