Quantum Drummer

Jung’s studies regarding the opposites made him conclude that their origin could be found in “the polaristic structure of the psyche”, a characteristic that the psyche shares with all other natural phenomena. In the introduction to Mysterium Coniuntionis, Jung describes that “Natural processes are phenomena of energy, constantly arising out of a ‘less probable state’ of polar tension. This formula is of special significance for psychology, because the conscious mind is usually reluctant to see or admit the polarity of its own background, although it is precisely from there that it gets its energy.” (Jung, 1963, pp. xvi-xvii).

Jung’s Early Views on the Mind ~ Body Relationship

On his essay Psychological Typology, written in 1936, Jung starts his analysis on the nature of opposites by discussing the mind (or soul) ~ body relationship, and introduces the concept of “temperament”, which he relates to the earlier theory of the four “humours” which are: Melancholic, phlegmatic, sanguine, and choleric, and he defines temperament as the “sum-total of emotional reactions.”

For this purpose, Jung mentions:

“The whole make-up of the body, its constitution in the broadest sense, has in fact a very great deal to do with the psychological temperament, so much that we cannot blame the doctors if they regard psychic phenomena as largely dependent on the body. Somewhere the psyche is living body, and the living body is animated matter; somehow and somewhere there is an undiscoverable unity of psyche and body which would need investigating psychically as well as physically; in other words, this unity must be as dependent on the body as it is on the psyche so far as the investigator is concerned.” (Jung, 1971, p. 545).

This description seems to leave no doubt that Jung believed some type of dual nature of the body ~ mind relationship, and that both elements maintained a complementary relationship. However, later on the same paragraph, Jung indicates:

“What proved to be a good working hypothesis, namely, that psychic phenomena are conditioned by physical processes, became a philosophical presumption with the advent of materialism. Any serious science of the living organism will reject this presumption; for on the one hand it will constantly bear in mind that living matter is an as yet unsolved mystery, and on the other hand it will be objective enough to recognize that for us there is a completely unbridgeable gulf between physical and psychic phenomena, so that the psychic realm is no less mysterious than the physical.” (Jung, 1971, p. 543).

These observations by Jung give us some clear ideas of where his understanding was at that time, in 1936.

First of all, Jung is embracing the materialistic mental model, and more importantly, he is in reality rejecting the idea of having the body ~ mind relationship representing a complementary pair. That is, Jung is indicating that body and mind are separate entities. Also, as part of his reflection, Jung admits that both the psychical and the physical are both mysteries, therefore requiring more studies.

Even more, Jung continues to reinforce his view in more detail:

“The materialistic presumption became possible only in recent times, after man’s conception of the psyche had, in the course of many centuries, emancipated itself from the old view and developed in an increasingly abstract direction. The ancients could still see body and psyche together, as an undivided unity, because they were closer to that primitive world where no moral rift yet ran through the personality, and the pagan could still feel himself indivisibly one, childishly innocent and unburdened by responsibility.” (Jung, 1971, pp. 543-544).

So this paragraph shows how Jung is definitely accepting the materialistic paradigm, at least when he wrote these words in 1936, and not only that, but Jung is also indicating that the “undivided unity” of body and mind (psyche) is the view of pagan and primitive ancestors. Here, Jung is also including in his reflections, judgements regarding religion and morality points of view, which were strong elements of the dogma of his time.

On the following paragraph of Jung’s writing, he is making an effort to strongly differentiate the ancient and primitive cultures which were dominated by their emotions, with the “philosophical man” being the civilized and advanced human that demonstrated an advanced psyche. Jung seems to be completely absorbed by his position as “educated and sophisticated member of the Western culture”, when he continues writing:

“All passions that made his (the pre-philosophical man) blood boil and his heart pound, that accelerated his breathing or took his breath away, that “turned his bowels to water” – all this was a manifestation of the “soul.” Therefore he localized the soul in the region of the diaphragm (in Greek phren, which also means mind) and the heart. It was only with the first philosophers that the seat of reason began to be assigned to the head. There are still Negroes today whose “thoughts” are localized principally in the belly, and the Pueblo Indians “think” with their hearts – “only madmen think with their heads,” they say. On this level consciousness is essentially passion and the experience of oneness. Yet, serene and tragic at once it was just this archaic man who, having started to think, invented that dichotomy which Nietzsche laid at the door of Zarathustra: the discovery of pairs of opposites, the division into odd and even, above and below, good and evil. It was the work of the old Pythagoreans, and it was their doctrine of moral responsibility and the grave metaphysical consequences of sin that gradually, in the course of the centuries, percolated through to all strata of the population, chiefly owing to the spread of the Orphic and Pythagorean mysteries.” (Jung, 1961, p. 544).

These notes by Jung seem to be some of the most biased and entitled words that attempt to describe the evolution of the body ~ mind ~ soul relationship, as well as the seat of thoughts. It is clear once again here that Jung is completely dominated by his paradigm of Western-White cultured man, to the point that his comments sound not only ignorant but quite offensive. Rather than judging and labeling the “Negroes and Indians” living in his time as “archaic” and “primitive” because the first have their “thoughts localized in the belly” and the second “think with their hearts,” it would have been more valuable to analyze this findings with an open mind, as Jung normally did, and try to understand why could this be happening with these cultures. Today, when there is evidence that the “heart brain” and the “gut brain” are real, the observations obtained by Jung from the “primitive” cultures he describes do not appear to be out of line, but instead, well ahead of their time.

The positive thoughts that can be salvaged from these paragraphs are Jung’s observation that it was “the archaic man” who invented the dichotomies and discovered the pairs of opposites, such as good and evil, above and below, and odd and even. Therefore we can determine that the action of dividing nature into pairs of opposites has been present since the time of primitive tribes in the world.