Symbiotic

The term ‘symbiotic’ traverses the depth-psychology corpus along two distinct but related axes. The first is biological and evolutionary: following Margulis and autopoietic theory, symbiosis names the intimate co-dwelling of differentiated organisms whose merger generates emergent individuality — a process Thompson, Damasio, and Simondon each examine with philosophical precision, probing whether ‘symbiosis’ is even the correct word once genuine biological individuality arises from the union. The second axis is developmental and psychodynamic: anchored in Mahler’s separation-individuation schema, the ‘symbiotic phase’ (months one through four) designates the primal dyadic state in which self and other have not yet been differentiated. Schore elaborates this extensively through neurobiological research, showing how ‘dyadic symbiotic states’ — induced by mutual gaze and synchronized arousal — literally sculpt the developing orbitofrontal cortex. Porges introduces the clinically consequential concept of ‘symbiotic regulation,’ in which the caregiver’s mature nervous system compensates for the infant’s undeveloped one. The term carries evaluative weight as well: Woodman employs ‘symbiotic relationship’ to name a pathological bond requiring severance for individuation to proceed, while Yalom classifies ‘symbiotic love’ as a passive, deficiency-motivated mode of relating. The central tension throughout is between symbiosis as life-enabling interdependence and symbiosis as a developmental stage that must be outgrown.

In the library 19 passages

the mature nervous system of the caregiver becomes intertwined with the undeveloped nervous system of the infant to create a model of ‘symbiotic regulation.’ The caregiver becomes part of a complex feedback system supporting the biological and behavioral needs of the infant.

Porges coins ‘symbiotic regulation’ to describe how the caregiver’s nervous system functionally substitutes for the infant’s immature one, constituting a bidirectional neuroregulatory dyad.

Porges, Stephen W., The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-Regulation, 2011thesis

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mutually regulated opioid activity supports the psychobiologically attuned mirroring process, and that the positive affect-amplifying mirroring process supports a neurobiological imprinting mechanism which occurs first in the symbiotic, and then, if so, most intensely in the practicing period.

Schore maps symbiotic-phase opioid regulation onto the neurobiological imprinting mechanism, arguing that the symbiotic period provides the neurochemical substrate for all subsequent attachment learning.

Schore, Allan N., Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self: The Neurobiology of Emotional Development, 1994thesis

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failure to develop attachment and to achieve a satisfactory symbiosis because of environmental factors, such as institutionalization, may lead to the development of characteristic disturbances such as the inability to keep rules, lack of capacity to experience guilt

Flores, drawing on Horner, establishes that failure to achieve adequate symbiosis produces characteristic structural deficits in the self, including the affectionless psychopathy associated with absent bonding.

Flores, Philip J, Group Psychotherapy with Addicted Populations An, 1997supporting

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ontogenetic adaptation of the ability to experience the practicing high arousal states supporting the positive affects of elation and interest-excitement depends on precedent and continuing successful dyadic psychobiologically attuned visuoaffective (symbiotic ‘merger’) transactions which occur in the previous stage.

Schore argues that the positive-affect capacities of the practicing period are epigenetically contingent upon successful symbiotic-phase merger transactions, revealing a developmental cascade.

Schore, Allan N., Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self: The Neurobiology of Emotional Development, 1994supporting

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unlike borderlines, they have successfully dyadically negotiated the symbiotic through early practicing periods. Late practicing shame transactions are central events in narcissistic pathogenesis.

Schore differentiates narcissistic from borderline pathology by the relative success or failure of symbiotic-phase negotiation, making the quality of this phase diagnostically determinative.

Schore, Allan N., Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self: The Neurobiology of Emotional Development, 1994supporting

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Symbiosis is defined as the intimate living together of two or more organisms of different species. Many organisms depend on other organisms that live inside them or attached to them. Hereditary symbioses, in which the symbionts remain together throughout their life cycle, are common.

Thompson establishes symbiosis as a fundamental category of biological inheritance and identity, arguing that hereditary symbioses undermine the simplistic identification of biological continuity with DNA transmission alone.

Thompson, Evan, Mind in Life: Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind, 2007thesis

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living cells arose from the ‘symbiotic’ merger of two independently evolved, prior systems — one a self-replicating system composed of nucleic acids and the other a self-maintaining, autocatalytic system of proteins.

Thompson examines Dyson’s hypothesis that the origin of cellular life involved a ‘symbiotic’ merger, then qualifies it via Margulis and Sagan, noting that the term is imprecise once genuine biological individuality emerges.

Thompson, Evan, Mind in Life: Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind, 2007supporting

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Homophyseal is an adjective that describes living beings growing together within the same symbiotic complex, while heterophyseal describes living beings growing on their own within the same symbiotic complex.

Simondon, via Biard and Rabaud’s taxonomy, differentiates modes of co-existence within the symbiotic complex, distinguishing organisms that grow together from those that maintain individual autonomy within the shared milieu.

Simondon, Gilbert, Individuation in Light of Notions of Form and Information, 2020supporting

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an alga and a fungus associated as a lichen are, in fact, for one another elements of the exterior milieu and not of the interior milieu

Simondon uses the lichen as a paradigm case to argue that genuine symbiotic association operates through the exterior rather than interior milieu, distinguishing it categorically from parasitism.

Simondon, Gilbert, Individuation in Light of Notions of Form and Information, 2020supporting

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all multicellular organisms are involved in mutual, symbiotic relationships of various kinds with a host of microorganisms. And the organisms, similarly, with the environment.

McGilchrist invokes symbiosis as evidence against reductive, unidirectional biological causation, positioning it within a broader argument for reciprocal organism-environment entanglement.

McGilchrist, Iain, The Matter With Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions and the Unmaking of the World, 2021supporting

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all multicellular organisms are involved in mutual, symbiotic relationships of various kinds with a host of microorganisms. And the organisms, similarly, with the environment.

McGilchrist invokes symbiosis as evidence against reductive, unidirectional biological causation, positioning it within a broader argument for reciprocal organism-environment entanglement.

McGilchrist, Iain, The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World, 2021supporting

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masochism: collapse of ultimate rescuer defense and, 134–37; fusion in, 381–82; guilt, decision, and, 319–20; as passive symbiotic love, 370

Yalom’s index classifies masochism as a form of ‘passive symbiotic love,’ linking the concept of symbiosis to deficiency-motivated merger and the collapse of existential autonomy.

Yalom, Irvin D., Existential Psychotherapy, 1980aside

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the asymmetrical relation of parasitism leads the parasite to a regression; in the majority of parasitic species, it is impossible to speak of an ‘adaptation’ to parasitism, since this adaptation is a destruction of the organs that guarantee the being’s individual autonomy

Simondon contrasts productive symbiosis with parasitism, arguing that the latter destroys individual autonomy rather than generating a higher-order individuated complex.

Simondon, Gilbert, Individuation in Light of Notions of Form and Information, 2020supporting

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organisms give up something in exchange for something that other organisms can offer them; in the long run, this will make their lives more efficient and survival more likely. What bacteria, or nucleated cells, or tissues, or organs give up, in general, is independence

Damasio frames cooperative biological mergers — the evolutionary substrate of symbiosis — as an exchange of independence for access to shared commons, establishing a homeostatic logic for symbiotic cooperation.

Damasio, Antonio R., The strange order of things life, feeling, and the making, 2018supporting

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Related terms