Author Archives: Federico Soldani

‘World Revolutionary Elites’, MIT 1965 (2021)

“Parallel with these events is the perfecting of conditioning procedures, with or without the aid of drugs and hypnosis. The abolition of privacy – already well along in our day – is placing potent instruments of control in the hands of elites who may see an opportunity to consolidate their position by policing the population medically” – Harold Lasswell

“What benefit does Russia derive from this Institute?” Tsar Nicholas II on the Psycho-Neurological Institute (2021)

The last Emperor of Russia and Vladimir Bekhterev’s Psycho-Neurological Institute revolutionaries.

Un anno di PsyPolitics (2021)

Un rovesciamento del mito della caverna di Platone: anziche’ essere liberati dalla prigionia dei sensi e delle percezioni veicolate attraverso la cultura, la societa’, la storia, ovvero attraverso l’ego psicoanalitico, i cittadini trasformati in pazienti vengono sempre piu’ isolati tra loro, distanziati, fatti operare attraverso il digitale ovvero a distanza, e vengono cosi’ infilati in una caverna di isolamento digitale, virtuale e tra non molto allucinogena.

Sia ‘cibernetica’ che ‘psichedelico’ sono espressioni con una chiara origine politica.

Fino a che punto un capitalismo che si cinesizza puo’ vedere la convergenza teorica di ‘comunismo acido’ e ‘completamente automatizzato’ da una parte e di ‘cypsy capitalism’ o ‘capitalismo cyber-psichedelico’ dall’altra?

E’ possibile capire la caotica politica contemporanea attraverso lo studio della storia della psichiatria e delle psicodiscipline?

PsyPolitics intende continuare nell’analisi dei prepotenti fenomeni politici oggi in corso.

‘Geo’, ‘bio’ e ‘psico’ politica (2021)

Il primo uso a cui si puo’ risalire del termine psicopolitica fu del giurista tedesco esperto di diritto internazionale Heinrich Rogge in “La psicopolitica e il problema del leader“ (Psychopolitik und Führerproblem, 1925).

La prominenza di Rogge e’ testimoniata anche dalle recensioni che almeno dal 1934 al 1937 i suoi scritti su Hitler e sulla prospettiva della pace in Europa ottennero sulla rivista Foreign Affairs, dello statunitense Council on Foreign Relations (CFR).

Ambrogio Lorenzetti e l’Allegoria del Buon Governo di Siena 1338-1339 (2021)

Gli anni in cui l’affresco venne commissionato e realizzato erano anche gli anni in cui si stava diffondendo la peste nera.

L’Allegoria del Buon Governo “si basa sul concetto della divisione dei poteri tra il “Governo”, raffigurato attraverso un vecchio saggio vestito dei colori di Siena (bianco e nero), e la “Giustizia” dotata della simbolica bilancia. I due protagonisti dell’ amministrazione dello Stato agiscono sullo stesso piano, pur lavorando in ambiti diversi.”

The Lancet’s Editor-in-Chief: “We will be transformed into biopolitical citizens” (2021)

Horton, while clearly and unmistakably espousing a globalist and technocratic view, at the same time introduces themes from an author such as Foucault – who worked largely on topics related to psychology and psychiatry – and even appears to criticize the dangers of technocracy at the end of his book. The risk of recuperation – of Foucauldian themes and tools radically challenging the rising ‘biomedical’ as well as ‘psy’ global power – into mainstream globalist and technocratic discourse is definitely present, in my view, in Horton’s latest book.

La psicologizzazione della politica (2019)

Perche’ sta avvenendo questa psicologizzazione o psichiatrizzazione della politica?

E quali sono le funzioni di questa psicologizzazione e di questa psichiatrizzazione della politica?

‘Psychologie’, ‘politique’. Encyclopédie, 1751-1765 (2021)

“PSYCHOLOGY, the doctrine of the soul is only a part of Pneumatology or the doctrine of spirits, which is itself only a part of Metaphysics.”

“POLITICS, Political philosophy is that which teaches men to behave with prudence, either at the head of a state or at the head of a family.”

Origins of the cyber-psychedelic subculture (2021)

In this article, two covers are presented from conferences proceedings sponsored by the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation, about Cybernetics – 1953 Macy Conferences – and Neuropharmacology – 1955 Neuropharmacological Conferences, in which U.S. neurophysiologist and behavioural scientist Ralph Waldo Gerard proposed the term ‘psychotomimetic’.

‘Pneumadelic’? Osmond, 1957: “my own preference being ‘psychelytic’, or ‘psychedelic’ ” /3 (2021)

“There is one golden rule that should be applied in working with model psychoses. One should start with oneself.”

“Our psychotomimetics resemble the hypothetical endotoxin that Carl Jung called toxin-X and that we have called M (mescalinelike) substance.”

Osmond views raise an interesting paradox of experience over logos: if in order to discuss rationally about such substances one has to use them and if using them disorganizes the psyche, would it ever be in fact possible to discuss rationally about them? Or the move to use them implies – a priori – an abandonment of human rationality?

‘Freud of the Rings’ (2021)

“In her book The Secret Ring: Freud’s Inner Circle and the Politics of Psychoanalysis, Phyllis Grosskurth explains that around 1912, Freud’s primary disciple and intellectual heir, Carl Jung, split with his mentor and began outlining his own theories which deviated from Freud’s work.

Freud, hoping to keep a grip on the emerging field of study, brought together six prominent students and created a “Secret Committee” to propagate and defend his work against Jungian psychoanalysis. To seal the deal, Freud gifted each committee member a signet ring with a Greek or Roman god from antiquity taken from his collection.

He later gifted other rings to friends and students, in total handing out about 20 of the signets during his life.”

‘Pneumadelic’? Osmond, 1957: “my own preference being ‘psychelytic’, or ‘psychedelic’ ” /2 (2021)

“No account of model psychoses would be complete that did not relate those that are induced chemically to those induced by other means, such as the reduced or specialized environments described by Heron, Bexton, and Hebb and by Lilly. These specialized environments have been used since antiquity.”

“The substances in question can be used to develop very high degrees of that mysterious yet vital quality – empathy.”

“I believe that these agents have a part to play in our survival as a species.”

‘Pneumadelic’? Osmond, 1957: “my own preference being ‘psychelytic’, or ‘psychedelic’ ” (2021)

The broader political meaning of these substances was stated by Osmond from the very birth of the word ‘psychedelic’.

‘Psychelytic’ would appear to be in line with a Gnostic worldview – as presented by Eric Voegelin – requiring the dissolution or disintegration of the psyche. However, instead of psychedelic, for the pneuma to be revealed or manifested a more appropriate term could be ‘pneumadelic’.