Walter Freeman was a doctor who performed lobotomies on hundreds of patients. He and his partner were so excited about the procedure that they set themselves a goal to do 20 in four months. They hit it, at least one patient died; 19 more had been scarred for life. Dr. David Frum: It's both a personal tragedy and a great warning to other people not to fall into such traps.
When physician Walter Freeman died in 1972, he still believed that lobotomies were the best treatment for mental illness. A pioneer in the method, he was a deeply confident and charismatic man who eagerly spread the technique in America, long after the rise of alternative treatments that were less destructive. Listen as journalist Megan McArdle and EconTalk's Russ Roberts discuss what McArdle calls the "Oedipus Trap": mistakes that no one can live with, even if they were innocently made, and how admitting such mistakes to ourselves is nearly impossible. They also discuss the complexity of the credo, "follow the science."