The challenge of the oceanic feeling: Romain Rolland’s mystical critique of psychoanalysis and his call for a ‘new science of the mind’

In a letter written in 1927, the French writer Romain Rolland asked Sigmund Freud to analyse the ‘oceanic feeling,’ a religious feeling of oneness with the entire universe. I will argue that Rolland’s intentions in introducing the oceanic feeling to Freud were much more complex, multifaceted, and critical than most scholars have acknowledged. To this end, I will examine Rolland’s views on mysticism and psychoanalysis in his book-length biographies of the Indian saints Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda, which he wrote just after he mentioned the oceanic feeling to Freud in 1927. I will argue that Rolland’s primary intentions in appealing to the oceanic feeling in his 1927 letter to Freud – less evident in his letters to Freud than in his biographies of Sri Ramakrishna and Vivekananda – were to challenge the fundamental assumptions of psychoanalysis from a mystical perspective and to confront Freud with a mystical ‘science of the mind’ that he felt was more rigorous and comprehensive than Freud’s psychoanalytic science.     

Sigmund Freud und die Lauterkeit

In his carrier as physician, Sigmund Freud claimed various and surprising successes in healing patients. An evaluation of those cases in which evidence independent of Freud's publications has been discovered reveals a lifelong pattern of Freud claiming successes, patients, however, not being cured, and Freud being aware of this. The elements of this pattern are matched with the components of the legal definition of fraud.     

Eighth annual meeting of the international society for the history of the neurosciences hosting the Ninth meeting of the european club for the history of neurology JULY 7–10, 2003

Damasio (1994) claims that Descartes imagined thinking as an activity separate from the body, and that the effort to understand the mind in general biological terms was retarded as a consequence of Descartes dualism. These claims do not hold; they are Damasios error. Descartes never considered what we today call thinking or cognition without taking the body into account. His new dualism required an embodied understanding of cognition. The article gives an historical overview of the development of Descartes radically new psychology from his account of algebraic reasoning in the early Regulae (1628) to his neurobiology of rationality in the late Passions of the soul (1649). The author argues that Descartes dualism opens the way for mechanistic and mathematical explanations of all kinds of physiological and psychological phenomena, including the kind of phenomena Damasio discusses in Descartes error. The models of understanding Damasio puts forward can be seen as advanced version of models which Descartes introduced in the 1640s. A far better title for his book would have been Descartes vision.     

Heritage vs. History: Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy as a “Physician of Memory”

In a paper presented to the American Historical Association annual meeting in 1934, entitled “The Predicament of History,” Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy (1888–1973) argued that professional (or “scientific”) historians had lost touch with collective memory and were engaged in a free-floating enterprise connected to the vital past only arbitrarily or randomly. Historians should be the physicians of memory, he said. His admonitions relate closely to the stress, often discussed today, between popular heritage, or tradition and memory, on the one side, and critical history, on the other, each vying for influence and authority. Beyond his 1934 paper, Rosenstock-Huessy’s grammatical method opens the way for complementarity and balance, rather than antagonism, between the popular voice and critical history.     

Die Entdeckung des Unbewußten um 1900: Wissenschaftshistorische Anmerkungen zu Sigmund Freud

The Discovery of the Unconscious by Henri F. Ellenberger has become a common topic in the historiography of (dynamic) psychiatry. But many users of this term have still the opinion that Sigmund Freud was the unique discoverer. In reality there was a scientific context at the fin de siècle, which corresponded intensively with Freud's original concepts and formed their implications (e.g. Darwinism, Neurophysiology). Besides well-documented synchronic analogies Freud implanted diachronic traditions within his psychoanalytic theory. Especially, his main work The Interpretation of Dreams implies Greek mythology as well as natural philosophy of romanticism. Freuds special concepts like ‘transfer’ and ‘resistance’ have to be analysed as historical metaphors.     

Paracelsus and Roman censorship – Johannes Faber’s 1616 report in context

This article analyses a central episode in the response of the Catholic bodies of doctrinal control to the emergence of Paracelsianism. More specifically, it discusses the censorial report written in 1616 by the physician Johannes Faber for the Congregation for the Index about the works of Paracelsus. This report was written in a time that Paracelsianism had become increasingly popular, but also a source of fierce debates. The complex context surrounding the report is investigated, with particular attention to the broader social, religious, and scientific aspects as well as the precise historical situation in which it was written. Faber’s report and an English translation are provided in separate appendices.     

从三篇阿格西劳斯传记的差异看奈波斯与普鲁塔克对西方传记史学的贡献

由于古典学术传统中对历史与传记在体裁上的区分,奈波斯、普鲁塔克的传记往往被视为不具备史学性质的作品,而在历史研究中受到忽视。对色诺芬、奈波斯和普鲁塔克的三篇阿格西劳斯传记的比较显示,奈波斯和普鲁塔克的成果实际上代表了共和末期和帝国初期传记文学向传记史学发展过程中的过渡阶段,在传记作品的史学化过程中扮演了重要角色。他们在西方史学史上的贡献理应得到当代史学家们更多的重视。     

Poesis and Immediacy: A Reply to Davis

Abstract

It is argued here that the Christian doctrines of Trinity and creation make imperative the notion of "mediation" as God's mode of existing in himself and toward us, as well as our mode of existence in God's grace. This is the case in Saint Thomas's account of grace, and it is also the basic configuration of Sergei Bulgakov's sophiology. Josh Davis's understanding of grace, by opting for immediacy as our mode of dependence on God, ultimately fails to give a full account of human cooperation, and in so doing establishes a competitive relation between human and divine agency.     

略谈魏晋的杂传

魏晋时代是我国政治、文化发生重大变迁的时代,同时在魏晋时期史部的地位上升,摆脱了《汉书·艺文志》中经学的附属地位,而魏晋杂传的大量出现是推动史部地位上升的重要动力。杂传的产生与魏晋时代品评人物的社会风气有着密切的关联,本文主要通过分析郡书、家传、别传三种类型的杂传,来探讨杂传与当时的社会风气,尤其是士族文化之间的关系。     

韩愈、柳宗元他传性托传体式研究

唐代出现了大量文人所写的应用性传记。其中,他传性托传基本上体现史传的“有益于世”的精神,但和史传的具体写作目的截然不同,它不用拘于史传的种种体式,具有多种多样的表现形式。所以,他传性托传的突破传统史传体式,使得传统的“传”由单纯记述历史的散文发展成为极富文学艺术性的散文,从而开创了中国传记文学的新天地。     

《徐复传》版本考

徐复是北宋著名术数家,因其精通京房易数,获宋仁宗赐号“冲晦处士”。曾巩的《隆平集》、李焘的《续资治通鉴长编》、王称的《东都事略》及脱脱等着的《宋史》均收录了《徐复传》。从比较不同版本的《徐复传》,可以得出一项重要的启示,也就是《隆平集》的史书地位不但出类于宋代,更留芳于元代。     

Freud's impact on aphasiology ‐ aphasiology's impact on Freud*

Abstract

In 1891, Sigmund Freud published a book on aphasia. Although Freud's contribution to aphasiology could have been important in retrospect, it was hardly acknowledged for three quarters of a century. It may have had an impact on psychoanalytic theory, but this was not acknowledged by Freud. If there are neurological roots in psychoanalysis, they are buried by paradigmatic shifts in Freud's theory.     

胡适年谱思想略论

胡适在撰写年谱的学术活动中,就年谱体例的发展与创新、年谱的功用与价值、年谱与传记的关系等问题,形成了丰富系统的思想,并对年谱体裁的发展产生了重要影响.胡适认为年谱应该揭示谱主学问思想的变迁沿革与发展脉络,总结其学术地位与学术贡献,年谱不仅要记述谱主的成就,也可以进行评判与批评,指出他的错误与短处.胡适总体上是将年谱视为传记之一种,但也注意到年谱在内容、体例、功用等方面与一般传记又有一定的区别.     

文本话语与行为规范:西藏宗教人物传记的史学史意义

From the perspective of historical anthropology, this article examines a great deal of the biographies of religious figures in Tibetan history, reveals their special way of writing, classification, and circulation. In Tibetan Buddhism, biographies of religious figures are considered as a subject’s demise (lung-rgyun) and have their special meanings. They are the text of the largest quantity in the historical works of Tibet and had great influence on Tibetan historiography. A comprehensive research on their cultural characteristic, historical evolvement and historical influence will help us understand the Tibetan culture in depth. __________ Translated from Shixueshi Yanjiu 史学史研究 (Journal of Historiography), 2007, (4): 67–77     

Locating physical disability in Freudian and Lacanian psychoanalysis: Problems and prospects

In this paper, I use psychoanalytic theory to look at the meaning of disability within an ableist culture, and its relationship to issues of sexuality and death. I suggest that while disability has not been a central focus of psychoanalysis, it has been employed to stand in for something else, and this has had important implications for disability that have yet to be fully explored. Particular emphasis is placed on the use of disability as a 'symbolic substitute' for castration as conceived by Freud and Lacan, and the implications of this formulation for the cultural construction of disabled bodies as lacking. While there is cause for continued caution with respect to this theoretical tradition, psychoanalysis offers important insight into the complex origins of 'aesthetic anxieties' that surround disability within ableist culture, and the way in which these emotions are implicated in the geographic exclusion of 'different' bodies. In particular, psychoanalysis helps to demonstrate the illusory nature of the 'able-body' as a key source of oppression.     

颜延之行实与诗文作年新考

缪钺《颜延之年谱》历史资料翔实,是我们研究颜延之生平的重要参考资料,具有很高的学术价值。今在《颜延之年谱》基础上进一步确定其出仕时间,补充奉使入关行迹及时间;考订《请立浑天仪表》等4篇诗文的写作时间。     

Beyond Consumption: Functionality, Artifact Biography, and Early Modernity in a European Periphery

This paper considers the functionality and biographies of artifacts in the context of historical archaeology. It is argued that in order to understand how human life in the recent past unfolded in relation with material culture, artifacts must be recognized to perform various unobvious functions and also be conceived as processes rather than bounded physical objects. The paper begins with a theoretical discussion and then focuses on the post-acquisition life of artifacts and human-artifact relations in the seventeenth-century town of Tornio, northern Finland.