A logical reading key in psychology: Clinical paradoxes in mental systems.

Abstract

This article defines mind as a system, in general and logical terms. In general terms, a system has internal elements related both to each other (organization) and to the external environment (adaptation). In logical terms, moreover, a system can be opened when its determinate language (symbolic internal organization) is inclusive, so that it accepts external indeterminacy in an effort to expand and strengthen itself. But a logical system can also be closed when its impervious language is exclusive, so that it refuses and contrasts the same external indeterminacy in an illusion to preserve itself in nonchange. So that, like a general and logical system, mind can be internally organized to include the indeterminacy of reality and existence, so that it becomes as a changing flow, which is preserved in the sense of its own continuity and persistence. But mind can be organized to exclude the same indeterminacy, so that it becomes as a rigid structure which does not change, but in a world and in an existence that change. So that, mind generates paradoxes, just like closed logical systems studied by Kurt Gödel, and so it generates suffering of misunderstanding. In conclusion, from a clinical perspective, these paradoxes can become opportunities for understanding and growth, as Graham Priest demonstrates with his paraconsistent logic. Therefore, a clinical intervention on paradox marks the way of change, as we will show at the end of this article with some clinical examples, which are based on evidence. Public Significance StatementThe study demonstrates the importance of considering psychic suffering as a closed and paradoxical system. The objective pursued is to broaden the knowledge of mental illness in general, with the aim of offering new tools for understanding and clinical intervention on the individual. Starting from assumption that becoming aware of one's contradictions facilitates the process of change, discovery and resolution of one's paradoxes can thus help the person to solve their problems.