Do we owe Sigmund Freud an apology?
Mark Solms has dedicated his life to revising the complete works of the father of psychoanalysis. His thought still informs our everyday lives, he tells Laura Hackett
Mark Solms has dedicated his life to revising the complete works of the father of psychoanalysis. His thought still informs our everyday lives, he tells Laura Hackett
Fred Thornton
October 15, 2024 @ 11:15 pm
A thinker who is not wrong as often as he’s right can never really be called a great thinker. Maybe a great publicist for a compilation of the thought of other thinkers, but not a great thinker in their own right working (pardon the pun) virgin terrain. Siggy was a great thinker, and contrary to the modern hype and hustle “thinker” and “scientist” are not the same thing, not at all.
It is the errors of the thinkers that show the scientists where to start. If you’re right reality validates that thought at every turn, when you’re wrong is when the scientists ask “if all that checks as correct then how can this, drawn from the same line of reasoning, be wrong?”
Those errors jump start science and save an immense amount of time compared to waiting on the scientists to discover the proper set of questions for themselves. Everything is made of earth, air, fire, and water, right? No, not really. But that was enough to jump start chemistry and physics.
Without Siggy psychology wouldn’t be half as advanced as they are today, and maybe I wouldn’t have to cuss at them for being indiscriminant arms merchant’s arming all sides of the covert cultural warfare doing battle for the soul of humanity. But… fair is fair and that wasn’t Siggy’s doing.