Perspicuo
Veteran Member
I totally agree with Allen Fraces on this subject (actually I found these articles attempting to find if anyone else has had this idea):
Darwin, the Greatest Psychologist
http://www.project-syndicate.org/co...he-study-of-human-psychology-by-allen-frances
Freud's genius was putting Darwin's instinctualist ideas to work in understanding specific phenomena, like dreams, lapsi linguæ ("Freudian slips"), and virtually everything else. The idea is basically, that whatever you do, your behavior expresses instinct as much as learnt restraint, and even the restraint is fueled itself by instinct.
Freud also gave instincts an interpretation which today we call a "hydrodynamic" interpretation, meaning that instinct had to have some sort of outlet, either displaced or sublimated (socialized, acceptable and successful, i.e. not producing conflict or neurosis [inhibition, symptoms or anxiety]). It's a wonderful shorthand guide for case conceptualization, but I'm unsure of its being literally true. What I understand is that instincts should be allowed non-harmful outlets because holding them back is needlessly unpleasant and therefore stressful, not because they accumulate energy. As far as I know, the "energy" of an instinct or drive is genetically set, and what increases it (in addition to hormones, etc) is cognition (the "Feeling" of frustration, of not getting your part in sex or food like "everyone else" is supposedly having).
In any case, reading this, you get the feeling it's at least half of what Freud put into his theories (from HERE):
This is also interesting:
It took some time for scientists to put these methods to work. For decades such methods lie dormant.
Darwin, the Greatest Psychologist
http://www.project-syndicate.org/co...he-study-of-human-psychology-by-allen-frances
CORONADO, CALIFORNIA – Most people do not think of Charles Darwin as a psychologist. In fact, his work revolutionized the field. Before Darwin, philosophical speculation shaped our psychological understanding. But even great philosophers – Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, Hume, Locke, Kant, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and others – could only describe current mental events and behaviors; they could not explain their causes.
CommentsView/Create comment on this paragraphDarwin provided the profound understanding that evolution has influenced the shape of our minds as strongly as it has the shape of our bodies. Since humans evolved from the same primate ancestor as modern chimpanzees or gorillas, he suggested one could learn more by comparing human instincts, emotions, and behaviors to those of animals than one can surmise from subjective speculation. As he put it, “he who understands baboon would do more towards metaphysics than Locke.”
Emphasis mine.Freud built on Darwin’s evolutionary insights in order to understand psychological symptoms, dreams, myths, art, anthropology, and much more. Freud’s biographer, Ernest Jones, was mistaken in calling Freud “the Darwin of the mind.” Darwin himself was the Darwin of the mind; Freud was his great popularizer.
Freud's genius was putting Darwin's instinctualist ideas to work in understanding specific phenomena, like dreams, lapsi linguæ ("Freudian slips"), and virtually everything else. The idea is basically, that whatever you do, your behavior expresses instinct as much as learnt restraint, and even the restraint is fueled itself by instinct.
Freud also gave instincts an interpretation which today we call a "hydrodynamic" interpretation, meaning that instinct had to have some sort of outlet, either displaced or sublimated (socialized, acceptable and successful, i.e. not producing conflict or neurosis [inhibition, symptoms or anxiety]). It's a wonderful shorthand guide for case conceptualization, but I'm unsure of its being literally true. What I understand is that instincts should be allowed non-harmful outlets because holding them back is needlessly unpleasant and therefore stressful, not because they accumulate energy. As far as I know, the "energy" of an instinct or drive is genetically set, and what increases it (in addition to hormones, etc) is cognition (the "Feeling" of frustration, of not getting your part in sex or food like "everyone else" is supposedly having).
In any case, reading this, you get the feeling it's at least half of what Freud put into his theories (from HERE):
Darwin's most fundamental conclusions:
•We are animals -- just part of the grand tableau of creation, not its purpose.
•Our instincts, emotions, and intellect evolved from a common primate ancestor -- just as completely as did our bodily form.
•We can understand ourselves best by studying the psychological, as well as the physical, steps in that evolution.
•Our psychology is the product of the natural and sexual selection of reproductively adaptive chance variants -- it was not preplanned or inspired by divine intervention.
•The mind and its consciousness are a product of brain functioning in a way that is not essentially different than digestion is a function of the gut.
•Psychology can be studied using the standard experimental and observational tools of science.
•People all over the world, despite differences in their current customs, are brothers and sisters within one human species, sharing the same basic emotions and intellectual endowment.
•The child is father to the man -- we can learn about the psychology of the individual and evolution of the species by carefully studying the maturation of behaviors in infants and children.
•Instincts are not completely fixed but interact with the environment.
•Unconscious forces play a large role in influencing are our behaviors.
This is also interesting:
And Darwin also established novel methods of psychological study that have since become standards in the field:
•His statement that we can learn more about ourselves by studying baboons than by reading the great philosophers created the field of evolutionary psychology and provided the opportunity for deep insights into human motivation and behavior.
•Darwin's Biographical Sketch of an Infant detailing his minute, naturalistic observations of the day to day emotional, intellectual, interpersonal, and moral development of his eldest son created the field of child development.
•Darwin's method of studying emotions and facial expressions using photographs he commissioned for this purpose is still an enormously fruitful research tool.
•Darwin conducted the first survey in psychology -- a written instrument gathering information from scientists and missionaries to show the universality of human emotions all around the world.
It took some time for scientists to put these methods to work. For decades such methods lie dormant.