Social networking technologies have become a ubiquitous framework for social interaction, serving to organise much of the individual’s social life. Such technological structuring affects not merely the individual’s psyche (as a psychotechnics), it also affects broader aspects of society (as a socio-technics). While social networking technologies may serve to transform society in positive ways, such technologies also have the potential to significantly encroach upon and (re) construct individual and cultural meaning in ways that must be investigated. Erich Fromm, who psychoanalytically (...) describes humans as a product of their society and the economic systems within that society, may provide insight into the influence of social networking technologies in contemporary society. He sees the relationship between the individual and society as being in a constant state of dynamic change. Utilising Fromm’s psycho-societal insight, social networking technologies are shown to conflate and confuse the relation between Thanatos and Eros – the Thanatos of a lifeless and consumerist agenda-filled mechanisation, and the Eros associated with social engagement. Thanatos and Eros are tied together via social networking technologies. This results in, firstly, social networking technologies functioning predominantly to further capitalist agendas through the monetisation of these technologies – particularly in terms of linking commodity fetishism and the foundational social drive of the individual. Secondly, social networking technologies mechanise human action according to predictable behavioural paths through the use of these technologies, especially in terms of how socialisation is possible via these technologies (shaping how platonic and romantic relationships may take place in the contemporary world). Such a mechanisation of interpersonal engagement contrasts with Erich Fromm’s assertion that interpersonal relations (vis-à-vis love) are not “mere emotion”, but rather represent an interpersonal creative capacity and interplay. Fromm’s psycho-societal insights will show how contemporary individuals may take independent and responsible rational action to establish accountable and psychologically beneficial ways of engaging with others through social networking technologies. (shrink)

Cette étude vise à mettre en lumière l’ambivalence de la machine dans la fiction romanesque de Jarry. La machine y est à la fois exploitée comme instrument de la satisfaction du désir humain et envisagée dans ses potentialités destructrices. Cette ambivalence fournit la trame de la narration, principalement articulée autour de deux dispositifs mécaniques imaginaires qui servent ici à une expérimentation, sur le plan littéraire, des limites de l’humain.

If Panentheism’s core thesis, that God is in the world, is to animate a spiritual approach to life, then we have to account for the way in which God is in the destructive or thanative dimensions of life. From the perspective of evolutionary ecology the universe is imbued with creative and destructive energies. The creative drive can be termed eros as creation occurs through the expansion of relational unities, holons. The destructive drive is termed thanatos and is the drive (...) to sever connection. An argument is developed from the perspective of evolutionary ecology to show how thanatos serves eros, serves the evolutionary unfolding of higher orders of communion. I suggest there are healthy and pathological expressions of the thanative drive. God within the thanative invites us to embrace the transformative potentials of suffering by integrating thanatos-in-eros. God as eros invites us to develop expanded modes of connection, inter-subjectivity and communion. (shrink)

Dans la correspondance de Fénelon à Madame Guyon. Éros, force motrice qui vise la jouissance de la création, dialogue intimement avec l’ascétisme de la pulsion de mort – Thanatos. Cette polarité est en effet requise par le quiétisme. Il s’agit de parvenir à l’extrémité de Thanatos (« la faiblesse de l’homme » - son anéantissement), pour ensuite, entrevoir Éros (« l’espérance la plus folle » - l’union en Dieu). Le corpus de lettres structuré thématiquement autour de cette gageure (...) de l’ « union » dans la « mort », nous fournit donc l’occasion d’explorer la genèse des enjeux les plus radicaux de l’écriture fénelonienne dans son rapport contradictoire aux pulsions et leur manifestation stylistique principale : la répétition. C’est dans ce corpus que Fénelon évoque sa fameuse « sécheresse », celle qui fait de lui « un bateau qui n’a ni rames ni voiles », et qui a été depuis rapprochée de la pulsion de mort. Par l’intimité, voire le « secret » qu’elles révèlent, ainsi que leur datation entre 1689 et 1690, ces missives constituent un moyen de sonder les origines du lien entre mystique, psychanalyse et stylistique dans l’œuvre de Fénelon. Elles nous apprennent que dans cette relation épistolaire vécue et narrée comme exceptionnelle, la pulsion de vie trouve un point d’ancrage et, partant, la valeur littéraire des répétitions s’en trouve amoindri. Si les redondances expriment toujours la puissance du dogme du pur amour ou pulsion de mort - que les correspondants ne cessent de gloser, la pulsion de vie ne s’exprime que peu, tarie par les aveux d’amour en je-pense-à-toi et je-t-aime. Dans ces aveux, Fénelon scelle définitivement le mariage d’Eros et de Thanatos à travers l’expression « mourir d’envie ». Une fois ce mariage prononcé, l’écriture n’a plus lieu d’être et s’interrompt. (shrink)

Freud speculated that the course all living beings travel from birth to death is determined by a contest between a life instinct (Eros) and a death instinct (Thanatos). He believed that instinctual repression required by civilization tended to strengthen Thanatos. Herbert Marcuse argued that civilization did not require quite as much repression as Freud assumed. This joyous suggestion was greeted with enthusiasm by the countercultural political movements of the 1960s. I ask whether Marcuse was overly optimistic, given the (...) fact that humanity appears to be hell-bent on destroying itself due to its inability to deal with global warming. (shrink)

Partindo da segunda tópica freudiana, assinalaremos a ação triunfante de _Thanatos _através da _repetição, _da _morte _e da _agressividade _pulsionais. Falaremos do novo dualismo pulsional_, _reconhecendo na _morte _um impulso silencioso que, contrariando _Eros, _atua como fundo não-figurável, dispersivo e estruturante do psiquismo. Se outrora Freud pautou-se pela conservação da vida, é atentando ao problema da _repetição_ que dá lugar ao vazio e ao caos pulsionais, teorizando sobre o impulso ao estado de não-vida: a _pulsão de morte_. Sendo a meta (...) não-prognosticável dos nossos investimentos, esta é a dimensão da teoria freudiana que nos faz querer-morrer e que, no âmbito do mal-estar na cultura, personifica a potência _agressiva, _pela qual assumimos, diante de _Eros, _o total triunfo de _Thanatos_. Como potência de transvaloração, defenderemos que _Thanatos _presentifica o limite do discurso falado e dos saberes instituídos por _Eros, _pela civilização e pela lógica determinista dos prazeres. (shrink)

In examining Judith Butler's treatment of Spinoza insofar as it reflects the tenacity of a commitment to the need to "honor the death drive," a need often justified by the ethical and political resources it provides, this essay asks about the basis of this need for feminist theory. From whence does it come? What ethical and political work does a primary vigilance toward our destructive and death-bent urges do? Thus, I begin with a review of Butler's treatment of Spinoza, and (...) proceed to make some suggestions about what motivates her creative appropriation of his principle of conatus. Finally, without demanding that Butler represent Spinoza's philosophy accurately, I propose that Spinoza's philosophy allows a very strong acknowledgment of destruction, including self-destruction, without conceding the necessity of an ethics or politics of anxiety. Like Butler, and perhaps even more radically, Spinoza insists upon our opacity to ourselves, our irreducible and original multiplicity and constitutive relationality, as well as the inability finally to demarcate the boundaries of the self. Yet his ethics culminates in what he calls a "remedy for the affects," in an endeavor to displace and minimize sad passions, like anxiety. In concluding, the question for feminist theory remains: Which are the best fictions, models of selfhood, and modes of speculation for the displacement of anxiety, aggression, and the passions that trigger violence agianst ourselves and others in a misogynist, homophobic, and racist culture? If I am not able to answer these questions in the course of this brief essay, I hope to underline the importance of asking them. (shrink)

In this article, the author discusses the thesis that Freudo-Lacanian psychoanalysis proposes a radical split between man and animal, and argues that this split is closely connected to the drive. Arguments for this thesis are found in the works of Freud and Lacan. According to Freud, the inner traumatic pressure (‘Drang’) of the drive becomes from its first occurrence associated with the figure of the external Other. From this Other, an answer or representation is expected. Two central problems regarding the (...) drive are discussed, the representation problem and the problem of aim. The representation problem relates to the unbridgeable gap between the real of the drive and the symbolic presence of the Other. The problem of aim concerns the contradictory intention inherent in the drive. Freud found that two tendencies are working at the same time. One is striving towards complete separation and the other strives to undo the separation. This brought him to formulate a dualism in his drive theory: the relationship between Thanatos and Eros. This dualism explains why the drive remains ever unsatisfied: once one aim is reached the possibility of reaching the other is lost, and vice versa. As a conclusion, Lacan's main ideas on this subject are mentioned. The double and contradictory aim of the drive is traced back to a double lack. A primordial lack is situated in the Real, since eternal life is lost. Within humans, attempts to undo this loss lead to a second (Symbolic) lack. The original lack is thereby re-written as a phallic lack in the relation between subject and Other. As a consequence the primordial loss is confirmed on a different and more distant level. The result is a circular, non-reciprocal relationship ‘qui ne cesse pas de ne pas s'écrire’. The missing link between man and nature remains missing. (shrink)

My main purpose in this article is to establish the meaning of a ‘good death’ when death is self-chosen. I will take as my point of departure the new notion of ‘self-euthanasia’ and the corresponding practice that has evolved in the Netherlands in recent years. Both physician-euthanasia and self-euthanasia refer to an ideal process of a good death, the first being ultimately the physician's responsibility, while the second is definitely the responsibility of the individual choosing to die. However, if we (...) also accept the existence of a fundamental moral difference between ending another person's life and ending your own life, and if we accept this moral difference to be also relevant to the normatively laden good death, then this difference represents a strong reason for preferring self-euthanasia to physician-euthanasia. (shrink)

El contexto de la crisis sanitaria por la Covid-19 ha exigido una profunda reflexión sobre el presente que vivimos. Una de las propuestas es asumir este momento como una “coronacrisis”, entendida como una categoría para significar cómo la pandemia exacerba la crisis multifacética de la civilización capitalista occidental en su era neoliberal; lo que ha puesto al desnudo la dialéctica de la muerte y la vida, posicionada en el centro de la lucha contra la negritud. Las consecuencias de la pandemia (...) rápidamente se analizaron desde los códigos de la blancura. En este artículo proponemos un acercamiento a este fenómeno, desde la zona del no ser de la herencia afro de nuestro continente. Situándonos en este momento de la enunciación, no sólo se abre la oportunidad de una mayor comprensión de lo vivido hasta ahora, sino que, de igual manera, podemos buscar y encontrar salidas a dicha crisis. (shrink)

In continuation with my on-going research and presentations on sport as a field of channeling and externalizing cruelty and violence, as a field of transfiguration of drives, in this paper I will examine instincts, drives and sublimation in Freud and post-Freudian psychoanalytic literature within the context of sports. Freud was influenced by Nietzsche on his drive theory; however, in Freud it assumes a specific meaning and finds its place within the context of his overall psychoanalytic work, especially in relation to (...) his second topology of the human psyche that consists of id, ego and superego and his theory of sublimation. Ultimately, Freud reduces all drives to Eros and Thanatos and explains their workings in relation to the constitution of the psyche. Sublimation has a direct correlation to drives, which is a culture/individual specific way of treating and channeling drives; sublimation also has much to do with suffering and how we deal with suffering (and other emotions as I discuss in my book, Emotion in Sports). What I would like to explore in this paper is to understand in what ways sport is a form of sublimation and how sport may address the subject of drives, both Eros and Thanatos. Since Freud sees both of these drives as bound together in many contexts, does sport constitute one of those areas? What type of psychic constitution does the sporting culture assume? Or, to put it differently, what are the dynamic relations of the different parts of the human psyche, the id, the ego and the superego, in the practice of sport and in the community of sports? Here and elsewhere, in agreement with Jung, I will include discussion of ‘collective unconscious’, as I explore the significance of symbols of sport in the life of individuals and cultures. (shrink)

In Eros and Civilization, Marcuse claims that the two fundamental drives of civilization, namely, Eros and Thanatos, may eventually be reconciled. Such reconciliation, Marcuse contends, could potentially lead to new, utopian possibilities for humankind. However, Marcuse’s argument is deeply flawed: he equates time with death and therefore only defeats a straw man. Thus, it may be argued that Marcuse’s entire project in Eros and Civilization not only remains incomplete, but indeed fails. In the following paper, I demonstrate—by relying on (...) Heidegger’s understanding of temporality in Being and Time—that it may still be possible to reconcile Eros and temporality after all. I conclude that Marcuse’s project may still be viable, but only by reconciling time with Eros, and not death. (shrink)

Modern medicine has done much in the fields of infectious diseases and emergencies to aid cure. In most other fields, it is mostly control that it aims for, which is another name for palliation. Pharmacology, psychopharmacology included, is mostly directed towards such control and palliation too. The thrust, both of clinicians and research, must now turn decisively towards prevention and cure. Also, longevity with well-being is modern medicine's other big challenge. Advances in vaccines for hypertension, diabetes, cancers etc, deserve attention; (...) as also, the role of meditation, yoga, spirituality etc in preventing disease at various levels. Studies on longevity, life style changes and healthy centenarians deserve special scrutiny to find what aids longevity with wellbeing. A close look at complementary and alternative medicine is needed to find any suitable models they may have, cutting aside their big talk and/or hostility towards mainstream medical care. Medicine is a manifestation of the human eros, and should not become a means of its thanatos. It must realise its true potential, so that eros prevails, and thanatos prevails only ultimately, not prematurely. (shrink)

By concentrating on abortion, the culture wars have avoided facing a crisis about the end of life. This paper explores four themes: (1) the technological transformation of birth and death into matters of decision, not matters of fact; (2) abortion as the nexus of Eros (sex) with Thanatos (death); (3) the real crisis, conveniently masked by our obsession with sex, looming at the end of life, not at its beginning; (4) the surplus-repression that protects us from assuming responsibility for (...) choosing between life and death. (shrink)

Partindo de O Mal-Estar na Civilização (1930), advogaremos que, se não há nada na cultura que não garanta nossa ruina, nosso destino reside num indefinível e persistente mal-estar. Problematizando incógnitas como a felicidade, a inibição pulsional, a destrutividade como variante da pulsão de morte, o sentimento de culpa, a hegemonia do Super-Eu e o triunfo de Thanatos, veremos que Freud não vislumbra possibilidades de anular a situação de desamparo em que nos encontramos. Sendo a agressividade uma de nossas fontes (...) propulsoras, acentuaremos não só o desejo de extermínio de tudo e todos, mas o quanto a cultura leva-nos a renunciar da satisfação ao propor uma seguridade que jamais garantirá. Da falta de comunhão entre indivíduo e sociedade, a ação de Thanatos revela que a civilização está minada por dentro. Portanto, veremos que o mal-estar é um fator inerente à civilização, sendo ilustrativo do atual destino da subjetividade. (shrink)

Freud introduces his dualistic theory of the life and death drives in Beyond the Pleasure Principle. Much of that essay is devoted to the justification of the death drive, while little is said in defense of the introduction of “life drives” and “Eros,” which he claims are simply an extension of his libido theory from the psychological into the biological realm. In this essay, I argue that Eros is, on the contrary, fundamentally incompatible with Freud’s metapsychology. I first show that (...) Freud’s theory of society permits the production and preservation of social bonds only through the restraint of sexual aims rather than, as the theory of Eros would require, through the satisfaction of sexual drives. I then demonstrate that Eros is incompatible with three key elements of Freud’s metapsychology: the theories of the drives, the pleasure principle, and the principle of constancy. Finally, I argue that the death drive is indistinguishable from the early and late theories of the principle of constancy. Consequently, it is the death drive, and not Eros, that is merely an extension of the original libido theory. Because Eros is incompatible with the very foundations of Freud’s metapsychology, his drive theory can only consistently be interpreted as a monism of the death drive. (shrink)

In psychoanalytic theory, the notion of the person inevitably evokes the notion of subjectivity. Not that the former can be reduced to the latter; but if psychoanalytic theory is anything more a certain type of therapeutic practice, it is indeed a theory of the subject or a theory of the subjective relation. We should perhaps begin by specifying that the subjective relation must be understood as a complex whole: an intrapsychic relation, that is, a relation between the various instances that (...) make up the subject, and at the same time an inter subjective relation, that is, a relation between (at least) two subjects. These two aspects are both inseparable and conflictual. They are inseparable because the self cannot exist, cannot construct itself without the other (whether this be a parental other or a peer). They are conflictual for at least two reasons. On the one hand, because the intrapsychic relation is by definition an arena of conflict: the conflict that opposes the Ego to the contradictory but equally tyrannical demands of the Id - which translates its attachment to the body and testifies to its inherent drives - and of the Superego, which represents its rootedness in the social and cultural sphere. And on the other hand, because this subject, which is thus divided within itself, must undergo the trial of bringing its desire face to face with the desire of the others with whom it is destined to live. The psychoanalytic theory of the subject is therefore the theory of a doubly heterogeneous relation: there is the heterogeneity of the components of the self, which go, once again, from their anchorage in somatic drives to the most ethereal expressions of the ideal; and there is the heterogeneity of the relation between this self and the self of the other. Moreover, this double heterogeneity is not limited to the matter of components: after all, these, one might think, would ideally be open to reabsorption into the homogeneity of the individual. On the contrary, this heterogeneity gives rise to a double rationality or double logic. Psychic causality - to borrow André Green's expression - is also driven by the conflict that opposes what in psychoanalysis are known as the primary processes, which Freud has described in chapter 7 of the Traumdeutung and which govern the formation and organization of the dream images, to the secondary processes, which are those processes that govern our daytime thoughts. Psychic causality is formed by the struggle for hegemony between these two logics, each of which is itself acted upon by an antagonism between what Freud, at the end of his life, called Eros and Thanatos, the urge for Life and the drive toward death or destruction. (shrink)

Les tomes 1 et 2 qui rassemblent une trentaine d'articles le premier, rdition d'un livre qui avait inaugur la Collection d'Esthtique en 1967 sont l'oeuvre d'un philosophe qui a dcouvert dans l'esthtique une voie privilgie vers une philosophie de la nature. Mikel Dufrenne y explore des thmes qui hantent la rflexion contemporaine sur l'art: l'art comme [non-]langage, l'oeuvre comme objet ou vnement, l'criture et le style, le jeu, la perception sauvage, le retour vers l'originaire. Chemin faisant, il rencontre les appareils (...) conceptuels en vogue: structuralisme, smiologie, psychanalyse, marxisme; il en use, mais avec rserve, sans se laisser sduire ou terroriser; et c'est en solitaire qu'il poursuit sa route, sans moyens, sans pouvoir. Mais il ne s'y sent pas seul: une esthtique non dogmatique dbouche sur le politique, et il veut tre l'cho de tous ceux qui en appellent un art autre, libr et librateur, joyeux, et qui rvent que la pratique de cet art contribue faire la vie autre dans un monde autre. Mikel Dufrenne n'est pas un philosophe triste. Si vous prfrez Thanatos Eros, ne le lisez pas! (shrink)

Dr. R. Michael Fisher came across Ken Wilber's published work in 1982 and has ever since been a learner and critic of it. In this video he shares both his love of many aspects of Wilber's work and a few critiques that particularly focus on Conflict and Fear. He invites people to respond and also ask questions, and if enough of these are offered, he'll created another video on the topic and respond to your questions and concerns. If you'd rather (...) talk directly: r.michaelfisher52 [at] g[mail].com p.s. Phobos-Thanatos is what Wilber also articulates, again based on adaptation from Plotinus, as this never got into this video; likewise, it was missed that there are post-Integral levels of consciousness as well, beyond where Wilber writes from and where I work from... so, the "spectrum" is vast, at least 9-10 levels and "Integral" is only level 7 in this schema... (shrink)