ABSTRACT
In Learning from Experience, Bion states: “Function” is the name for the mental activity proper to a number of factors operating in concert. The contact-barrier—a term Freud analogized to the neuronal synapse—is used by Bion to indicate that it both protects consciousness from the unconscious and the reverse. The contact-barrier in this case was one that was formed from the proliferation not of a-elements but, rather, of ß-elements. Bion also states that elements are functions of the personality, and that: Psycho-analytic investigation formulates premises that are as distinct from those of ordinary science as are the premises of philosophy or theology. An interpretation cannot be regarded as satisfactory unless it illuminates a psycho-analytic object and that object must at the time of interpretation possess these dimensions.
