Psychology of the Unconscious: A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido. A Contribution to the History of the Evolution of ThoughtJung, C. G. (Carl Gustav)
Philosophy
Psychology of the Unconscious: A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido. A Contribution to the History of the Evolution of Thought
Jung, C. G. (Carl Gustav)
Libido (Psychology); Mother and child; Psychoanalysis; Subconsciousness; Symbolism (Psychology)
When I said just now that directed thinking is properly a thinking with
words, and quoted that clever testimony of Anatole France as drastic
proof of it, a misunderstanding might easily arise, namely, that
directed thinking is really only “word.” That certainly would go too
far. Language should, however, be comprehended in a wider sense than
that of speech, which is in itself only the expression of the formulated
thought which is capable of being communicated in the widest sense.
Otherwise, the deaf mute would be limited to the utmost in his capacity
for thinking, which is not the case in reality. Without any knowledge of
the spoken word, he has his “language.” This language, considered from
the standpoint of history, or in other words, directed thinking, is here
a descendant of the primitive words, as, for instance, Wundt[22]
expresses it.
“A further important result of that co-operation of sound and sign
interchange consists in the fact that very many words gradually lose
altogether their original concrete thought meaning, and turn into
signs for general ideas and for the expression of the apperceptive
functions of relation and comparison and their products. In this
manner abstract thought develops, which, because it would not be
possible without the change of meaning lying at the root of it, is
indeed a production of that psychic and psychophysical reciprocal
action out of which the development of language takes place.”
Jodl[23] denies the identity of language and thought, because, for one
reason, one and the same psychic fact might be expressed in different
languages in different ways. From that he draws the conclusion that a
“super-language thinking” exists. Certainly there is such a thing,
whether with Erdmann one considers it “hypologisch,” or with Jodl as
“super-language.” Only this is not logical thinking. My conception of it
agrees with the noteworthy contribution made by Baldwin, which I will
quote here word for word.[24]
“The transmission from pre-judgmental to judgmental meaning is just
that from knowledge which has social confirmation to that which gets
along without it. The meanings utilized for judgment are those already
developed in their presuppositions and applications through the
confirmation of social intercourse. Thus, the personal judgment,
trained in the methods of social rendering, and disciplined by the
interaction of its social world, projects its content into that world
again. In other words, the platform for all movement into the
assertion of individual judgment—the level from which new experience
is utilized—is already and always socialized; and it is just this
movement that we find reflected in the actual results as the sense of
the ‘appropriateness’ or synomic character of the meaning rendered.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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