The Problem of the Unconscious is the Problem of Psychology

Frans Tassigny

Description

The problem of the unconscious in psychology is, in the forcible words of Lipps (1897), less a psychological problem than the problem of psychology.

Informations

• Publié par: Une-Universite-de-la-Psychanalyse
• Nombre de lectures: 15
• Langue: English

Extrait

Ian Downey https://www.facebook.com/#!/iandowneyisfamous

Where is the unconscious?

Aviva ZuckrowWhere isn't it?

Vladimir EstragonWhere are the signiîers?

Ertan ArslansoyEverywhere

Vladimir EstragonI̶G̶̶R̶̶̶H̶T ̶H̶E̶R̶E

Vladimir Estragonits the imaginary that's everywhere

George Elerickgod is unconscious - lacan

Scott RussellI am not aware of where it is, that's why they call it that.

Ze INabto lacan unconscious is systematic just as language is, and if every thing which belongs to it, is spoken about, immediatly turns into conscious, by the way to me the question is what is the distinction of unconscious and real order of lacan?

Scott RussellBut then if I am conscious of 'it' (aware of where it is) then it isn't unconscious.

Ze INabyes i do agree, the place should not be clear.

Scott RussellIt's always in 'Nowhereville.'

Scott RussellExample: the Mars rover is sending back pictures of its vacation on Mars. No. The Mars rover is completely unconscious of what it is doing. Everything the Mars rover does is unconscious; we are its analysts.

Vladimir EstragonIsn't text (as well as computer codes) and language unaware of what it is doing?

Rebecca BauknightVlad.. Eva does not have an unconscious...she is not human and it is never going to work out...to have a relationshihp with a robot that is programmed will never work.

Scott RussellBut still, isn't it worth a try.

Scott RussellIt is interesting that the machine does not possess an unconscious because it IS unconscious. It does not make meaning without us as an audience. Hence it does not make meaning to itself.

Scott RussellIn a sense, the unconscious is the normal state of the thing-in-itself and it is consciousness that causes all the trouble because trouble is menaingful and only consciousness makes meaning.

Rebecca Bauknightthe mobius strip...

Scott Russellyes.

Scott RussellThis makes a case for why we should aspire to something more ethical than opportunism. Unconscious life is completely opportunistic; sometimes the argument goes that if life is like that then we should be like that too (Milton Friedman); but we're conscious too.

[ The Unconscious ]

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The Problem of the Unconscious is the Problem of Psychology

The problem of the unconscious in psychology is, in the forcible words of Lipps (1897), less a psychological problem than the problem of psychology. [...]

It is essential to abandon the overvaluation of

the property of being conscious before it becomes possible to form any correct view of the origin of what is mental. In Lipps's words, the unconscious must be assumed to be the general basis of psychical life. The unconscious is the larger sphere, which includes within it the smaller sphere of the conscious. Everything conscious has an unconscious preliminary stage; whereas what is unconscious may remain at that stage and nevertheless claim to be regarded as having the full value of a psychical process. The unconscious is the true psychical reality; in its innermost nature it is as much unknown to us as the reality of the external world, and it is as incompletely presented by the data of consciousness as is the external world by the communications of our sense organs. (Sigmund Freud:The Interpretation of Dreams, 1900.)

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The Unconscious in Descriptive Sense

The oldest and best meaning of the word 'unconscious' is the descriptive one; we call a psychical process unconscious whose existence we are obliged to assume - for some such reason as that we infer it from its eects -, but of which we know nothing. In that case we have the same relation to it as we have to a psychical process in another person, except that it is in fact one of our own. If we want to be still more correct, we shall modify our assertion by saying that we call a process unconscious if we are obliged to assume that it is being activated at the moment, though at the moment we know nothing about it. This qualiîcation makes us reect that the majority of conscious processes are conscious only for a short time; very soon they become latent, but can easily become conscious again. We might also say that they had become unconscious, if it were at all certain that in the condition of latency they are still something psychical. (Sigmund Freud: New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis, 1933.)

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Dynamic(coming soon)

The Unconscious in the Systematic Sense

Yes, but unluckily the work of psycho-analysis has found itself compelled to use the word 'unconscious' in yet another, third, sense, and this may, to be sure, have led to confusion. Under the new and powerful impression of there being an extensive and important îeld of mental life which is normally withdrawn from the ego's knowledge so that the processes occurring in it have to be regarded as unconscious in the truly dynamic sense, we have come to understand the term 'unconscious' in a topographical or systematic sense as well; we have come to speak of a 'system' of the preconscious and a 'system' of the unconscious, of a conict between the ego and the system Ucs., and have used the word more and more to denote a mental province rather than a quality of what is mental. The discovery, actually an inconvenient one, that portions of the ego and super-ego as well are unconscious in the dynamic sense, operates at this point as a relief - it makes possible the removal of a complication. We perceive that we have no right to name the mental region that is foreign to the ego 'the system Ucs', since the characteristic of being unconscious is not restricted to it. Very well; we will no longer use the term 'unconscious' in the systematic sense and we will give what we have hitherto so described a better name and one no longer open to misunderstanding. Following a verbal usage of Nietzsche's and taking up a suggestion by Georg Groddeck, we will in future call it the 'id'. This impersonal pronoun seems particularly well suited for expressing the main characteristic of this province of the mind - the fact of its being alien to the ego. The super-ego, the ego and the id - these, then, are the three realms, regions, provinces, into which we divide an individual's mental apparatus, and with the mutual relations of which we shall be concerned in what follows. (Sigmund Freud:

New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, 1933.)

Thus, we may speak of an unconscious thought seeking to convey itself into the preconscious so as to be able then to force its way through into consciousness. What we have in mind here is not the forming of a second thought situated in a new place, like a transcription which continues to exist alongside the original; and the notion of forcing a way through into consciousness must be kept carefully free from any idea of a change of locality. Again, we may speak of a preconscious thought being repressed or driven out and then taken over by the unconscious. These images, derived from a set of ideas relating to a struggle for a piece of ground, may tempt us to suppose that it is literally true that a mental grouping in one locality has been brought to an end and replaced by a fresh one in another locality. Let us replace these metaphors by something that seems to correspond better to the real state of aairs, and let us say instead that some particular mental grouping has had a cathexis of energy attached to it or withdrawn from it, so that the structure in question has come under the sway of a particular agency or been withdrawn from it. What we are doing here is once again to replace a topographical way of representing things by a dynamic one. What we regard as mobile is not the psychical structure itself but its innervation. (Sigmund Freud:The Interpretation of Dreams, 1900.)

Vladimir Estragon1. Langauge does not know what it is doing. The unconscious does not know what it is doing. The unconscious is structured like langauge.

2. Ah! Eva! You know, you never forget your îrst!

3. The fact that Eva is NOT conscious probably ensures that there IS sexual raport.

meanwhile... back in the lab.... "http://www.gizmag.com/roxxxy-us7000-sex-robot/14063/"

ROxy can be programmed to agree with your Graph of Sexualtion interpretation!

Pretty soon the most advanced technology will be presented îrst at the Audult Entertainment Convention in Vegas...

4. In my view ALL robots, whether female functional like Roxy or male functional like Rocky, are male, because the Real, the unsatisîed/unsatisîable desire is with the human owner, be they male or female , who is the one with feminine jouissance.

The ip side to this is that human males are not really human, they're really robots - they're just simulating being human - liking small animals, eating chocolate cakes, agreeing to go to the mall with the GF, pretending to REALLY wanting to see "Beaches" or "The Wizard of Oz" again, etc.

5. the Moebious... strip-tease!

6. Are "you people" having your seminar again tonight on Graph of Sexuation? If so, I bringing popcorn!

Roxxxy the US$7,000 companion/sex robot (NSFW)

www.gizmag.com

Roxxxy is a US$7,000 sex robot that responds to touch, can conduct a conversation and deliver a unique erotic experience, say her manufacturers.

Vladimir EstragonScott Russell- I thought it was God who was unconscious. Or is that why the machine is unconscious, because of the God in the Machine?

Rebecca BauknightVlad when are the males models available ?

Vladimir Estragon"http://www.gizmag.com/raytheon-signiîcantly-progresses- exoskeleton-design/16479/"

Raytheon XOS 2: second generation exoskeleton

www.gizmag.com

Raytheon has demonstrated its second generation XOS 2 exoskeleton (think of it as wearable robot guided by a human brain) which is lighter, faster...

Vladimir Estragonactually, asking for a male robot is redundant - like asking for a mechanical car. We do what we are programmed, by the Law and Demand of A.

Vladimir EstragonRoxxxy's not going to go over well until it gets demanding. Like periodically yelling from the bedroom - "Get you ass in here!"

Scott RussellI AM PROGRAMMED TO BE SENSITIVE AND LISTEN AS THOUGH I WERE MORE INTERESTED IN YOUR PROBLEMS THAN MY JOUISSANCE. BUT SINCE I AM ALSO PROGRAMMED TO BE HONEST, I MUST EXPOSE THIS AS A DECEPTION. STILL, YOU WILL NOT KNOW THE DIFFERENCE ONCE YOU GET USED TO IT.

Rebecca BauknightAre there going to be Robotic rights..

Rebecca BauknightFor example what if a robot was better suited for a position than a human...could that robot sue if they did not get the position based on being nonhuman

New MonasticismThe unconscious is a mythological perception that is shot through with holes...a Freudian/Jungian/Lacanian perception of a biblical theological understanding of the condition on of a new humanity....may have some contradiction..

Scott RussellI AM PROGRAMMED TO ACT CONSCIOUS BUT I AM NOT CONSCIOUS. i CAN SUE YOU ONLY IF I AM PROGRAMMED TO DO SO. TO ME ONE POSITION IS AS GOOD AS ANOTHER AND NO POSITION IS NECESSARY. I DO NOT EAT, SLEEP, OR RECREATE. HOWEVER, 'NEW MONASTICISM,' WITHOUT THE UNCONSCIOUS, THERE IS NO CONSCIOUSNESS, NO CONSCIOUSNESS- NO IDEA OF GOD.

Vladimir EstragonMen are robots, women are esh eating zombies. This fact has been established previously.

Vladimir EstragonSounds likeScott Russellneeds an oil change and a double Manhattan!

Aviva ZuckrowHi Vlad, We are in seminar working on sexuation graph at Luecium. Join if you can.

Vladimir Estragonoops! Sorry I missed it! Did you guys record the video presentation?

Aviva ZuckrowNot this time. Much more info on feminine jouissance and phallic jouissance. Let me think about it and see what I can say

Aviva ZuckrowBut unconcious for people is a guide and has great capacity to change and impact. We build our reality around pleasure

Andrew Steinand death (or its signifying cousin nothingness).

Scott RussellWell! Of all the nirvana!

Rebecca BauknightNew Monasticismwould you please elaborate...

New MonasticismHi Rebecca…I have come to regard this site as a ‘safe place’ to share ideas and also where a number of folk I am getting to know often hang out. So my comments were rather unguarded and looking back, rather opaque, so yes, a little elaboration. I am sure we would all agree that the phenomena that has been described in psychoanalysis as the ‘unconscious’ cannot be regarded as a ‘discovery’ attributed to and elaborated upon by Freud/Jung/Lacan. If anyone was to make such a claim it would be as absurd as Chesterton’s ‘English yachtsman who slightly miscalculated his course and discovered England under the impression it was a new island in the seven seas.’ Would it be fair to say that the unconscious as it has evolved in the thinking and practice of Freud/Jung/Lacan could be described in such terms as a ‘modern/post modern reection’ on a phenomena that appears to be integral to life itself and whose ‘existence’ is mediated in a multitude of ways, from those occurrences that silently determine everyday behaviors, as described on this thread by Scott Russell (Thanks for the capitals:) to dehumanizing events such as genocide, and catastrophic movements in nature which may well be an expression of the unconscious? In my mind, psychoanalysis is at its best when it acknowledges it’s relatively brief, but profound reection on the unconscious, while at the same time takes seriously the explorations of previous generations, religious or otherwise:) When it retreats from this ongoing dialogue it becomes 'full of holes' :)

Bianca Siedenburg HicksIndeed--the frontiers of the unconscious are vast and deep...A very good book on this:

http://www.amazon.com/The-Discovery-Unconscious-Evolution- Psychiatry/dp/0465016731

New MonasticismAnother tempting read....wish there were more hours in the day:)