Difference between revisions of "Beyond the Pleasure Principle"

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'''''Beyond the Pleasure Principle''''' (first published in [[German language|German]] in [[1920]] as '''''Jenseits des Lustprinzips''''') is an essay by [[Sigmund Freud]]. It marked a turning point and a major modification of his previous theoretical approach. Before this essay, Freud was understood to have placed the sexual instinct, [[Eros (Freud)|Eros]], or the [[libido]], centre stage, in explaining the forces which drive us to act. In 1920, going "beyond" the simple [[pleasure principle (psychology)|pleasure principle]], Freud developed his theory of [[drive (psychology)|drive]]s, by adding [[Thanatos (Freud)|Thanatos]], also known as the [[death instinct]].
 
  
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The main importance of the essay resides in the striking picture of human being, struggling between two opposing instincts or drives: [[Eros]] working for creativity, harmony, sexual connection, reproduction, and self-preservation; Thanatos for destruction, repetition, aggression, compulsion, and self-destruction.
 
  
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In sections IV and V Freud posits that the process which cause cell death at a microscopic level might have developed in order to give human beings a death instinct as individuals. This theory has generally been discredited.
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In ''[[Beyond the Pleasure Principle]] [[Freud]] revised his earlier [[theory]] of the [[drives]] which asserted the primacy of the [[pleasure principle]], that is to say, the theory that our primary motivation as [[human]] beings is the fulfilment of [[pleasure]] or [[desire]].
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[[Clinical]] [[experience]] revealed to Freud that [[subjects]] compulsively repeated painful or [[traumatic]] experiences in direct [[contradiction]] to the primacy of the pleasure [[principle]].
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Freud called this beyond of pleasure 'the [[death]] [[drive]]' and suggested that the primary [[purpose]] of [[life]] is to find the correct path to death.
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[[Lacan]] followed Freud in associating the [[death drive]] with [[repetition]], but he argued that we are not driven towards death but by death.  
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It is [[loss]] that drives life through desire but, human beings will settle for any experience, however painful, rather than fall out of the familiarity of the [[symbolic]] into the [[trauma]] and [[void]] of the [[real]].
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[[Category:Freudian psychology]]
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[[Category:Sigmund Freud]]
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[[Category:Works]]
  
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Freud also took the opportunity to state the basic differences, as he saw them, between his approach and that of [[Carl Jung]], and covered the history so far of research into the basic drives (Section VI).
 
  
 
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Latest revision as of 21:01, 23 May 2019


In Beyond the Pleasure Principle Freud revised his earlier theory of the drives which asserted the primacy of the pleasure principle, that is to say, the theory that our primary motivation as human beings is the fulfilment of pleasure or desire.

Clinical experience revealed to Freud that subjects compulsively repeated painful or traumatic experiences in direct contradiction to the primacy of the pleasure principle.

Freud called this beyond of pleasure 'the death drive' and suggested that the primary purpose of life is to find the correct path to death.

Lacan followed Freud in associating the death drive with repetition, but he argued that we are not driven towards death but by death.

It is loss that drives life through desire but, human beings will settle for any experience, however painful, rather than fall out of the familiarity of the symbolic into the trauma and void of the real.

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