Publication 6433

We start from the systemic autoreferential epistemology that A. Pichot and J. Varela have applied to Biology, to describe some properties of living matter. Pichot broadens the approach to describe the cerebral functions with convincing results. We show how the same logic can be applied to a description of the human mind. This allows a description that takes into account the different therapeutic levels without reducing one to the other, and makes it possible to articulate them logically better than the usual psychiatric theories do. This leads to a much more coherent picture of the clinical psychiatric symptoms and of the therapeutic procedures.

Key words: epistemology, psychiatry, autoreference, human person.