The other Freud : Rethinking the philosophical roots of psychoanalysis

This thesis inquires into the intellectual roots of Freudian psychoanalysis. In reemphasising the influence of British empiricist sources of Freud’s early thought (especially before 1900), it offers an interpretation of his philosophical inspiration that contrasts with most contemporary accounts.

One major theme concerns the place of psychoanalysis within European intellectual history. Accordingly, Freud’s evolving theory of the unconscious is set in the context of key themes in the 17-18th century Enlightenment and Counter-Enlightenment (Mendelssohn, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Kant, Hamann). If Freud’s determination to scientifically investigate the human mind was an indisputably ‘enlightened’ project, its results nonetheless challenged the capacity of Enlightenment reason to banish the darkness of the human soul.

This folds into the second major theme, concerning the identification of various “tradition lines” (Gödde’s phrase) that fed into psychoanalysis. If Enlightenment rationalism was one such line, German Romanticism and irrationalistic vitalism also contributed, both implicitly before 1900, and more explicitly later. However, contrary to (but building on) Gödde’s threefold schema, the thesis argues for a fourth (“Anglo-Scottish empiricist”) tradition line that has been routinely overlooked.

After the Introductory chapter, that sets out the main thesis arguments and addresses issues of methodology, the thesis begins with an examination of the 17-18th century Enlightenment and European Rationalism, noting even here the early signs of an opening to a sese of the “non-conscious” recesses of the mind. It is in this context that Freud’s various models of the unconscious throughout his career are considered.

From there, nineteenth century German thought is considered in terms of the way that the idea of the unconscious emerges powerfully in Romanticism (Schelling, Carus), as well as in the turn to drive-related theories of the unconscious that emerged slightly later (Schelling’s middle period, Schopenhauer, von Hartmann, and Nietzsche).

The following two chapters then focus in on the evidence for a largely overlooked fourth tradition line, including both the broader philosophical influences as well as the philosophical psychology of later nineteenth century British thought. These influences on Freud are many. From Brentano, Freud received an entrée into British empiricism, imbibed the principles of intentionality and immanentism, and was introduced to the problem of introspection via Brentano’s debates with Henry Maudsley. J.S. Mill and the British associationists helped Freud develop his theory of thought and language. In William Hamilton’s work, he found the outlines of a biology of unconscious thought and energic responses. Bentham and the utilitarians provided him with a scientific model of pleasure and pain. William Carpenter’s theory of unconscious cerebration also proved a major early influence. James Ward’s notion of “attention” (that itself built on Locke and Dugald Stewart) informed Freud’s accounts of reality testing and the “system preconscious”. In John Hughlings Jackson’s writings, Freud found ample grist for his theoretical mill concerning mind-body parallelism, regression (building on Hobbes), language, and dreams. It was James Braid’s work on hypnosis, as much as Charcot’s, that provided stepping stones to Freud’s mature understanding of transference, a theory furthered by his reading of James Frazer.

The conclusion draws out some tentative implications (and openings for further research) on how this enlarged tradition-lines approach can serve as a helpful heuristic for understanding twentieth century and contemporary psychoanalysis. The cognitive unconscious tradition-line is presented as being revitalised in contemporary epiphenomenalism and neuroscience more generally. The Romantic tradition-line inspired twentieth century figures such as Carl Jung and James Hillman. The drive-based irrational line was taken up in the work of figures such as Melanie Klein and Ian Suttie, as well as quite recent work on evolutionary psychiatry. There have also been new lines of tradition, such as the linguistic and structuralist turn associated most strongly with the work of Jacques Lacan.