The End of Evolution.

Charles Darwin's theory of evolution was founded on the core belief that natural history is one of slow, incremental change, a concept he called "speciation." A hundred years later Eldredge and Gould challenged Darwin's theory, arguing that the data of paleontology reveals something quite different: long periods of stasis followed by bursts of change, a concept they called "punctuated equilibria." This article will follow that progression and then describe the three punctuated equilibria that I believe led to .

Safety: From the Paris Morgue to Oxytocin.

On Tuesday April 21, 1896, Freud gave a lecture to the Viennese medical community arguing that "hysteria," as it was then known, was caused by memories of actual physical and sexual abuse suffered in childhood. Freud rightly felt that he had made a major discovery about the science of hysteria, of psychotherapy, and of the mind. However, his idea was ridiculed.

Evolution, Shame, and Psychotherapy.

Medea, the title character in Euripides' play, murdered her two sons in response to her husband Jason's abandonment. If her behavior can be understood, it is best understood in the context of shame. In an evolutionary context, shame is the affective response to the loss of one's place in the group.

Aspects of psychodynamic neuropsychiatry IV: love, ripe fruit, and other addictions.

Passionate love is a powerful emotional/biological force. So too is heart-break a powerful emotional/biological force. This article studies the neurobiological underpinnings of the two.

Aspects of psychodynamic neuropsychiatry III: magic spells, the placebo effect, and neurobiology.

Through a case study, the importance of supporting the positive transference is stressed-from both a psychological and neurobiological perspective. The article argues that the neurobiology of expectation underlies transference. This neurobiology has been investigated particularly over the past several decades in work concerning the placebo effect.

Aspects of psychodynamic neuropsychiatry II: psychical locality and biology: toward the neurobiology of psychotherapy.

Throughout his career, Freud believed that psychiatry in general and psychoanalysis in particular would one day be rooted in anatomical/biological ground. He felt confidant that such ground would replace the psychological understanding on which he had been forced to base most of his clinical theory and practice. He felt confidant that one day psychotherapy would be more "scientific.

Aspects of psychodynamic neuropsychiatry I: episodic memory, transference, and the oddball paradigm.

Psychotherapy has, since the time of Freud, focused on the unconscious and dynamically repressed memory. This article explores a therapy where the focus is on what is known, on episodic memory. Episodic memory, along with semantic memory, is part of the declarative memory system.

Freud, Darwin, and the holding environment.

Freud's hypothesis of the neonate, derived from the data of adult psychoneurotic patients, was of a supremely narcissistic being who lived in a dreamlike state of hallucinatory satisfaction. A corollary hypothesis was that the neonate's drive to attach was learned and emerged only after the failure of wish fulfillment. These hypotheses provided the ground for Freud's theories of regression, dream, primary process, and pleasure principle.