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The [[distinction ]] between doubt as an [[instrument ]] of [[rational ]] [[thought ]] and pathological doubt was known to [[philosophers ]] ([[Descartes]], [[Spinoza]]) long before [[Freud]], and had long been studied as a [[symptom ]] or syndrome in [[psychiatry]]. Théodule Ribot defined doubt as "a [[conflict ]] between two tendencies in thought, incompatible and antagonistic, without any possible reconciliation, into a succession of positive and [[negative ]] judgments [[about ]] the same [[subject ]] that does not culminate in a conclusion" (1925). In his study on [[obsessional ]] [[neurosis]], Freud noted that "[a]nother [[mental ]] [[need ]] . . . [[obsessional neurotics ]] . . . is the need for uncertainty in their [[life]], or for doubt" (1909d, p. 232).

Freud first discussed doubt in his [[work ]] on [[dreams ]] where he saw it as a mark of [[resistance ]] and an indication to the [[analyst ]] of the [[significance ]] of the [[repressed ]] element to which it related. But for the most part Freud considered doubt in the context of obsessional neurosis, where it applied to events that had already occurred, and could be seen above all as an expression of [[ambivalence]], a [[repudiation ]] of the [[instinct ]] for [[mastery ]] as sublimated into an instinct for [[knowledge ]] (1913i, p. 324).

The etiology of doubt as a symptom is [[analyzed ]] at length in the [[case ]] [[history ]] of the "[[Rat Man]]" (1909d). Freud summarized it in a [[letter ]] of April 21, 1918, to Lou Andreas-Salomé: "The tendency to doubt arises not from any occasion for doubt, but is the continuation of the powerful ambivalent tendencies in the [[pregenital ]] [[phase]], which from then on become attached to every pair of opposites that [[present ]] themselves" (1966/1972, p. 77).

Obsessional thought, however, to characterize it more accurately, has [[three ]] somewhat different aspects: uncertainty, [[hesitation]], and doubt. Uncertainty can be viewed as that voluntary blurring of references, which underpins the aversion for watches, for example. Doubt, for its part, is an [[internal ]] [[perception ]] of indecision, which just like hesitation is associated with the volitional sphere, whereas uncertainty belongs to the cognitive and doubt to the [[affective]]. These three aspects do not necessarily function simultaneously, as [[witness ]] the fact that we can be certain yet unable to decide on [[action]]; at the same [[time]], action can overcome hesitation in the [[absence ]] of the slightest certainty about the reasonableness of that decision. The [[essence ]] of wisdom would be to achieve certainty before abandoning hesitation—the precise attribute obsessionals find it so hard to adopt (Mijolla-Mellor, 1992).

Apropos of the Rat Man, Freud mentions the "predilection for uncertainty" of obsessional neurotics who turn their [[thoughts ]] to "those [[subjects ]] upon which all mankind are uncertain and upon which our knowledge and judgments must necessarily remain open to doubt" (1909d, p. 232-33). This tendency extends to easily accessible knowledge, seemingly as a [[form ]] of protection against the risk of [[knowing]]. In fact the obsessive neutralizes any [[idea]], any decision, by evoking its opposite. Thus hesitation and the predilection for uncertainty constitute the cognitive aspect of the [[impossibility ]] of choosing, an attitude that serves to delay action indefinitely. The obsessive is paralyzed by ambivalence, immobilized by two [[instinctual ]] impulses directed at the same [[object]].

What is the source of this ambivalence? Since it is too general a [[concept ]] to determine the "[[choice ]] of neurosis," Freud offered a hypothesis based on constitutional factors: "The [[sadistic ]] components of [[love ]] have, from constitutional causes, been exceptionally strongly developed." And in [[terms ]] of [[individual ]] history, these "have consequently undergone a premature and all too thorough [[suppression]]" (1909d, p. 240).

Serge Leclaire (1971) has made significant contributions to our [[understanding ]] of the [[nature ]] of doubt in the obsessive individual, which he sums up rather laconically as "He doubts because he [[knows]]."

# [[Freud, Sigmund]]. (1909d). [[Notes ]] upon a case of obsessional neurosis. SE, 10: 151-318.

# Freud, Sigmund, and Andreas-Salomé, Lou. (1972). [[Sigmund Freud ]] and Lou Andreas-Salomé; letters. (Ernst Pfeiffer, Ed. and William and Elaine Robson-Scott, Trans.). New York: Harcourt Brace. (Original work published 1966)