The Mechanics of Repetition Compulsion: Lacan, Cybernetics, and the Symbolic Order

Abstract

In his “return to Freud,” Lacan proposes an epistemological reformulation of psychoanalysis. Although there is extensive literature on the influence of philosophy, anthropology, linguistics, and the epistemology of science in this rereading, the role of cybernetics in this process remains relatively underexplored. Our aim is to demonstrate that Lacan’s interest in cybernetics is not only inseparable from his return to Freud, but was also decisive in the reformulation of the concept of repetition compulsion. We argue that this concept is conceived as a machine composed of a symbolic order governed by laws of system regulation. Recovering this mid-twentieth-century dialogue may offer valuable insights for rethinking the relationship between psychoanalysis and emerging technologies in the twenty-first century.

Keywords:
Cybernetics; repetition compulsion; machine; psychoanalysis