Adolescent and Adult (Lifespan Development) Psychology (South East European University, SEEU)

Okay.

We discuss continuity and discontinuity.

Do you feel that you are changing all the time? Do you feel change? Do you feel that you are changing all the time? Or do you feel that you are stuck and stable?

You are changing all the time.

Remember, you're not a population yet. So you are changing all the time.

Okay. And you? You're changing all the time?

Like every day you're changing? How often are you changing?

It takes you a long time.

So maybe you're not changing that often. You're changing infrequently, not frequently. Is that true?

You're not sure? You don't know yourself.

So you're not sure how often you're changing? That in itself is interesting.

And you, are you changing?

I think I'm changing.

And again, every week, every month, every year.

I don't know.

It's not consistent.

Not consistent.

And when you say I'm changing, what do you mean you're changing? How do you define change?

Like something to me like person who can't work?

Like what? You hate cats and a year later you love cats this kind of thing give us an example you hate coffee then you love coffee what's the change give us an example of a change.

Another example could be I love to read books and then I hate to read books. I don't read books anymore. I begin to watch movies. That's a change.

Okay. Maybe I'm going to now. Maybe I'm going to work too.

Okay, but did you have anything in your history.

Okay, but did you have anything in your history?

Anyone else, by the way, it's an open conversation. Anyone else who can come up with the change?

I see that you are having difficulty, actually, to come up with meaningful changes.

You failed, you failed.

For me, I changed an element of change my learning behavior and your personality.

So, the future I'm trying to not to do the same so I'm working on my beginning.

It is an element of change. It is called learning. You are learning. Learning is an element of change. It is called learning. You are learning. Learning.

But it's not change. It's a precondition for change in some cases, but not always.

For example, you can change without learning from the inside.

So what you describe is not change, actually. It's learning.

But I think it changes the inside of So what you describe is not change actually, it's learning.

Yes, a change is something substantial. If I learn out how to eat with chopsticks, I've learned something, but it's not change. Learning that leads to making you something, someone new, someone you were not before.

You will discover, if you try really hard, you will discover that you have great difficulty to find any meaningful changes in your life.

You think you are changing. It is a common human illusion that we are changing.

But you will discover that we have very, very, very, very few and sometimes none changes.

So there is this illusion that we are changing and why do we have this illusion?

Because our bodies are changing. It starts with the body.

There is something called proprioception. I love big words. I love big words. I'm going to teach you many big words if I find big words. I love big words, so I'm going to teach you many big words if I find the marker.

Oh, here's the marker.

So there's something called proprioception.

By the way, feel free to make notes or anything, you know, it's a class.

Proprioception is how you experience your bodies.

Your bodies change all the time. Your body, eight years ago has very little in common with your body today. Your body changes all the time.

Because we experience our body, because it's an experience, we tend to think that we are changing all the time.

But we are coming here to a very important lesson in psychology.

There is, of course, an interaction between mind and body, but they're not the same. They're not the same.

The mind is the way we experience the activity of the brain.

That's the mind, how we experience the activity of the brain.

But it has a little less to do with the rest of the body.

So if you look at your body eight years ago and now, definitely, there was a massive change.

However, if you look at your psychology eight years ago, and now the change is a lot smaller and maybe none.

Maybe none until. Sometimes small, sometimes not.

So there is a divorce. There is a discrepancy between changes in the body which are massive, rapid throughout life, and changes in the mind which are much, much slower.

Development, therefore, has two forms, two shapes.

One type of development is gradual, slow, incremental, invisible.

You don't even feel it. Changing slowly, slowly, slowly.

And one type of change is discontinuous, abrupt.

This second type of change is abrupt, is sudden.

In adolescence, for example, how our bodies change in a way, especially female bodies, male bodies less, but female bodies change in a way which is relatively abrupt.

Because within usually two years you have a new bodies, completely new bodies. That's very abrupt.

However, your minds take a lot longer, for example.

For you to become adults takes about 25 years. About 25 years. That's much, much more.

Slow, and many of you never become adults you remain stuck as children.

Okay, what do you think is more important?

By the way, I expect you to respond. I mean, this is the way we teach you, where I come from. We talk. This is a talk. I'm not here to...

So I expect you to respond, I expect you to think, I expect you to disagree with me, although then I may start to cry, and so on. So be a lot more active, please.

What do you think is more important? What do you think is more important?

Your genes, what you are born with, your heredity, your genetics, or what happens to you throughout life?

What do you think is more important if you care to speculate?

For example, if I were to take you, when you were just born, minutes after you were born, and isolate you in an aquarium, in a glass room, and never allow you to interact with any other person, which is my personal dream, by the way, how would you develop? How do you think you would develop the same as if you were in touch with people? Do you think being in touch with people has any meaning, any influence on development?

Yes? You think if I isolated you in a glass room and you never met anyone, including your parents, do you think you would have become you?

No, interesting, you?

Do you think you would have become you as you are now if I never allowed you to be in touch with other people?

Some of it would remain and can you give me a percentage like 10% would be you and 90% will not be you like if I take you now and I don't allow you to be in touch with people, all your life, you never see another person. Do you think you would be the same as you are now? You did not meet your mother, you did not meet your father, you did not meet anyone, no friends, no one. You're stuck in a glass room. Do you think it would still be the same?

No.

Anyone thinks they would still be exactly the same?

Okay, anyone thinks they would be 50% the same?

No.

Anyone thinks they would be 20% the same?

It's like auction, you know? Do I hear 20? Do we hear 50?

So anyone think they... something will remain? 10%, 5%, 2%, something?

I don't think so.

Okay.

So this class, people in this class, they support, they subscribe to what we call the relational view of development.

The relational view of development says that there is not such thing as individual.

We are the consequences of our interactions with other people.

Let me try to visualize this. Lydia, I can? I am now deleting you. I'm deleting myself also, just to be, you know, equal opportunity deleter.

This is the individualistic, so we have two classes, two schools in psychology.

The school of individual personality and the school of relational personality.

The second school is known as object relations. So this is the classic school.

You heard of Sigmund Freud? It's this school. You heard of Carl Jung? It's this school. You heard of Erickson? Yes. it is this school. So this is the individual school.

It's as if the individual develops from the inside, mostly, although Erickson gave a role to society.

But still, all the drive to develop, all the growth is coming from inside, not from outside.

And this is known as the individualistic school.

Individualistic school, okay?

The other school is known as object relations.

Or relational, for short.

According to this second school, which started in the 1960s in the United Kingdom, according to this second school, we are just the sum total of our interactions with other people.

So if I have an interaction with you, interaction with you, with you, with you, and I put these six interactions together, that's me.

There is nothing except my interactions with other people. There's nothing except relationships.

What we call individual is an intersection.

Let me show you, let me demonstrate to you visually.

I love to delete. It's a destructive urge. Okay.

How is my drawing skill? I could have been a painter had I not been a psychologist.

So, this is one individual, that's the second individual.

Okay? Two individuals.

According to this school, the classical school, this is the individual.

This is according to the classical schools. Freud, Jung, Erickson, Mahler, Melanie Klein, many, many others.

They believe that this is the individual.

This.

According to the Object Relation School, this is the individual.

The intersection with others.

If there are no others, you don't exist.

So according to the Object Relations School, if I isolate you in a cage and do not let you see any other person in your all life, your entire life, you will never become human beings. You will never acquire a self. You will not have a personality.

And actually, there have been such cases.

Have you heard of feral children?

No.

Okay.

Finally, I can teach you something.

Because every time I say something, you say, yeah, yeah, yeah. We heard it before.

Feral children.

Feral children are children who have been abandoned in the forest.

In the 17th century, 18th century, there were no social services.

So if you had a child as a woman, single woman, and you had a child and you didn't have a husband, no one supported you. You couldn't apply to anyone. You couldn't get one supported you. You couldn't apply to anyone. You couldn't get money from anyone. You couldn't get work because to have a child out of wedlock was stigmatized. You were a bad woman. You were a fallen woman. So you couldn't even get work.

So many women took their children and put them in churches, abandoned them, left them in churches.

Actually, many churches in Europe have a special box. Very old churches, when you go to very old churches, the church has a big box. The box opens, and you can put the baby and close the box. I'm kidding you not.

So many women abandoned their children in these boxes of the church.

But some women went to the forest and abandoned the children in the forest. And these children grew up with animals. They grew up with wolves. They grew up with deer. They grew up with animals. They never saw a human being, ever.

The most famous feral child was Kaspar Hauser. There's a movie, actually a few movies, about Kaspar Hauser, if you want to watch it.

Why I'm mentioning feral children?

Because this is exactly the experiment that I'm proposing. These are children who never met other people. These children were observed by people who found them in the forest.

And initially, for a very long time, one year, two years, three years, they did not have a personality. They did not have a self.

Of course they did not have any language. They couldn't talk.

But they also did not perceive themselves as separate.

In a minute we'll come to it.

They didn't perceive themselves as selves. They didn't have a self.

So we know that in the absence of interactions with other people, you do not become yourself.

The word, your self, is misleading. It's as if you own, you possess yourself, yeah?

My self. My smartphone, my laptop, myself. It's like some kind of possession.

But you're not in possession of yourself. Not at all.

Other people create your self.

So it's delusional. It's an illusion to think that yourself is owned by you.

It is a gift or a curse given to you by other people.

Those of you who would like to learn more, there was a guy who, by the way, looks like my twin. Exactly my twin. You go online and you will see what I mean. It's like identical twin.

His name is Lacan. He was a psychologist. And his area, his field of psychology, is my field of psychology.

I teach personality disorders. That was his field. And we do the same work, and we use the same language and so on, and I think I'm the reincarnation of Lacan, only much more handsome. So, this is the perception that people are the combined outcomes of relationships with others. And of course you immediately begin to see that lifespan development psychology is not only about what happens to you from the moment you are born, or actually from the moment you are conceived to the moment you die, but it's also about society. It has a social dimension. What happens to you when you are among other people? The change actually, the only change that is happening, the only two changes. One, your body. Two, your social interactions. The way you interact with others and with society, the ways change all the time. That part is true. You, when you interact with other people, maybe you're not the same as you were 10 years ago. There's a bigger chance that this change has happened than any other change.

And some people don't change. When they are babies or when they are infants or when they are children, they're shy. And when they grow up, they're also shy. So some people don't change, but the majority of people do change in the way they interact with other people. Obviously when you are 10 years old, you don't want to get married and have children, and you don't even pay attention to the other sex if you're heterosexual or to the same sex if you're homosexual. Obviously when you're 10 years old. 10 years later, you can think of nothing else. That's the way your perception of other people and interaction with other people has changed. You are social creatures, and you are nothing, you're nothing except social creatures. There is no meaning to define a human being without society. No such thing.

You can hate society. You can hate society. You can isolate yourself. You can be a loner. You can be a terrorist. You can even become a psychologist, which is the ultimate way of hating society. But even when you hate someone, you are defining yourself by that someone. If I love someone, I'm defining my, this love defines me. And if I hate someone, this hate defines me. No way to avoid this. And if I'm isolating myself and I never ever want to meet any human being ever, that's a relationship. I have a relationship with human beings, which is a relationship of avoidance. Now we call this negative identity formation. Let me explain to you what is positive identity formation and negative identity formation. Let me explain to you what is positive identity formation and negative identity formation. Don't worry, there's a break every 45 minutes. Negative identity formation, positive identity formation. When you grow up and say I will never be like my mother, that's negative identity formation. I will never be like.

There's positive identity formation. I want to be like my father when I grow up. I want to be a doctor or something. When I grow up, that's positive identity formation.

There is no other type. There is no other type. So you define yourself as who you are not compared to other people. Or you define yourself as who you are compared to other people. But it's always compared to other people. This is your point of reference. You become, through your interactions with other people, starting with mother. And we will talk a lot about mothers in the first part of this extended course. Mothers are very, very crucial. One note about mothers and why they're crucial, and we move on. We started at 10 minutes after, so I'm very cognizant. 45 minutes you will have a break. Those of you who survive and for some reason come back, we continue. I mentioned. I mentioned mother, but I did not mention father.

It's important to realize the differences.

Let's start with neuroscience, the science of the brain. Not the mind.

The mind is how you experience your brain. The science of the brain, this hardware, it's known as wetware, this wetware in your skull.

By the age of three years, when you're born, you have 40% of your brain. The human baby is the only baby in nature that continues the pregnancy outside the mother.

When animals are born, they are fully formed. They're finished. An animal that is born is a finished product. This animal can stand, can eat, can run, can do anything within days. Two, three days, they can do anything.

A human baby continues the pregnancy outside the mother. The pregnancy continues for five years.

Why is that? Do you know? Can you speculate?

The head. The head develops, grows.

As the brain doubles itself in less than three years, the head grows.

Because the head is growing, becoming very big, the baby cannot continue the pregnancy inside the mother because it will not be able to exit. I will not go into details. It will not be able to exit.

So the pregnancy has to continue outside because of the size of the head.

Now, this is age zero. This is the first day you are born. Only 40% of your brain is completed.

And in many people you will meet, it never changes. No, I'm kidding.

Okay.

By age three years, by age three years, 80% of your brain is completed. And by age 5, 90% of your brain. And by age 25, 100% of your brain.

Okay.

So, there's a critical period here. This is the critical period. This is the critical period.

And this critical period is known as the formative years.

During this critical period, these three years, the mother is the dominant influence and only the mother is the dominant influence.

It is the mother who determines if the child grows up to be healthy, mentally healthy or mentally ill, if the child becomes functional or not, etc., etc.

So we'll discuss the mother a lot when we discuss the formative years.

Later, the father enters the picture, and the father teaches the child how to behave in society. This is a process known as socialization. Socialization.

So the father is the one who teaches the child how to behave. The father teaches the child scripts.

We have social scripts. We have sexual scripts.

Much later, the father teaches the child how to flirt with a woman or how to respond to the flirting or whatever.

So it's the father's role, socialization, and the father teaches the child skills, all kinds of skills.

Now it is common misperception, common misperception, that the father is very influential together with the mother at the beginning, not true, and that daughters acquire skills from the mother, partly true, not completely true, they acquire more skills from the father.

The father is the skill bearer. He is the socialization agent.

Again, we'll discuss all this a bit later.

Don't be alarmed. It's a lot to take in, I understand. But we'll try to make it as interesting for you as possible.

Now, we finish this part, we finish this part, by discussing the main role of the mother.

What do you think the main role of a good mother is?

We just said the baby. What's the main role of the mother? The main role, the main function. What does a good mother do?

By the way, there was a guy. His name was Winnicott. Donald Winnicott.

I'm giving you all these names, because they have written wonderful books, really fascinating books about development, about psychology.

Donald Winnicott was a pediatrician, and then he became a psychologist. And he described the world of the child amazingly, if you want.

So Winnicott. Donald Winnicott defined what it is to be a good mother. So it's called the good enough mother. Good enough mother. Good enough. Mother. That's Donald Winnicott's version.

Now, Sam Vaknin version. What do I think the most important function of the mother is?

Take a guess. What do you think is the most important gift that a mother can give to her child?

It's helpful, yeah, it's helpful.

But that's not the most important gift because a grandmother can do it.

Attention is very important as well but again you're talking about things that others can give. Attention, food, grandmother can give, grandfather can give, uncle, aunt.

Yeah, important to get it from mother, of course.

But that's not what I'm talking about.

Something only the mother can give.

Unconditional love can be given by maternal figures, in other words by those who fulfill the role of the mother if the mother is absent.

What?

I will not torture you, I will not torture you anymore, although this is great fun.

The thing that a mother can give that no one else can give is push the child away. Push the child away.

It's exactly opposite what you think. You think a mother should embrace, should hold.

That's a bad mother.

A good mother pushes the child away so that the child can separate from her and become an individual, divided from her. Individual means divided. Divided from her.

We call this process separation, individuation.

I'm sorry?

Yes.

For a healthy child to become a healthy adult, he needs to go through separation from the mother and individuation.

He cannot become individual if he is still with the mother, if he is enmeshed, if he is one with the mother, what is known as symbiotic phase.

Sorry?

When the child is born initially, we'll talk about it, I don't want to go into details, but at some point, usually around two years old, the mother needs to encourage the child to separate from her. Separate.

And if the child refuses to separate because the child is shy, or the child is frightened, or the child has bad self-image, the mother needs to encourage the child, to push him away so that the child can separate from her, discover the world, become an individual.

You know this, they're babies, small babies with mothers. You can see them in the park anywhere.

So the baby hugs mummy's leg, because you cannot reach higher. It has the leg.. So the baby hugs, hugs mummy's leg, because he cannot reach higher.

And suddenly the baby leaves Mommy and runs away. Runs away for ten steps.

He's not running away to Skopje. He runs, you know, five steps, ten steps, and then the child looks back, looks back at mommy, turns around and runs back to mommy and hugs her.

This is the beginning of separation. The mother allows the baby to separate. She doesn't panic. She doesn't panic. She doesn't punish the baby that he went away. She encourages the baby to discover the world, to explore the world.

And the baby knows mother is always there. Mother is not going away. Mother is there and he can always come back to her.

We call this process secure base. The mother is a secure base.

Mothers who do not allow the child to separate because they are selfish or because they're needy or because they're anxious, they're afraid, something will happen to the child. Of whatever reason, these are bad mothers.

The child then cannot separate and cannot become individual.

We will have a whole session, a whole lecture about this. So I will not go into details right now.

It's a fascinating process.

How would you divide human life? To which stages? Which periods would you divide human life?

So just say anything you feel like. would you divide human life?

So just say anything you feel like.

How would you divide human life? Give me some periods. How do you start life?

Is what? You don't know how you start life? Is what?

You don't know how you start life?

You're born.

It's news. Breaking news. You're born.

So newborn. Okay. That's the first stage, yeah?

Okay. New born.

Then, what's the next stage? You were just born. What's the next stage? You become children, I mean, some of you.

Baby, okay. Come on, a bit faster.

Child, okay. Teenager, adolescent. Adolescent is teenager.

Adolescent is teenager. Yeah.

Next. What happens to you after you are an adolescent?

Looks like very far future, but what happens to you?

Who do you become?

Adult, yes. Become adults.

And then when you finish being adults, what happens to you?

Old people. Like me.

And then what happens to you?

Then what happens to you?

You die.

Yes. This is guaranteed. No one can escape this.

Death. Death is a part of life. A very important part of life.

Imagine, for example, if you could live forever. What a nightmare.

Imagine you could live forever. How would your life look? Would you have any motivation to do anything?

No.

If you would be boring? Would you want to do anything?

No. Why to do it now? You can do it in a million years, you know. Why to do it now?

So if you had an infinite life, if you could live forever, probably you would never leave bed. You would be in bed all day. You would have no motivation to see anything. Not even, for example, not even to watch a movie. Why to watch a movie?

You're going to live to be a million years, so, you know, there's so many movies waiting.

Maybe the only exception is Taylor Swift, maybe. Taylor Swift, I understand, but all the rest, I don't think you will do anything.

Okay, this is your suggestion, I don't think you will do anything.

Okay, this is your suggestion, yeah?

I'm not saying this is how we in psychology divide human life, but this is how you divide human life.

Okay?

Do you know that until the 18th century there was no concept of child? Do you know that the first time we began to talk about children was in the end of the 18th century?

Before the end of the 18th century. Before the end of the 18th century, we did not describe people as children. We described them as little adults.

So the concept of child is only 300 years old. It's very new.

Do you know how long humanity has existed? Do you know how long since we started as a species? How long do you think? How long since we started to be human beings?

About a million years.

How long since we started to build cities?

Do you think? Can you speculate? How long since we build the first city?

I'm not talking about Tetouan. How long since we built the first city?

Give a guess. You will not be punished if you get it wrong. Give a guess.

What do you think? A hundred years, thousand years, how long since we built the first city?

Two thousand years? It's ten thousand years, how long since we built the first city? 2,000 years? It's 10,000 years actually. We built the first city 10,000 years ago.

And only in the last 300 years we have the concept of a child. Actually, in many places in the world, this concept is only 100 years.

There is an author, she wrote novels. Her name is Louisa May Alcott. And she wrote two famous books. Little Women and Little Men.

In these books, she describes children from the age of two to the age of ten.

But she doesn't call them little children. And she doesn't call them little children, and she doesn't call them little boys.

She calls them little women and little men.

It's important to understand that the way you look at life, the way you divide life, is very new.

You know, when we are born into a specific environment, when we are born into a period in history, we think that the way we think is normal. The way we think is how we always thought.

That how we think today is how other people thought 2,000 years ago, and 1,000 years ago, and 500 years ago.

We think that because today we have children, there were children 100 years ago, and there were children 100 years ago, and there were children 200 years ago, and there were children 500 years ago.

But that's not true.

The concept of child is very, very new.

Adolescence, the concept of adolescents, did not exist until 1926.

We did not have teenagers until 1926.

The guy who invented this concept, his name was Stanley Hall.

Stanley Hall was the first to describe adolescence.

And he said it's a specific phase in human development.

Imagine that for a million years, or maybe 300,000 years, or maybe 10,000 years. It didn't occur to anyone.

No one thought about teenagers. Even though our bodies change dramatically, no one thought that it is anything special, that it deserves a special name.

So, adolescence and childhood are very new developments.

This is interesting that it's new developments because if it is so new, maybe it's wrong.

I mean, everyone 200 years ago were stupid. Everyone 500 years ago, they were stupid.

They didn't notice children, they didn't notice adolescents. Why didn't they come up with childhood?

What didn't they come up with childhood? What didn't they invent adolescence?

Maybe we are the ones who are wrong.

They were right, we are wrong.

Maybe. We don't know.

We are used to think of people as children. We are used to think of people as teenagers, but this is very new, and because it's very new, there is a possibility that they were right 500 years ago, and we are wrong.

It's a possibility. I'm not saying it's for sure, but there is a possibility.

So, this raises an interesting question.

When we divide life into stages, is this the correct approach?

Maybe we should not divide life into stages, but we should divide life into topics, themes, something that continues throughout life, throughout the lifespan.

Maybe we should isolate one, two, three, four, five processes, internal processes, psychological processes that start at zero and end with death.

Maybe that's a better way to look at life.

Maybe all these divisions, baby, child, these, that, maybe they're artificial, maybe they're wrong, because they're new. It's very new.

Maybe our way of looking at human life is completely wrong.

For example, in the West, in Western countries, in industrialized countries, we are very afraid to talk about death.

We hide death. We put death in cemeteries, in morgues, and whenever death is mentioned, everyone is terrified, shaking, waking.

We take medications, we make surgeries. I mean, we try to postpone death as much as we can because we reject death.

While throughout human history and in many cultures people welcome death, they accepted death as a part of life. Death was all over.

Do you know that in the majority of human history, people buried their ancestors and family members in the backyard? It was near home. Near the home. Cemetery existed, but many people buried their dead at home, or even did not bury them at all. Mammifiedmummified them, and so on.

So the rejection of death in the West is another cultural bias. The division of death in the West is another cultural bias.

The division of life into distinct stages is a new invention and is problematic. It's very problematic.

Because there are many things that start when you are baby or when you are child and they continue until you die.

Isn't it much better to study these things, these processes that are throughout life rather than divide artificially?

And by the way, would you agree? Can you agree among you when each stage starts and finishes?

I want to tell you that there is a huge disagreement among psychologists.

For example, let's talk about adolescence.

Remember, it's a new invention, did not exist before the 1920s.

Let's talk about adolescence.

When does adolescence start? When do you start being teenagers and when do you stop being teenagers?

Give me numbers.

13?

Okay.

Where am I?

One by one.

13 and?

19.

What do you think?

Same.

Same?

You?

Same?

Same?

Don't you think maybe a bit earlier? Like 12?

So maybe 12, okay.

19, you're sure? Not 18, for example, when you're allowed to vote or?

19.

Okay.

What do you think? 19? That's when you end. When do you start?

What would you think? When do you start? Being a teenager? It became a symposium.

So what's the result of the conference?

When do you think it starts? When do you become teenager? Do you have a number for me? 10, 11, 12, 13, what?

12.

Okay. You?

18.

Why did you choose 19, by the way? What's so special about 19?

Ah, so it's not about you, it's about society.

So, yeah, it's about 17, like 13, and in 19, so...

But adolescence is supposed to be something not dependent on society. It's supposed to be an internal process, a development process.

But in Israel, for example, people go to the army, they join the army when they are 18.

That means in Israel, teenagers stop being teenagers at 18?

No.

That means in Israel there is one teenager in Macedonia, another teenager.

In fact, there was those practice school from seven years until 13... There is those Bradford school from seven years until 13. And they are in Paso 14 to 18 and then you are considered to be. This is in Macedonia. There are other countries where the numbers are different.

What I'm asking is, I understand what they're doing.

What I'm asking is, in other countries, the number are different.

So the teenage years depend on where you are.

So it's not part of development. It's dictated by society.

By society.

For example, in Yemen, you could get married when you're 14.

By the way, in the United Kingdom, until the end of the 19th century, you could get married when you were 12. That's United Kingdom.

In Canada, you were allowed, not now, but you were allowed until a few years ago. You were allowed to begin to have sex when you were 14.

So you're beginning to understand the problem?

It doesn't seem to be scientific. It doesn't seem to be real. It depends too much on location, on high school, this school, this school, that school, obligations. It's not serious. This whole period is not serious.

So, we say, okay, forget society. Let's talk about the body.

Teenage years is when the body changes.

It's a great definition because the body changes the samein Israel, in Yemen, in Macedonia, in Russia, in United States, everywhere in the world, the body changes the same.

So this seems to be a bit more scientific, a bit more.

So what changes in the body should define teenagers?

Which changes in the body should define teenagers? Which changes in the body?

Sexual changes in the body?

Sexual changes?

Depends on the country.

Menstruation, the period, starts in the United States two years earlier than in Africa, for example.

So that's a bit of a problem because if we use sexual changes, in Africa, teenagers would have another two years. So that's a problem.

How about the brain, the development of the brain? Can we say that teenagers when the brain finishes to develop?

Why not?

We can say you become adult when you have full brain, when you have 100% brain.

Why not? It sounds logical to me.

Where do you disagree? Why not?

I think that the brains continue to develop to 25 years old.

Exactly, so teenagers, 25.

Until 25, why not?

Actually, there are scholars in the world that say exactly this.

For example, this woman, Twenge, she says the teenagers today are from about 12 to 25.

She redefined adolescence. And she said, adolescence, teenage, is 12 to 25, because she uses the brain.

She says when the brain finishes developing, that's...

Again, this is not serious.

This is not serious.

This is not science.

If we have so many arguments about...

You've seen how many arguments we had here?

If we disagree about everything, we disagree about changes to the body, we disagree. We are six, eight people and we had three different opinions. This is not science.

If I ask you about the Sun, we all will have a single opinion.

So it's a very big problem, these divisions, and today in lifespan development psychology, we are transitioning from this approach to topical approach.

In other words, we don't care if you're a child, adolescent, adult, we care what is happening in your mind and what is happening in your body.

And some of these processes that are happening in your mind, they start at age zero and they end when you die.

And some of these processes in the body start at age zero and they end when you are 25.

So we focus on what is happening.

We focus on processes.

We don't focus on this kind of division.

This is very old thinking.

But it's old thinking and you will still find it in textbooks.

In all textbooks you will find this division.

It's not the current thinking.

That's not how we think about human life anymore.

Today we think about human life in topical terms.

So, if you look for a textbook, if you look for a text to study lifespan, a book, article, video, look for something containing the word topical.

That's the newest approach.

Yeah, thematic.

Yeah, thematic. From now on, we are not going so much to use the word child or adolescent or teenager or adult or, first of all you would agree, I think, that there are many adults who are like children.

They're not mature.

There are many adults who are six years old.

They are 45 years old in the body, but in the mind they are six years old.

So there is a discrepancy. There is a biological age. There is chronological age, and there is psychological age, and there is social age.

You could have an adult who is in the Lichna Carta, he is 50 years old.

His body, because he's smoking and drinking, is 70 years old.

His mind is like, let's say, 90 years old because he's a genius, but he doesn't know how to behave with people. He's bad with people.

So his social age is two years old.

These differences, social, psychological, these are very important and that's why we don't use this division anymore. It'sa meaningless division.

Okay.

So, Zadavolfo, there's for no problem. Fala,ina, of us. Ah? Thank you. Thank you very much. Ah? She's interested.

No, no, seriously, I'm not mocking you. Thank you very much, and I appreciate that she's making the effort to learn.

No problem whatsoever.

Guys, am I, because I'm using English of Cambridge University, am I for you a bit too much? Do you want me to reduce, to go down in...

It's okay, we understand you, but some of the recovery is not...

Yeah.

Stop me. Stop and ask me. Usually I will not know the answer, but sometimes I...

Okay.

There are three schools in lifespan, the lifespan development psychology. Three big groups of scholars like me, you know, academics and so on, and they disagree with each other.

Now when academics disagree, this is the worst kind of conflict you ever see. Not Ukraine, not Gaza, this is the worst kind of conflict you ever see. Not Ukraine, not Gaza. This is the worst.

It's a very dangerous situation.

So consequently, academics don't talk to each other. They talk only to other members of the school. Because it could be life-threatening.

There are three schools.

By the way, this is just introduction. Throughout the course, we will go much deeper into each.

So I'm just giving you like a taste, you know, like meze, a taste of the...

Okay, so we have basically three schools.

One is known as Blank Slate. One is known as developmental plan. Also known as unfolding, and one is known as templates. Very mysterious. Sounds like the Freemasons.

Now, three schools.

Blank Slate is the oldest school.

Blank Slate says, when the baby is born, the mind is totally empty, like a container, like a bottle, with no wine. Totally empty. Not even a bottle, because a bottle is already something. There's nothing. Just brain. Some of us have brains. Just a brain.

And then life, experiences, interactions with other people, gradually fulfill this empty container.

There's a blank slate. The metaphor is a blank slate.

Do you know what this slate? Slate used to be when children in the 18th century, when they went to school, they had like a small blackboard, like a small square, and they used to write on this square, and then they used to wipe it, to clean it, like I'm doing here. This is essentially a very big slate.

So a blank slate means a slate with nothing written on it. Nothing is written.

Tabula rasa, da.

That's not you, that's Latin.

It's not you, that's Latin. Tabula rasa, yes. Tabula rasa, that's the Latin. That's not you, that's Latin. Tabula rasa, yes, tabula rasa.

And nothing is written and it is life that writes on the slate.

And at the end, when the slate is full, you become. That's you.

That's one approach.

The second approach is developmental plan.

Inside us, according to this approach, there is a computer program, like a computer program, and this computer program is working and developing us from inside. Everything that's happening to us is predetermined, is decided in advance. Everything that's happening to us, all the developments, all the changes, mind and body, they come from the inside.

We are like computers and there's a software, and the software dictates how the computer behaves.

Okay?

So this is a second approach.

The third approach is the templates approach.

Templates approach means we are born, and we have softwares, but with no content.

Think, for example, about Microsoft Word. You have a computer. You're like a computer. You have Microsoft Word installed in your mind, but nothing is written there. There's no documents, no files. Just Microsoft Word.

This approach, the second one, is Word plus content. Both the software is installed, and in the software there are documents of files that generate your development.

This approach, word only. No content, only word, ready for the content. And the content is coming from outside.

And this approach, no word, nothing. No word and no contentNothing.

These are the three approaches. And we will study, we will learn each one of them in detail.

Today, just to acquaint you with the situation today, today most psychologists, most developmental psychologists, believe in this. So today we believe in templates theory. When I say believe, I mean that there have been studies that convinced us that this is the right approach and not this and definitely not this.

For example, there was a guy, his name is Noam, there is a guy, he's still alive, Noam Chomsky. Noam Chomsky discovered that babies are born with the ability to absorb and acquire language. They're born with a template. They're born with a word program for languages.

When they're born, this program is automatically activated by the sound of the mother's voice.

Later we discovered, after Chomsky, decades after Chomsky, we discovered that the program is activated in the womb. When the baby hears the mother's voice and listens to music, especially Mozart, I'm not kidding you. When the baby is exposed to music, classical music, don't try rap or hip-hop, classical music. And when the baby hears the mother's voice, but no one else's, another proof that the father is not so important.

When the baby listens to these sounds, already this word program is opened on the computer, ready to absorb.

So, when the baby is born, the program is open and the baby begins to acquire language. This is Chomsky's universal grammar.

So, in at least one field, which is language acquisition, the acquisition of language, learning how to speak, at least in this field, we have proof that babies are born with a pre-installed application, with a pre-installed software.

If you think of the mind as a smartphone, they have an app. When the mother buys a smartphone, the new baby, the new baby comes with apps from Makanowski Telecom.

So today we believe more in templates.

But this was a big thing. The blank slate was for 200 years, the dominant theory.

And because this was the dominant theory, this created the belief that we can influence and shape people and change them and have an effect on people, which is infinite.

Like we can take a baby, a newborn baby, and because he's a blank slate, nothing there, we can make him anything we want. We can change him in any way we want. And the baby will become whatever we want.

That was the belief for 200 years.

And so this had a huge influence, this approach, had a huge influence, for example, on education.

All the educational system of the world, this university included, all educational institutes, are built on the wrong theory of the blank slate.

It's like when you are coming to me to my class, you're a blank slate. And I can write on it whatever I want that's the approach of university that's the approach of school that approach of kindergarten military all social human institutions are built on this misconception this mistake, that we are blank slates.

It's amazing.

But to go back now and to reprogram everything is impossible because there's too much investment.

And I will tell you a horrible story because one of the main tasks of this course is to give you nightmares. So I will tell you a story that will give you nightmares.

You don't like nightmares? You drifted off?

Okay.

I'll tell you a story that will give you nightmares.

In 19th century Europe, I love these small stories, because you know, in 19th century Europe, children were kidnapped. Babies, especially babies.

At the time, groups of nomads, groups of, at the time they were known as gypsies, but actually they were not only gypsies, they were just people traveling and so on.

And they were stealing babies. They were stealing many other things, but they were stealing babies also.

And they were stealing babies, and the baby was tiny, and they had these huge bottles. And they put the baby in the bottle. I'm kidding or not, that's true. It's a true story. They put the babies in bottles. The baby was growing inside the bottle. And the bottle broke the bones of the baby.

So the baby became the shape of the bottle. When the baby was about your age, no, younger, 11, 12, something like that, they broke the bottle. And what was left was a human being in the shape of the bottle.

So this is the blank slate theory. It's like the bottle is, the baby is a blank slate and the bottle can shape the baby.

By the way, if you want to read more about it and to have night long nightmares, then this is called this historical fact.

Sorry, this historical fact.

These babies were known as Comprachicos.

Sorry? All my stories were true.

This is science class, not the...

What are the jar? Big jars where you can fit a baby. Enough for baby, like this size. They put a baby and they never let the baby out. So how did they feed the baby? The baby's like this size. They put a baby, and they never let the baby out. So how did they feed the baby?

Baby's head was out.

They had a hole in the end of the jar, everything. They were washing the jar from bottom, and the baby was growing inside, and a jar was breaking the bones of the baby. And then there were all kinds of jars. There were this kind of jar and this kind of jar. And they were using them in circus. They were selling these children to circuses, to the circus. And this is known as Compuacicose and you can read about it online. It's a true. All my stories are true, by the way.

So it's an example of the blank slate. The baby is like a blank slate, and then the bottle defines the baby.

Okay, next time we meet, you will tell me about your nightmares, because that's my favorite part of the course.

Now I'm going to introduce you to an amazing character. Character, personality.

Eric Erickson, sounds like a Viking. Eric Erickson. Sounds like a Viking. Eric Erickson.

And before I go there, another story, all true. I never lie. At least not in class.

So another story. Of the ten most important figures in psychology, seven were not psychologists. That shows you. Sigmund Freud was not psychologist. He was neurologist. Melanie Klein was not psychologist. Winnicott was not psychologist, not later.

I mean, of the ten most important figures in psychology, seven were not psychologists at all, other professions.

There was even one who was a liar. He lied that he's a psychologist. But actually he was not. His name was Bruno Bettelheim. And he became one of the most important figures in psychology. He interpreted fairy tales and legends and so on. It's very famous. And his books are used until today. I teach his books. But he was never a psychology. And he was a liar. He was a con artist. Islamnik.

Okay. Eric Erickson is another example. Eric Erickson is the most influential figure in lifespan development psychology, by far. And yet, he failed to become a professor. He tried in Harvard University and so and so forth. And for many, many decades, they refused to make him a professor because he didn't have sufficient education.

So here's an example of someone who was officially not, you know, top-level academic, but created the whole field.

So don't be too fixated, don't be too obsessed with degrees and professors and doctors and enlightenment and inspiration and insight come from unexpected places.

You don't have to be a doctor or a professor to contribute to psychology.

You have to be a human being. You have to observe. You have to resonate. You have to empathize. These are the tools of psychology.

Psychology can never be a science. Anyone who tells you otherwise is misleading you. It can never be a science.

Because we are studying things. We are studying humans, and humans change all the time, like from minute to minute.

The very fact that I am studying you changes you. The fact that you are my subject of study changes you.

So there's a serious problem with psychology as a science.

But psychology is a wonderful branch of literature. Literature.

The greatest psychologist ever was Dostoevsky. The greatest, and the second greatest is Nietzsche, not a psychologist.

So you must approach psychology with humility because you are studying the most complex topic in the whole universe.

I know because I have also a PhD in physics. I'm a doctor of physics as well.

So I can compare physics with psychology. And I'm telling you that the most stupid human being is millions of times more complicated than the universe.

And I have a theory about the universe which is developed all over the world and studied and so on. In both fields.

So the universe was nothing for me. Nothing when coming to the human mind. The human mind for me is still a mystery. Universe. Much simpler.

Be humble when you come to psychology.

And now we're going to discuss Eric Erickson.

Have you, I see that you're nodding your heads and so on. Have you studied Erickson elsewhere?

Yeah. It was mentioned or did you study him?

Mentioned? Yes.

In which course, if I may?

Child psychology.

Eric Erickson, of course, is the opposite of child psychology. I don't know if you realize.

There was a big debate initially. Sigmund Freud and later Jung and later others, object relations and so on.

For about 50 years, classical psychology at the time, they said that what happens to you as a child determines your life.

In other words, whatever experiences you have as a child, whatever difficulties you have as a child, these shape you. You become the outcome, the result of what happened to you in childhood.

This is the approach of Sigmund Freud, of Jung, of many others. Winnicott I mentioned, there are many Guntrip, Fairbairn, many others. Winnicott I mentioned, there are many Guntrip, Fairbairn, many others.

We'll discuss them a bit later.

Erickson came and said, this is wrong. It is not true. The development stops in childhood. That's not true. Development continues all life. Development is a lifespan phenomenon.

So he was actually against child psychology. He said that's nonsense. We shouldn't have child psychology. We should have lifespan development psychology.

And he was the father of lifespan-span. Because he said when you are 40 and when you are 50 and when you are 60, you're still developing. And until the very day you die, you're still developing.

So what's the point of isolating childhood? What's a big deal? Why only childhood? You're developing all the time.

So he was against child psychology. So for you to know.

He divided life to eight stages. I'm going to focus a bit on him. So we're going to dedicate a whole session to him. He deserves it. He deserves this whole session. But I'm going to kind of review.

He said the first crucial thing when you're born, first crucial thing is you have to trust. If you don't trust your mother, you're in bad shape as a baby.

Of course this raises immediately the question can a baby trust. Do babies have cognitive processes?

And for a very long time we thought that babies don't have cognitive processes. They don't think, they don't have emotions, they don't notice the environment.

There were schools in psychology that said that until age more or less six months, seven months, the baby cannot tell the difference between mommy and the world. Mommy was the world. Mother was the world. And this was known as the symbiotic phase.

But recently, especially in the last 10 years, we have proven conclusively that starting around four or five weeks after you are born, you begin to experience the environment, you're reacting to the world, and so you have a relationship with the world and with people outside you.

There is something called reflexive empathy. Reflexive empathy is mommy smiles at you, you smile at mommy. You reflect mommy. It's a reflexive empathy.

So the baby is embedded in reality immediately. It's not true that it takes a long time and the baby is merged with mother.

So today we know that the baby is active. And actually there are scholars who have demonstrated that the babies are integrated with the environment outside mother when they are inside mother. When they're in the womb, they're already interacting with the world outside the womb.

So, in this particular case, it raises the question, what does a baby experience as trust? I mean, what all of us experience is trust, we understand.

Because you're teenagers, I'm a dinosaur, but we all experience trust. And that's an adult conception of trust.

Someone is reliable, someone is predictable, someone keeps promises, someone keeps his word.

In other words, your conception of trust is a study, an experiment. You're testing people, right? Like we do in laboratory. You're testing people.

If they pass the test, you give them trust.

So, we say that your concept of trust is pragmatic, heuristic. You're testing.

The baby cannot test.

Or can the baby test?

Do you think a baby can test mother?

Why not?

Think about it from him.

Do you think a baby can test his mother?

How would you as a baby test mother?

For example, you want to eat and she gives you food. Is this not a test? It's a test.

If you want to eat and mother doesn't give you food. Mother fails, no? As far as the baby is concerned.

You cry.

The baby cries.

Crying is known as nurturing or caring cue. The baby cues the mother. Mother and needs something. Mother doesn't know what the baby needs. Maybe he's wet, maybe he's hungry, but it's a cue.

But of course the baby tests mother all the time.

Actually we know that babies get frustrated. And when babies get frustrated, they're angry at mommy. And mommy becomes a bad mother.

When they're frustrated, they don't get, they want to eat, they don't get food. They want mommy to stay in the room. Mommy leaves the room. They get angry at mommy, and mommy becomes a bad mother.

Now this is a process known as splitting. Splitting is when the baby divides the world. It's very early. It starts at age six months and continues until about 36 months.

The baby divides the world. The baby says, this part of the world gives me my needs, gratifies me, satisfies me. This is a wonderful part of the world. It's a good part of the world.

Baby identifies good with satisfaction. If you satisfy baby, you're good. If you don't satisfy baby, you're bad.

And this part of the world is bad because it frustrates me. It doesn't give me what I need. It's not reacting to me. It's not responding to me.

But what to do with mother? Mother sometimes satisfies and sometimes doesn't satisfy, sometimes react, sometimes doesn't react. It's a problem, isn't it?

If you divide the world into all good and all bad, what to do with mother? Sometimes she's all good, sometimes she's all bad. It's a major problem.

So the baby creates two mothers, good mother and bad mother.

The woman who invented this idea, her name is Melanie Klein. And Melanie Klein called it the bad breast and the good breast. Sounds a lot like pornography, but actually it's part of the history of psychology.

So the good breasts and the bad breast. The baby divides mother into a good breast that gives food and a bad breast that withholds food.

This tendency to divide the world has to do with trust.

Because the baby says, I can trust good mother and I cannot trust bad mother.

This creates a problem. We'll discuss it later in some other session.

But of course it involves trust.

So babies can decide if they trust someone or not. And this is the first stage in Erickson, trust or distrust.

According to Erickson, if you fail in each of these stages, you remain stuck. You cannot progress, you cannot proceed.

These are not called stages. We call them stages today. Erickson called them crisis.

He said that the first crisis, second crisis, he never used the word stage or phase. He used the word crisis.

So, if you are stuck as a baby, for example if your mother is unhelpful, selfish, depressive, avoidant, doesn't give you food, neglects you, abandons you, and so you are stuck in the first crisis and you are the kind of person who can never trust other people. Never.

You become suspicious, you become paranoid, and you become hypervigilant.

In other words, you scan for threats all the time, who is threatening me, and so on. And you're stuck in this first crisis. You cannot progress to the second one.

And this way, Erickson divided life into eight stages.

What? Eight stages, yes.

According to Erickson, when the child develops trust, then the child is able to develop a sense of self, an agency, what we call agency.

The child thinks, I can motivate mother to do what I want, so I have power.

But wait a minute, think about this sentence. I have power. I, this is the self. Power, independence, autonomy, agency.

So these two things emerge from the first crisis.

He continues with eight stages, and we will have a whole session dedicated to them, so I will not go into them right now in details.

There are two important scholars that we will also dedicate sessions to.

And when I say dedicate sessions, it will not be like now that we are just, you know, we'll go in depth, I'll give you many examples, we'll have exercises in class, one of you will be baby, another will be mother, and so on so forth.

The two others that you need to know of, or already knowiersz, Jean Piaget, and Lev Vygotsky.

So we'll study Vygotsky, Piaget and Erickson.

Bear in mind, Piaget and Erickson, these are the classics. This is not the current thinking anymore. This is the background to the current thing, but it's not the current thing.

Today, we actually don't use anymore. Erikson, or Piaget, or Vygotsky. I think it's stupid that we don't use anymore. Erickson or Piaget or Vygotsky, I think it's stupid that we don't use them, in my view. It's a loss.

We don't use them because today we have alternative theories. For example, Bandura's social learning theory, for example, information processing theory, and we use this.

And we use this because in each stage in psychology, we have a metaphor. We have a kind of image of the mind.

So I don't know, you're too young to remember this, but initially when we started to discuss the mind, psychologists were comparing the mind to a typewriter, because that was the technology at the time. Then they were comparing the mind to a television set. And now they're comparing the mind to a computer, and now they're comparing the mind to a smartphone.

So when you use these similes, when you use this metaphor, these images on how the mind works, it limits you. It simply limits you. The metaphor has power.

If you think the mind is a computer, then automatically you assume that it has operating system, that it has software.

The comparison limits you. And this is a big problem in psychology, these images that limit you, don't allow you to open up and don't allow you to incorporate and accept previous thinkers.

So for example, today Freud, no one teaches Freud in big universities in the West and so. Cambridge, I'm not allowed to teach Freud. They say it's nonsense. A lot of Freud is nonsense, but a lot of it is genius. It's a net loss. It's a net loss of psychology.

And so today we do not teach and we do not use Piaget, Erickson and so on and so forth, except in parts of Europe. And instead we use Bandura and others, which we'll also teach you about. We'll also discuss.

Another theory we will study is the ecology or ecological theory of development. It's a fascinating theory in its own right, and we will discuss it too.

I'm giving you an overview of what is awaiting you.

Okay, there was a German psychologist, his name was Baltes. You heard of Baltes? You did not hear of Baltes? This is very not nice. You should hear of Baltes.

He was a German psychologist, which is a contradiction in terms, but okay.

And Baltes was the first to systematize lifespan development psychology. He described the properties of lifespan development psychology. He said what lifespan development psychology should be like.

And these properties are very important, and we will discuss them, and we will try to argue among us whether his approach is the correct one or not.

Again, this particular 45 minutes is an overview.

Okay, so it's a bit boring because it's like a list, but I'm giving you all these names and so and so forth because maybe you would like to look them up on your own, and then challenge me and disagree with me and get thrown out of the class in due time.

Okay?

Let's see what else. Okay? Let's see what else. Okay.

Do you have access to Google Classroom?

Okay. On Google Classroom, I place the syllabus and I place the first lesson. The first lesson defines the entire course.

So I'm not quite sure I'll post additional lessons because everything is there. It's like a small textbook. So this defines the whole course. You can find all the names, all the dates, all the details of each theory and who said what to whom and why, and all the fights and all the schools and all the mess.

This is a template. This is the foundation for your own self-discovery and research. You can do your own research. You're not dependent on me.

And I would welcome it if you have your own insights and if you disagree with me, because then we can have lively arguments and maybe even physical fistfights.

And after you review this first lesson, on this particular occasion today, I will not give you an assignment. That's because I'm very nice and empathetic lecturer.

But you are warned that in future lessons I will not be so merciful. I will show my sadistic side and I will give you assignments.

Your assignment now is simply to review the first lesson, which is available on Google Classroom.

Okay.

So, let's try.

What we are going to do, we are going to make all of you a single individual.

All of you will become the same organism.

This happens, actually, psychologically. This is a process known as enmeshment.

Now, today we use the terms enmeshment, merger, fusion.

In the past, when I was born, they were using the phrase symbiotic phase. We no longer used the phrase symbiotic phase.

Enmeshment is when two individuals become one. Like one organism with two heads. Everything is shared. Cognitive processes, thoughts, emotions, experience of oneself, everything is shared.

Can you give me an example of enmeshment or merger or fusion or symbiotic phase, whatever is your favorite phrase. Can you give an example? Can you think of an example?

Yes. When you are with someone and you can't tell where you stop and that individual begins, when you have no boundaries, when you merge with each other, when you become one, you feel his feelings, he thinks your thoughts. He has the capacity to change your moods and your emotions. You're down. He can take you up, you're up, you can put you down. He regulates your emotions. In other words, he can make your emotions intense or less intense. He has total control over your mind. You have total control over his mind. You can't tell the difference between you. You are like one person.

Can you give me an example when this happens?

When you're in a pathological relationship, yes.

True. When you are in an unhealthy relationship with someone, it could be toxic, it doesn't have to be, but definitely unhealthy. There is merger and fusion. There is enmeshment. It's extremely unhealthy.

A healthy relationship involves separation. A healthy relationship involves, you know who you are, you are your own person, the other person is also their own person, and you bring to the togetherness, you bring inputs.

So, in a healthy relationship, you have three entities. You, your loved one, and your relationship. Your relationship is a third entity.

You remember the Venn diagrams? You remember the Venn diagram? The middle, the overlap, is the relationship.

But in enmeshment, there's only one circle. Only one circle. You are your loved one, and you and your loved one are the relationship. Being your loved one is the relationship.

The relationship is about being not you. You immediately see that this is not healthy. If the purpose of the relationship is to not be you anymore, but to be someone else, that's not healthy, of course.

Similarly, the other party usually is also enmeshed. So both of you lose yourselves. You disappear as separate entities and you reappear as a third entity.

Sounds a lot like a horror movie.

Very frequently it is.

Give me another example. Yes, you're right, pathological relationships. Give me another example. From life, starting with zero, ending with hero. Give me an example. When in life do you merge and fuse and mesh? Lose yourself and become someone else. Lose yourself and end that other person and become a relationship. When a symbiosis. Give me an example. Any stage in life doesn't have to be late in life, early in, any stage. Can you think of a situation where two separate people actually are perceived as one by those involved? Can you think of a situation?

Yes.

Yes, that's a good example. You're very good with the enmeshment. So yeah, twins is a good example.

What about pregnancy? When you're pregnant? This is a total state of enmeshment, of course.

What about when a baby is just born? Just born? From the baby's point of view.

Do you think the baby makes a difference? This is me, this is mother, this is the doctor, this is Sistina, this is...

No.

So, we have a state of enmeshment. The baby is born, the baby is not able to tell the difference between itself and other people.

Especially mother, at the beginning it's mother. Not able to tell the difference between itself and other people, especially mother.

At the beginning it's mother. Not able to tell the difference.

As far as the baby is concerned, the baby and mother are the same.

And because the baby and mother are the same, mother is the world.

Mother brings the world to the baby. Mother is the world. Mother brings the world to the baby. Mother is the world.

The baby is able to listen, to see.

Today we know that after four, five weeks, the baby is able to absorb sensory inputs, sensa.

But to make sense of this information, the baby can hear a sound.

Okay, so the baby hears a voice. As far as the baby is concerned, the voice is coming from inside, not from outside, because he and mother are the same. It's the same entity.

So when mother speaks to baby, he, a cute baby, this, the voice is coming from inside.

There is a mental health illness, severe mental health illness, where we confuse internal voices and we think they are external.

What's the name of this mental illness?

Where we have internal voices, but we think they are external.

Which?

A mental illness where you talk to someone and he says, there's a voice coming from the door talking to me. You can't hear the voice, but this person can hear the voice.

Schizophrenia is one example of this.

This psychotic disorders, in psychosis.

Psychosis, we have hallucinations.

And in hallucinations we hear voices that are actually internal voices. And we see images that are actually internal images.

Now we go back to the baby.

The baby hears voices in his mind that are actually external, but he thinks they are internal.

So this is very much a psychotic state. You realize this.

A typical psychotic confuses external voice with internal voice, internal voice, internal voice, the baby does the same.

The baby's confusion is the same.

He cannot tell the difference between internal and external.

The outside is part of baby. And baby includes the world. Because baby includes mother. Baby and mother are the same. And mother is the world. So baby is the world.

There is a name for this. There's a clinical name for this. Hyper- reflexivity.

Now in psychology, if the word is less than eight letters, we reject it. The words have to be minimum 16 letters, and we love words with 34 letters. They're wonderful.

So hyper-reflexivity. Hyper-reflexivity is when we are not able to tell the difference between internal and external.

And that is the state of babies and mentally ill people, which is a clue.

Remember this. It's a clue when we discuss infancy and compare it to a kind of mental illness. And we try to see the similarities. What's a common ground?

So the baby is in a state of enmeshment. The baby is in a state of enmeshment with mother. Mother's voice is perceived as internal, not as external.

What about mother's touch? How does the baby interpret touch?

The baby cannot say I'm touching myself. The baby can say mother's voice is coming from my head. Maybe you can say that.

How would the baby explain touch. Sorry?

Physical touch, yes. A voice, you can say a voice is in my head. That's easy. Even adults do this.

Sometimes you talk to yourself. But what about touch when you are touched and you look around and there's nobody? The first thing you do is you go to a psychiatrist.

So what about touch when you are touched and you look around and there's nobody, the first thing you do is you go to a psychiatrist.

So what about touch? How does the baby explain touch?

The baby doesn't, actually.

Touch is the major engine of personal development and growth in the first six months.

The baby evolves, the baby develops psychologically because of touch.

There has been a very famous experiment with monkeys, baby monkeys. I don't know if you've heard of it.

The experiment of the scientists, are you okay? Are you following? Yeah? If something is not clear, ask me.

The scientists took baby monkeys.

Scientists love to be cruel to pets and small animals. It's very pleasing. So you have many cruel, sadistic experiments with animals in science.

Just that you know what's awaiting you. You will have to torture animals or you will not get your degree.

So, this particular scientist took small baby monkeys.

And he created a construction with wire. Wire. There was a contraption of wire with no fur. No fur, you know what is fur?

And there was a contraption of wire with fur.

And then he put some baby monkeys on the furless wire and some baby monkeys on the fur.

The baby monkeys who were in touch with the fur, which is an imitation of mother, they grew and developed much more than the baby monkeys that were just in touch with the metal.

The touch is super critical.

There are studies that show that if a mother does not touch her baby, this creates severe developmental deficits in the baby, neurodevelopmental disorders in the baby.

It is so important to touch that in the 1960s, there was a very stupid school in psychology, and many schools in psychology are very stupid, and it was a very stupid school in psychology that said that people with autism spectrum disorder are people who are not touched by their mothers.

And these mothers were called refrigerator mothers.

So there was a school about refrigerator mothers. These are mothers who don't touch the baby, and the baby becomes autistic.

But they're right about one thing. Touch is super critical because touch is the only thing the baby cannot explain.

The baby can explain voice, can explain image, can explain everything, like a psychotic, like a schizophrenia. Can explain it's coming from inside. I'm imagining this.

But he cannot explain touch. So touch is an engine of growth.

What other thing the baby cannot explain?

Think about it from him.

The baby can explain voice, can explain. What other thing the baby cannot explain? What other thing forces the baby to realize that he is not a part of mother, that mother and he are two separate objects?

What in the mother forces the baby to realize that mother and me are not the same?

We mention touch.

What else?

Sorry?

You're not bad. You're not bad at all. Next time you teach.

The gaze, the mother's gaze, the mother looking at the baby, the baby cannot explain this.

The baby is reflected in the mother's gaze. The mother looking at the baby. The baby cannot explain this. The baby is reflected in the mother's eyes.

She's reacting to it. She's smiling. She's cooing.

And the baby cannot explain the gaze. It is the mother's gaze and the mother's touch that define the separateness of the baby.

The baby begins to think of itself as separate from mother. That happens around age six months.

Now, imagine that you believe something about the world. You have some belief about the world. And this belief is foundational.

For example, you believe that there is gravity. Someone convinced you there's gravity.

And imagine you wake up one morning after this course, for example, and you discover that you're floating. There is no gravity.

How would you react?

Initial reaction? They were right, they were not right. They told you there is gravity. You wake up and discover there's no gravity.

What would your initial immediate reaction be? You were told something and then you discovered it's not true at all. But something fundamental, something, you know, major, something crucial. What would be your reaction? Initial reaction. If you float away from your bed in the morning, how would you react?

You, how would you feel?

Panic.

Hmm?

Panic, yes. Shock.

You'd be shocked. Why are you afraid to answer, by the way?

Am I that threatening? Don't be afraid to answer.

Even the wrong answer is okay.

I'm asking the wrong question, so of course I should get the wrong answers.

So, panic, shock.

Now imagine that you think that mother and you are one organism. You're one person. And then suddenly you discover that it's not true. That mother is not you. And you are not mother.

How do you think the baby reacts?

Confusion, I think, is a mild reaction. When you think that you, there's no mother, in the baby's eyes, there's no mother. There's single entity which includes everything. And then the baby discovers that the baby does not include everything. There's something outside the baby.

Imagine that you thought that there was nobody in a dark room and then you discovered there is somebody in the dark room.

You react with terror. It's terrifying. The baby is traumatized. It's a major trauma.

The baby thought that it was alone. The baby thought there's only me. Mother, the table, Marian with the camera, everything is me.

And then suddenly the baby snaps out of it and discovers that, wait a minute, I'm not alone. There's another person in this dark room.

It's very traumatizing, and that's the initial major trauma. There's a debate where the birth is a trauma, but okay, first major conscious trauma. It's a very traumatic experience, the breakdown of the world.

Suddenly the baby develops concepts of me and others. Internal, external. The world breaks, cracks, falls apart, and the unity is gone.

At that point, the baby begins to realize that there is mother. There is me, there is mother. And now the baby begins to have a relationship with mother.

It's very interesting because this shows us that having relationships with people is instinctual.

Because think about it for a minute.

The baby discovers there is mother. So, why does it mean that there has to be a relationship?

I mean, the baby discovers there's mother, you know, end of story. The baby goes one way, mother goes another way, that's the end of the story.

But that doesn't happen. The baby develops a relationship with mother.

It seems that the way we react to other people is determined in very early childhood. As a baby, even babies have relationships. And there's an initial first relationship we all experience. It's the first relationship.

And this relationship is with mother.

Now, initially, the relationship is a relationship of dependency. We depend on mother.

And so now, I need to introduce you to two concepts, and then we will discuss what does it mean to be dependent on mother.

Because this is seriously terrifying to be dependent on mother. We think it's a pleasant experience, nice experience. We have mother, mother loves us, mother cares for us.

But actually, the initial experience of mother is absolute horror, absolute terror.

If you come to think about it, first, mother separates from you. That is traumatic.

Then you depend on mother for your life. That is terrifying.

Throughout this period, it's only terror, only horror. We begin as human beings from a state of horror.

That is not Sam Vaknin, that is Jean-Paul Sartre. Jean-Paul Sartre was an existentialist French philosopher, and he said that the natural state of human beings is angst. Angst means severe anxiety, severe fear, severe terror.

And if you come to think how we become individuals, how we become separate, you realize why.

Initially there was the comfort of the womb. Wewere in the womb. It's warm, it's nice, you're floating. It's almost like a spy in a five-star hotel. Only much better because the food is free.

So, you're in the womb.

And then, suddenly, you're thrown out of the womb, which is cozy, warm, fluid, you know, nice. If I could stay there, I would stay there.

Suddenly you're thrown out of the womb and it's one of the most violent acts that you will ever experience in your life because you haven't witnessed birth. I did. It's a violent act.

The baby is extracted and the baby is slapped and disaster. It's a major mess. I mean, trauma, fear, horrible.

Next thing the baby knows.

Next thing the baby knows is that it exists. It's a new experience. A new experience. It exists.

And then gradually over six months, the baby realizes that it exists, but there are others that exist.

For example, mother.

That's terrifying. It's absolutely terrifying.

Next thing the baby realizes, I, that's terrifying. It's absolutely terrifying.

Next thing the baby realizes, I'm going to die. I'm going to die because my life depends on another person, not on me.

It's another terror. Endless terror.

From the minute you're born, actually until about 24 months, you're in a constant state of terror.

Forget about love, caring, compassion, mother, hugging, none of this.

The first 24 months are the pits. They suck. Most horrible period in your life. Until you get married, of course.

Now I'm going to teach you two concepts.

And... The two concepts.

The two concepts are only long words, of course. It's psychology.

The first concept is theory of mind.

The process, the internal process that leads to the creation of a theory of mind is known as mentalization.

What is the theory of mind?

When the baby becomes dependent on mother, the baby urgently must develop a theory about mother, because the baby must activate mother.

The baby must ask for food. The baby wants the diapers change. The baby wants a smartphone.

So he needs to know how to activate mother.

It's okay to laugh. It's okay. Thank you.

So, the baby develops a theory about mother, initially about mother.

He says, I think if I cry, she gives me food. I think when she's smiling, better for me to smile. Like in this class, for example. When I smile, it's better for you to smile. Like in this class, for example. My smile is better for you to smile.

And so on, so. There's a theory, gradually there's a theory about mother.

He observes mother, he accumulates information, analyzes it. He becomes a tiny psychologist, effectively a tiny psychologist.

What do psychologists do? They create theories about the mind, of course.

That's what a baby does, mentalization. This remains with us for life. We create theories about other people.

What makes other people tick? What is the operating system of other people? How do other people think? What emotions they experience? How to motivate them? How to frighten them?

So this is a theory of mind, mentalization. And it starts with mother.

Next thing is the internal working model. The internal working model is, again, a theory about relationships, not about other people, but about relationships with other people.

So the baby, and it also develops in the early years, in the formative years between three and five.

So the child, the infant, the toddler, the baby, they develop a theory about relationships.

The baby says, I cannot trust other people. That's a baby with a bad mother.

So I cannot trust other people. Other people will not gratify my needs. They don't take care of me. No one loves me. I'm unlovable.

It's a working model.

And then in future relationships, this kind of baby turned adult would have very bad relationships because this kind of baby would have what we call an insecure attachment style. He would have a dismissive, anxious style. He would approach and avoid. He wouldn't know how to manage a relationship because he has a bad internal working model based on the behavior or misbehavior of his mother initially, and later on, father, teachers, peers and so.

Initially, the baby creates the theory of mind. A bit later, two or three years later, he adds an internal working model, and this is what you are left with for life. This stays with you for life.

Now, if you go online, all kinds of self-styled experts and wannabe psychologists will tell you that you can change this.

You cannot change this.

Attachment styles are very, very difficult to change. Almost impossible. In extreme cases it's possible, almost impossible.

Internal working model is literally impossible to change.

And mentalization of theory of mind is fixed at a very, very early age.

So these are the two processes.

Now we come back to the mother.

I don't know if you notice, but we are already studying the topic. This is part of the course. Okay? It's not an overview. It's the course.

So let's go back to the mother.

I have a mother fixation, of course. I can't get rid of my mother, so I'm talking about mothers all the time.

Let's go back to the mother and ask yourself, what is the first thing most important for the baby to survive? In relation to the mother, what does the baby need from mother, without which the baby cannot survive?

And don't say food.

Sorry?

And don't say food.

That comes a bit later.

The condition without which the baby cannot survive. And it is before food and before warmth and before anything, before anything.

When you hear the answer, you will understand how basic it is. And you will also be very angry that you didn't think of it.

That's the outcome.

Connection, hopefully, is the outcome. Could be bad connection.

What?

Attention.

The mother needs to notice the baby.

If the mother doesn't notice the baby, it cannot give the baby food.

It's like, you know, you want to date some guy and he doesn't notice you, and it doesn't help. All the rest never will come. You have to be noticed somehow.

So you put makeup, this, that, you try to be noticed. Being noticed, the baby needs to be noticed. If the mother doesn't need notice the baby, it's a dead baby. A baby who is not noticed is a dead baby.

In other words, being noticed, getting attention is an issue of survival.

We, today, we mock social media. We say, people, they just want attention, they are eating bananas or they are half naked on social media, stupid people, they're wasting their time.

It's not true.

Social media represents the most basic human need, the most critical need for survival, the most foundational survival strategy, attracting attention.

Being seen, you need to be seen. If no one sees you, you're dead. If no one sees you, you will not get a job, you will not get married, which may be a good thing, you will... You will not flourish, you will not thrive, and if you are baby and you don't get noticed, you don't grow past the baby, you're dead baby.

So being noticed is super critical.

To be noticed, the mother needs to see the baby. Not to see, to pay attention, to be focused on the baby.

And so being seen is critical.

You remember what I mentioned earlier? The mother's gaze defines the baby and conveys to the baby that it is separate from the mother. So the mother's gaze is super crucial.

The mother's gaze makes the baby feel safe.

Mother sees me, it's okay, she will take care of me because she sees me.

Okay? Safety, secure base, stability. The mother gaze defines the baby. Mother sees me, so that means I am not mother. If mother sees me, I'm not mother. So, separateness.

Mother's gaze conveys to the baby emotions, unconditional love, acceptance, even idealization. My baby is the most beautiful thing in the world. My baby is amazing.

This idealization is also very important.

Mother's gaze is the main communication channel of the baby until 36 months old. It's a super crucial period.

And the baby looks at mother to obtain her gaze, to secure her gaze. It is through her gaze that he surfs his internal space.

The mother's gaze is the baby's internet. That's the internet of the baby. And this baby surfs the gaze to all the destinations, all the websites, all the pornography, you know, all the, whatever it is that you are surfing.

To be seen is therefore very important.

But in order to be seen, you need to act.

If you just lie there, this kind of baby, no one will see you, no one will pay attention to you, and if they do, they will kill you with a pillow.

I mean, you need to be a very nice baby, very cute baby, smiling baby, cheeky baby.

And so the baby secures attention. This is called cueing, baby cues, the baby secures attention. This is called cueing.

The baby cues, the baby secures attention throughout life.

Because we're talking about lifespan.

And remember what I told you in the beginning? I'm not a believer in this division. Childhood is that.

I believe in topics. I believe what is lifelong.

Throughout life, we engage in identical behaviors, exactly like a baby. We behave in a way that attracts attention.

And then we use this attention to define who we are, our self-esteem, for example.

If you don't get any attention, your self-esteem will be at rock bottom.

Even healthy people, not only narcissists, even healthy people, if you don't get any attention whatsoever, ultimately you will begin to think of yourself as a loser, as a failure.

So the gaze of other people regulates you, stabilizes you, makes you feel secure.

That's why social interactions are very, very important, because the social interactions mean that other people see you.

It's about being seen.

So we continue with the same strategies from age four weeks until we die. And if there is an afterlife, probably after we die, with Angel Gabriel or whoever.

So, this is the foundation. This is the foundational picture which later on leads to development.

Now, looking at lifespan this way, when you look at it this way, and we're going to look at it in many ways. We're going to talk about Vygotsky, about this, about many people you never heard of. I'm going to present to you the ecological theory and so on.

But looking at it this way, what I'm talking to you right now, this is known as the object relations view of lifespan development. This is the object relations view.

So looking at it this way is very interesting because it means that in some sense we carry with us baggage from childhood until we die.

It's not like we think you're a child, then you forget about being a child, you become adolescent, then you forget about being an adult. It's not that way.

According to Object Relations Schools, we carry with us baggage, and this baggage accumulates and accumulates and accumulates.

It is a little like archaeology. There is a layer of childhood, a layer, and this is city over city, over city, and if we want to understand the individual, the best is to study the foundation.

And the foundation is childhood, and therefore psychoanalysis, psychodynamic theories, and object-relation schools, they study mostly childhood, mostly, not only, but mostly, and the transition from childhood to the ability to interact with other people.

Now, in these theories, other people are called objects, which teaches you a lot about the compassion and empathy of psychology. These people in these theories are called objects.

So object relations, relations with other people. That's a translation.

So this was touching on object relations.

There is another way to look at it, and it is known as social learning theory.

Social learning theory was developed in the 80s. The first publication was in 1985 by Albert Bandura.

Now, Bandura in many languages means tomato.

But, sorry? Bandura in many languages means tomato. But, sorry?

Bandura in Arabic means tomato, in some dialects of Spanish, and so Bandura is tomato.

But the guy was very far from tomato. He was a lot more intelligent than any tomato that I've ever met.

So I think we can ignore this aspect of his unfortunate name and focus on what he had to say.

And what he had to say became known as social learning theory.

Again I'm going to summarize it for you.

By the way, in your help me here, in your lesson, in your lesson of the Google Classroom, you have links, you have links to videos that I've made, because I've teaching other universities and so on. You have links in videos, two videos that I've made. You have a link to social learning theory, these are lectures that I gave on these topics. So you can watch these lectures.

In the lesson plan.

Okay, so when you go to the lesson plan, I'm not sure about the...

No, only in the lesson plan.

Okay, so there's a video there about social learning theory.

In a nutshell, social learning theory says that the child is an imitation machine. Monkey sees what monkey does, what monkey sees. It's an imitation machine.

So while psychoanalysis and psychodynamic theories and object relations theories, they discussed interactions as the driving engine.

Social learning theory says, no, it's not interactions, it's imitation. The child imitates, and the child imitates behaviors and so.

And there are role models. You heard of the phrase role model? Role model comes from social learning theory.

There are adults that play roles in the life of the child and the child imitates them.

It could be an influential parent, it could be a teacher, it could be peers, it could be actors or football players or whatever, role movies.

Social learning theory is very good at describing the mechanics of development. It's a mechanical theory.

Can you think of another theory that is mechanical, totally mechanical in psychology? Totally mechanical. Like input A, output B, nothing in between, black box. It's a black box theory. Can you think of another school of psychology like this, a school of psychology that says we cannot know what's happening in the mind, we only see input and output. Can you think of another school like this?

You want me to help you? Do you beg me to help you? You want me to help you? Do you beg me to help you? Beg me to help you?

Behaviorism.

Behaviorism is a school that says we cannot know what's happening in the mind. We can only observe behaviors. And behaviors are responses to stimuli and reinforcements.

So this is a black box theory. A black box theory is a theory that says it is nonsense to talk about what's happening in the mind.

In a minute I will discuss this contention, this claim, because it's not as stupid as it sounds.

It's a claim that we cannot know what happens in the mind. We can only observe external phenomena. We can only be scientists.

So we observe, if I give you a certain stimuli, you will salivate. If you're hungry and I show you food, you will salivate. We can observe this.

What went through your mind? It's a mystery. It's a mystery. And it's not science because I have to rely on what you are telling me. Maybe you're lying. I have no idea. There's no scientific way to determine this.

So, social learning theory is a black box theory. It says, there's a child, there's an adult. Or there's a child, there's another child, doesn't matter. There's a child, there's another person.

That other person behaves in a specific way. The child imitates. Also behaves in this way. That other person says something, says something, the child repeats it.

What's in between? What's happening in the child's mind? Who cares? Not interesting.

These are known as phenomenological schools of lifespan development theories. You notice that phenomenological is also a very long word. Okay? So it qualifies, it fits into psychology. Don't ever dare to use words less than 16 letters, ever. You will never be licensed as psychologists.

So this is a phenomenological school. It is a school that deals with phenomena, with anything that is observable.

These are the kinds of words, where when you start to write, you are much younger than when you finish. So you grow old as you write the words.

The other group of theories, the theories that say we can learn something about the mind and how the mind operates and what's happening in the mind, and we can. It's not a black box.

These other types are known as etiological theories. Or dynamic theories. Dynamic. Dynamic. Dynamic is the only exception in psychology, a word with fewer than 16 letters. Only exception. And it's accepted because it was coined by Freud. So we cannot argue with this.

Okay, let's discuss, to finish today's torture session for you, let's discuss the claim that we cannot know what's happening in the mind.

That in principle we cannot know what's happening in the mind.

It is a close relative, it's a close cousin of the claim that psychology can never be a science, because psychology deals with human beings, and human beings change all the time, and human beings especially change when they are being observed.

When you observe someone, they become self-conscious, they, you know.

Marianne will tell you, he is a top-level cameraman, he works for Reuters and everything, Marianne will tell you that when you direct a camera at someone, their behavior changes. True or not?

They become self-conscious. Their body posture. Usually I sound like that, then sound like that.

So, the act of observation changes. When I observe the sun, there's no impact except that I go blind. But nothing happens to the sun. But when I observe you, you change.

So there's a problem. And that's why 80% of the studies in psychology can never be replicated.

This is known as the replication crisis. We cannot replicate 80% of the studies in psychology. We get different results over time.

Okay, so this is psychology.

Now to the mind. Can we know what's happening in the mind?

You tell me. Can I know what's happening in your mind? Yes or no?

Why not?

I cannot know, yeah.

I'm asking why I cannot know.

You say because you cannot know.

I'm asking why I cannot know.

I'm not you.

Let's try to make it more scientific.

What does it mean, I'm not you?

I'm not you.

By the way, luckily for you.

Luckily for you, that I'm not you. So Luckily for you that I'm not you.

So what does it mean I'm not you?

Can I say, for example, I have no access to your mind?

I have no access to anyone's mind.

Okay.

Sorry? Yeah. I have no access to anyone's mind. Okay.

But...

But...

But visually...

Yeah, but I'm talking about her mind. Her mind, not about her body, a mind.

So, maybe, like Marian suggests, I can decipher your mind, I can make deductions about the mind, by observing your body language. Is that possible? If I observe your body language, I can make deductions about the mind by observing your body language. Is that possible if I observe your body language?

I can, for example if you're crying, I can say you're sad. Can I say this with safety? Is it safe to say this?

No.

You can stop here. No. It's not safe.

But okay, you're an honest person, I'm an honest person, I ask you what you feel. So you tell me what you feel. Isn't that enough to know what's happening in your mind? Self-reporting. You self-report. Isn't that enough?

No? Because you may be lying. You may be deluded and psychotic. Anything can be. You may try to gratify me, to satisfy me. So you change the truth.

In other words, I have no access to anyone's mind except through observation of external inputs like body language and so on or self-reporting and both methods are very flawed, very problematic.

We could generalize and say that we have no access to anyone's mind.

Can you prove, can I assume safely that you are human?

Why? Because you tell me so.

If you are an advanced form of artificial intelligence created by the rector to monitor my lecture, for example, maybe you're a robot sent by the Professor Begetti to monitor my lecture.

How would I know that?

Maybe you're so sophisticated that you're convincing as a human being.

But you're not, you're a robot.

Do I have any way to tell whether you're a robot or human being? Do you think there's any way to tell if you're a robot or human being, for example?

Yes? How?

I can. I can't explain.

You cannot explain how? That's because there's no way. There is no way to tell if any of you are human beings or sophisticated robots with artificial intelligence and from the future, for example. Or from some secret laboratories in Stip.

There's no way to tell. Simply no way.

There is something called the Turing test. The Turing test is supposed to separate robots from human beings.

You're supposed to ask the robot a few questions and the answers will tell you if it's a robot or a human being.

But in the past three years, robots succeeded in the Turing test. They succeeded to deceive people in the Turing test.

So the fact is that I don't know what's happening in your mind. I can never, ever know what's happening in your mind, and I cannot even be sure that you are human in a future.

Let's say not now, but in 2100, there will be robots which look fully human and androids.

You saw the movie Blade Runner? If you haven't, go and see it. It's about a future city where there are androids, they're robots that look identical to human beings and even there's a love affair between a man and a woman. And the woman is not a woman, not a woman, but like she's a robot.

So, when we talk about the mind, there are only two ways to do that. And both of them are methodologically wrong, scientifically problematic.

I can talk about your mind, projecting my own mind. I can talk about your mind because I know my mind.

That's it. We must be the same. You have two arms. I have two arms. Because we look the same, your mind must be the same.

That's a perfectly flawed assumption.

This is known as the introspective method. Introspection. I look inside, I observe my mind, and I say, you must have the same mind like me because we look the same.

That's nonsense, of course, you realize. That's the first method.

And the second method, we can construct a theory with predictions.

And if the predictions come true, and they say, well, the theory must be true, because the predictions came true.

There's only one minor problem with this.

We can construct a hundred theories, all of them will give the same predictions. And we have no way of telling which of these hundred theories is correct.

In short, a lot of psychology is founded on speculation, not on science. There's no way to verify a lot of psychology. And that includes lifespan psychology.

But lifespan psychology is based on observations. So it's a bit more scientific, a bit more rigorous.

Okay. You have been patient. You have been highly masochistic for surviving this lecture.

So I would advise, consult someone. And this is it for today.

I know your hearts are broken and you can't wait for the next installment. It's normal. It's totally normal, understandable. Even Marianne's heart is broken.

So, we will meet again. It's like the famous French song. We'll meet again. On Wednesday, I think, I don't know the hour. I don't know the place. I don't know the hour. It sounds like a lousy date, but that's what we have. We'll meet again, and when we meet again, we will do the game that I wanted. I wanted to play a game, but two of you were late, so we started something. Next time, don't be late, I promise to not be late, and we will start by playing the game. And it's interesting. This game is interesting. We. I promise to not be late. And we will start by playing the game. And it's interesting. This game is interesting. We'll take you to an interesting place, I believe.

Okay. Thank you for coming. And have a good rest of the day. Try to forget. Reduce the trauma. Anxiety. If I appear in your dreams, tell me to go away.

Okay, bye. Thank you.