Discuss two major sources of influence on the psychoanalytic movement.
Philosophical speculation about unconscious psychological phenomena was one of the major source of influence on the psychoanalytic movement the other being the evolutionary theory by Charles Darwin. Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz developed the idea of monadology in the early eighteenth century. He believed mental events had many levels of consciousness that ranks from an entirely unconsciousness level to distinctly conscious one.
After a century, Johann Friedrich Herbart modified Leibnitz’s proposition about the unconscious into the idea of portal of consciousness. In Herbert’s view, disagreement develops amid the ideas, as these ideas scuffle for the realizing conscious. Fechner also hypothesized the concept of unconsciousness. Using the idea of threshold, he suggested that a similarity exist between mind and an iceberg, which greatly affected Sigmund Freud.
Fechner proposed that similar to the major part of the iceberg, mind’s much of the ideas remain hidden beneath the outer surface, where it get affected by forces that are unobservable. Thus, we observe that many people discuss the unconscious human mind very seriously. Philosophers had dealt with the notion of the unconscious before, but Freud was the first to discover a scientific way to study it.
Frank J. Sulloway was a famous science historian. In the year 1979, he published his writing, that was, Freud: the mind’s biologist, in which Sulloway argued that the thinking of Freud had been influenced, by Darwin’s writings strongly. Sulloway’s interpretations were based on the conclusions drawn on the basis of the history’s data.
The data that has persisted for years was examined by him in the way that no other individual had viewed. Sulloway analyzed books from the library of Freud and many editions of Darwin’s work were discovered by him. The fresh research supports the impact of Darwin on the psychoanalytic theory of Freud.
In his later life, Freud insisted that the evolution theory, proposed by Darwin should become an important part of the psychoanalysts’ training program. Many ideas were discussed by Darwin that was later employed in Freud’s work. He considered that sex is important in confectioning the personality of humans. Later, this notion was rejected by many analysts.