Abstract
One of the challenging problems with the unconscious is that it turns out to affect our consciousness and influence our behaviour. This enigma of the effectivity of unconscious contents asks for a theory about how we can at the same time know and not know about unconscious contents. In my opinion this enigma may be solved partly by pointing out that there is a non-language system of representation still working in our mind. I consider the difference of language and non-language systems of representation to be one of the most important steps in the continuum from conscious to unconscious thoughts. In my opinion we do not only refer to states of affairs in language modes of symbolization but also in a system of scenic phantasma accompanied by feelings. The cooperation of both systems can make us understand how to know and not-know something at the same time.
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Notes
- 1.
This contribution does not intend to replace Freud’s concept of unconscious, it only tries to present an interpretation of the unconscious from a phenomenological point of view that concentrates on non-linguistic forms of thinking. If one like paradoxical wording we may characterize this as an attempt to understanding unconsciousness within consciousness, i.e. within the paradigm of a refined phenomenological analysis of consciousness.
- 2.
What is thinking? Here every answer depends on the idea of thinking you start with. If you tie thinking exclusively to the use of language concepts by definition, then consequently non-linguistic thinking is not thinking at all. But this is simply the outcome of a definition, not more. If you understand thinking as proceeding your experience, your ideas about possible challenges and useful solutions in a symbolic medium not using language symbols that non-linguistic operations may pass for thinking. I prefer the second understanding because it allows to understand primates and non-linguistic humans (deaf and aphasic persons after stroke) as thinking agents and it harmonizes with the phenomenological analysis of the system of scenic phantasma.
- 3.
- 4.
This is true also for nightly dreams, cf. Symons (1993).
- 5.
- 6.
I have elaborated this in my recent book (Lohmar 2016) Ch: I.1 and I.3 “Husserls Theorie der Bedeutung”. The central idea of this theory of meaning is that the meaning of symbols (in language or other media), deeds and objects is not fixed. It asks in every case for an act of consciousness to give a symbol a meaning (the meaning-giving act) and this meaning-giving is usually oriented to the conventions in a communicating society. But meaning-giving may be performed quite freely and spontaneous, completely apart from conventions. Think for example of a child sitting in a sandy playground using a wooden block with the acoustic expression “Broom, broom.” as if it is a car. This is already a meaning-giving activity and it is obvious that there is a long way of communication and agreement until we reach a lexicon of meanings shared by all members of a community.
- 7.
With this analysis I do not claim a comprehensive understanding of all psychic events in correlation with daydreaming. Such a claim would be disproportionate when compared with my limited knowledge of the psychoanalytical theory-formation.
- 8.
If the reader is interested in the most important differences of the two systems I would like to refer to the extensive discussion in Lohmar (2016), Ch. III–VI, p. 91–266.
- 9.
It goes without saying, that the preservation of experience is also possible for a language system, the point of my investigation is that this performance is already possible for the non-linguistic system of scenic phantasma.
- 10.
The characteristic transformations sometimes also include denying of former events, because in negation we are still holding on to these former events, inverting, or transferring my former and future activities to other persons and other objects etc. Because of such far-reaching transformations, which nonetheless preserve the “lessons of experience” while opening up particular future possibilities, I see in this discussion a contribution to the epistemological founding of psychoanalysis.
- 11.
- 12.
The basic level of non-linguistic thinking can function solitary and private (to organize future action under the information of former experience) but it must not, because it can refer extensionally to other’s insights, valuations etc.
- 13.
The concept of non-linguistic thinking is obviously also of some use to understand thinking in animals. Cf. Lohmar (2008a). The decisive point in my analysis is that humans are using language and the older non-linguistic mode of thinking. And this is the ground of our possibility to manipulate the characteristic scene, and somehow also to manipulate our memories but in doing this to keep the central lessons of our experiences.
- 14.
Understanding some displacements of contents as a self-deception asks for the contribution of other persons who could show me that my memory is not fully accurate but changed and improved. This also means that we do not have to solve the enigma of a subject who decides to deceive himself and may even be successful in this action. The mechanisms of self-deception are more closely to a strategy of avoiding certain insights, cf. for this Rinofner-Kreidl (2012).
- 15.
I have done this discussion in Lohmar (2012a). But please keep also in mind that I am not an expert in psychoanalytical theory, therefore it may happen that I have presented some of its parts in a too simplified way.
- 16.
For an analysis of this function of weak phantasma in perception cf. Lohmar (2008b).
- 17.
The precise contents of types are not explicit and consciously given to us, even if they are functioning in perception. Their contents only manifests in the use of types and the continuously raising expectations in perception. Cf. Lohmar (2008b).
- 18.
It is surely a promising way of therapy to turn non-linguistic modes of thinking into linguistic modes - but language is not the only way to communicate about contents we do not know in linguistic modes. Cf. D. Lohmar, Denken ohne Sprache, Heidelberg 2016, Ch. 7.1.
- 19.
Cf. Freud (1909).
References and Endnotes
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———. 2012c. Thinking and non-language thinking. In Handbook of contemporary phenomenology, ed. Dan Zahavi, 377–398. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
———. 2016. Denken ohne Sprache. Dordrecht: Heidelberg.
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Symons, Donald. 1993. The stuff that dreams aren’t made of: Why the wake-state and dream-state sensory experiences differ. Cognition 47: 181–217.
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Lohmar, D. (2017). The Unconscious and the Non-linguistic Mode of Thinking. In: Legrand, D., Trigg, D. (eds) Unconsciousness Between Phenomenology and Psychoanalysis. Contributions To Phenomenology, vol 88. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-55518-8_12
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