I am using my little Webster's, the root is ludere, to play, and delude means to mislead, beguile or deceive. So to me, the original use of the word must have been that delusion must have been caused by someone else deliberately, so it would be accurate to say that a person who had accepted a counterfeit bill was deluded, but perfectly rational.
Now, of course, the use is colored by the psychiatric definition, a delusional person is pretty bad off. The image I would have under those circumstances would be someone who was psychotic, senile, hallucinating, or else out of their mind on drugs. |
