Psychic determinism 

There are three main types of hypothesis that Freud presented at three different periods in his life, which seem to have and important significance, seen from a Buddhist stand point. The first idea he presented was psychic determinism. What Freud meant by this term was that the subjective mental processes arise and continue, depending on the presence of necessary conditions, just as physical processes in the objective physical world do. It was after the 15th century, during the age of enlightenment, that the Western world came to recognize the law of determinism in nature. 


In ancient times, primitive men thought that thunder, lightning and other natural phenomena were due to the activity of invisible spirits who controlled the external world. When modern scientists discovered how thunder, lightening, and other such phenomena occurred, the belief in spirits was discarded. What they discovered was the law of determinism, which means that every occurrence in the world was determined by the necessary conditions. This idea is generally accepted today even by school children. Yet unfortunately even in modern times almost everyone believes that the thinking, speaking, and physical behaviour of a person are activities done by a spirit living inside every human body, which is called the “self” or the “soul.” 


It was Freud who pointed out, in the West, by using the term “psychic determinism,” that even mental processes follow the law of determinism. This means, there is no “person” or “self” thinking, speaking, or doing anything inside our body; it is only the workings of a mental process, similar to the workings of a mechanically worked engine, radio, or television set, whose workings are determined by the necessary conditions. The mind of the driver that drives a car at high speed is as mechanical as the engine that pulls the car, even though we like to think otherwise. 


This fact was brought to the attention of the people of India by the Buddha twenty five centuries before Freud. The Buddha called this principle of psychic determinism “contingent concurrence” (paticca samuppada),(6) and presented an in-depth exposition of this fact. This fact is the basic principle underlying the philosophy of the Buddha. He even identified his entire teaching with the contingent concurrence: “He who sees the Dhamma sees the contingent concurrence; he who sees the contingent concurrence sees the Dhamma.” 


Freud, being a neurologist, clearly saw that the mind was not an entity separate from the body but only an activity of the nervous system. He saw the mind as a process of activity that started with sensory stimulation and ended with motor activity. It was the reaction of the organism to environmental stimulation. He compared this process to the activity of a telescope. It was a chain reaction starting with perception, which was followed by an interpretation of what is perceived using memory. This then resulted in an emotional arousal, followed by the release of tension in action. The emotional arousal produced tension in the muscles of the body. This tension was uncomfortable, and therefore it was removed by the release of tension in action. 


This release of tension in action, he called the secondary process. The emotional arousal always accompanies a mental image of what is desired, of what is hated, or of what is feared. That he called the memory image. The secondary process begins with this memory image, and it is followed by planning to get what is desired, to get rid of what is hated, or to run away from what is feared. The plan is made using a mental image of the future action, using the cognitive process, intelligence, and reason. This secondary process, however, can also be inhibited, by feelings of shame, and moral considerations, due to the activity of the conscience. Inhibition can also occur due to considerations of consequences and fear. This inhibition will be discussed in more detail later.

(6) This translation is a more accurate and more meaningful one than the common “dependent origination.”