The self’s dialectical contradiction has a biological foundation in the neuronal.

Evidence

Let us return to the problem of the transition from the neuronal to the mental. The dialectical nature of identity is rooted in the very nature of identity, that is to say, in its biological foundation. Indeed, in adopting the thesis of a neuronal self, I would postulate that it, too—indeed, it above all—is structured by the dialectical play of the emergence and annihilation of form, that the historico-cultural fashioning of the self is possible only by virtue of this primary and natural economy of contradiction. — Catherine Malabou, What Should We Do with Our Brain?, 238

Categorization

• XREF: Relates to reading purpose: whether the brain-workplace analogy is argued — here Malabou argues biology grounds culture, grounds the analogy in mechanism rather than metaphor.