LECTURE VISUBCONSCIOUS PROCESSES
In what I have said thus far I have had another purpose in view than that of a mere exposition of the psycho-physiological theory of memory. This other and chief purpose has been to lay the foundation for a conception of theUnconsciousin its larger aspect. We have seen that thoughts and other conscious experiences that have passed out of mind may be and to an enormous extent are conserved and, from this point of view, may be properly regarded as simplydormant. Further we have seen that all the data collected by experimental pathology and other observations lead to the conclusion that conservation is effected in the form of neurographic residua or brain neurograms—organized physiological records of passing mental experiences of all sorts and kinds. We have seen that these neurographic records conserve not only our educational acquisitions and general stock of knowledge—all those experiences which we remember—but a vast number of others which we cannot spontaneously recall, including, it may be, many which date back to early childhood, and many which we have deliberately repressed, put out of mind and intentionallyforgotten. We have also seen that it is not only these mental experiences which occupied the focus of our attention that leave their counterpart in neurograms, but those as well of which we are only partially aware—absent-minded thoughts and acts and sensations and perceptions which never entered our awareness at all—subconscious or coconscious ideas as they are called. Finally, we have seen that the mental experiences of every state, normal, artificial, or pathological, whatever may be the state of the personal consciousness, are subject to the same principle of conservation. In this way, in the course of any one’s natural life, an enormous field of neurograms is formed representing ideas which far transcend in multitude and variety those of the personal consciousness at any given moment and all moments, and which are far beyond the voluntary beck and call of the personal consciousness of the individual.
Neurograms are concepts and, by the meaning of the concept, they are unconscious. It is not necessary to enter into the question whether they are in their ultimate nature psychical or physical. That is a philosophical question.[72]They are at any rate unconscious in this sense; they are devoid of consciousness, i.e., have none of the psychological attributesof any of the elements of consciousness, and in the sense in which any physiological arrangement or process is not conscious, i.e., is unconscious. We have here, then, in the concept of brain residual neurograms the fundamental meaning of theUnconscious.[73]The unconscious is the great storehouse of neurograms which are the physiological records of our mental lives.By the terms of the concept neurograms are primarily passive—the potential form, as it were, in which psychical energy is stored. This is not to say, however, that, from moment to moment, certain ones out of the great mass may not become active processes. On the contrary, according to the theory of memory, when certain complexes of neurograms are stimulatedthey take on activity and function—the potential energy becomes converted into dynamic energy. In correlation with the functioning of such neurographic complexes, the complexes of ideas which they conserve—the psychological equivalents—are reproduced (according to the doctrines of monism and parallelism) and enter the stream of the personal consciousness. The unconscious becomes the conscious (monism), or provided with correlated conscious accompaniments (parallelism), and we may speak of the ideas arising out of theunconscious.unconscious.
Neurograms may also function as subconscious processes exhibiting intelligence and determining mental and bodily behavior.—Here two important questions present themselves. Is it a necessary consequence that when unconscious neurograms become active processes psychological equivalents must be awakened; and when they are awakened, must theynecessarilyenter the stream of the personal consciousness? If both these questions may be answered in the negative,then plainly in either case such active processes become by definition subconscious processes—of anunconsciousnature in the one case and of acoconsciousnature in the other. They would be subconscious because in the first place they would occur outside of consciousness and there is no awareness of them, and in the second place they would be a dissociated second train of processes distinct from those engaged in the conscious stream of the moment.Theoretically such subconscious processes, whether unconscious or coconscious, might perform a variety of functions according to the specificity of their activities.
Now, in preceding lectures, when marshalling the evidence for conservation, we met with a large number and variety of phenomena (automatic writing, hallucinations, post-hypnotic phenomena, dreams, “unconscious” solution of problems, etc.), which clearly demonstrated that memory might be manifested by processes of which the individual was unaware and which were outside the content of consciousness. Hence these phenomena presented very clear evidence of the occurrence of processes that may be properly termedsubconscious.[74]Attention, however, was primarily directed to them only so far as they offered evidence of conservation and of the mode by which conservation was effected. But necessarily these evidences were subconscious manifestations of forgotten experiences (memory), and in so far as this was the case we saw that unconscious neurograms can take on activity and function subconsciously; i.e., without their psychological equivalents (i.e., correlated conscious memory) entering the stream of the personal consciousness. We may now speak of these processes assubconscious memory. But when their manifestations are carefully scrutinized they will be found to exhibit more than memory. They may, for instance, exhibit logicalelaboration of the original experiences, and what corresponds to fabrication, reasoning, volition and affectivity.Theoreticallythis is what we should expect if any of the conserved residual experiences of life can function subconsciously. As life’s experiences include fears, doubts, scruples, wishes, affections, resentments, and numerous other affective states, innate dispositions, and instincts, the subconscious memory process necessarily may include any of these affective complexes of ideas and tendencies. An affective complex means an idea (or ideas) linked to one or more emotions and feelings. In other words, any acquired residua drawn from the general storehouse of life’s experiences may be systematized with feelings and emotions, the innate dispositions and instincts of the organism. Now it is a general psychological law that such affective states tend by the force of their conative impulses to carry the specific ideas with which they are systematized to fulfilment through mental and bodily behavior. Consequently, theoretically, it might thus well be that the residua of diverse experiences, say a fear or a wish, by the force of such impulses might become activated into very specific subconscious processes with very specific tendencies expressing themselves in very specific ways, producing very specific and diverse phenomena. Thus memory would be but one of the manifestations of subconscious processes.
Now, as a matter of fact, there are a large number of phenomena which not only justify the postulationof subconscious processes but also the inference that such processes, activated by their affective impulses, may so influence conscious thought that the latter is modified in various ways; that it may be determined in this or that direction, inhibited, interrupted, distorted, made insistent, and given pathological traits. There is also a large variety of bodily phenomena which can be explicitly shown to be due to subconscious processes, and many which are only explicable by such a mechanism. Indeed, a subconscious process may become very complex and constellated with any one or many of the psycho-physiological mechanisms of the organism. In special artificial and pathological conditions where such processes reach their highest development, as manifested through their phenomena, they may exhibit that which when consciously performed is understood to beintelligence, comprising reasoning, constructive imagination, volition, and feeling; in short, what is commonly called thought or mental processes. Memory, of course, enters as an intrinsic element in these manifestations just as it is an intrinsic element in all thought. The automatic script that describes the memories of a long-forgotten childhood experience may at the same time reason, indulge in jests, rhyme, express cognition and understanding of questions—indeed (if put to the test), might not only pass a Binet-Simon examination for intelligence, but take a high rank in a Civil Service examination. In these more elaborate exhibitions of subconscious intelligence it is obviousthat there is an exuberant efflorescence of the residua deposited in many unconscious fields by life’s experiences and synthesized into asubconscious functioning system.
It is beyond the scope of this lecture to examine into the particularmechanismby which a subconscious process is provoked at all—why, for instance, a dormant wish or fear-neurogram becomes activated into a subconscious wish or fear, or having become activated, the mechanism by which such a wish or fear manifests itself in this phenomenon or that—or to examine even any large number of the various phenomena which are provoked by subconscious processes, and it is not my intention to do so. Such problems belong to special psychology and special pathology. Of recent years, for instance, certain schools of psychology, and in particular the Freudian school, have attempted to establish particular mechanisms by which subconscious processes come into being and express themselves. We are engaged in the preliminary and fundamental task of establishing, if possible, certain basic principles which any mechanism must make use of, and, as a deeper-lying theoretical question, the nature of such processes.
The subconscious now belongs to popular speech and it is the fashion of the day to speak of it glibly enough, but I fear it means very little to the average person. It is involved in vagueness if not mystery. Yet as a necessary induction from observed facts it has a very precise and concrete meaningdevoid ofabstrusenessabstruseness, just as the other has a precise and concrete meaning. Although subconscious processes were originally postulated on theoretical grounds, the theory is fortunately open to experimental tests so that it is capable of being placed on an experimental basis like other concepts of science. It is possible to artificially create such processes and study their phenomena; that is to say, the modes in which they manifest their activities, their influence upon conscious and bodily processes. We can study their effect in inhibiting and distorting thought, in determining it in this or that direction, in creating hallucinatory, emotional, amnesic, and other mental phenomena, in inducing physiological disturbances of motion, sensation, of the viscera, etc. We can also study the capabilities and limitations of the subconscious in carrying on intelligent operations below the threshold of consciousness. Again, we can investigate the phenomena of this kind as met with in the course of clinical observations, and by technical methods of research explore the subconscious and thus explicitly reveal the process underlying and inducing the phenomena. By such methods of investigation the subconscious has been removed from the field of speculative psychology, and placed in the field of experimental research. We have thus been enabled to postulate a subconscious process as adefinite concrete process producing very definite phenomena. These processes and their phenomena have become a field of study in themselves and, from my point of view,the determination of the laws of the subconscious should be approached by such experimental and technical methods of research. After its various modes of activity, its capabilities and limitations have been in this way established, its laws can then be applied to the solution of conditions surrounding particular problems. Though we can determine the actuality of a particular subconscious process this does not mean that we can determine all the components of that process; we may be able to determine many or perhaps none of these: just as among the constituents of a crowd we may discern an active, turbulent group creating a disturbance, though we may not be able to recognize all the components of the group or the scattered individuals acting in conjunction with it. Nor may we be able to determine the intrinsic nature of a subconscious process—whether it is a conscious or unconscious one, but only the actuality of the process, the conditions of its activity, and the phenomena which it induces.
A subconscious process may be provisionally defined as one of which the personality is unaware, which, therefore, is outside the personal consciousness, and which is a factor in the determination of conscious and bodily phenomena, or produces effects analogous to those which might be directly or indirectly induced by consciousness.It would be out of the question at this time to enter into an exposition of the larger subject—the multiform phenomena of the subconscious, but as its processes arefundamental to an understanding of many phenomena with which we shall have to deal, we should have a clear understanding of the grounds on which such processes are postulated as specific, concrete occurrences. The classical demonstration of subconscious occurrences makes use of certain phenomena of hysteria, particularly those of subconscious personalities and artificial “automatic” phenomena like automatic writing. The epoch-making researches of Janet[75]on hysterics and almost coincidently with him of Edmund Gurney on hypnotics very clearly established the fact that these phenomena are the manifestations ofdissociatedprocesses outside of and independent of the personal consciousness. Among the phenomena, for example, are motor activities of various kinds such as ordinarily are or may be induced by conscious intelligence. As the individual, owing to anesthesia, may be entirely unaware even that he has performed any such act, the process that performed it must be one that is subconscious.
The intrinsic nature of subconscious processes.—Janet further brought forward indisputable evidence showing that in hysteria these subconscious processes are real coconscious processes. It is only another mode of expressing this to say that there is a dissociation or division of consciousness in consequence of which certain ideas do not enter the contentof the personal consciousness of the individual. It is possible, as he was the first to show, to communicate with and, in hypnotic and other dissociated states, recover memories of these split-off ideas of which the individual is unaware, and thereby establish the principle that these ideas are the subconscious process which induces the hysterical phenomena. (These phenomena are of a great many kinds and include sensory as well as motor automatisms, inhibition of thought and will, deliria, visceral, emotional, and other disturbances of mind and body.) The hysterical subconscious process is thus determined to be a very specific concretecoconsciousprocess, one, the elements of which are memories and other particular ideas. This type of subconscious process, therefore, may be regarded as the activated residua of antecedent experiences with or without secondary elaboration. All subsequent investigations during the past twenty-five years have served but to confirm the accuracy of Janet’s observations and conclusions. It would be out of the question at this time, before coconscious ideas have been systematically studied, to attempt to present the evidence on which this interpretation of certain subconscious phenomena rests. This will be done in other lectures.[76]I will simply say that this evidence for coconsciousness occurring in certain special conditions, artificial and pathological, and perhaps as a constituent of the normal content of consciousness, is of precisely the same character asthat for the occurrence of consciousness in any other individual but one’s self. If we reject the evidence of hysterical phenomena, of that furnished by a coconscious personality, and by automatic script and speech, etc., we shall have to reject precisely similar evidence for consciousness in other people than ourselves.[77]The evidence is explicit and not implied.
A subconscious personality is a condition where complexes of subconscious processes have been constellated into a personal system, manifesting a secondary system of self-consciousness endowed with volition, intelligence, etc. Such a subconscious personality is capable of communicating with the experimenter and describing its own mental processes. It can, after repression of the primary personality, become the sole personality for the time being, and then remember its previous subconscious life, as we all remember our past conscious life, and can give full and explicit information regarding the nature of the subconscious process. By making use of the testimony of a subconscious personality and its various manifestations, we can not only establish theactuality of subconscious processes and their intrinsic nature in these conditions, but by prearrangement with this personality predetermine any particular process we desire and study the modes in which it influences conscious thought and conduct. For instance, we can prescribe a conflict between the subconsciousness and the personal consciousness, between a subconscious wish and a conscious wish, or volition, and observe the resultant mental and physical behavior, which may be inhibition of thought, hallucinations, amnesia, motor phenomena, etc. The possibilities and limitations of subconscious influences can in this way be experimentally studied. Subconscious personalities, therefore, afford a valuable means for studying the mechanism of the mind.[78]
The conclusion, then, seems compulsory that the subconscious processes in many conditions, particularly those that are artificially induced and those that are pathological, arecoconsciousprocesses.
There are other phenomena, however, which require the postulation of a subconscious process, yet which, when the subconscious is searched by thesame methods made use of in hysterical phenomena, do not reveal explicit evidence of coconsciousness. An analysis of the subconscious revelations as well as the phenomena themselves seems to favor the interpretation that in some cases the underlying process is in part and in others whollyunconscious. The only ground for the interpretation that all subconscious processes are wholly conscious is the assumption that, as some are conscious, all must be. This is as unsound as the assumption that, because at the other end of the scale some complex actions (e. g., those performed by decerebrated animals) are intelligent and yet performed by processes necessarily unconscious, therefore all actions not under the guidance of the personal consciousness are performed by unconscious processes.
If some subconscious processes are unconscious they are equivalent to physiological processes such as,ex hypothesi, are correlated with all conscious processes and perhaps may be identified with them. In truth, they mean nothing more nor less than “unconscious cerebration.”
We can say at once that considering the complexity and multiformity of psycho-physiological phenomena there would seem to be noa priorireason why all subconscious phenomena must be the same in respect to being either coconscious or unconscious; some may be the one and some the other. It is plainly a matter of interpretation of the facts and there still exists some difference of opinion. The problem is a very difficult one to settle by methodsat present available; yet it can only be settled by the same methods, in principle, that we depend upon to determine the reality of a personal consciousness in other persons than ourselves. No amount ofa prioriargument will suffice. Perhaps some day a criterion of a conscious state of which the individual is unaware will be found, just as the psycho-galvanic phenomenon is possibly a criterion of an effective state. Any conclusions which we reach at present should be regarded as provisional.[79]
As one of our foremost psychologists has said, the subconscious is not only the most important problem of psychology, it istheproblem. But ofcourse it involves many problems of practical and theoretical interest. Among them are:
First of all the evidential justification of the postulation of subconscious processes in general.
Second; the intrinsic nature of such processes. In other words and more specifically, whether the neurograms of experiences after becoming active subconsciousprocessescontinue to be devoid of consciousness, nothing but a brain process,—i.e., unconscious; or whether in becoming activated they become conscious (monism), or acquire conscious equivalents (parallelism), notwithstanding they are outside (dissociated from) the content of the personal consciousness.
Third; the kind and complexity of functions a subconscious process can perform. Can it perform the same functions as are ordinarily performed by consciousintelligence(as we commonly understand that term); that is to say memory, perception, reasoning, imagination, volition, affectivity, etc.? If so, to what extent?
Fourth; are the processes of the conscious mind only a part of a larger mechanism of which a submerged part is a subconscious process?
Fifth; to what extent can and do subconscious processes determine the processes of the conscious mind and bodily behavior in normal and abnormal conditions?
These are some of the problems of the subconscious which for the most part have been only incompletely investigated.
It is, of course, beyond the scope of these introductory lectures to discuss with any completeness the evidence at hand bearing upon these problems or to even touch upon many of the points involved. We may, however, study more deeply than we have done some of the phenomena with which we have become familiar with a view to seeing what light they throw upon some of these problems, particularly the first three.
1, 2, and 3; Actuality, Intrinsic Nature and Intelligence of Subconscious Processes.—As to the first question, whether subconscious processes can be established in principle as a sound induction from experimental and clinical facts and not merely as a hypothetical concept, I have already pointed out that many manifestations of conservation already cited in the exposition of the theory of memory are of equal evidential value for theactualityof such processes. Let us now consider them in more detail from the point of view, more particularly, of the second and third questions—theintrinsic nature(whether coconscious or unconscious) andintelligenceof the underlying processes at work. In any given case however the actuality of the subconscious process must always be first demonstrated.
If we leave aside those conditions (hysteria, coconscious personalities) wherein specific memory of a coconscious process can be recovered, or such a process can be directly communicated with (automatic writing and speech), the conditions requiredfor the valid postulation of a subconscious process underlying any given phenomenon are: first, that the causal factor shall be positivelyknown; second, that it shall be an antecedent experience; and, third, that it shall not be in the content of consciousness at the moment of the occurrence of the phenomenon. If the causal factor and the phenomenon are both known, then the only unknown factor to be determined is the process, if any,intervening between the two. If this is not in consciousness, a subconscious process must be postulated.
Obviously, if the known causal factor isimmediatelyrelated to the caused phenomenon, the subconscious process must be the causal factor itself. But if the known causal factor isnot immediatelyrelated to the caused phenomenon, there must be an intervening process which must be subconscious, perhaps consisting of a succession of processes eventuating in the final phenomenon. For instance, if the causal factor is a hypnotic suggestion (for which there is afterwards amnesia) that the subject when awake shall automatically raise the right arm, a subconscious process which is the memory of that suggestion immediately provokes the automatic phenomenon. If, however, the suggestion is that of a series of automatic actions involving complicated behavior, or if it is a mathematical calculation, the intervening process which provokes the end result must not only be subconscious but must be a more or less complicated succession of processes.
When, on the other hand, the causal factor is notknown but only inferred with greater or less probability, the justification of the postulation of a subconscious process may be invalidated by the uncertainty of the inference. If for example a person raises his right hand or has a number come into his head without obvious cause, anyinferredantecedent experience as the causal factor must be open to more or less doubt, and, therefore, a subconscious process cannot be postulated with certainty. This uncertainty seriously affects the validity of conclusions drawn from clinical phenomena where the antecedent experience as well as a subconscious process must be inferred and perhaps even a matter of guesswork.
Let us examine then, a few selected phenomena where the causal factor in the process is a known antecedent conscious experience, one which can be logically related to the succeeding phenomenon only by the postulation of an intervening process of some kind. By an analysis of the antecedent experience and the caused phenomenon into their constituent elements we shall often be able to infer the functional characteristics of this intervening process. Then, if the subject is a favorable one, by the use of hypnotic and other methods we may be able to obtain an insight into the intrinsic nature of the subconscious process and determine how far it is conscious and how far unconscious. Necessarily the most available phenomena are those experimentally induced. We can arrange beforehand the causal experience and the phenomenon which itis to determine—an hallucination, a motor automatism, a dream, a conscious process of thought, or the product of an intellectual operation. The number of observations we shall examine might be made much larger and the types more varied. Those I have selected have such close analogies with certain experiences of everyday and pathological life that what is found to be true of them will afford valuable fundamentals in the elucidation of these latter experiences.[80]
Subconscious processes in which the causal factor was antecedently known.—I. The evidential value ofpost-hypnotic phenomenaranks perhaps in the first place for our purpose as the conditions under which they occur are largely under control. Among these showing subconscious processes of a high order of intelligence are:
(a) The well-known subconscious mathematical calculations which I cited in a previous lecture (p. 96). There is no possible explanation of this phenomenon except that the calculation was a subconscious process and done either coconsciously or unconsciously. That it may be done, in some cases, by coconscious processes of which the subject is unaware is substantiated by the evidence.[81]Inother cases this does not appear to be wholly the case if we can rely upon hypnotic memories. We will examine this process in connection with:
(b) A second class of post-hypnotic phenomena, namely, those of suggested actions carried out by the subject more or less automatically, in a sort of absent-minded way, without his being aware of what he is doing. The subject is directed in hypnosis to perform such or such an action after being awakened. Sometimes the suggested action is performed consciously, the suggested ideas with their impulses arising in his mind, but without his knowing why. In other instances, however, he performs the action automatically without being consciously aware at the moment that he is doing it, his attention being directed toward something else. Such actions must be performed by some kind of subconscious processes instigated by the ideas suggested in hypnosis.
Now hypnotic and other technically evoked memories sometimes reveal the conscious content of the processes involved in both classes of phenomena. For instance: two intelligent subjects, who have been the object of extensive observations on this point, are able to recall in hypnosis the previous occurrence of coconscious ideas of a peculiar character. The description of these ideas has been very precise and has carried a conviction, I believe, to all those who have had an opportunity to be present at these observations that these recollections weretrue memories and not fabrications.[82]The statements of these subjects is that in their own cases, under certain conditions of everyday life, coconscious ideasof which the principal consciousness is not awareemerge into the subconscious, persist for a longer or shorter time, and then subside to be replaced by others. So long as the conditions of their occurrence continue these coconscious ideas keep coming and going, interchanging with one another. Sometimes these ideas take the form of images, or what is described as visual “pictures.” When the conditions are those of the subconscious solution of a mathematical calculation then the same “pictures” occur and take the form of the figures involved in the calculation; the figures come and go, apparently add, subtract, and multiply themselves until the final result appears in figures. An example will make this clear.
While the subject was in hypnosis the problem was given to add 458 and 367, the calculation to bedonesubconsciouslyafter she was awake. The problem was successfully accomplished in the usual way. The mode in which the calculation was effected was then investigated with the following result: In what may be termed for convenience the secondary consciousness, i.e., the subconsciousness, the numbers 458 and 367 appeared as distinct visualizations. These numbers were placed one over the other, “with a line underneath them such as one makes in adding. The visualization kept coming and going; sometimes the line was crooked and sometimes it was straight. The secondary consciousness did not do the sum at once, but by piecemeal. It took a long time before it was completed.” The sum was not apparently done as soon as one would do it when awake, by volitional calculation, “but rather the figuresadded themselves, in a curious sort of way. The numbers were visualized and the visualization kept coming and going and the columns at different times added themselves, as it seemed, the result appearing at the bottom.” In another problem (453 to be multiplied by 6) the process was described as follows: The numbers were visualized in a line, thus, 453 × 6. Then the 6 arranged itself under the 453. The numbers kept coming and going the same as before. Sometimes, however, they added themselves, and sometimes the 6 subtracted itself from the larger number. Finally, however, the result was obtained. As in the first problem, the numbers kept coming and going in the secondary consciousness until the problem wassolved and then they ceased to appear. It is to be understood, of course, that theprincipal or personal consciousness was not aware of these coconscious figures, or even that any calculation was being or to be performed.
In suggested post-hypnotic actions, the pictures that come and go correspond to and represent the details of the action as it is carried out. Each detail is preceded or accompanied by its coconscious image or picture. Likewise, when somatic phenomena have followed dreams, pictures representing certain elements of the dream have appeared as secondary conscious states. When the subject has been disturbed by some unsolved moral or social problem (not suggested) the pictures have been symbolic representations of the disturbing doubts and scruples.[83]
One of these two subjects, while in hypnosis and able to recollect what goes on in the secondary consciousness, thus describes the coconscious process during thespontaneoussubconscious solution of problems. “When a problem on which my waking self is engaged remains unsettled, it is still kept in mind by the secondary consciousness even though put aside by my waking self. My secondary consciousness often helps me to solve problems which my waking consciousness has found difficulty in doing. But it is not my secondary consciousnessthat accomplishes the final solution itself, but it helps in the following way: Suppose, for instance, I am trying to translate a difficult passage in Virgil. I work at it for some time and am puzzled. Finally, unable to do it, I put it aside, leaving it unsolved. I decide that it is not worth bothering about and so put it out of my mind. But it is a mistake to say you put itoutof your mind. What you do is, you put itintoyour mind; that is to say, you don’t put it out of your mind if the problem remains unsolved and unsettled. By putting itintoyour mind I mean that, although the waking consciousness may have put it aside, the problem still remains in the secondary consciousness. In the example I used the memory of the passage from Virgil would be retained persistently by my secondary consciousness. Then from time to time a whole lot of fragmentary memories and thoughts connected with the passage would arise in this consciousness. Some of these thoughts, perhaps, would be memories of the rules of grammar, or different meanings of words in the passage, in fact, anything I had read, or thought, or experienced in connection with the problem. These would not be logical, connected thoughts, and they would not solve the problem. My secondary consciousness does not actually do this, i.e., in the example taken, translate the passage. The translation is not effected here. But later when my waking consciousness thinks of the problem again, these fragmentary thoughts of mysecondary consciousness arise in my mind, and with this information I complete the translation. The actual translation is put together by my waking consciousness.[84]I am not conscious of the fact that these fragments of knowledge existed previously in my secondary consciousness. I do not remember a problem ever to have been solved by the secondary consciousness.[85]It is always solved by the waking self, although the material for solving it may come from the secondary. When my waking consciousness solves it in this way, the solution seems to come in a miraculous sort of way, sometimes as if it came to me from somewhere else than my ownmind. I have sometimes thought, in consequence, that I had solved it in my sleep.”[86]
A series of observations conducted with a fourth subject (O. N.) gave the following results, briefly summarized. (This subject, like the others, is practiced in introspection and can differentiate her memories with precision.) She distinguishes “two strata” in her mental processes (an upper and lower). The “upper stratum” consists of the thoughts in the focus of attention. The lower (also called the background of her mind) consists of the perceptions and thoughts which are not in the focus. This stratum, of course, corresponds with what is commonly recognized as the fringe of consciousness, and, as is usual, when her attention is directed elsewhere she is not aware of it. She can, however, bring this fringe within the field of attention and then she becomes aware of, or rather remembers, its content during the preceding moment. To be able to do this is nothing out of the ordinary, but what is unusual is this: by a trick of abstraction which she has long practiced, she can bring the memory of the fringe or stratum into the full light of awareness and then it is discovered that it has been exceedingly rich in thoughts, far richer than ordinary attention would show and a fringe is supposed to be. It is indeed a veritable coconsciousness in which there goes on a secondary stream of thoughts often of an entirely different characterand with different affects from those of the upper stratum. It is common for thoughts which shehas resolutely put out of her mind as intolerable or unacceptable, or problems which have not been solved, to continue functioning in the lower stratum without entering awareness.[87]She can, however, at any time become aware of them by the trick of abstraction referred to, and sometimes they emerge apparently spontaneously and suddenly[88]replace the “upper stratum.” In hypnosis also the content of the lower stratum can be distinctly recalled.
Now the point I have been coming to is, the subject has acquired the habit of postponing the decision of many everyday problems and giving them, as a matter of convenience, to this second stratum or fringe to solve. She puts one aside, that is out of (orinto) her mind and it goes into this stratum. Then, later, when the time for action comes, shevoluntarily goes into abstraction, becomes aware of the subconscious thoughts of the second stratum and, lo and behold! the problem is found to be solved. If a plan of action, all the details are found arranged as if planned “consciously.” If asked a moment before what plans had been decided upon and decision reached she would have been obliged in her conscious ignorance to reply, “I don’t know.”[89]
An analysis of these different observations shows,first, that the post-hypnotic phenomena—calculations (a) and actions (b)—were performed by a subconscious process. Of this there can be no manner of doubt, even if the subsequent hypnotic memories of the process be rejected as untrustworthy. The phenomenon—the answer to the mathematical problem in the one case and the motor acts in the other—is so logically related to the suggestion, and can be predicted with such certainty, that only a causal relation can be admitted.
Second, in the calculation phenomena the process is clearly of an intellectual character requiringreasoningand the coöperation of mathematicalmemory. (Reasoning is more conspicuous when the problem is more complicated, as in the calculation of the number of seconds intervening between, say, twenty-two minutes past eleven and seventeen minutes past three o’clock.)[90]The phenomenon is the solution of a problem.
The final phenomenon was notimmediatelyrelated to the suggested idea. It was the final result of a quite long series of logical processes of a more or less complex character occurring over a period of time as in conscious calculation.Conation(volition?) would seem also to be essential to carry the suggested idea to fulfilment.Subconscious cognitionwould seem also to be required. There must have been an intelligent appreciation of what theproblem was and as soon as the solution was accomplished the process stopped. Random figuring did not continue.
In the post-hypnotic motor acts conation is obvious. Here too there is a series of subconscious processes covering a period of time and carrying out a purpose. The suggested causal idea did not include the acts necessary for the fulfillment of the idea. Each step was adapted to an end, ceased as soon as it accomplished that end, and was followed by another in logical sequence, the whole taking place as if performed by an intelligence. Reasoning may or may not be involved according to the complexity of the actions.
Third;the coconscious figures in the calculation experiments do not constitute the whole of the process. They would seem to be the product of some deeper underlying process. The figures “kept coming and going” and seemed to “add themselves.” There was no conscious process that related the figures to one another and determined whether the problem was one of addition or multiplication—as is the case when we do a calculation consciously; that is to say, of course, if the hypnotic personality remembered the whole of the conscious calculation. It was more as if there was an underlying unconscious process which did the calculation, certain final results of which appeared as dissociated states of consciousness, i.e., figures which did not enter the personal consciousness. The process reminds us of the printing of visible letters by the concealedworks of a typewriter; or of visible letters of an electrically illuminated sign appearing and disappearing according as the concealed mechanism is worked. This interpretation is in entire accord with the spontaneous occurrence of the coconscious images during the everyday life of these subjects. These images were pictorial representations of antecedent thoughts and seemed to be the products or elements of these thoughts apparently functioning as underlying unconscious processes. Likewise, in post-hypnotic suggested actions, I have not been able to obtain memories of coconscious thoughts directing the actions, but only the images described. These behave as if they were the product of another underlying process determining the action. Inferences of this sort are as compulsory as the inference that the illumination of a sensitive plate observed in the study of radio-activity must be due to the bombardment of the plate by invisible particles emitted by the radio-active substance. These particles and the process which ejects them can only be inferred from the effects which they produce. So, in the above observations, it would seem as if the coconscious figures, and other images involved, must be ejected as conscious phenomena by an underlying process. There is no explicit evidence that this is conscious.
I said advisedly, a moment ago, “if the hypnotic personality remembered the whole of the conscious calculation,” for, as a matter of fact, we find, when we examine several different hypnotic states in thesame subject, that their memories for coconscious ideas are not coextensive, one (or more) being fuller than another. Indeed in certain states there may not be any such memories at all. It is necessary, therefore, to obtain by hypnosis a degree of dissociation which will allow the complete memories of this kind to be evoked. In the subjects I made use of this procedure was followed. Theoretically it might be held that, no matter how complete the memories evoked in the various states, some other state might possibly be obtained in which still more complete memory would be manifested. Theoretically this is true and all conclusions are subject to this criticism. Practically, however, I found, when making these investigations, that I seemed to have come to the limit of such possibilities, for, obtain as I would new dissociated arrangements of personality, after a certain point no additional memories could be evoked. There is still another possibility that there may be coconscious processes for which no memories can be evoked by any method or in any state.
II.Artificially induced visual hallucinationswith which we have already become familiar can, as we have seen, only be interpreted as the product of subconscious processes. If only because of the important part that hallucinations play in insanity and other pathological states and of the frequency with which they occur in normal people (mystics and others), the characteristics of the subconscious process are well worth closer study. What is foundto be true of the experimental type is probably true of the spontaneous variety whether occurring in pathological or normal conditions. Indeed, as we shall see, spontaneous hallucinations have the same characteristics. We have considered them thus far only from two points of view, viz. (1) as evidence of conservation of forgotten experiences, and (2) as evidence for specific residua of such experiences functioning as subconscious processes. Now, artificial visual hallucinations, like the spontaneous ones, may be limited—relatively speaking—to what is apparently little more than an exact reproduction of an antecedent visual perception, e. g., a person or object. But, generally speaking, it is more than this and when analyzed will be found almost always to be the expression of a complicated process. For instance, take the relatively simple crystal vision, of the subject smoking a cigarette in a particular situation during hypnosis, which I have previously cited. (Lecture III.) As a matter of fact, the subject had no primary visual perceptions at the time of the original episode at all. She was in hypnosis, her eyes were closed, and she did not and could not see herself (particularly her own face) or the cigarette or her surroundings. And yet the vision pictured everything exactly as it had occurred in my presence, even to the expression of her features. Looking into the crystal the subject saw herself sitting in a particular place, enacting a series of movements, talking and smoking a cigarette with a peculiar smile and expression of enjoymenton her face.[91]For this experience there was complete amnesia after waking from hypnosis and at the time of the vision.
Now consider further the facts and their implications. In the mechanism of the process eventuating in the visual phenomenon we obviously have two known factors: the antecedent causal factor—the hypnotic episode—and, after a time interval, the end result—the vision. As there was no conscious memory of the hypnotic episode the neurograms of the latter must have functioned subconsciously to have produced the vision. But what particular neurograms? As the subject’s eyes had been closed in hypnosis, and, in any event, as she could not have seen her own face, there were at the time novisualperceptions of herself smoking a cigarette, and therefore the vision could not have been simply a reproduction of a visual experience. There were, however, tactual, gustatory, and other perceptions and ideas of self and environment, and these perceptions and ideas of course possessedsecondary visual images.[92]The simplest mechanism would be that the neurograms of this complex of perception and ideas of self, etc., functioned subconsciously and theirsecondaryvisual images emerged into consciousness to be the vision. I give this as the simplest mechanism by which we can conceive of a visual representationof an antecedent experience emerging out of a subconscious process.[93]There is a considerable body of data supporting this interpretation.
But the original experiences of the episode included more than the mere perceptions and movements of the subject. They included trains of thought and enjoyment of the cigarette smoking experience. All formed a complex of which the tactual and other perceptions of self were subordinate elements. At one moment, of course, one element, and, at another moment another element, had been in the focus of awareness, the others becoming shifted into the fringewhere at all times were secondary visual images of herself. Did the subconscious process underlying the vision include the whole of this complex? As to this, one peculiarity of the vision has much significance. In behavior it acted after the manner of a cinematographic or “moving picture,” and delineated each successive movement of the episode, as if a rapid series of photographs had been taken for reproduction. Inthis manner even the emotional and changing play of the features of the vision-self, expressive of the previous thoughts and enjoyment, were depicted. Such a cinematographic series of visual images would seem to require a concurrent subconscious process to produce the successive changes in the hallucinatory images. As these changes apparently correspond from moment to moment with the changes that had occurred in the content of consciousness during the causal episode, it would also seem that the subconscious process was a reproduction in subconscious terms of substantially the whole original mental episode. This conclusion is fortified by the following additional facts: In many experiments of this kind, if the subject’s face be watched during the visualization, it will be observed thatit shows the same play of features as is displayed by the vision face,[94]and the visualizer at the same momentexperiences the same emotion as is expressed by the features of the vision face,[95]and sometimes knows “what her [my] vision self is thinking about.” In other words,in particular instances, sometimes the feelings alone and sometimes both the thoughts and feelings expressed in pantomime in the hallucination arise at the same moment in consciousness. This would seem to indicate that the same processes which determined the mimetic play of features in thehallucinationwere determining at the same moment the same play in thefeatures of the visualizer, and that these processes were a subconscious memory of substantially all the original perceptions and thoughts. That is to say, this memory in such cases remains sometimes entirely subconscious and sometimes emerges into consciousness. The hallucination is simply a projected visualization induced by what is taking place subconsciously in the subject’s mind at the moment. Whether this shall remain entirely subconscious or shall emerge partially or wholly into consciousness depends upon psychological conditions peculiar to the subject.
That even when the thoughts of the causal experience emerge in consciousness along with the vision a portion of the functioning complex—e. g., the perceptual elements—may still remain submerged is shown by the following example: The vision, one of several of the same kind, portrayed in pantomime an elaborate nocturnal somnambulistic act. It represented the subject walking in her sleep with eyes closed; then sitting before the fire in profound and depressing thought; then joyously dancing; then writing letters, etc., and finally ascending the stairs,unconsciously dropping one of the letters from her hand on the way,[96]and returning to bed. During the visualization the thoughts and feelings of the vision-self, even the contents of the letters, arose inthe mind of the visualizer whose features and tone of voice betrayed the feelings.
The point to be noted in this observation is that thevision reproduced as a detail of the somnambulistic act the accidental dropping of a letter from the hand of the somnambulist who was unaware of the fact; it reproduced what was not in conscious experience. How came it that an act for which there had been no awareness could appear in the vision? The only explanation is that originally in the somnambulistic state, as is so commonly observed in hypnotic somnambulism, there was a subconscious tactual perception (with secondary visual images?) of dropping the letter and now the memory of this antecedent perception, functioning subconsciously, induced this detail of the vision. The general conclusion then would seem to be justified that this hallucination was determined by a fairly large complex of antecedent somnambulistic experiences of which a part emerged as the hallucination and the thoughts of the somnambulist into consciousness, and a part—the tactual and other perceptions—remained submerged as the subconscious process. How much more may have been contained in this process the facts do not enable us to determine.
An examination, then, of even the more simple artificial hallucinations discloses that underlying them there is a residual process which is quite an extensive subconscious memory of antecedent thoughts, perceptions and affective experiences.Whether this memory is only an unconscious functioning neurogram or whether it is also a coconscious memory, or partly both, cannot be determined from the data.[97]The bearing of these results upon the interpretation ofinsane hallucinationsis obvious.
Our examination of subconscious processes in the two classes of phenomena thus far studied—post-hypnoticpost-hypnoticphenomena and artificial hallucinations—permits the following general conclusions: First, there is positive evidence to show that in some instances, in their intrinsic nature, they are coconscious. In other instances, in the absence of such evidence, it is permissible to regard them as unconscious. Second, that in the quality of the functions performed they frequently exhibit that which is characteristic of Intelligence. This characteristic will be seen to be still more pronounced in the phenomena which we shall next study.