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[[Freud]]'s [[terms ]] "primary [[process]]" and "[[secondary process]]" designate two opposed yet nevertheless complementary modes of functioning within the [[psychic ]] [[apparatus]]. The primary [[processes]], directly animated by the [[drives]], serve the [[pleasure ]] [[principle ]] and [[work ]] to actualize a free flow of psychic [[energy]]. Secondary processes, which presuppose the binding of this energy, intervene as a [[system ]] of [[control ]] and regulation in the service of the [[reality ]] principle. [[Psychical ]] [[life ]] is entirely regulated by the equilibrium between these two types of processes, which varies between [[subjects ]] and at different points in [[time]].

Freud raises the prospect of this fundamental [[duality ]] as early as his "[[Project ]] for a [[Scientific ]] [[Psychology]]" (1950c [1895c]), where an entire paragraph is devoted to the [[complete ]] [[enunciation ]] of a [[schema ]] that he would refine over the decades to come. Briefly put, [[desire ]] or the [[wish ]] (le [[désir]]) unleashes a process of [[discharge]]. But since in this "precocious [[phase]]" the [[psychic apparatus ]] is not capable of distinguishing between the [[representation ]] of a [[missing ]] [[object ]] and its [[perception ]] in reality, the fulfillment of the wish is therefore [[hallucinatory ]] and "requires a criterion from elsewhere in [[order ]] to distinguish between perception and [[idea]]." This mode of functioning may be "[[biologically ]] detrimental"—a regulation therefore intervenes which makes it possible for the [[psyche ]] to "distinguish between a perception and a [[memory ]] (idea)" (p. 324-325) by deferring hallucinatory [[satisfaction]]. Thus "wishful [[cathexis ]] to the point of [[hallucination ]] . . . which involve a complete expenditure of [[defense ]] are described by us as psychical primary processes; by contrast, those processes which are only made possible by a [[good ]] cathexis of the ego, and which [[represent ]] a moderation of the foregoing, are described as secondary psychical processes" (p. 326-327).

This [[statement ]] is made from within the framework of Freud's attempt to account for psychic functioning on the basis of an [[economic ]] hypothesis, that is to say by positing the [[existence ]] of a specific energy, and, in neurobiological terms, by distinguishing between different types of neurons, and considering the circuits through which this energy circulates between [[them]]. He will quickly reject the second hypothesis, but the first will remain central, in that the energy in question, henceforth psychical, is to be re-baptized "[[libido]]," and is given a major application in the [[case ]] of the [[dream ]] work, which is conceived from the first as an actualization of desire that transforms [[latent ]] [[thoughts ]] into dream [[images]]. "The intensities of the [[individual ]] [[ideas ]] become capable of discharge en bloc and [[pass ]] over from one idea to [[another]]" (1900a, p. 595). Either in mutual [[displacement]], or agglomeration via [[condensation]], this play of unbound energy is characteristic of the primary processes of the dream: "The first wishing seems to have been a hallucinatory cathecting of the memory of satisfaction. Such [[hallucinations]], however, if they were not to be maintained to the point of exhaustion, proved to be inadequate to bring [[about ]] the cessation of the [[need]], or, accordingly, the pleasure attaching to satisfaction. A second activity—or, as we put it, the [[activity ]] of a second system became necessary . . ." (p. 598-599). Whereas the activity of the first system, that of the primary processes, is "directed towards securing the free discharge of the quantities of [[excitation]]," the second system, that of secondary processes, "succeeds in inhibiting this discharge" (p. 599).

The influence of Jacksonian theses defining the neuropsychic apparatus as a hierarchical system of regulating and regulated [[structures ]] is [[apparent ]] in this kind of conceptualization. What is also apparent here is Freud taking sides against the positions held by both Josef [[Breuer ]] and Pierre Janet simultaneously, in that both only tended to account for the weakening of psychical functioning in the cases of hypnoid states or when the [[mental ]] tonus had been reduced. According to Freud, it is ever indispensable to take an equilibrium between antagonistic forces into account.

This conception is at one and the same time both [[synchronic ]] and [[diachronic ]] or, in [[other ]] terms, both [[structural ]] and [[developmental]]. This is seen clearly in Freud's commentary on the terms he chooses to designate this opposition-complementarity: "When I described one of the psychical processes occurring in the mental apparatus as the 'primary' one, what I had in [[mind ]] was not merely considerations of relative importance and efficiency; I intended also to choose a [[name ]] which would give an indication of its [[chronological ]] priority. It is [[true ]] that, so far as we [[know]], no [[psychical apparatus ]] [[exists ]] which possesses a [[primary process ]] only, and that such an apparatus is to that extent a [[theoretical ]] [[fiction]]. But this much is a fact: the primary processes are [[present ]] in the mental apparatus from the first, while it is only during the course of life that the secondary processes unfold" (1900a, p. 603).

Specifying the opposition between the [[pleasure principle ]] and the [[reality principle]], whereby he posits the pleasure principle as temporally primary, Freud would later write: "It will be rightly objected that an organization which was a [[slave ]] to the pleasure principle and neglected the reality of the [[external ]] [[world ]] could not maintain itself alive for the shortest time, so that it could not have come into existence at all." His answer which followed was to constitute the keystone of the contemporary [[development ]] of theories of psychogenesis in their entirety, by bringing the [[mother]]-[[child ]] [[relationship ]] into consideration: "The utilization of a fiction like this is, however, justified when on considers that the infant—provided one includes with it the care it receives from its mother—does almost realize a psychical system of this kind" (p. 603).

The opposition-complementarity of the primary and secondary processes was therefore described first by Freud in economic terms. However he also accords it a [[topological ]] [[dimension]]. In "The [[Unconscious]]" (1915e), he specifies that the [[Preconscious ]] is the locus of the secondary processes and their regulating function over the primary processes characteristic of the Unconscious. It is this regulation that binds the cathectic energy used for representations, and therefore makes possible the development of [[thought]], which occurs via the passage from [[thing]]-representations to [[word]]-representations. Indeed the work of thought, which functions via the "displacement of small quantities of energy" requires that the representations upon which it is based remain [[stable ]] and distinct. This would not be possible if the free flow of energy, and the condensations and displacements characteristic of the primary processes, prevailed.

See also: Act, passage to the; Condensation; [[Contradiction]]; Displacement; Dream; Dream [[symbolism]]; [[Dream work]]; [[Free energy]]/bound energy; Fusion/defusion of [[instincts]]; [[Logic]](s); Perceptual [[identity]]; Process; "Project for a Scientific Psychology, A"; [[Regression]]; Representability; Secondary revision; [[Memories]]; Thought identity; "Unconscious, The".[[Bibliography]]