The metabolization of primary process in groups

Groups cope with the unbridled character of primary process by assigning to certain members roles that are designed unconsciously to contain and to metabolize those parts, both of the group and individual psyches, that group members, for defensive reasons, must reject. This group process occurs isomorphically throughout the layers of social organization, from society at large, down to small therapy groups.This paper is based on a presentation at the Washington Square Institute Conference on Madness, November 1988.     

Ayodhya and the Hindu resurgence

It is usually accepted that although cosmological references in the early Pali Buddhist texts refer metaphorically to meditative states of mind, they should at the same time be understood as referring in literal terms to an externally existent cosmos. Because the ontological status of the cosmos appears to be tangential to what the Buddha taught, however, it is not clear that this literal interpretation is appropriate. From a study of the early textual material, this paper suggests that an alternative understanding of the cosmos is more compatible with the Buddha's teachings.     

Hindu Counselling in the Netherlands

Increasing participation of Muslims and Hindus in church-state relations in the Netherlands is bringing about a slow change in the different cultural and historical backgrounds of non-indigenous religious traditions and in their self-esteem and religious attitudes. We may call this participation, and especially the changes it causes, a good example of Systemzwang, the systematic power of the dominant but historically grown social and cultural order in which newcomers are expected to fit. This process of external influence will be demonstrated by the example of the development of the traditional Hindu priest, the pandit, to a modern professional pastoral or Hindu-spiritual counsellor and by the mutual-learning process of the religiously different pastoral professionals in the semi-governmental service organizations.     

The development of primary process in children's Rorschachs

Three cohorts of normal Italian schoolchildren, 55 boys and 47 girls, were given Rorschachs at ages 6, 7, and 8; 9, 10, and 11; and 12 and 13. Regardless of sex or score, primary process (scored by Holt's method) tends to diminish with age; but significantly among the boys only for the sums of all primary process, of Level 2 responses, and of content. Measures of control showed similar developmental trends, mean form level advancing significantly in the total sample and among girls. Even stronger trends within cohorts were confounded by retest effects.     

Myth as Metaphysics: The Christian Saviour and the Hindu Gods

A distinction which is often rehearsed in some strands of Christian writing on the ??Eastern?? religions, especially Hinduism, is that while they are full of ??mythological?? fancies, Biblical faith is based on the solid rock of ??historical?? truth. I argue that the sharp contours of this antithesis are softened when we consider two issues regarding the relation between ??myth?? and ??history??. First, the decades?Clong attempts to separate the ??historical?? facts about Jesus Christ from the interpretive elements in the Biblical narrative highlight the presence of ??mythical?? imagination in Christian thought. Second, a comparative study of the Christian understanding of Jesus Christ as the Incarnate God and the Hindu conception of avat??ras reveals a highly significant set of differences and analogies, and shows how the supposed equivalences between ??historical as real?? and ??mythological as unreal?? need to be reformulated.     

The psychoanalytic assumption of the primary process: extrapsychoanalytic evidence and findings

No evidence for an assumption of a theory can be gained by data derived from methods dependent on that theory. Three experiments, using methods independent of psychoanalysis, test the psychoanalytic posit that primary process exists as a formal mental mode distinct from secondary process. The three experiments, using a nonpsychoanalytic index for primary process, test for a preponderance of primary process organization in three areas in which Freud observed primary process: (1) in unconscious mental states and during implicit tasks; (2) in the mental productions of preschool children; and (3) in anxiety states, as these are typically associated with unconscious conflict. All three experiments show significant results in favor of the primary process. Further, the three experiments taken together, because they account for seemingly disparate data, lend further credence to the original assumption. These positive results suggest that primary process may be more important than even Freud suspected. Perhaps it is the basic mental organization in many nonhuman mammals and some birds. Primary process organization may also underlie aspects of such basic psychological operations as generalizations in conditioning and assessments-in-action, as opposed to judgments proper, about how one would act. Finally, primary process may play a key role in drive activity. Three types of experiments are proposed to test these far-reaching applications of the primary process concept.     

Hindu Perspectives on the Thirst for Transcendence

Abstract. Definitions of nature and transcendence are given, and the framework of Hindu thought is presented. The levels of reality as discovered by physics are then discussed, which leads us to revise our notions of reality and objectivity. Transcendence is defined as something beyond matter‐energy in space‐time and is explored in several contexts of modern science, as in pre‐Big‐Bang state, negative entropy, information, complexity, and others. Finally, a philosophical reflection on consciousness is presented.     

Marijuana-induced primary process content in the TAT

Seventy-two normal adult male subjects wrote TAT stories under baseline and either placebo- or marijuana-ingestion conditions. Marijuana subjects received 20 mg. doses of delta-9 tetrahydrocannabinol. The stories were keypunched and content analyzed with the Regressive Imagery Dictionary, which yields a score for primary process content. Results indicate that marijuana, relative to placebo, caused subjects to write stories with a higher proportion of primary process content than they had included in baseline stories.     

Instrumentalist Interpretations of Hindu Environmental Ethics

Many environmental ethicists believe that any adequate environmental ethic should attribute ‘direct moral standing’ (often glossed in terms of intrinsic value) to plants, animals, and the rest of nature. But certain interpretations of Hindu environmental ethics apparently attribute only instrumental value to nature. This places them in direct conflict with the purported adequacy condition on an environmental ethic. So, is such a Hindu ethical view really inadequate? In his recent book Hinduism and Environmental Ethics, Christopher Framarin claims that it is because Hindu instrumentalism about nature is either viciously circular or unacceptably arbitrary. I argue, however, that Framarin’s claim founders in virtue of his misconstruing the logical structure of instrumental value.     

The empowering image of the divine mother: A South African Hindu woman worshipping the goddess

The worship of the Mother Goddess by Hindu women in KwaZulu‐Natal is very popular, as an ongoing daily devotion, as well as at the Goddess's various annual festivals, especially the Draupadi firewalking festival. A crucial question is how far this veneration of a powerful female deity brings empowerment, both to a woman's sense of her own worth and as recognition in the community. Pat Pillay, of Pietermaritzburg, is an example of a woman with little education or social and economic status, whose devotion to the Goddess has brought her a considerable sense of personal empowerment and social recognition, as well as offering healing to numbers of women in her community. It has also motivated her to challenge an all‐male temple committee over their decision not to allow women full participation in the firewalking ceremony.1