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Editorial
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Sarcasm, risk taking, callous unemotional responses, confabulation, telling lies, gambling, fear-conditioning and compulsive activity: this is not a list of traits that characterize the Editor of Brain offered by disappointed authors (their language is usually less restrained) but, rather, aspects of brain and behaviour on which we have published in recent months. To that list we now add hubristic decision-making.
For some years, David Owen has written and spoken of impetuosity and the refusal to listen or take advice that herald a change of style towards impulsivity and recklessness in world leaders, and in which the common theme is exaggerated pride, overwhelming self-confidence and contempt for others (see Q J Med 2003: 96; 325–36; Q J Med 2005: 98; 387–402; Clin Med 2008: 8; 428–32). In ‘Fit to decide’, A. J. Coles and A. J. Coles review In sickness and in power: illness in heads of government during the last
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