Robert Miller Invitation

Klinik für Psychiatrie und Psychotherapie
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AG Angewandte Neurotechnologie
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Robert Miller
ONZM, B.A., B.Sc. (Oxon), PhD. (Glasgow)
Freelance Researcher, and Honorary Fellow,
Otago University
Invitation
Friday April 15th, 2016, 12:30 s.t.
Alois Alzheimer Auditorium
Dept. of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy
Calwerstr. 14, Tübingen.
'Prototype for a Scientific
Classification of Mental
Disorders'
About Robert Miller
Robert Miller was born in Sheffield, England in 1943, and did his
schooling there. At age 17, in the school library, he came across a
book entitled 'Doubt and certainty in Science', the published version
of the 1954 Reith Lecture series given by J.Z.Young. This kindled an
interest in the workings of the brain which continues unabated to this
day. In 1961 he started as a medical student at Oxford University,
where he did his first research on neurophysiology. However, at the
time he experienced increasingly severe psychiatric problems, which
led, in 1966 to a serious psychotic breakdown.
This led to his abandoning the attempt to obtain a medical
qualification, and put him out of action, as far as developing any
career was concerned, for about three years. In 1969 he started
work in the Zoology Department at Glasgow University, and in 1973
obtained his doctorate from Glasgow. He emigrated to New Zealand
in 1977, as lecturer in the Department of Anatomy, University of
Otago. His first book “Meaning and purpose in the intact brain”
(Clarendon press, 1981) has been followed by many journal articles
and several more scientific monographs. In 1999 he resigned his
position in Otago University, continuing research in a free-lance
capacity. He retains links with Otago University, with the position of
Honorary Fellow. At New Year 2007, the award “Officer of the New
Zealand Order of Merit” was given to him “for services to
schizophrenia research”.
Robert calls his approach to research 'library based brain theory',
which involves piecing together a coherent picture from many
fragments of information in innumerable research papers. The focus
has been, firstly, to understand normal brain function, and from
that, to shed light on psychosis, and the complex disorder called
schizophrenia. His largest scientific work to date is an overall theory
of schizophrenia, entitled “A neurodynamic theory of schizophrenia
and related disorders”. In 2015 Robert Miller and John Dennison
published "An Outline of Psychiatry in Clinical Lectures", their edited
translation of a collection of 41 lectures by Carl Wernicke, a German
pioneer of neurology and psychiatry. Inspired by that seminal work
he is now undertaking a wholesale revision of the way mental
disorders are described and classified.
Since emigrating to New Zealand, Robert Miller has worked in
collaboration with the Schizophrenia Fellowship of New Zealand.
Amongst other things, this led to the writing of autobiographical
accounts of his own illness, when he was a young man, and also to
the production of an educational booklet, entitled “Straight talking
about mental illness (with emphasis on schizophrenia)”, which has
been used throughout New Zealand.
Invited Lecture
The classification of mental disorders, as used by the psychiatric
profession in the last century, has never been based on true
scientific reasoning. The one pioneer who attempted this - long
neglected even in the German-speaking world - was Carl Wernicke,
whose life's work remained incomplete, due to his premature death
in 1905. Recently, in collaboration with John Dennison of Otago
University, I was involved in producing the first available edited
English translation of Wernicke's Grundriss der Psychiatrie from
1906. Inspired by this seminal work, I can now see at least the
framework for recasting the description and classification of mental
disorders, based on a neuroscience-based concept of human nature
in its vast variety. This also draws on some of my own theory of
normal brain function, and work of pioneers such as Ernst
Kretschmer and Victor Frankl.
(http://www.springer.com/us/book/9783319180502)
About OCTSPAN
The Otago Centre for Theoretical Studies in Psychiatry and
Neuroscience – brings together the various threads of Robert Miller’s
scientific work, including basic neuroscience, theory of psychotic
illnesses, including schizophrenia, and educational and other related
writings. (http://robertmiller-octspan.co.nz/octspan/?page_id=488)

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