Notes on Schizophrenia - Mixing of Properties

Mixing of Properties: Objects and concepts are mixed and matched, mostly as a means of attempting to hold together the world-view.

The schizophrenic's world-view cannot hold together without the creation of chimera or hybrid concepts. First the ego is aggrandized, and then the world-view is made to fall into place around the central axiom of: everything relates to me directly, and everything I do has an effect on some important aspect of the world. The connections will often have to be far flung (and this is not difficult for the schizophrenic), since placing one’s ego at the centre of the world is an untenable position logically and ethically. Once, for example, you have come to believe that aliens are transmitting messages to you through the sequences of your DNA, you will be forced to open a complimentary Pandora’s box of concepts and beliefs that will need to be equally fanciful and equally implausible (faulty logic requires faulty logic to sustain itself). At this point, regular intrusions from the real world (contact with loved ones and friends, etc) may become disturbing as these contacts will dispute or contradict the distorted world view the schizophrenic is fashioning. These "real-life" intrusions will need to be interpreted, warped, contorted in order for the schizophrenic to keep themselves from descending into a full blown psychosis due to untenable contradictions in the reality that they firmly believe, and the events of the “real’ world.