The unconscious : $b The fundamentals of human personality, normal and abnormalPrince, Morton
Science
The unconscious : $b The fundamentals of human personality, normal and abnormal
Prince, Morton
Psychology, Pathological; Subconsciousness
It would be a gross exaggeration to say, on the basis of the evidence at
our disposal, that all life’s experiences persist as potential memories,
or even that this is true of the greater number. It is, however,
undoubtedly true that of the great mass of experiences which have passed
out of all voluntary recollection, an almost incredible, even if
relatively small, number still lie dormant, and, under favoring
conditions, many can be brought within the field of conscious memory.
The significance of this fact will become apparent to us later after we
have studied the nature of conservation. Still more significant,
particularly for abnormal psychology, is the fact we have brought out by
our technical methods of investigation; namely, that almost any
conserved experience under certain conditions can function as a
subconscious memory and become translated into, i.e., produce sensory
and motor automatic phenomena, such as hallucinations, writing, speech,
etc. It will not be surprising if we shall find that various other
disturbances of mind and body are produced by such subconscious
processes.
Two striking facts brought out by some of these investigations are the
minuteness of the details with which forgotten experiences may be
conserved and the long periods of time during which conservation may
persist. Thus, as we have seen, experiences dating back to early
childhood may be shown to be preserved in extremely minute detail though
the individual has long forgotten them. Furthermore, it has been shown
that even remembered experiences may be conserved in far more elaborate
detail than would appear from so much of the experience as can be
voluntarily recalled. Probably our voluntary memory is not absolutely
perfect for any experience in all its details but the details that are
conserved often far exceed those that can be recalled.
In the survey of life’s experiences which we have studied we have, for
the most part, considered those which have had objective relation and
have been subject to confirmation by collateral testimony. But we should
not overlook the fact that among mental experiences are those of the
inner as well as outer life. To the former belong the hopes and
aspirations, the regrets, the fears, the doubts, the self-communings and
wrestlings with self, the wishes, the loves, the hates, all that we are
not willing to give out to the world, and all that we would forget and
would strive not to admit to ourselves. All this inner life belongs to
our experience and is subject to the same law of conservation.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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