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Addiction in the light of the hypothesis of ordinary psychosis

In the language of psychiatry in the English-speaking world the signifiers of “dependence” and “comorbidity” tend to co-occur. Meanwhile, in psychoanalytic jargon we witness the birth of the concept of ordinary psychosis. With reference to clinical cases, we will discuss our work with those dependent subjects who have a structure in which the function of the father is not operating. A distinction will be made between psychiatric or decompensated psychosis on the one hand and ordinary psychosis on the other. Possible diagnostic signs of ordinary psychosis, for example, disconnection (débranchement), will be discussed. We will also articulate our therapeutic point of view with regard to these subjects, for instance the way in which de-intoxication can trigger this disconnection or, alternatively, how reconnection (rebranchement) can be facilitated.

Experimental versus naturalistic psychotherapy research: consequences for researchers, clinicians, policy makers and patients

During the first half of the twentieth century, psychotherapy research was synonymous to single case research. Research and practice were highly integrated in this era, but to be considered full-fledged scientific research, the case descriptions lacked methodological rigor. From 1970 onwards, the experimental Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) design gained momentum in the field of psychotherapy research and the single case paradigm was marginalised. In this article, it is argued that the classical RCT design is ethically troublesome, created a dramatic gap between research and practice, fails to yield the promised objective evaluation of the efficacy of psychotherapy, and systematically disadvantages the types of therapy that prove to be most effective in everyday clinical practice. For several reasons, returning to the classical single case paradigm, however, is not an option. As an alternative, a research program based on naturalistic effectiveness studies and empirical single case studies is put forward. It is argued that, compared to RCT research, this type of research: (1) is methodologically superior; (2) is more informative towards clinicians; (3) is a more reliable basis for anticipating cost-effectiveness of psychotherapy.

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Genesis of the commencement oblique côtoiement stances at distance / dis-stances

This paper deals with the “human”, or the “anthrop” establishing himself. Aiming at the “real” this text relates us to emptiness or to the Thing of both architecture and the human being. This text shows that architecture is an art that one can think of as being at the heart of the genesis of the human subject. Therefore it is an art that touches the real of that human who get stuck and then avoids signification. The author takes us from the very foundation of architecture through to what he calls the “infinition” of architecture. The text begins with “intentions” which briefly outline the foundations of the theory. He continues with “acceptations” which are woven through events, interrogations and the dialectic of the human being, reaching finally the indication of a certain direction given by the sense that senses without meaning. The paper ends with “propositions” establishing the poetics of the architectural stanza logically coupled to the genesis of the human. This opens the way, not to a reductive thought of architecture, but to the exigency to consider architecture as necessary to the genesis of the human being.

Anxiety is not without an object: a Lacanian speculation on the uncanny

Anxiety poses serious problems in regards to the phenomenological conception of perceptual awareness: what is the particular mode of “givenness” proper to the experience in anxiety? Is the existentialist tradition right to understand anxiety in relation to or in opposition with fear (i.e., as a sort of object-less fear)? The work of Lacan in his Anxiety Seminar (1962-1963) challenges the notion that anxiety can be understood in relation to fear, and it offers a novel way of addressing the troublesome phenomenological problem of anxiety’s object-relation. The formula that he puts forward, and which we explore in this essay, is that “anxiety is not without an object”. As a point of reference, the essay explores the properties of a curious topological object that greatly interests Lacan – viz. the Möbius strip – in order to shed light on a very peculiar class of phenomena, viz. uncanny phenomena. The overall aim is to show how the category of uncanny phenomena comprises a field of experience that forces us to revise the basic eidetic categories of Husserlian and existentialist phenomenology.