SOC 3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Antonio Damasio, Rubia, Bodymind
22 Aug 2019
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The paradox of subjectivity: to know, feeling is also necessary
The opposites I refer to are both the mental ones and the emotional ones (the well-known
Freudian love-hate dialectic, for example). Further still, to the unity of opposites such as feeling
and thinking in the totality of being. And even further, to the unity of matter and information as I
show in one of my articles.
I began to conceive this unit in the decade of my twenties. It took me, however, about five years
to have the experience that made me write the present article. On the subject of this experience
and its consequences for knowledge I will talk in more detail later.
I have, however, to say, before beginning, that the unity of opposites is not a purely conceptual
issue; the whole being intervenes in it through the body-mind, feeling-thinking unity. It is,
therefore, a mental-emotional experience, a total experience. Only in this way can one fully
understand the extent that the unity of opposites reaches.
Subjectivity to complete knowledge
Unlike the disciplines of other sciences or studies on reality, psychology implies, to have full access
to the theoretical training that it provides us, a process of personal knowledge of one's being and
being in the world.
A process, after all, of consciousness development. Without it, one cannot truly enter deeply into
the knowledge of the subject being studied. The fact that this knowledge is, reviled by many, as
subjective, only paradoxically indicates its relevance to complete the knowledge we have about
reality.
As a psychologist I have to tell you about the unit of feeling-thinking, body-mind or what,
according to neurologists, the joint response unit of the left and right hemisphere of the brain or
of the lower and upper pathways. From the perspective of psychology, these issues, although
important for a global vision of being, are secondary to understanding that unity from one's own
conscience.
Thus, beyond the demonstrated brain-mind unit that neurologist Francisco Rubia speaks of, there
would be the joint feeling-thinking (or body-mind) response unit of the total human being,
whether or not we are aware of it. That is, we can believe that our mind and body act separately
(as the culture in which we are immersed dictates us), but that is only a false image-perception of
who we are as a unit.
Antonio Damasio (2003) has much to tell us about "... feelings as mental events in the conscious
mind" (p. 171). However, I think that here I have another look at the question. More similar,
perhaps, to what Zubiri says, according to Pedro Rubal: "We intellectually intellectually or, if you
prefer, feel intellectually, in a radical unity with feeling and volition."
The unity of duality is something already studied and expressed by many authors from different
backgrounds. From the affirmation of Francisco Rubia that the brain does not function dually until
the Eastern philosophies of non-duality. From the UDO theory of Manuel Medina; Fox Keller's
(1985) statement that there is another way of doing science that involves the unity of the subject-
object; and even Kuhn's (1962, 1972, 1982), which describes the subjectivity of the scientist in his,
supposed, objective activity. Subject-object unity is, on the other hand, a fundamental theme in
the three most influential Eastern spiritual systems: Buddhism, Vedānta and Taoism, as explained
by David Loy, (1988).
A largely vain task
As I perceived at the time, trying to rationally describe a ‘place’ that is both feeling and thinking is
a largely vain task. On that occasion, I just described the things that could be rationally
understood. However, the subject matter, the unity of feeling-thinking, is not easy to understand-
experience if in your understanding we do not share the subject-feeling-body with it.
But also the poets try to describe-provoke a feeling with the words, so it may not be entirely
impossible to evoke that ‘place’ through their own language. Even knowing that language defines
our perceptions, that we only see (feel, hear ...) what we think we can see. This ‘place-state’ that I
refer to in the feeling-thinking unit is eternal and immutable, without ‘movement’. It is not
"totality" in the sense that totality also includes movement, change; but I will leave the details of
this question for another time.
I know that it is something difficult to experience and understand in a world dedicated to research
and purely mental knowledge. But quantum physics research points to the need to take this
situation seriously. And what is more serious than exploring the issue from the other side and not
continuing to understand it only from the rationalist view?
This effort may be futile. But as Castilla del Pino (1971) once said to those who disliked
psychoanalysis, a discipline or knowledge cannot be criticized from the outside, only by immersing
ourselves in it can we know it and only if we know it - do we truly experience it can we criticize it.
Affirmation that can also be found in Gestalt psychotherapy and in many spiritual texts of the East.
Thus, explaining - rationally - as I do next, the thinking-feeling unity is for many trying the
impossible. But it is one of those things that can only be understood if we add to subjective
consideration the subjective experimentation of the subject. However, Jung (1933) tells us about
the rational nature of feeling. This is also confirmed by Damasio (2003). And we can add, following
Francisco Rubia beyond the obvious and the objective, that, at deep levels, the division between
thought and feeling does not exist in the brain.
It is difficult to understand this only from the left side of the brain. But it has always been my
effort to arrive as close as possible to a plausible explanation that opens the door to a full
experimentation of what I affirm in my explanations. This is what basically works in Gestalt
therapy: the phenomenological experience of ‘what is there’. No arguments to blur it. In this sense
it resembles extraordinarily many sentences of Eastern spirituality.
The existential paradox
It is necessary to reconnect the mind with the body and with the feeling, so undervalued and
unknown in our culture. And so unconsciously members of our thinking. The feeling makes us say
many times things that we would not want to say. We would do well, then, to know him better. In
knowing us better.
There is no what we call objective (reductively objective) thinking. However subtle the
interference of feeling is always there. Understanding this deeply does not imply removing
objectivity from its constructive role of reality. On the contrary, it paradoxically implies expanding
it. The objective is more objective if it is also subjective, if we include the observer in the
observation, as quantum mechanics does.
Only if we understand the nature of this paradox can we contemplate a more total and therefore
more objective reality; that is, more real. Because objectivity and subjectivity are, like every
polarity, two extremes of a duality whose action is synergistic if the unity of its action is
completed.
The paradox of this situation takes us a little beyond the rational paradox. It leads us to an
existential paradox that involves not only thought but also feeling and body. That is, to the totality
of being.
Through the experience of the thinking-feeling unit, one can better understand the unity of the
mind-mind, since matter is, in this case, the body itself, its emotions and its sensations.
Think and feel
As Jung (1974) already said, thought and feeling are two opposite psychic functions that can be
integrated. What I am going to affirm in this article is that a single consciousness (in terms of
Bohm, 1987) is formed at certain deep levels in which the thought of feeling is no longer
distinguished because at that level one realizes that They are one and the same thing. In another
way: it is the experience that occurs when perceptions of the right cerebral hemisphere with the
left (or the lower and upper) are integrated into consciousness.
From a more everyday perspective: our feelings always accompany (even in the most scientific,
objective and allegedly aseptic exhibitions, and despite what the rationalists say) to our thoughts.
When we have negative thoughts our feelings are negative and vice versa, the same goes for
positive thoughts-feelings.
The therapies of positive thinking are based on the mutual influence between thought and feeling.
These therapies are based on the proven fact that thinking influences feeling and mood. In the
same way it is affirmed (and it is a daily experience for all of us) that when one has negative
feelings he thinks negatively and therefore is susceptible to being led into negative and even
dangerous situations (from depression to suicide through everything type of accidents more or
less serious).
The philosophical assumption that accompanies most of the discourse of this type of approach is
that thought and feeling are different things, even if their interdependence, relationship and
mutual influence are evident.
However, here we start from the unitary idea (admitting, at the same time, the dual vision that
distinguishes between thought and feeling) that there is a deep place in consciousness-experience
in which thought and feeling are a still undifferentiated unit. That is, we can observe-experience
its unity and its difference in two different levels of consciousness that are mutually integrated. It
Document Summary
The paradox of subjectivity: to know, feeling is also necessary. The opposites i refer to are both the mental ones and the emotional ones (the well-known. Further still, to the unity of opposites such as feeling and thinking in the totality of being. And even further, to the unity of matter and information as i show in one of my articles. I began to conceive this unit in the decade of my twenties. It took me, however, about five years to have the experience that made me write the present article. On the subject of this experience and its consequences for knowledge i will talk in more detail later. I have, however, to say, before beginning, that the unity of opposites is not a purely conceptual issue; the whole being intervenes in it through the body-mind, feeling-thinking unity. It is, therefore, a mental-emotional experience, a total experience.
