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M. Svrˇ cek
“subconscious” and “preconscious”, but all mental factors and processes of which
we are not immediately aware, whatever they be: organic or personal tendencies
or needs, memories, processes of mimicry, emotions, motives, intentions, policies,
beliefs, assumptions, thoughts, or dishonesties.”
Whyte describes Descartes‘ philosophical motivation: “Descartes recognized that
the “union of soul with body” is intuitively known, and that their pervasive connections are a matter of everyday experience. However, in his doctrine these connections
are not ones of true causation, but an illusion resulting from some kind of parallelism
between the two modes of being. It is therefore, in Descartes‘ view, abortive to study
these connections in detail.”
The basic comparison of different attitudes towards the unconscious mind from
the positions of materialism, idealism and the Cartesian school follows: “During
the late seventeenth century three main attitudes dominated European philosophical
thought, corresponding to three interpretations of the nature of existence. Materialism
treated physical bodies and their motions as the primary reality; idealism took it to
be spirit or mind; while Cartesian dualism postulated two independent realms: the
mental res cogitans and the material res extensa. For the first two schools there was
no difficulty in recognizing unconscious mentality, though under other names… But
to the third, Cartesian, school the admission of the existence of unconscious mental
processes presented an acute philosophical challenge, for it demanded the discarding
of the original conception of the dualism as one of two independent realms, matter in
motion and mind necessarily aware. For those who were loyal to Descartes, all that
was not conscious in man was material and physiological, and therefore not mental.”
Whyte continues with the post-Cartesian chronology of the conceptual development of the unconscious mind up to Freud: “As often happens in the history of
thought, an idea may be fashionable and even transform society before it is properly
understood… The unconscious mind, in the post-Cartesian sense, was discovered
around 1700; it is now transforming Western thought; who would dare to claim
that its basic laws are yet understood?… I have given sufficient evidence to show
that the general conception of unconscious mental processes was conceivable (in
post-Cartesian Europe) around 1700, topical around 1800, and fashionable around
1870–1880. …when Freud was forty-two he was unaware that at least fifty writers
(probably many more) had been developing similar assumptions for over two hundred years. Finally in 1925, at the age of sixty-nine, Freud wrote: “The overwhelming
majority of philosophers regard as mental only the phenomena of consciousness. For
them the world of consciousness coincides with the sphere of what is mental.” This
curious mistake shows how narrow his reading had been, and how wrong a conception he must then have had of his own originality. The inference is that not only Freud
but most of us are largely unaware of what has made us what we are and led us to
think as we do, and it is sometimes as well that we should be ignorant.”
From the above quote it is apparent that Freud might have been overemphasized
at the expense of other researchers. His famous psychoanalysis is claimed to be a
method for the treatment for mental-health disorders, but does actually in many cases
also become misinterpreted disrupting individuals, families and societies.
M. Svrˇ cek
“subconscious” and “preconscious”, but all mental factors and processes of which
we are not immediately aware, whatever they be: organic or personal tendencies
or needs, memories, processes of mimicry, emotions, motives, intentions, policies,
beliefs, assumptions, thoughts, or dishonesties.”
Whyte describes Descartes‘ philosophical motivation: “Descartes recognized that
the “union of soul with body” is intuitively known, and that their pervasive connections are a matter of everyday experience. However, in his doctrine these connections
are not ones of true causation, but an illusion resulting from some kind of parallelism
between the two modes of being. It is therefore, in Descartes‘ view, abortive to study
these connections in detail.”
The basic comparison of different attitudes towards the unconscious mind from
the positions of materialism, idealism and the Cartesian school follows: “During
the late seventeenth century three main attitudes dominated European philosophical
thought, corresponding to three interpretations of the nature of existence. Materialism
treated physical bodies and their motions as the primary reality; idealism took it to
be spirit or mind; while Cartesian dualism postulated two independent realms: the
mental res cogitans and the material res extensa. For the first two schools there was
no difficulty in recognizing unconscious mentality, though under other names… But
to the third, Cartesian, school the admission of the existence of unconscious mental
processes presented an acute philosophical challenge, for it demanded the discarding
of the original conception of the dualism as one of two independent realms, matter in
motion and mind necessarily aware. For those who were loyal to Descartes, all that
was not conscious in man was material and physiological, and therefore not mental.”
Whyte continues with the post-Cartesian chronology of the conceptual development of the unconscious mind up to Freud: “As often happens in the history of
thought, an idea may be fashionable and even transform society before it is properly
understood… The unconscious mind, in the post-Cartesian sense, was discovered
around 1700; it is now transforming Western thought; who would dare to claim
that its basic laws are yet understood?… I have given sufficient evidence to show
that the general conception of unconscious mental processes was conceivable (in
post-Cartesian Europe) around 1700, topical around 1800, and fashionable around
1870–1880. …when Freud was forty-two he was unaware that at least fifty writers
(probably many more) had been developing similar assumptions for over two hundred years. Finally in 1925, at the age of sixty-nine, Freud wrote: “The overwhelming
majority of philosophers regard as mental only the phenomena of consciousness. For
them the world of consciousness coincides with the sphere of what is mental.” This
curious mistake shows how narrow his reading had been, and how wrong a conception he must then have had of his own originality. The inference is that not only Freud
but most of us are largely unaware of what has made us what we are and led us to
think as we do, and it is sometimes as well that we should be ignorant.”
From the above quote it is apparent that Freud might have been overemphasized
at the expense of other researchers. His famous psychoanalysis is claimed to be a
method for the treatment for mental-health disorders, but does actually in many cases
also become misinterpreted disrupting individuals, families and societies.