Freuds Ideas Remain Influential Even When They Seem Implausible - Essay Example

Freud’s ideas remain influential even when they seem implausible Sigmund Freud is probably one of the most well-known individuals who have made significant contributions to the field of social sciences through their work and ideas. Despite the fact that some of his ideas seem to be outdated and have come to be disputed by many modern scholars, they have nevertheless remained relevant in the field. Many of the terms and ideas that he developed are still used in a wide range of subjects as well as being used to describe many aspects of individual and societal life all over the world. Even though some of his ideas might seem implausible, it has become the norm to use them either as a basis for making arguments or for the development of other ideas through the furtherance of modern research into diverse matters. The ability of Freud’s ideas to remain relevant in the current world is mainly based on the fact that Freud was the first in his field to explore the numerous aspects of the psychology of individuals, essentially being a pioneer into the realm of the development of the human mind as well as making the first attempt to define the various stages of this development. Because of his dedication in the study of the human mind, Freud was able to come up with ideas which can be considered to have been revolutionary in his time, since these ideas challenged the way in which individuals analysed the way that human beings developed. The fact that many of the aspects of human development explored by Freud were relatively new fields of study meant that he singlehandedly created a new form of psychological and sociological analysis of human beings. As a result, it is the ideas that he came up with that have been the basis of the study of modern psychological development and this has ensured that while they may seem implausible, they remain relevant because the attempt to define or criticize them is essential to the creation of new theories. It is a fact that Freud worked towards the exploration of the human mind in a more thorough manner than any of his predecessors and it is because of this that his contributions to the field of psychology are massive. His influence in the twentieth century was so vast that he was able to influence other fields other than psychology and it is this influence over other subjects and fields which has ensured that his ideas remain relevant to the present (Ferris, 1999). Moreover, the fact that there are some scholars who deem his ideas to be implausible has not in any way diminished Freud’s influence. On the contrary, they have worked towards the further propagation of these ideas to more individuals all over the planet since the criticisms levelled at them have led to a situation where studies on them have increased in order to better understand them as well as to further develop them. It is for this reason that Freud’s ideas have continued to influence a vast part of human life and subjects including art, literature and the way people bring up their children, with the last being a very pertinent since in before the ideas of Freud became common, not much attention was given to the development of children. Many of the words which Freud coined when describing his theories have come into general use and people in the world today still use these words in their daily interaction without really knowing their origins. In addition to his well-documented contribution to the study of psychology, Freud also developed ideas concerning the treatment of mental patients as well as laying the ground for the development of psychoanalysis in the process (Herding, 2000). It is this form of analysis which was also the basis of his attempt to describe human behaviour and why it was that various human beings behaved as they did. Freud was the first to develop a model of the mind which is unrivalled to this day and he did this in an attempt to describe its various features as well as the manner in which all of these features functioned. Within the model that he created, he asserted that the conscious mind, or the human awareness, was only the tip of the iceberg and that if one were to go much deeper, he would find that there was an unconscious mind (Freud, 2003). It is the latter which contained a majority of the information within the human mind; it was the store of all the primitive impulses and desires which an individual had and these were normally kept away through the meditation of the preconscious area. Despite this being the case, Freud also believed that there were some events or impulses which individuals had that were either too painful or frightening for them to acknowledge, and these, he deduced, must be among those that were stored in the unconscious mind. The process of storing this information in the unconscious mind is what he termed as repression and it acted as a defence mechanism for the mind (Esterson & Ceci, 2006). Moreover, Freud was emphatic about the importance of the unconscious mind and this is because of his belief that it was the part of the mind which governed most of the aspects of human behaviour. In fact, he believed that it governed the behaviour of individuals to a greater extent than many people thought. It is for this reason that the ideas that he developed during psychoanalysis was to ensure that the unconscious was made conscious as a means of studying human behaviour. This method of mental analysis has more or less continued unchanged since it was developed by Freud and it is for this reason that it has remained influential to the current period, with the possibility of retaining relevance for a long time to come. The concept of the mind that consisted of id, ego and superego was developed by Freud as a means of creating an understanding of how the mind works (Morris, 1991). These are theoretical conceptualizations of the working of the mind that have remained relevant to this day and this has been mainly because of the fact that no better ideas have yet to be developed as a means of understanding the human mind. In this theory, Freud stated that the id consisted of a couple of natural instincts which were known as Eros and Thanatos, and while the former is the life instinct which helps individuals to survive, the latter was the death instinct, which was the self-destructive part of the human mind. It was Freud’s belief that the id operated in the unconscious level of the mind and that its Eros part was essential in the development of those activities which were life sustaining such as breathing, feeding, and having sexual intercourse (Stafford-Clark, 1997). Furthermore, this part of id also produced a form of energy which he called libido, and this came about as a result of the activities of Eros. Thanatos, on the other hand, is what Freud considered to be the death instinct and he believed that it consisted of all the destructive forces that all human being had. It was these forces, when directed outside the individual, which resulted in the expression of violence of aggression and that it was a means to ensure that the individual did not self-destruct. It is because of Eros being much more powerful than Thanatos that human beings were able to survive and this was as a result of the former asserting its control through the survival instinct that it was able to stifle the death instinct of the latter. According to Freud, the ego comes about during the infancy stage of human development and the goal of this aspect of mental development is to find satisfaction for the desires of the id but in a manner which is safe (Freud, 2010). While the id is mostly dominated by the instincts of the individual, the ego is dominated by reality and despite the fact that it works towards the fulfilment of the desires of the id, the ego can be said to be based on the control of these desires so that they do not get out of hand. The ego, therefore, functions not only in the unconscious level but also in the conscious level and this ensures that there is a balance between the two. The superego, on the other hand, develops during early childhood when the child comes to identify with the parent of the same sex, and this parent becomes the compass for the child’s moral development. It is the superego which is responsible for the development and upholding of moral values among individuals as a means of ensuring that they behave in a manner which is in accordance with the values and norms of the society. Moreover, it is responsible for the feelings of guilt which afflict individuals when they commit acts which go against the values of the society (Freud, 2013), and this enables them to correct their mistakes. According to Freud, there comes a time when there are conflicts between the id and the superego and when this occurs, it is normally the role of the ego to act as a mediator and to decide the best course of action that can be undertaken to solve the conflict. It is because of this that in some cases, the ego puts in place defence mechanisms which are designed to ensure that it is not overwhelmed by anxiety and this enables it to make the right decision about what to do. It has been declared that the theories brought forth by Freud, while very good at providing explanations for behaviour, are not quite good at making predictions for the possible occurrence of such behaviour. It is for this reason that there has arisen a belief that Freud’s theories are not scientific because they can neither be proven false nor true. An example of such a scenario is the determination of what takes place in the unconscious mind because of the fact that this is something which cannot be tested or measured in an objective manner (Levin, 2010). It is because of this that it is believed that the theories propagated by Freud are neither scientific nor do they have objectivity. Because of the relatively few samples that he used, it has been declared that Freud’s studies and results were unrepresentative of the general population since he mainly made studies of himself, his patients and only one child. Since most of the studies consisted of his patients, mostly women of middle age (Storr, 2001), it is difficult to determine whether the theories developed by Freud can be applied to the realities of the human mind. This has also created a situation where it is difficult to make generalizations of his results to the greater human population since his samples were based only on a specific age group and were not diversified. Despite this, there is still some evidence that show some of Freud’s theories can indeed be applied in some parts of psychological studies such as in depression and paranoia. As has been seen above, the ability of Freud’s ideas to remain relevant in the current world is mainly based on the fact that he was the first in his field to explore the numerous aspects of the psychology of individuals. In addition, Freud was the first to develop a model of the min which is unrivalled to this day and he did this in an attempt to describe its various features as well as the manner in which all of these features functioned. Moreover, the concept of the mind that consisted of id, ego and superego was developed by Freud as a means of creating an understanding of how the mind works. Furthermore, according to Freud, the ego comes about during the infancy stage of human development and the goal of this aspect of mental development is to find satisfaction for the desires of the id but in a manner which is safe. However, it has been found that the theories brought forth by Freud, while very good at providing explanations for behaviour, are not quite good at making predictions for the possible occurrence of such behaviour. References Esterson, A. & Ceci, S.J. 2006, "Freud did not anticipate modern reconstructive memory processes", Behavioral and Brain Sciences, vol. 29, no. 5, pp. 517. Ferris, P. 1999, Dr. Freud: A Life. Counterpoint. Freud, S. 2013, Totem and Taboo. London: Freud Press. Freud, S. 2010, Civilization and Its Discontents. New York, W.W. Norton. Freud, S. 2003, The Uncanny. London Penguin Books. Herding, K. 2000, "Freud's Leonardo: A discussion of recent psychoanalytic theories", American Imago, vol. 57, no. 4, pp. 339-368. Levin, C. 2010, "THE LIMINAL SMILE: ETHICS IN PSYCHOANALYSIS AND THE PROBLEM OF REGULATION", Canadian Journal of Psychoanalysis, vol. 18, no. 1, pp. 60-85,166. Morris, B. 1991, Western Conceptions of the Individual. Oxford University Press. Stafford-Clark, D. 1997, What Freud Really Said: An Introduction to His Life and Thought. Schocken. Storr, A. 2001, Freud: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Read More