ABSTRACT
Psychoanalysis has undergone continuous changes both in theory and practice since the very beginning. This is true for what concerns its founder’s methods and procedures, but also for the following contributions given by his most influential successors. This chapter looks at the distinction made by the analysts of the Association Psychoanalitique de France regarding the two terms of psychoanalytic ‘doctrine’ and ‘theory’. The concept of internal setting becomes particularly important when talking about virtual reality and new technologies. In the ‘virtual’ one can configure infinite possibilities that can have an endless number of representations within the mental space, from highly evolved ones, down to the collapse or the psychopathologic implosion of the ‘concrete thought’ consequent to the failure of the alpha function. Risks such as the loss of a ‘physical’ individual encounter, the confusion between internal and external worlds, and the addicted relationship with ‘separation’ that has been eliminated by ‘constant connection’.
