Programming Conflict (Sellam)

The programming conflict (conflit programmant) is one of the key concepts that Salomón Sellam adopted from Hamer's German New Medicine and developed within his psychobiogenealogy. It designates a specific emotional situation that precedes the onset of a physical symptom, during which the body—according to the model—'learns' to respond with that pathology to future, emotionally similar situations.

Concept Structure:

Programming Conflict: the initial situation where the pattern is established. The person experiences an intense emotional conflict (loss, shame, betrayal) that their psyche cannot verbally process; the body registers the pattern.

Triggering Conflict (conflit déclenchant): a subsequent situation, typically months or years later, that emotionally reproduces the original conflict. At this moment, the physical symptom appears—the body activates the learned pattern.

Clinical Importance: identifying the programming conflict allows, according to the model, to understand why the symptom appeared when it appeared—not before, not after. The 'key-date' of the symptom's onset is traced back to the triggering conflict; this, in turn, leads to the programming conflict.

Academic Caution: the concept of programming conflict is psychoanalytically plausible (the idea that traumatic situations leave response patterns that are reactivated by analogous situations has clinical foundation). But Hamer's specific claims about organ-conflict correspondences do NOT have rigorous medical-scientific backing. Serious contemporary psychogenealogy—including Sellam in his more careful texts—uses the general concept without necessarily assuming Hamerian specific correspondences.

For Constelando: work with clinical and ethical awareness. When a client arrives with a biological decoding framework, do not dismiss it, but also do not uncritically validate it. Accompany them to explore the emotional dimension of the symptom without abandoning appropriate medical treatment.