The story that follows is true. It is also not true.

This is patient #5213’s first hospitalization. His name is David Lurie. He is a thirty-nine-year-old advertising copywriter, married with two children, and he hears voices.

The psychiatrist opens the intake interview with some orienting questions: What is your name? Where are you? What is the date? Who is the president?

He answers all four questions correctly: David Lurie, Haverford State Hospital, February 6, 1969, Richard Nixon.

Then the psychiatrist asks about the voices.

The patient tells him that they say, “It’s empty. Nothing inside. It’s hollow. It makes an empty noise.”

“Do you recognize the voices?” the psychiatrist asks.

“No.”

“Are they male or female voices?”

“They are always male.”

“And do you hear them now?”

“No.”

“Do you think they are real?”

“No, I’m sure they’re not. But I can’t stop them.”

The discussion moves on to life beyond the voices. The doctor and patient speak about Lurie’s latent feelings of paranoia, of dissatisfaction, of feeling somehow less than his peers. They discuss his childhood as a son of two devout Orthodox Jews and his once intense relationship with his mother that had cooled over time; they speak about his marital issues and his struggle to temper rages that are sometimes directed at his children. The interview continues on in this manner for thirty minutes, at which time the psychiatrist has gathered nearly two pages of notes.

The psychiatrist admits him with the diagnosis of schizophrenia, schizoaffective type.

But there’s a problem. David Lurie doesn’t hear voices. He’s not an advertising copywriter, and his last name isn’t Lurie. In fact, David Lurie doesn’t exist.