Journey into Nothingness: Structure of the Mental Entity—Shlomo Giora Shoham’s Personality Theory

Abstract

Shoham’s theory of personality divides the entity of the mind into two main structures: The “self” and the “I.” While the “self” (which is the component in an entity that aspires to interact with the outside environment) appears in some form or other in all theories of personality, the “I” is unique to Shoham’s theory. This is the component that aspires to return to the undefined pre-existential state, to “nothingness.” This article discusses Shoham’s contribution to the theory of personality. It concludes that the “I” is an additional structure to the existing personality theories. Therefore an attempt is made to present a model that combines the “I” with the classical psychoanalytical theory, and to suggest three structures inside the “I”: The one, the being, and the nothingness.

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