The Molecule of More

again. I just wanted them to stop . . . Then I said, who am I going to call? 
Then I called up Ghostbusters. I mean, no, that came out wrong. I didn’t 
call up Ghostbusters, I called crisis intervention . . . Can I go back inside 
now? I think somebody might be trying to shoot me.
—Excerpted from an interview with a 
man living with schizophrenia
The creative mind is the most potent force on earth. No oil well, gold 
mine, or thousand-acre farm can compete with the wealth-producing 
Creativity is the power to connect the seemingly unconnected.
—William Plomer, writer

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THE MOLECULE OF MORE
possibilities of a creative idea. Creativity is the brain at its best. Mental 
illness is the opposite. It reflects a brain struggling to manage even the 
most ordinary challenges of everyday life. Yet madness and genius, the 
worst and the best the brain can do, both depend on dopamine. Because 
of this basic chemical connection, madness and genius are more closely 
connected to each other than either is to the way ordinary brains work. 
Where does this connection come from, and what does it tell us about 
the essential nature of both? Let’s start with madness.
BREAKING WITH REALITY
William had to be brought in by his parents because he refused to accept 
that he had a mental illness. His mother and father were both accomplished 
writers, and had traveled around the world visiting active war zones to 
collect material for their books. William had also shown signs of superior 
intelligence, although he was inconsistent. During his senior year of high 
school his parents promised to buy him a car if he got good grades, and he 
managed a 3.7 GPA.
Things changed dramatically after he went off to college. Strange ideas 
invaded his mind. He had made friends with a young woman, and he 
developed the mistaken belief that she was interested in him romantically. 
When she denied having these feelings, he came to the conclusion that she 
was HIV positive and was trying to protect him from infection. Soon, this 
idea spread to other people. He became convinced that more than a dozen 
people he knew were HIV positive, and that they were all counting on him 
to travel to Africa to find a cure. He figured this out because the voices of his 
dead grandmother and God were explaining things to him.
When his friends suggested he should see a mental health professional, 
William thought that his parents were bribing them to say this. It was part 
of a conspiracy, he thought, to make him think he was sick. He decided his 
parents were imposters, and he left the country to look for his real parents.
He didn’t stay away long, but when he returned home, he accused his 
parents of monitoring him with hidden listening devices. He traveled to New 
York City to escape the overwhelming stress of his imagined persecution. He 

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CREATIVITY AND MADNESS
gave it the name “ambient abuse.” Everything was becoming too intense, and 
he needed a break. He wanted to go someplace where no one could follow him.
By the time he returned home, paying a taxi driver $600 for the ride, 
his parents had had enough. They told him that he couldn’t live in their 
house unless he saw a mental health specialist. William, who was now 
facing the prospect of becoming homeless, agreed. Under the supervision of
a psychiatrist he began taking an antipsychotic medication. His condition