Vida e morte em Fechner e Freud

As concepções de vida e morte de Freud e de Fechner se entrelaçam no momento em que o primeiro, em Além do princípio do prazer (1920), aclimata ao seu arcabouço teórico o princípio fechneriano da tendência à estabilidade, tomado a partir de então como um princípio mais geral ao qual se subordina o princípio da constância (ou princípio do Nirvana). O princípio de Fechner, contudo, é destacado por Freud de uma obra publicada em 1873, onde seu autor o formula como um princípio físico que se insere em uma concepção geral sobre a vida — sobre a sua origem e o seu desenvolvimento, mas também o seu ocaso —, concepção que difere sobremaneira da visão científica usual, à qual Freud se filia. No entanto, a visão sobre a vida e a morte dos dois autores conflui a partir do ponto em comum representado pelo princípio da tendência à estabilidade, que, em Fechner, leva os organismos progressivamente ao estado inorgânico e, em Freud, parece poder ser entendido como o fundamento da pulsão de morte, que naturalmente se esforça por alcançar este mesmo fim.Palavras-Chave: Freud. Fechner. Vida. Morte. Life and death in Fechner and FreudABSTRACTFreud's and Fechner's conceptions of life and death are intertwined when the former, in Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920), acclimatizes to his theoretical framework the Fechnerian principle of the tendency to stability, taken from then on as a more general principle to which the constancy principle (or Nirvana principle) is subordinated. Fechner's principle, however, is highlighted by Freud from a work published in 1873, where its author formulates it as a physical principle that fits into a general conception of life — about its origin and its development, but also the its sunset — a conception that differs greatly from the usual scientific view, to which Freud adheres. However, the vision of life and death of the two authors converges from the common point represented by the principle of the tendency to stability, which, in Fechner, leads organisms progressively to an inorganic state and, in Freud, seems to be understood as the foundation of the death drive, which naturally strives to achieve this very end.Keywords: Freud. Fechner. Life. Death.

Psychoanalysing Technoscience

While the previous chapter discussed the shift from Hegelian dialectics to dialectical materialism, this chapter addresses the shift from dialectics to psychoanalysis, notably in France, paying due attention to the productive tensions between both approaches. After a concise exposition of Freudian psychoanalysis, focussing on Beyond the Pleasure Principle, the text in which Freud explicitly “plunged into the thickets” of modern biology (Gay, 1988, p. 401), I will extensively discuss the views of Gaston Bachelard and Jacques Lacan on technoscience. Building on a previous publication (Zwart, 2019a), where I already presented a psychoanalytic understanding of technoscience, which I don’t want to duplicate here (focussing on the oeuvres of Sigmund Freud, Carl Gustav Jung, Gaston Bachelard and Jacques Lacan), I will now emphasise the continuity between dialectic and psychoanalysis, indicating how dialectics remains an important moment in Bachelard’s and Lacan’s efforts to develop a psychoanalysis of technoscience, both as a discourse and as a practice. In addition, I will elucidate the added value of this convergence by extrapolating it to three concrete case studies, one borrowed from particle physics and two from life sciences research: the Majorana particle, the malaria mosquito and the nude mouse.

Is the Death Instinct Silent or Clinically Relevant? From Freud’s Concept of a Silent Death Instinct to Understanding Its Clinical Manifestations

When Freud introduced his concept of the death instinct in Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920) he solved three theoretical problems which could not be explained by the one drive theory: masochism, repetition compulsion and the negative therapeutic reaction. The concept of two inherently opposed instincts remained one of the most controversial parts of Freud’s theory. For Melanie Klein, Freud’s idea of the death instinct was a powerful instrument in solving her greatest problems of integrating her clinical evidence of an earlier, very harsh superego. In Freud’s account, the superego was the manifestation at birth of the death instinct operating in destructiveness towards the person, as he had argued. In this way, Klein put – as Hinshelwood claims – clinical “flesh on the bones of Freud’s theory of the death instinct.” I will describe the development of Freud’s theory and how this was elaborated by Klein and her followers Bion, Esther Bick, Segal and Rosenfeld. With three clinical vignettes--from an Infant Observation, a child analysis and an adult analysis--the clinical use of the concept will be illustrated.

The Talmudic way of thinking cannot suddenly have disappeared from us. Death instinct, anti-Semitism and Jewish traditions in the foundation matrix of group analysis

One hundred years after the publication of Freud’s Beyond the Pleasure Principle (Freud, 1920), anti-Semitism is understood as the realization of the (self-)destructive force in its group form of the anti-group (Nitsun, 1996). Foulkes’ secrecy about the impacts of the German National Socialism(NS)-anti-group in his life (unlike Freud and Elias), as well as the libidinal idealization of the group, can be understood as a post-traumatic defence. But, as Nitsun (1996) has demonstrated, the creative potential of the anti-group can help to develop the group if it is analysed by the group, and can also be demonstrated by this example: the analysis of the traumatic effects of the NS-annihilation-anti-Semitism on the history of group analysis may reveal its hidden prophetic and rabbinical traditions in its foundation matrix. In this respect we can think of every group analytical session as a sign that Auschwitz did not win.

Intertekstualność. Wersja pop

The concept of intertextuality used in the field of literary theory for the first time by Julia Kristeva seems to be (nowadays) a well-recognised category, though understood in different ways. Numerous interpretations of contemporary cultural phenomena testify to its attractiveness. However, the author of the article argues that in relation to popular literature and culture, a more theoretical approach to the place and status of this category is lacking. He argues that in this context intertextuality should be understood simultaneously as a strategy for producing texts and a specific model of reading. In this sense, it is an indication of formation based on the pleasure principle of a community of cultural representations, experiences and interpretations. However, this heterogeneous universe demonstrates that popular culture is agonist by nature, where the issue of emotional participation and recognition plays a key function.

DO UNIVERSAL (TIMELESS) VALUES EXIST? ETHICAL PROJECT OF MORITZ SCHLICK

Реконструируется этическая философия М. Шлика и акцентируется внимание на темпоральных аспектах его этики. Для этого анализируется его последняя работа «Вопросы этики», где он предпринимает попытку научного рассмотрения морали. Отмечается, что для начала ХХ века характерно обращение к рассмотрению ценностей, т. к. «старый» набор ценностей, дискредитированный во многом войной и последующим изменением общества, больше не мог «закрепить» человека в текучей современности. Делается вывод, что этика Шлика представляет собой результат тонкого чувствования изменяющегося времени с его потребностью в переосмыслении всех оснований культуры - начиная с того, как мы познаем этот мир, и заканчивая тем, как нам жить и действовать в этом мире. The article aims at reconstructing philosophical ethics developed by Moritz Schlick and at outlining its relation to temporality. We analyze in greater detail Schlick's last work 'Problems Of Ethics', in which he addresses the problems of philosophical reflection on morality. We place Schlick's work into the historical context of the early twentieth century, which can be characterized by an increased interest in values because the 'old' values were dismantled by world war and major social transformations. Human life and its meaning required renewed forms of orientation and meaning in «liquid modernity». In this respect Schlick's ethical reflection originates in the Zeitgeist with its search for new meaning of human life. For Schlick, the key question is why human beings act morally. To answer this question, Schlick investigates central concepts of ethics from the perspective of human activity. He also distinguishes his ethics of the good which relies on human nature, from the rationalistic ethics of duty, which, in his view, causes but alienation from life. Morality does not have to hinge on selfabnegation, while true virtue can be based on pleasure principle and remain independent from social pressures. Virtue can evolve from human free will and involve both reason and feelings. Thus, we argue that Schlick's heightened sensitivity to the spirit of the times with its need to reimagine the foundations of our culture shaped his approach to and his main concerns in ethical reflection, which embraced both the ways we can know the world and the ways we should live and act in it.