The Influence of Schopenhauer`s and Nietzsche`s ideas on Freud`s Theories

TheInfluence of Schopenhauer’s and Nietzsche’s ideas on Freud’sTheories

TheInfluence of Schopenhauer’s and Nietzsche’s ideas on Freud’sTheories

Studyof Schopenhauer central ideas on “The world as Will andRepresentation,” it seems that Freud borrowed most of his ideasfrom Schopenhauer. Schopenhauer was considered a great thinker whooften expressed culture through parallels that have been restated byFreud. His ideas, however, went beyond cultural limitations as hedeveloped new concepts such as the ideas about the human Id andconsciousness. These are the ideas that founded Freud’s theory ofrepression and theory of etiology of neurosis. Unlike Freud’s work,Schopenhauer’s work is freer gives a chance to scholars such asFreud to expound on the main ideas (Tauber, 2012). Freud, however,fails to acknowledge the idea that he owes some ideas to Schopenhauerhence the continued debate.

Ellenbergerfirst established the similarities in Freud’s ideas on the moderndynamic psychiatry. He acknowledges Schopenhauer contribution andstates that psychoanalysis was an idea first introduced bySchopenhauer. He further states that most of the nineteenth centuryphilosophers derived most of their ideas from Schopenhauer.

Anotherscholar named Gupta noted that most of Schopenhauer’s work werelater developed and elaborated by Freud. Gupta also states that thereare major similarities between the idea of the will by Schopenhauerand Nietzsche and the idea of Id by Freud. From his explanation,Schopenhauer is the pioneer and Freud is elaborating his ideas. Henotes the similarity between Freud’s ideas on sexuality toSchopenhauer’s. He further notes how Freud develops the theory ofrationalization through expounding on Schopenhauer’s ideas on thenotion of repression and how repression affects a person’spersonality. Unlike Freud, Nietzsche credits Schopenhauer and evendedicates an essay titled Schopenhauer als Erzieher to him (Simmel,2012)

Thereis also a similarity between Nietzsche’s descriptions of repressionto Freud’s idea of unconsciousness and will. Many scholars haveestablished that Freud seemed to have borrowed significant backgroundinformation from the works and ideas of Schopenhauer. Since Freud hasnot acknowledged this, scholars continue to accuse Freud of fraud.This may or may not be through mainly because both describe similarissues(Katsafanas,2016).&nbsp

Accordingto Tauber (2012), given that both philosophers developed correctplausible theories, they were bound to agree on some issues. Forinstance, there could be no other way to explain consciousnesswithout having to make a reference to repression. These are justfacts that act as background information for philosophers such asFreud (Simmel,2012).&nbsp

Asmentioned above, Schopenhauer was the pioneer of modern psychology.Just like any scholar, Freud studies psychology by referencingphilosophers that came before him. He might have learned from someinformation introduced by Schopenhauer, but since he introduces newideas, it means that he cannot directly acknowledge basing his ideason Schopenhauer. Like any other study, psychology will always dependon past studies to continue to introduce new ideas. It is, therefore,safe to say that Schopenhauer’s ideas indirectly contributed toFreud’s philosophies.

References

Katsafanas,P. (2016).&nbspTheNietzschean self: moral psychology, agency, and the unconscious.Oxford: Oxford University Press.

NietzscheAs Affirmative Thinker Papers Presented at the Fifth JerusalemPhilosophical Encounter, April 1983.(2013). Springer Verlag.

Simmel,G. (2012).&nbspSchopenhauerund nietzsche.Place of publication not identified: Nabu Press.

Tauber,A. I. (2012). Freud, the reluctant philosopher. Princeton UniversityPress.