Alchemy Symbolism And Psychology

So science has progressed, but still any model becomes a cage, for if ones comes across phenomena difficult to explain, then instead of being adaptable and saying that the phenomena do not conform to the model and that a new hypothesis must be found, one clings to one’s hypotheses with a kind of emotional conviction and cannot be objective. Why shouldn’t there be more than three dimensions, why not investigate and see where we get? But that people could not do.

I Remember a very good illustration given by one of Pauli’s pupils. You know that the theory of ether played a great role in the 17th and 18th centuries – namely, that there was a kind of cosmic air-like pneuma in the cosmos in which light existed, et. One day a physicist at a Congress proved that the theory of ether was quite unnecessary, an old man with a White beard got up and in a quavering voice said: “If ether does not exist, then everything is gone!” This old man had unconsciously projected his idea of God into ether. Ether was his god, and if he did not have that then there was nothing left. The man was naive enough to speak of his ideas, but all natural scientists have ultimate models of reality in which they believe, just like the Holy ghost.

So the archetype is the promoter of ideas and is also responsible for the emotional restrictions which prevent the renunciation of earlier theories. It is really only a detail or specific aspect of what happens everywhere in life, for we could not recognize anything without projection, but it is also the main obstacle in arriving at the truth. If one meets an unknown woman, it is not possible to make contact without projecting something; you must make a hypothesis, which of course is done quite unconsciously: the woman is elderly and probably a kind of mother figure, and a normal human being, etc. You make assumptions and then you have a bridge. When you know the person better, then many earlier assumptions must be discarded and you must admit that your conclusions were incorrect. Unless this is done, then you are hampered in the contact.

At first, one has to project, or there is no contact, but then one should be able to correct the projection, and it is the same not only as regards human beings, but everything else also. The projection apparatus must of necessity work in us, nothing can even be seen without the unconscious projection factor. That is why according to Indian philosophy the whole of reality is a projection, which it is, in a subjective manner of speaking. To us reality exists only when we have projections on it.

Question: Can you relate without projection?

Dr. von Franz: I don’t think so. Philosophically speaking, you cannot relate without projection, but there is a subjective feeling status in which you sometimes fell that your projection fits, and that there is no need to change it, and another status in which you feel uneasy, thinking that it ought to be corrected. But no projection is ever c oorrected without such a feeling of uneasiness.

Let us assume that there is in you an unconscious liar and you meet someone who lies like a trooper. You can only recognize the liar in the other because you are a liar yourself, otherwise you would not be aware of the other. A quality in another person can only be recognized if one has the same quality and knows what it feels like to lie, and therefore one recognizes the same thing in the other person. Since the other person really is a liar, you have made a true statement, and why should you call that a projection which should be taken back? It makes the basis for the relationship, for you think to yourself: If X is a liar, whatever he tells me I must not believe entirely, I must question it. That is very reasonable and well adapted and right. It would be very wrong to think it was only one’s projection, and that one should believe the other person; one would be a fool to dos o. But if you take that philosophically, then is it a projection or a@|atement of fact? Philosophically, you cannot reach a cocnlusion, you can only say taht subjectively it seems to be correct. That is why Jung says – and this is a sublte point which is seldom undertsood when people think about projection – that we can only speak of projection, in the proper sense of the word, whene there already exists a certain uneasiness, when the feeling identity is distrubted; that is, when I have an uneasy feeling as to wehether what I have said about X is true or not. Until that has happened autonomously within me, there is no projection.

So in natural science, just as in interpersonal contacts, there is the same problem of projection, even the most scientific and most modern and most accurate forms of modern natural sciences are all based on projections. Progress in science is the replacement of a primitive projection by one more accurate, so that one can say that natural science is concerned with the projection of models of reality into which phenomena seem to fit better, or less well. If the phenomena apparently click with my model, then it is all right, but if not then I must revise my model. How that links up is a great problem.

Knowledge is either poisonous or healing, it is one or the other, and that is why some myths say that knowledge brings about the corruption of the world and others that knowledge is healing, and then we have the biblical idea which says that it is first corruption, but later turns, thank God, into healing. In the Old Testament it meant corruption, but Christ, who made something out of it, turned it into healing, so one has to have a double attitude about it, the teaching of the felix culpa.

I mark words in the books I read which either (A) I have not come across or (B) I am familiar with but need a refresher.

• Individuation: Becoming a distinct, self-realized individual (Jungian concept).
• Banalities: Trivial, unoriginal ideas or remarks.
• Concretistic: Focused on literal details rather than abstract ideas.
• Heresiology: Study of heretical beliefs.
• Schizoid: Marked by emotional detachment and social withdrawal.
• Compensatory: Acting to balance or make up for a deficiency.
• Analysand: A person undergoing psychoanalytic treatment.
• Numinous: Evoking a sense of the divine or awe.
• Enantiodromia: The tendency for extremes to turn into their opposites.
• Irruption: A sudden, forceful burst or intrusion.
• Animus: In Jungian terms, the inner masculine aspect (in women) or spirit.
• Constellates: Arranges into a recognizable pattern or cluster.
• Acede: To agree or give consent.
• Concomitant: Occurring alongside or in association with something else.
• Somatic: Relating to the body or physical aspects.