Fire Arrow on 30/12/2023 at 06:04
For some context:
I got a copy of Peter Gay's "Freud: A Life in Our Time" recently (it was a discard from a library). It's been filling in a lot of gaps in my knowledge, particularly surrounding the chronology of the early developments in psychoanalysis and the relationship between Freud and Jung. Unfortunately, I lost my place while reading about one of the case histories, and lost momentum. Plus I'm trying to take it easy at the moment anyway, I've been very busy lately.
(I'm aware that reading about Freud today requires some justification. Like a lot of people, I was sceptical of psychoanalysis, seeing it as pseudoscience. On a whim I listened to an audiobook of "The Psychopathology of Everyday Life", and found the way Freud writes insightful even though I still feel psychoanalysis is generally too speculative.)
Over all, I'm enjoying it. It's not polemical against Freud in a way that some might want it to be, but that's probably part of the reason I enjoy it. Nor is it too dense; Gay gives exactly as much detail as you'd want without going overboard.
Anarchic Fox on 30/12/2023 at 16:29
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
(I'm aware that reading about Freud today requires some justification. Like a lot of people, I was sceptical of psychoanalysis, seeing it as pseudoscience. On a whim I listened to an audiobook of "The Psychopathology of Everyday Life", and found the way Freud writes insightful even though I still feel psychoanalysis is generally too speculative.)
I've read a fair amount of Freud. My overview is that the overarching theories are bunk, like the Oedipal structure, the id/ego/superego, the stages of child development, and mental illness as being stuck in a certain phase of said child development. However, many of the individual concepts (repression, regression, sublimation, transference, wish fulfillment) are still quite valuable, once you detach them from the grandiose parts.
Fire Arrow on 3/1/2024 at 13:29
Quote Posted by Anarchic Fox
I've read a fair amount of Freud. My overview is that the overarching theories are bunk, like the Oedipal structure, the id/ego/superego, the stages of child development, and mental illness as being stuck in a certain phase of said child development. However, many of the individual concepts (repression, regression, sublimation, transference, wish fulfillment) are still quite valuable, once you detach them from the grandiose parts.
I definitely agree things like an "oral personality" are far fetched. However I would note that some of the individual concepts you mentioned are defence mechanisms, and my understanding is that defence mechanisms exist to maintain the sense of control of in the ego. So for instance the ego represses anger because it can cause a sense of losing control (I guess what I'm getting at is that I find it difficult to imagine defence mechanisms without any concept of an ego). I can easily imagine objections to the Oedipal structure, but its harder for me to imagine objections to the id/ego/superego structure. Is there something in particular you think is wrong with it, or did you just mean the standard objections apply to it (e.g. its unfalsifiable or its falsifiable and wrong)? Sorry to go into such a pedantic line of questions, and also if the problem was something else I hadn't thought of.
I should note that I was motivated to read Freud because I was interested in being a therapist for a while, so I'm not exclusively concerned with the scientific validity of Freud's theories, more that he seems to provide a way of describing things which are otherwise difficult to describe.
Lastly, to try to tie this back to reading, have you read any Melanie Klein? and if so, how did you find her in comparison to Freud? More or less grandiose?
Sorry for editing this into something almost completely different later. I was in the middle of doing something when I wrote the initial reply and didn't put the amount of thought into what I was saying as I usually try to.
Anarchic Fox on 3/1/2024 at 23:32
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
I definitely agree things like an "oral personality" are far fetched. However I would note that some of the individual concepts you mentioned are defence mechanisms, and my understanding is that defence mechanisms exist to maintain the sense of control of in the ego. So for instance the ego represses anger because it can cause a sense of losing control (I guess what I'm getting at is that I find it difficult to imagine defence mechanisms without any concept of an ego). I can easily imagine objections to the Oedipal structure, but its harder for me to imagine objections to the id/ego/superego structure. Is there something in particular you think is wrong with it, or did you just mean the standard objections apply to it (e.g. its unfalsifiable or its falsifiable and wrong)? Sorry to go into such a pedantic line of questions, and also if the problem was something else I hadn't thought of.
The id/ego/superego is the least objectionable of the theories I mentioned, and can be salvaged if you think of them as the subconscious mind, consciousness, and the conscience respectively. I recall Freud attaching a lot more cruft to the ideas, being overly specific and systematic about their contents and interactions. However, when I search my twenty-year-old memories of Freud I realize they aren't clear enough to articulate an objection. Oh well.
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Lastly, to try to tie this back to reading, have you read any Melanie Klein? and if so, how did you find her in comparison to Freud? More or less grandiose?
No, do you recommend her? Realistically, I only read so much Freud because his books were easy to find in used bookstores. I also read some Jung and Maslow, but my overall knowledge of psychoanalysis is not deep.
However, I have realized recently that I'm the archetypal "good listener," and I've also got a basic overview of psychiatry from dealing with my own illness. I'd like to develop this talent with some reading in modern psychotherapy. Do you have any recommendations, granting I'm self-aware enough not to pretend to be an actual therapist?
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Sorry for editing this into something almost completely different later. I was in the middle of doing something when I wrote the initial reply and didn't put the amount of thought into what I was saying as I usually try to.
As a chronic (and during one period, professional) editor, I am all in favor of edited replies. :cheeky:
Fire Arrow on 6/1/2024 at 20:18
Quote Posted by Anarchic Fox
The id/ego/superego is the least objectionable of the theories I mentioned, and can be salvaged if you think of them as the subconscious mind, consciousness, and the conscience respectively. I recall Freud attaching a lot more cruft to the ideas, being overly specific and systematic about their contents and interactions. However, when I search my twenty-year-old memories of Freud I realize they aren't clear enough to articulate an objection. Oh well.
Fair enough, probably my fault for being overly formal.
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No, do you recommend her? Realistically, I only read so much Freud because his books were easy to find in used bookstores. I also read some Jung and Maslow, but my overall knowledge of psychoanalysis is not deep.
I'm planning on reading her next, but the reasons are a bit convoluted.
To go into a brief digression into history, a lot of what happened after Freud in Psychoanalysis (mostly in the UK, although of course it has had influence on American psychoanalysis) was a conflict between followers of Anna Freud (AKA ego psychology) and followers of Melanie Klein (AKA object relations). I'm not an expert by any means, but I have more familiarity with ego psychology as its quite easy to grasp: its about replacing bad defence mechanisms with good defence mechanisms. Or to put it another way strengthening the ego. So for example you might replace repression with sublimation, or denial with humour, because these are more adaptable defence mechanisms.
As intuitively appealing as I find ego psychology, it began to peter out in the sixties. I think you might even go so far as to say its extinct today, even though psychoanalysts may go back and read ego psychologists today. Kleinians seem to have a more empirical orientation (and according to Gay, Freud was a positivist, so what Klein was doing seems truer to what psychoanalysis was originally trying to do). Attachment theory (the most empirical subject to come out of psychoanalysis) owes its origins to a John Bowlby who was originally a Kleinian (though he disagreed with a lot of her opinions).
So basically I'm hoping to find in her writing something more emotionally adequate than cognitive behavioural therapy but ideally something more empirically grounded than much of psychoanalysis.
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However, I have realized recently that I'm the archetypal "good listener," and I've also got a basic overview of psychiatry from dealing with my own illness. I'd like to develop this talent with some reading in modern psychotherapy. Do you have any recommendations, granting I'm self-aware enough not to pretend to be an actual therapist?
I might not be the best person to ask because I think there are some big limitations in modern psychotherapy. Mostly I prefer to read older writers or philosophy. However, if there is one author that seems to be forward thinking today, it would have to be Antonio Damasio. I'd also recommend Merleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception (though its not exactly recent or psychotherapeutic, its very good for giving you language for reflecting on experience). Less in the vein of reading, Don Carveth puts out stuff which is simultaneously psychologically insightful and scholarly. (Its hard to find the combination of scientific, philosophical, and practical that I think is what is really needed today).
Though if you want something more conventional/evidence-based, cognitive behavioural therapy is the way to go. Personally I can say its helped me before, so it definitely has its merits.
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As a chronic (and during one period, professional) editor, I am all in favor of edited replies. :cheeky:
That's a relief, I was thinking "This is only my second post, and I'm already changing it"...:sweat:
Anarchic Fox on 10/1/2024 at 17:11
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
So basically I'm hoping to find in her writing something more emotionally adequate than cognitive behavioural therapy but ideally something more empirically grounded than much of psychoanalysis.
The question of how scientific the study of mental health should be is no longer an academic one for me. After many psychiatrists who have little insight, and for that matter little
interest, in the subjective experience of mental illness, I've concluded that the field has been harmed by being overly imitative of the harder sciences.
For instance, for someone (like me) with severe bipolar disorder, it is crucial to be able to identify a manic episode quickly enough that I can counteract it; if I identify it too late, my judgment is too impaired to do much about it. This task is complicated by the fact that hypomania is very similar to a strong caffeine high. Part of my solution is simply to avoid a caffeine dependency; if I don't use caffeine for more than a couple days, but the high lasts longer than that, I know it's the start of a manic episode. Unfortunately, my practices are entirely self-developed; while I know that there exist therapists who specialize in bipolar disorder, I have not had the good fortune to encounter them.
For another example, from comparing my experiences with those of various friends, I've realized that there are stark differences between the depression of a depressive phase of bipolar disorder, and the depression of major depressive disorder. Intrusive suicidal ideation seems more characteristic of the former, anhedonia more characteristic of the latter. Antidepressants help with the latter, but are disastrous for the former. I think a more advanced understanding would distinguish them, but since they are so similar in behavior, they are conflated.
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I might not be the best person to ask because I think there are some big limitations in modern psychotherapy. Mostly I prefer to read older writers or philosophy.
Hmm, then I phrased my question too narrowly. For me "modern" will mean anything significantly newer than Freud, Jung, Skinner and their immediate successors. However the ones you mentioned look interesting, and I've added them to my list of authors to acquire.
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Though if you want something more conventional/evidence-based, cognitive behavioural therapy is the way to go. Personally I can say its helped me before, so it definitely has its merits.
CBT seems to be highly effective for certain problems, like PTSD, but also narrow in application. I've picked up one very helpful practice from it, namely shifting my attention whenever a traumatic memory pops up, so as to weaken the memory.
Fire Arrow on 13/1/2024 at 02:05
Quote:
The question of how scientific the study of mental health should be is no longer an academic one for me. After many psychiatrists who have little insight, and for that matter little
interest, in the subjective experience of mental illness, I've concluded that the field has been harmed by being overly imitative of the harder sciences.
I think part of the problem is that in the English language, subjectivity is usually taken to mean arbitrary or random. So for example when someone says "taste is subjective" it's misleading, because although it varies from person to person, it has certain conditions of possibility. If you look at how subjectivity is treated in German language philosophy, you may be refreshed by how they think about it.
Also, I think the innovations in physics after Newton (i.e. relativity and quantum mechanics) were possible precisely because the Germans took subjectivity seriously (I know Bohr was Danish though). English language philosophy and science, while it has its achievements, has an irrational neglect of the subject.
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For instance, for someone (like me) with severe bipolar disorder, it is crucial to be able to identify a manic episode quickly enough that I can counteract it; if I identify it too late, my judgment is too impaired to do much about it. This task is complicated by the fact that hypomania is very similar to a strong caffeine high. Part of my solution is simply to avoid a caffeine dependency; if I don't use caffeine for more than a couple days, but the high lasts longer than that, I know it's the start of a manic episode. Unfortunately, my practices are entirely self-developed; while I know that there exist therapists who specialize in bipolar disorder, I have not had the good fortune to encounter them.
Not to go onto too much of a rant but in my experience, mental health professionals are usually more interested in showing that they've followed procedure than actually understanding and alleviating the problem.
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For another example, from comparing my experiences with those of various friends, I've realized that there are stark differences between the depression of a depressive phase of bipolar disorder, and the depression of major depressive disorder. Intrusive suicidal ideation seems more characteristic of the former, anhedonia more characteristic of the latter. Antidepressants help with the latter, but are disastrous for the former. I think a more advanced understanding would distinguish them, but since they are so similar in behavior, they are conflated.
That sounds rough, you have my sympathy.
Have you come across the term "epistemic justice" before? Might be useful for framing part of the problem.
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Hmm, then I phrased my question too narrowly. For me "modern" will mean anything significantly newer than Freud, Jung, Skinner and their immediate successors. However the ones you mentioned look interesting, and I've added them to my list of authors to acquire.
Hope you enjoy them! I tend to be more interested in reading philosophy than about therapy, so I can only really recommend things which are tangential. I've found Alasdair MacIntyre's After Virtue somewhat "therapeutic", but he might be too Aristotelian for people who don't come from a Catholic background. I always recommend After Virtue to everyone though; it's one of my favourite books!
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CBT seems to be highly effective for certain problems, like PTSD, but also narrow in application. I've picked up one very helpful practice from it, namely shifting my attention whenever a traumatic memory pops up, so as to weaken the memory.
Definitely CBT has its uses. Though for me psychodynamic therapy feels like it gets at the heart of the matter, but unfortunately I haven't been able to find a psychodynamic therapist anywhere near where I live, so I'm stuck finding substitutes.
Kamlorn on 13/1/2024 at 11:05
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
I think part of the problem is that in the English language, subjectivity is usually taken to mean arbitrary or random. So for example when someone says "taste is subjective" it's misleading, because although it varies from person to person, it has certain conditions of possibility. If you look at how subjectivity is treated in German language philosophy, you may be refreshed by how they think about it.
Also, I think the innovations in physics after Newton (i.e. relativity and quantum mechanics) were possible precisely because the Germans took subjectivity seriously (I know Bohr was Danish though). English language philosophy and science, while it has its achievements, has an irrational neglect of the subject.
'Objectivity' by Daston, Gallison is an awesome book about twists and turns of subjectivity/objectivity terms throughout the history of philosophy and science ( I was shocked by the fact that those terms were actually invented not so long ago). And by twists and turns of those terms I mean that your claim of monosemantic usage of exact that term within the same language, and even the same language philosophy, have no sufficient reason.
Fire Arrow on 13/1/2024 at 21:05
Quote Posted by Kamlorn
And by twists and turns of those terms I mean that your claim of monosemantic usage of exact that term within the same language, and even the same language philosophy, have no sufficient reason.
I never intended to claim 'exact' usage. I mean as a rule of thumb I've found that I've had to adopt a radically different sense of the meaning of subjectivity in order to make sense of German idealism.
If by 'no sufficient reason', you mean you can show examples of subjectivity used in both ways in English, I think that would be over stating your case. It's common knowledge that English speakers use subjective as a synonym for meaningless. Whereas when someone speaks of Kant in relation to 'transcendental subjectivity', it's a very different use of 'subjectivity'.
If you're referring to me attributing Einstein's and Bohr's innovations in physics to the 'German view of subjectivity', I'm satisfied by my own experience among English language scientists that 'subjectivity' is something they avoid like the plague.
Still, the book looks interesting, thanks for the recommendation.
Kamlorn on 13/1/2024 at 22:24
Quote Posted by Fire Arrow
... in order to make sense of German idealism.
Now that's what I call the CLAIM. Aside that boring subjectivity dispute. I am really interested from now on. Can you give some hints? Cause I don't know a single person who has managed to do this. No jokes. I am god damn serious.
Man, this TTLG thing never ceases to amaze me so far. Last time it was a little conversation about a 'jump mechanic' which ended with a discussion of Bertolt Brecht's understanding of art, 'interrogation of reality' and the Doomslayer as, God forgive me, a conscientious objector.