Article
Formulations on the Two Principles of Mental Functioning
Formulierungen über die zwei Prinzipien des psychischen Geschehens
Freud's short paper of 1911 sets out how the mind comes to take account of the external world. It starts from the observation that every neurosis estranges the patient from some part of reality. The older, primary processes, which survive in the unconscious, obey the pleasure principle: they strive for pleasure, draw back from unpleasure, and at first satisfy a need by hallucinating its object. Only when the expected satisfaction fails to come is the mental apparatus forced to represent real circumstances and seek real change, and so the reality principle is installed. The paper lists the adaptations this brings: attention, a system of notation that forms part of memory, judgement in place of repression, motor discharge turned into action, and thinking as experimental acting that allows discharge to be delayed. Phantasying splits off and stays under the pleasure principle. The sexual drives, kept autoerotic and then halted by latency, are educated to reality later than the ego drives, which lays down a disposition to neurosis. The paper then treats religion, science, education and art as different settlements between the two principles, and ties the choice of neurosis to the phase at which development was inhibited. It closes by warning that in the unconscious, thought-reality counts as external reality, so the analyst must reckon in 'neurotic currency'.
Main ideas
- Every neurosis estranges the patient from some part of reality, because that part has become unbearable; hallucinatory psychosis, which denies the event that set it off, is the extreme case.
- The primary processes, remnants of a phase when they were the only mental processes, obey the pleasure principle: they seek pleasure and withdraw from whatever might cause unpleasure, which is repression.
- At first a need was met by hallucinating what was wished for; only the failure of the expected satisfaction forced the mind to represent what is real even when it is unpleasant, and so the reality principle was installed.
- A footnote answers the objection that a system ruled by the pleasure principle could not survive: the infant, taken together with the mother's care, almost realises such a system.
- The reality principle brings new functions: consciousness of sensory qualities, attention that scans the outer world in advance, a system of notation that forms part of memory, impartial judgement in place of repression, and motor discharge turned into action that alters reality.
- Thinking restrains action: it is essentially experimental acting with small quantities of cathexis, which requires freely mobile cathexes to be bound, and it becomes conscious only through its link to verbal residues.
- Phantasying is split off from reality-testing and stays under the pleasure principle, from children's play to daydreaming, like a nature reserve kept in its original state.
- The sexual drives come under the reality principle later than the ego drives, because autoerotism spares them frustration and latency interrupts their development; this keeps sexuality close to phantasy and is a central part of the disposition to neurosis.
- The reality principle does not depose the pleasure principle but safeguards it, giving up an uncertain pleasure now for an assured one later. Religion projects this exchange into reward in an afterlife, science comes closest to overcoming the pleasure principle, and education offers the educators' love as reward.
- Art reconciles the two principles: the artist turns from reality into phantasy and finds a way back by shaping phantasies into a new kind of reality that others value, since they share the dissatisfaction with renunciation.
- The choice of neurosis depends on the phase of ego development (from pleasure-ego to reality-ego) and of libido development (from autoerotism to object-love) at which inhibition struck.
- In the unconscious, reality-testing counts for nothing and thought-reality is equated with external reality, so a wish counts as its fulfilment; the analyst must reckon in neurotic currency, as a dream of a dead father, read as a wish for the father's death, shows.
What it shows
- 1911
Sigmund Freud introduced Pleasure principle
In 'Formulations on the Two Principles of Mental Functioning' (1911), Freud named the tendency governing the primary processes the pleasure-unpleasure principle, or pleasure principle, and set the reality principle beside it.
- 1900
Sigmund Freud introduced Secondary process
In the last chapter of Die Traumdeutung Freud sets a second, inhibiting process of the preconscious system against the primary process: excitation is bound, discharge is delayed, and thought can explore paths to satisfaction. In 1911 he tied it to the reality principle.
- 1911
Sigmund Freud introduced Reality principle
In 'Formulations on the Two Principles of Mental Functioning' Freud introduces the reality principle: when hallucinated satisfaction fails, the apparatus must form a conception of the real circumstances in the outside world and seek a real change in them, putting up with delay and unpleasure.
- 1911
Reality principle derives from Pleasure principle
Freud presents the reality principle not as a rival to the pleasure principle but as its modification: it gives up a momentary pleasure, uncertain in its results, only to secure a later and surer one. Beyond the Pleasure Principle repeats that the reality principle replaces the pleasure principle under the ego's drives of self-preservation without abandoning its aim.