SEMANTIC VACUUM OF NOTIONS – SPIRIT, SOUL, PSYCHE, MIND

Abstract

In the age of semantic vacuum, in which upon the social and scientific scene notions are being falsified on numerouslevels of speech and discussion while arbitrarily violation of semantics is emerging as a paradigm, a demand for the purification of caused “terminological mash” imposes itself. In this paper I will focus on the quartet of notions– spirit, soul, psyche, mind – which, I claim, represent the carrying pillars of scientific, philosophical, and theological reflections, but also cause confusion and imprecision, and, despite the substantive foundation of their semantics,are being manipulated on n-levels. The emphasis will be on the phenomenon of psyche, for which I claim that it carries the tangential characteristics of the aforementioned quartet, more so, that it is best suited for removing the veil of arbitrariness and relativity of semantic communicative relation. Misunderstanding the psyche carries quite virulent consequences on many levels, such as scientific, cultural, and political, for the community of living beings. Through this paperI argued with a representative selection of thinkers from the tradition of thought orientation, and the emphasis is on the philosophy of mind, psychiatry, theology, and especially integrative bioethics as a methodological bridge (platform) for pragmatic purification of imposed vacuum.