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Unconscious mind
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== Historical overview == === German === The term "unconscious" ({{langx|de|unbewusst}}) was coined by the 18th-century German Romantic philosopher Friedrich Schelling (in his ''[[System of Transcendental Idealism]]'', [http://www.zeno.org/Philosophie/M/Schelling,+Friedrich+Wilhelm+Joseph/System+des+transzendenten+Idealismus/6.+Hauptabschnitt.+Deduktion+eines+allgemeinen+Organs+der+Philosophie,+oder+Haupts%C3%A4tze+der+Philosophie+der+Kunst+nach+Grunds%C3%A4tzen+des+transzendentalen+Idealismus/%C2%A7+3.+Folges%C3%A4tze ch. 6, § 3]) and later introduced into English by the poet and essayist Samuel Taylor Coleridge (in his ''[[Biographia Literaria]]'').<ref name="Macmillan">{{cite book |editor1=W. F. Bynum |title=Dictionary of the History of Science |editor2=E. J. Browne |editor3=R. Porter |year=1981 |location=London |publisher=Macmillan |page=292 |editor-link3=Roy Porter}}</ref><ref name="Murray">Murray, Christopher John. ''Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760-1850''. Taylor & Francis, 2004: {{ISBN|1-57958-422-5}}, pp. 1001–1002.</ref> Some rare earlier instances of the term "unconsciousness" (''{{lang|De|Unbewußtseyn}}'') can be found in the work of the 18th-century German physician and philosopher [[Ernst Platner]].<ref>Platner, Ernst. [https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_4748AAAAYAAJ ''Philosophische Aphorismen nebst einigen Anleitungen zur philosophischen Geschichte''], Vol. 1 (Leipzig: Schwickertscher Verlag, 1793 [1776]), p. 86.</ref><ref>Nicholls, Angus and Martin Liebscher (2010). [https://books.google.com/books/about/Thinking_the_Unconscious.html?id=MCJzE-SxDUgC ''Thinking the Unconscious: Nineteenth-Century German Thought''.] Cambridge University Press, p. 9.</ref> === Vedas === Influences on thinking that originate from outside an individual's consciousness were reflected in the ancient ideas of temptation, divine inspiration, and the predominant role of the gods in affecting motives and actions. The idea of internalised unconscious processes in the mind was present in antiquity, and has been explored across a wide variety of cultures. Unconscious aspects of mentality were referred to between 2,500 and 600 BC in the Hindu texts known as the [[Vedas]], found today in [[Ayurveda|Ayurvedic]] medicine.<ref>Alexander, C. N. (1990). "Growth of Higher Stages of Consciousness: Maharishi's Vedic Psychology of Human Development". C. N. Alexander and E. J. Langer (eds.). ''Higher Stages of Human Development. Perspectives on Human Growth''. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press.</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Meyer-Dinkgräfe, D. |title=Consciousness and the Actor. A Reassessment of Western and Indian Approaches to the Actor's Emotional Involvement from the Perspective of Vedic Psychology |publisher=Peter Lang |year=1996 |isbn=978-0-8204-3180-2 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |author=Haney, W. S. II |title=Unity in Vedic aesthetics: the self-interac, the known, and the process of knowing |journal=Analecta Husserliana and Western Psychology: A Comparison' 1934}}</ref> === Paracelsus === [[Paracelsus]] is credited as the first to make mention of an unconscious aspect of cognition in his work ''Von den Krankheiten'' (translates as "About illnesses", 1567), and his clinical methodology created a cogent system that is regarded by some as the beginning of modern scientific psychology.<ref>Harms, Ernest., ''Origins of Modern Psychiatry'', Thomas 1967 ASIN: B000NR852U, p. 20.</ref> === Shakespeare === [[William Shakespeare]] explored the role of the unconscious<ref>The Design Within: Psychoanalytic Approaches to Shakespeare: Edited by M. D. Faber. New York: Science House. 1970 An anthology of 33 papers on Shakespearean plays by psychoanalysts and literary critics whose work has been influenced by psychoanalysis.</ref> in many of his plays, without naming it as such.<ref>Meyer-Dinkgräfe, Daniel "Hamlet's Procrastination: A Parallel to the Bhagavad-Gita, in Hamlet East West, edited by. Marta Gibinska and Jerzy Limon. Gdansk: Theatrum Gedanese Foundation, 1998e, pp. 187-195.</ref><ref>Meyer-Dinkgräfe, Daniel 'Consciousness and the Actor: A Reassessment of Western and Indian Approaches to the Actor's Emotional Involvement from the Perspective of Vedic Psychology.' Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1996a. (Series 30: Theatre, Film and Television, Vol. 67).</ref><ref>{{cite journal |author=Yarrow, Ralph |title=Identity and Consciousness East and West: the case of Russell Hoban |journal=Journal of Literature & Aesthetics |volume=5 |issue=2 |pages=19–26 |date=July–December 1997 }}</ref> === Philosophy === In his work ''Anthropology'', philosopher [[Immanuel Kant]] was one of the first to discuss the subject of unconscious ideas.<ref>{{cite book | last=von Hartmann | first=Eduard | authorlink = Eduard von Hartmann | title=Philosophy of the unconscious: Speculative results according to the inductive method of physical science, Vol 1 (2nd ed.). | chapter=General preliminary observations. | publisher=Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Company | publication-place=London | date=1893 | pages=1–42 | doi=10.1037/12947-001 }}</ref> Western philosophers such as [[Arthur Schopenhauer]],<ref>[[Henri Ellenberger|Ellenberger, H.]] (1970) ''[[The Discovery of the Unconscious: The History and Evolution of Dynamic Psychiatry]]'' New York: Basic Books, p. 542.</ref><ref>Young, Christopher and Brook, Andrew (1994) [http://http-server.carleton.ca/~abrook/SCHOPENY.htm ''Schopenhauer and Freud''] quotation: {{quotation|Ellenberger, in his classic 1970 history of dynamic psychology. He remarks on Schopenhauer's psychological doctrines several times, crediting him for example with recognizing parapraxes, and urges that Schopenhauer "was definitely among the ancestors of modern dynamic psychiatry." (1970, p. 205). He also cites with approval Foerster's interesting claim that "no one should deal with psychoanalysis before having thoroughly studied Schopenhauer." (1970, p. 542). In general, he views Schopenhauer as the first and most important of the many nineteenth-century philosophers of the unconscious, and concludes that "there cannot be the slightest doubt that Freud's thought echoes theirs." (1970, p. 542). }}</ref> [[Baruch Spinoza]], [[Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz]],<ref>{{cite book | last=Hendrix | first=John Shannon | authorlink=John Shannon Hendrix | title=Unconscious Thought in Philosophy and Psychoanalysis | chapter=Unconscious Thought in the Philosophy of Immanuel Kant | publisher=Palgrave Macmillan UK | publication-place=London | date=2015 | isbn=978-1-349-57968-6 | doi=10.1057/9781137538130_6 | pages=148–178}}</ref> [[Johann Gottlieb Fichte]], [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel]], [[Karl Robert Eduard von Hartmann]], [[Carl Gustav Carus]], [[Søren Aabye Kierkegaard]], [[Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche]]<ref>Friedrich Nietzsche, Preface to the second edition of "[[The Gay Science]]" 1886.</ref> and [[Thomas Carlyle]]<ref>{{Cite web |last=Fletcher |first=Jefferson B. |date=1905-05-01 |title=Newman and Carlyle: An Unrecognized Affinity |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1905/05/newman-and-carlyle-an-unrecognized-affinity/637948/ |access-date=2023-02-16 |website=The Atlantic |language=en}}</ref> used the word unconscious.<ref>{{cite journal | last1 = Staude | first1 = John Raphael | date = 1976 | title = From Depth Psychology to Depth Sociology: Freud, Jung, and Lévi-Strauss | url = https://www.jstor.org/stable/656968 | journal = Theory and Society | volume = 3 | issue = 3 | pages = 303–338 | doi = 10.1007/BF00159490 | jstor = 656968 | s2cid = 144353437 | access-date = 2022-06-28 | quote = 'the theory of the unconscious' [...] was already available as an idea [seed] from the beginning of the nineteenth century [...] in the writings of the philosophers Schopenhauer, von Hartmann and Carus[.]| url-access = subscription }}</ref> In 1880 at the [[Sorbonne University|Sorbonne]], Edmond Colsenet defended a philosophy thesis (PhD) on the unconscious.<ref>"Un débat sur l'inconscient avant Freud: la réception de Eduard von Hartmann chez les psychologues et philosophes français". de Serge Nicolas et Laurent Fedi, L'Harmattan, 2008, p. 8.</ref> Elie Rabier and [[Alfred Fouillee]] performed syntheses of the unconscious "at a time when Freud was not interested in the concept".<ref>"Un débat sur l'inconscient avant Freud: la réception de Eduard von Hartmann chez les psychologues et philosophes français". de Serge Nicolas et Laurent Fedi, L'Harmattan, Paris, 2008, p. 8.</ref>
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