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It was fitting that an IPA Congress in Chile should devote a major panel to the contributions of the Chilean analyst, Matte Blanco. There was a relatively large audience, which included many Chileans, as well as a broad overall representation, and a panel that included his widow, as well as scholars and colleagues intimately familiar with his work. For easy, smoother readability, I will present the contributions of the panellists grouped by subject matter rather than in the order of their presentation.
Gerald Wooster of London provided a ‘primer’ on Matte Blanco's work, which established a framework for the panel. Matte Blanco's best-known contribution is his concept of bi-logic. He stated that there are two kinds of logic operating in the psychological world: asymmetrical logic and symmetrical logic. The first kind, asymmetrical logic, is characterised as that used by ‘hard’ scientists and by psychologists. It is the logic upon which mathematics and science are built. It is the logic that enables us to discriminate between all the categories of difference in the world, such as differences in time, space, whole and part, syntax, grammar, language, gender, or to discriminate within any kind of classification; i.e. with this form of logic we discern differences, the lack of symmetry. It is the logic that has priority in consciousness and appears to have links in brain function with what we call dominant hemisphere functions. It is the outstanding contributor to our cognitive function.
The second kind of logic is symmetrical logic. By contrast with asymmetrical logic, symmetrical logic is characterised by examining for similarities and analogies in all that we perceive and think about. Some evidence suggests that the functioning of this part of our mind corresponds to subdominant hemisphere brain functioning and that it helps creative functioning. The logic is called symmetrical because of a simple test that can be applied to any proposition that comes to it for judgemen