Mans Search for Meaning - Essay Example

 “Man’s search for meaning”. Viktor Frankl and Sigmund Frued’s drive theories Customer’s Name Institution Date With the coming global changes of 20th century a traditional image of human being has also been changed. After Darvin’s theories of human creation and origin of life many intellectuals and philosophers had developed their own theories on human nature in a similar vein. It is fair to say so also about Sigmund Freud. He was influenced much by Darvin’s ideas, and he based his own theories of psychoanalysis on understanding human as a complicated animal, which’s driven by instincts. And one of the key instincts is seeking of pleasure. This Freud’s explanation is still popular nowadays. However, the 20th century revealed other image of human, less generalized and, in his drives, a more individual one. Viktor E. Frankl, mostly basing his ideas on his psychoanalytic experience in concentration camps during World War II, had developed quite opposite to Freud’s one, and more current point of view on a subject. According to Frankl, one of the key drives for human existence is finding a meaning of life. Considering human as an animal of higher order, Freud naturally generalizes drives of human life to instincts, which are common for all people, and also are inherent for all human beings. Thus, the reasons for individual to behave in particular way also originate from the “inside” of a human, because those reasons are rather inherent or based on individual’s past. Freud is known to be the “father” of psychoanalysis, and in his studying of neuroses he also believed, that the common origin for all mind disorders is a past psychological trauma. Therefore, neuroses are caused by those human desires which once in the past were repressed by individual himself (even if he was forced to repress his desires as the result of psychological trauma). This idea naturally comes from Freud’s structural model of human’s psyche, which consists of three parts. “Id” is a driving force for all human actions and behavior, and is in common for all human beings. “Ego” is human’s individuality, which is reasonable, and therefore establishes connections between “id” and “superego”. “Superego” is a human inner censor, who gauges actions. “Superego” is based upon issues of authorities. Yet Freud rests most of the responsibility for human behavior on that “id”, which always stays in common for all individuals while “ego” and “superego” depend on conditions very much. In his book Man’s Search for Meaning Frankl brings next Freud’s utterance. “Let one attempt to expose a number of the most diverse people uniformly to hunger. With the increase of the imperative urge of hunger all individual differences will blur, and in their stead will appear the uniform expression of the one unstilled urge” (1985). Thus Freud believes that “id”, the driving force is the thing that reasons humans mostly, and upon conditions of unsatisfied needs human is seeking for pleasure in the path of least resistance. Another words (and speaking already in Frankl’s terms), Freud considers that to derive pleasure is the main goal for every human, and thus, during the life human is seeking for pleasures. The only definition is that human sometimes seeks for self-preservation and “staying alive”, or, other times, human seeks for self-destruction. It is Freud’s conception of seeking pleasure what Frankl argues first of all. He considers a pleasure to be not the main goal as Freud does, but rather a cause from achieving other goals: when achieving goals human feels pleasure. Therefore pleasure is an accompanying emotion of a goal, not the goal itself. Frankl highlights that pleasure is an emotional condition, which never drives actions (1985). People will something in particular, not a general, any kind of pleasure. To generalize pleasure in Freud’s way means to equalize all diversity of goals, and basically all actions. According to Freud, to help those in need and to please you with a food should be considered as two similar actions, because both of them lead to deriving pleasure. Frankl doesn’t think that all actions are the same, and in fact, even the same action for different people may cause different emotions and outcomes. Individual who has access to satisfaction may not always be pleased. And opposite, an individual who is in need of most crucial issues for his “staying alive”, may not desire them if he sees no meaning for action. As a counter to Freud’s utterance, Frankl points, that he has never observed generalization of human drives in concentration camps to animal instincts. Despite that in concentration camps people were devoid of most of their rights, and also possibilities to satisfy most of their basic needs, they clearly demonstrated their individualities. “There, the “individual differences” did not “blur” but, on the contrary, people became more different; people unmasked themselves” (Frankl, 1985). Yet common for all those people was the question about meaning: what is the meaning of current sufferings, and is there a meaning to survive and etc.? Thus, depressed people had questioned even most crucial activities (like eating and etc.) despite that they potentially led to a pleasure, in case if they didn’t understand the meaning of “staying alive”. Consequently, Frankl supposed that driven force for human behavior was a seeking of meaning, a goal and its following realization. Frankl believes that when human doesn’t see the meaning, he /she experience a condition of “existential vacuum”. “It may be due to a twofold loss which man has had to undergo since he became a truly human being. […] No instinct tells him what he has to do, and no tradition tells him what he ought to do; sometimes he does not even know what he wishes to do” (Frankl, 1985). According to Franklin, finding of meanings is the first thing to be satisfied to keep individual alive. Meanings drive human behavior. They are desires which are preliminary to all actions. Frankl highlights that despite people are tend to ask for answer on the question about meaning, every individual should seek for the meaning for him/ herself. “Man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather he must recognize that it is he who is asked” (Frankl, 1985). Yet meanings are not inherent for human, neither can they be found “inside” human. Meaning only can be found in the world around, and cannot be subjectively created. Also, meaning as a goal refers to a future. Here Frankl speaks literally opposite to Freud, who (as it was afore-mentioned) considers that drives for human behavior coming from human past. And while Freud stresses on the role of unconscious in human behavior, Frankl considers conscience to be a unique ability to find a meaning. Therefore logotherapy (a kind of psychotherapy which was developed by Frankl) rather teaches people to search for meanings, than points on meanings. Logotherapy is basically built on killing “diseases”, caused by existential vacuum, in the manner of searching for individual reason. Despite that logotherapy usually applies method of psychoanalysis developed by Freud, it does not expect to find one general drive for different human behaviors. “I doubt whether a doctor can answer this question in general terms. For the meaning of life differs from man to man, from day to day and from hour to hour” (Frankl, 1985). Mostly focused on individual existence, logotherapy searches for day-to-day “small” meanings, rather than for general philosophical meaning of existence for humankind. Here logotherapy sounds similar to philosophy of existentialism, which rather than to be concerned about upper meaning of human life, is focuses on every individual existence. Also, Frankl considers generalization of meanings as not only untrue, but very harmful thing, because search for a general meaning leads rather to conformism, or to totalitarianism (1985). In the light of the above said, both doctors Freud and Frankl are naturally out of phase with each other on a subject of origin and treatment for mental disorders. When determining neuroses’ origin as necessary a past repressed desire, Freud implies the same origin for all neuroses. Frankl points, that not all neuroses are necessary mental disorders. Some of them – “noogenic neuroses”, - are results of the existential frustration (existential vacuum). “Noogenic neuroses have their origin not in psychological, but rather in “noological” (from the Greek “noos” meaning mind) dimension of human existence” (Frankl, 1985). Naturally, neuroses caused be philosophical problems implies philosophical treatment, rather than clinical care. In conclusion, I would like to mention, that, to my mind, such opposite views on human drives come naturally from Freud and Frankl’s different views on meaning of life. Freud was influenced by Darvin’s theory “human is an animal”, and therefore was skeptical about human’s meaning of life. In his turn, Frankl was influenced by existentialists, and by his uneasy life experience, and by existence itself. He thought, that humans’ ask for meaning is the best proof of the meaning’s existence. Reference Frankl, V. E. (1985). Man’s Search for Meaning. (Revised and updated ed.) New York: Washington Square Press. 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