Research Brief

Structured Like a Language

A research project testing whether transformer language models instantiate key Lacanian structures of the unconscious through formal theory and empirical analysis.

Phase 5 — Collaboration & Review

Status: Not started — Target: Weeks 31–38

Objective

Recruit expert reviewers from three fields for adversarial review of the complete manuscript. Revise based on their feedback.

Reviewer 1: Mechanistic Interpretability Researcher

Ideal profile: A researcher at Anthropic, EleutherAI, DeepMind, or an academic lab engaged in serious interpretability work.

Role: Verify that all computational claims are technically accurate, that proposed experiments are feasible, and that results are correctly interpreted. Identify existing interpretability findings relevant to the project but not yet recognized as such.

Reviewer:

Their assessment:

Weakest claim identified:

Strongest objection from their field:

Technical errors found:

Reviewer 2: Lacanian Theorist

Ideal profile: A scholar in the tradition of Milner, Fink, or Soler — someone at a psychoanalytic institute with serious theoretical commitments who can assess fidelity to the texts.

Role: Assess whether the formal extraction of Lacanian properties in Phase 1 is faithful to the texts and whether the theoretical arguments are philosophically sound. Identify where the project oversimplifies or distorts Lacan.

Reviewer:

Their assessment:

Weakest claim identified:

Strongest objection from their field:

Textual errors or distortions found:

Reviewer 3: Philosopher of Mind

Ideal profile: Someone familiar with both the multiple realizability literature and continental philosophy of technology, who can engage both analytic and continental traditions.

Role: Vet the ontological claims — the move from structural similarity to process identity, and the argument that lack is a property of symbolic systems rather than subjects.

Reviewer:

Their assessment:

Weakest claim identified:

Strongest objection from their field:

Philosophical errors found:

Revision Log

Date Reviewer Issue Raised Resolution Section Affected
         
         
         

Pre-Submission Checklist