The aim of this article is to propose the psychological processes that contributed to the transformation of a scientist into a pseudoscientist. The case of Carl Ludwig Schleich (1859–1922) is presented. Schleich, a noted inventor of an effective procedure of local anesthesia, propagated, during the last years of his life, pseudoscientific views and mystical theses. It is proposed that Schleich's propagation of the views were an expression of his artistic predilections and a reaction to early loss of his mother and persistent conflicts with his father.
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