Phi, phi, and i

This chapter aims to extend Lacanian concepts to mathematical operations and will culminate in the application of Lacanian and psychoanalytic concepts to the complex plane. The golden numbers, the Phi and phi concepts, and the notion of imaginary numbers are examples of this trend within Lacanian thinking. The chapter presents to appreciate the uniqueness of the Golden number, for example phi is the only kind of number that is one less than its square, and only for phi number one is greater than its reciprocal. Phi or the Golden number is an example of an irrational number. One of the ways to represent an irrational number is to use something called continued fractions . Lacan is making an important point that signifiers in the case of humans are before gestation, and even before the biological level inscribed in the DNA of egg and sperm that are about to join into one to create a new life.