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On psychoanalysis and non‐linear dynamics: The paradigm of bifurcation
Author(s) -
Priel Beatrice,
Schreiber Gabriel
Publication year - 1994
Publication title -
british journal of medical psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.102
H-Index - 62
eISSN - 2044-8341
pISSN - 0007-1129
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8341.1994.tb01788.x
Subject(s) - instinct , dynamics (music) , psychic , epistemology , psychoanalysis , psychology , philosophy , medicine , pedagogy , alternative medicine , pathology , evolutionary biology , biology
Some of Freud's main theoretical conceptualizations drew on metaphors from 19th century physics. However, though the physics of Freud's era was based on deterministic Newtonian mechanics and equilibrium thermodynamics, his descriptions of the dynamics of instincts, therapeutic change, and even transference, were far beyond this model. Freud's dynamic description of psychic development evokes contemporary theories of irreversible, far‐from‐equilibrium thermodynamics and non‐linear dynamics. The present paper focuses on bifurcation theory, which offers a paradigm for the investigation of unpredictable but deterministic phenomena; this paradigm sheds a retroactive light on the classical psychoanalytical conceptualizations of complemental series, repetition compulsion, transference and cure.