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In its primary [[meaning]], contradiction is [[The Act|the act ]] of contradicting, of opposing oneself to someone by saying the opposite of whatever he or she says. The term is used in [[mathematics ]] and [[philosophy]]. In [[mathematical ]] [[logic]], a contradiction is a [[statement ]] whose [[truth ]] function has only one [[value]]: [[false]]. In philosophy it is the relation that [[exists ]] between the [[affirmation ]] and the [[negation ]] of a proposition. A term that embodies incompatible (contrary or contradictory) elements is also called a contradiction.

Contradicting the fears and [[feelings ]] of a [[patient ]] under [[hypnosis ]] was the first therapeutic [[intervention ]] that [[Freud ]] described in his early article on "A [[Case ]] of Successful [[Treatment ]] by [[Hypnotism]]" (1892-93a). He showed that the etiology of the [[symptom ]] depended on "antithetic [[ideas]]" (p. 121) opposed to the [[individual]]'s intentions. The [[formal ]] element in the etiology was thus contradiction, which also applied to [[repression]]: "For these [[patients ]] whom I analysed had enjoyed [[good ]] [[mental ]] health up to the [[moment ]] at which an occurrence of incompatibility took [[place ]] in their ideational life—that is to say, until their ego was faced with an [[experience]], an [[idea ]] or a [[feeling ]] which aroused such a distressing [[affect ]] that the [[subject ]] decided to forget [[about ]] it because he had no confidence in his [[power ]] to resolve the contradiction between that incompatible idea and his ego by means of [[thought]]-[[activity]]" (Freud 1894a, p. 47).

The [[Interpretation ]] of [[Dreams ]] and the "first [[topography]]" increased the places in Freud's [[theory ]] where contradictory oppositions could be found within a single [[agency]], between [[agencies]], or between [[psychical ]] [[reality ]] and [[external ]] reality. As early as 1900, Freud noted that "[[Thoughts ]] which are mutually contradictory make no attempt to do away with each [[other]], but persist side by side. They often combine to [[form ]] condensations, just as though there were no contradiction between [[them]], or arrive at compromises such as our [[conscious ]] thoughts would never tolerate, but such as are often admitted in our actions" (1900a, p. 596). The [[absence ]] of contradiction, Widerspruchslosigkeit, at first an attribute of the primary [[process]], later became a feature of the [[unconscious]]:

The nucleus of the [[Ucs. ]] consists . . . of wishful impulses. These [[instinctual ]] impulses are co-ordinate with one [[another]], [[exist ]] side by side without [[being ]] influenced by one another, and are exempt from mutual contradiction. When two wishful impulses whose aims must appear to us incompatible become simultaneously [[active]], the two impulses do not diminish each other or cancel each other out, but combine to form an intermediate aim, a compromise. There are in this [[system ]] no negation, no [[doubt]], no degrees of [[certainty]]: all this is only introduced by the [[work ]] of the [[censorship ]] between the Ucs. and the Pcs. Negation is a [[substitute]], at a higher level, for repression" (Freud, 1915e, pp.186-187).

Freud used similar [[language ]] apropos of [[The Id|the id]], adding that "The [[logical ]] laws of thought do not apply to the id, and this is [[true ]] above all of the law of contradiction" (1933a [1932], p. 73). [[Ambivalence ]] is the final [[dynamic ]] factor necessary for [[understanding ]] the ubiquity of contradiction in the expression of [[psychic ]] [[processes]].

Thus, all products of the unconscious—dreams, slips, [[jokes]], symptoms—simply disregard "the [[category ]] of contraries and contradictories. ...Dreams feel themselves at liberty, moreover, to [[represent ]] any element by its wishful contrary; so that there is no way of deciding, at first glance, whether any element that admits of a contrary is [[present ]] in the dream-thoughts as a positive or as a [[negative]]" (Freud, 1900a, p. 318). Freud compared these psychic creations to the antithetical [[meanings ]] of [[primal ]] [[words ]] (1910e), which he again [[analyzed ]] in his study of taboos (1912-1913), and then in his essay on "The [[Uncanny]]" (1919h). The term "compromise [[formation]]," a feature of all defenses, demonstrates the extension of contradiction across the [[whole ]] of mental [[life]].

Contradiction intersects with negation and with the formal referential binary true/false. But Freud was especially interested in dynamic processes that allow contradictory mental positions to be maintained simultaneously. In addition to those already mentioned, he also referred to negation linked to repression, [[disavowal]], [[splitting]], and [[repudiation ]] (or [[foreclosure]], in [[Lacanian ]] [[terms]]). Thus the contradiction between [[wish ]] and reality is systematic in relation to the [[difference ]] between the [[sexes]].

The [[notion ]] of contradiction implies the formal expression of an opposition and its relation to truth. [[Mathematicians ]] such as Kurt Gödel have shown that its [[domain ]] of relevance is restricted. [[Structuralist ]] [[linguists ]] have distinguished oppositions based on contraries from those based on [[exclusion]]. Contradiction would appear to be a very rudimentary formal [[instrument ]] for investigating psychic conflicts. Freud did not rely much on it, preferring the more dynamic terms "opposite" and "contrary."

# [[Freud, Sigmund]]. (1892-93a). A case of successful treatment by hypnotism. SE, 1: 115-128.# ——. (1900a). The [[interpretation of dreams]]]]