From the author: Is all psychology scientific? How to distinguish a psychologist from a charlatan? Psychology is, after all, a science, which means it must be based on the scientific method. The scientific method, in turn, must necessarily be based on logic. Do psychologists teach this? Hard to tell. It seems that even technical specialists are taught little logic as such, let alone humanists. Let's imagine how 2 psychologists would work, one of whom relies on logic, the other does not. To do this, let us turn to the fundamental laws of formal logic. They are fundamental because, deviating from one of them, it immediately eliminates the conclusions from the category of scientific ones, and such a theory can safely be called pseudoscientific, or a form of hallucination, an unfounded invention. Law of Identity “To have more than one meaning means not to have any meaning.” Any thought or concept about which one is thinking must be clearly defined. In psychological counseling, this works great, especially in cognitive therapy, it often becomes clear what exactly the client means. The client may say, “I feel bad,” “My self is punishing me.” An illogical psychologist (NP) will think: “Oh, well, of course, he feels bad.” , and his ego suffers." A logical psychologist (LP) will clarify: “What does bad mean, in what particular area? What do you mean by self?” It may well turn out that “bad” means a hangover, or maybe a breakup with a partner, or maybe something else. And the self is not the ego at all, but the client persistently read C. Jung, and implied the archetype of integrity. Having clearly defined concepts, it is possible to build further reasoning on their meaning, which means this process will move towards the truth. In psychotherapy, the truth can be an accurate determination of the cause of a psychological problem. Knowing the cause, you can build a treatment plan and achieve your goal. The goal must also be clearly defined. A logical psychologist helps clarify and formulate an achievable and specific goal. An illogical person will grab onto one symptom, then another, circling around and around. Clear clarity in relationships also helps to avoid ambiguity and psychological games. Law of Contradiction “Two propositions, one of which is a simple negation of the other, cannot be true.” You can write novels about the inconsistency of people. A psychologist from a client can often hear “I’m a bad mother” and then “I take care of my child.” One clearly contradicts the other, either “I am a bad mother” or “I am not a bad mother” is true. A logical psychologist finds such contradictions and points them out to the client, thereby starting the process of rethinking the client’s beliefs and values. An illogical psychologist, or a household psychologist in kitchen therapy, will ignore contradictions, follow up with a couple of hackneyed tips on caring for a child, say in the spirit of “everything will resolve itself, be strong, be patient,” then, with a sense of accomplishment, he will remain with the thoughts “what I’m great.” In the context of this principle, I will note that a psychologist is either logical or illogical, one excludes the other, of these two only one is true, and the third is not given. And this is the third principle of logic. The law of exclusion of the third “... nothing can be in the middle between two contradictory judgments about one thing; each individual predicate must either be affirmed or denied.” If we consider "logical psychologist" and "illogical psychologist", concepts that are simple negations, some people may be tempted to say "I am moderately logical", and this would be a third judgment that is eliminated by having clear definitions of LP and NP. For example, LP is one that follows the four principles of logic in its work. Then moderately logical = illogical if it does not use at least one of the principles. In relation to a client, for example, if we take a dependent relationship, we can reason like this: “The client is dependent on the authority figure, or the client is not dependent on the authority figure.” If the client claims that “I am an independent person, but I can’t do anything without my husband’s permission,” such!