The Letter, Issue 47, Summer 2011, Pages 85 - 94
THE TOOL OF DIAGNOSIS AND OPERATION OF THE MATHEME
To know, to do, know-how, to construct knowledge
Christian Fierens
This is the unedited text of a talk, given to the ―Matinées de psychothérapie institutionnelle, at Facultés Universitaires de Saint-Louis, Brussels on the 24th September 2010 dealing with the problematic of diagnosis in terms of a particular structure of psychosis, neurosis, or perversion. This approach while facilitating communication between clinicians loses sight of the human who is the objectified in the process. Psychoanalysts need to think in terms of what theories/structures they are using as a basis of their knowledge and be aware that these are the scaffolding and not the building. The only thing that can be transmitted in analysis is what you can construct yourself vis use of the matheme.
What can I do? The freedom to intervene.
What should I not do? The deontology of intervention.
What can I fail to do? The right to intervene.
What ought I do? The ethics of intervention.
All that in function of a knowledge and a know-how.
An informed knowledge to act competently. Knowing what to do.