The
unconscious
“IL SUBCOSCIENTE”
by
Roberto Assagioli (1911)
abstract by J. S. Van Teslaar (1913)
The Journal of Abnormal Psychology October-November 1913
ΚΟΙΝΩΝΙΚΗ ΣΚΕΨΗ
IL
SUBCOSCIENTE.
By Roberto
Assagioli.
Firenze:
Biblioteca filosofica, 1911. Pp. 20.
The interest in the problems of
the subconscious is growing very rapidly even in countries like Italy where
clinical neurology and psychopathology seem to have been hitherto immersed
rather deeply in the so-called "naturalistic" atmosphere.
Since the subject is rendered
complex to an unnecessary degree by the great confusion of terms, the' most
practical task seems to be a precision of their meaning. Several years ago
Patini attempted to render such a service to the Italian student. The present
contribution by Assagioli represents a more systematic attempt in the same
direction. The most varied problems concerning the subconscious phenomena are
touched upon briefly so that the nature and extent of the problems involved may
become apparent to the general reader.
In the first place, Assagioli
points out the equivocal sense in which the term "unconscious" has
been used.
Descriptively it may mean: (a)
mental phenomena of which the subject is unaware, or (b) such phenomena
unaccompanied by any awareness whatever. The confusion increases when the
various attempts at explaining the subconscious in functional terms are
considered. In such relation the "unconscious" stands for nearly
everything dynamic and cryptic, from the fundamental principle, the ultimate
essence to which v. Hartmann reduces the whole universe to the sum total of our
mental impressions, residua, psychic dispositions or mnemonic data, racial as
well as individual, in whatever form they might be recorded upon the cortex, or
otherwise preserved in our psychic mechanism.
By way of illustrating the
difficulty it may be recalled that in the symposium on the subconscious,
published in this Journal (vol. 2, 1907-1908, p. 22), six diflfcrent views have
been represented.
Willy Helpach has outlined
eight different meanings in which the related term "unconscious" has
been employed. Adding to the confusion, no fewer than seven diflferent terms
are used by various writers to designate practically the same concept: unconscious, coconscious, supraconscious,
dissociated, cryptopsychic and subliminal
self.
But attempts at clearing up the
subject have also been made. In a paper presented before the Sixth
International Congress of Psychology (Geneva, 1909), Morton Prince has
suggested a very practical delineation of the term "subconscious,"
and recently Freud (Internationale Ztschr. f. Aerztl. Psychoanalyse, Vol. I,
No. 2, p. 117-123) has outlined the meaning and uses of the term from the
psychoanalytical standpoint.
Assagioli rejects the idea of
an unconscious unaware of itself as something unconceivable,
self-contradictory. The Leibnizian doctrine of petites perceptions inconscientes, he thinks, refers merely to the
presence of perceptions of which we are not ordinarily aware. To deny all
awareness to a perception is to leave the door open for the incursion of the
Hartmannian principle and with the notion of a universal, blind Unconscious
Assagioli has little sympathy. On the whole Assagioli attaches himself to the standpoint
of William James, who in his "Principles of Psychology" combats the
theory of a universal absolute unconscious. He considers some sort of awareness
an essential and integral part of the concept of psychic activity.
The term "unconscious
cerebration" which Carpenter first used to describe the unconscious
psychic activities, epitomizes the physiological veiwpoint. According to this
theory all subconscious activities, even those manifesting processes of high
mental order, such as automatic writing and the like, are reducible to terms of
brain physiology and may be explained wholly in such terms. This is the view
preconized by the majority of laboratory psychologists, such as Ribot and
Miinsterberg.
The core of the problem of the
subconscious presents a descriptive and a functional side. On the one hand the
question is: under what forms are our mental images, attitudes, affective
states, the whole train of past memories, preserved? And functionally the
question becomes: How do they affect our behavior at a given moment?
The answers have been worked
out in numerous ways and have given rise to a number of technical expressions:
mnemonic tracts, particular dispositions of cerebral structure, special
conduction, association paths, neurochemism and the like.
Janet and Prince have
demonstrated and others have verified the existence of psychic activity
presenting some form of consciousness of its own and manifesting itself
therefore as a separate personality distinct from the ordinary selfhood.
Automatic writing proves this
abundantly. During the process of such writing it is evident that a
consciousness other than and distinct from that of the ordinary self directs
the writing hand.
Morton Prince has proposed the
term "coconscious" to cover
these phenomena which center around a consciousness secondary to the one
representing the ordinary personality.
The coconscious of Prince is
the subconscious in coeval action. So-called "supernormal" phenomena
and many of the manifestations belonging to what has been loosely termed
"mysticism" are activities of the subconscious. Such phenomena point
to the presence of autonomous psychic forces with a center of activity of their
own.
The protean role of coconscious
activities in the determination of our daily acts is not yet fully appreciated.
But already, thanks chiefly to the work of Freud and his pupils, it is becoming
rapidly recognized that our conduct, opinions, emotions, temperamental
vacillations, and the like, are largely dependent upon a mass of psychic
factors of which we are not ordinarily conscious, but which, according to the
view which Assagioli is specially desirous to emphasize, bear a consciousness
of their own.
Since subconscious activities
play so great a role in our everyday living it follows that their proper
management and direction becomes a problem of greatest practical significance.
All psychotherapic methods owe their relative success largely to the influence
which they bring to bear upon the subconscious. "Psychogogy," a term
which the author has coined by analogy with pedagogy and similar terms used in
education, and by which he means to cover the art of "character
moulding" and the proper training of will, assumes an importance to which
all other educational disciplines are secondary.
On the subject of terminology Assagioli
proposes the following:
Subconscious should be used to
cover everything within our psyche beyond the awareness of our ordinary self.
Coconscious or dissociated psychic activity should be restricted to the
activity of secondary centers of consciousness.
Latent consciousness covers
suitably everything psychic beyond the actual sphere of mental activity at a
given time. Another term for this would be potential consciousness, as it
covers the whole mental content, any part of which may come to the front under
some form or other.
Assagioli objects to the
grouping of latent consciousness and physiological memory under the category of
the unconscious, as Morton Prince appears to do, for instance. He argues that
this would only add to the confusion which the term "unconscious" has
brought into the field of psychologic research. The latter term he would
restrict to the specific meanings in which it has been employed thus far; its
use should be followed by the name of the author whose particular theory of the
unconscious is preconized, so as to avoid confusion.
J. S. Van Teslaar.
Cambridge, Mass.
The Journal of Abnormal Psychology, vol. VIII, October-November
1913, pp. 276-279.
ΕΛΕΥΘΕΡΟΓΡΑΦΟΣ
[ ανάρτηση 8 Δεκεμβρίου 2024 :
The unconscious
“IL SUBCOSCIENTE”
by Roberto Assagioli (1911)
abstract by J. S. Van Teslaar (1913)
The Journal of Abnormal Psychology Oct-Nov 1913
ΚΟΙΝΩΝΙΚΗ ΣΚΕΨΗ ]
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