Philosophical perspectives

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// This paper discusses three philosophical perspectives that prevailed during the twentieth century. We will include in the paper the detailed overview of each philosophy and the explanation of the changes in the world during the time and how it was reflected in the philosophies. We begin the paper with a discussion on Freud and the psyche: //

Freud and the psyche

Sigmund Freud was a famous neurologist, known as the father of Psychoanalysis. He spent much of his life in developing an elaborate theory on the mind and operation of the psyche. Of all the work done by Sigmund Freud, most significant was his explanation on the behavior and thought process of the individual, guided by the unconscious mind. According to Freud, there are mainly three parts of psyche, namely, the conscious, preconscious and unconscious. The conscious part of the psyche reflects that part of individual of which they are currently aware or are enthusiastically thinking about. Conscious part includes all the thoughts that currently invade the mind of individuals. Next to conscious part comes the preconscious, which consists of the memories, thoughts and knowledge which are not a part of the current thought pattern of the individual, but that are available to them. This is the storage section of the human mind where the memories and knowledge are accumulated (Freud's Divisions of The Psyche, 2007).

The third component of the psyche is the unconscious part, which is known to be the most unique contribution made by Freud. This is the part which an individual is unaware of. According to Freud, unconscious part of individuals psyche is that part to which they do not have access. He further divided the unconscious into three parts, which are the system unconscious, descriptive unconscious and the dynamic unconscious and later gave the concept of id, ego and super-ego, in place of the system unconscious.

Id: According to Freud, id is the most unstructured part of the psyche. The id is motored by primordial animal instincts letting in the aggressive and sexual impetus. id works in accordance with the pleasure principle, which is aimed to capitalize on pleasure, not caring about whether it is realistic, protected and ethical or not and derogating any soreness. The id consists of two types of impulses, which are known as the life and death instincts.

Ego: The ego acts in accordance with the principle of actuality. It is the conscious and the aware part and it helps in letting us comprehend the situations, things and their reality. During toddler-hood, children come to recognize that they are individuals, separate from their surroundings. They distinguish that they have their own wants, aspirations and needs, so the ego begins to develop. Ego is the identity, as it develops out of the id part of the psyche and has the potential to control the id. Moreover, it is the moderating element between the id and the superego.

Superego: Superego is the third part of the psyche. At the age of 5 to 6 years, children start to acquire the rules, norms and societal values. According to Freud, children imbibe these rules to develop the superego that works as a very stern moral sense. The superego functions in accordance to the morality principle, i.e., it finds out about the good things and morality. On this basis, Freud stated that superego is also as irrational as the id. Similar to the ego, superego works on the basis of all levels of awareness ...