thibo026: January 2012 Archives

Despite being discounted by modern science for it's subjectivity, lack of replicability and emphasis on sexuality, the work of Sigmund Freud has been influential both within and outside of the field of psychology. In fact, even less accepted theories (like the Oedipal Complex) are still major points of discussion in looking at literature. The idea of the Unconscious has even been used to question the validity of scientific empiricism itself. I am taking a class where the reading material is based heavily on these assumptions and am curious about how many of Freud's ideas are still thought to be of value in modern practice. Further, our textbook establishes that claims are falsifiable or metaphysical, how are claims which question this binary itself classified? Does Freud's lack of applicability in his own field make the continued use of it by other disciplines a poor choice?

This is the trailer for the mediocre movie about Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud I saw this weekend. It (like psychoanalysis) may focus a bit too much on sex.

Chapter seven of the Lillienfeld textbook focuses on memory. It looks at the three types: sensory, short term and long term and the sub categories of each. It also looks at the ways that these interact with each other often creating schemata. Further, it looks at failures of memory including amnesia, Alzheimer's disease, the failure of adults to recall memories from their first two to five years, and the ability to create false memories. I found the idea of early childhood memory failure very interesting because children, even that young, have the physical brain capacity necessary to create memories, but it just does not occur. Memories assumed to be from this stage in life are assumed to be either false memories or to come from a time later in life on face. This leads me to wonder if some people do have these memories and our social expectation that they will not leads to preemptive dismissal. The book raises the question of the moral implications of erasing memories as happens to the characters in the movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. What do we make of the fact that each person loses those two to five years of memory?