You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
The purpose of this paper is to clarify the psychoanalytic concept of the unconscious by exploring its relationship to the brain, taking as a point of departure Rubinstein's (1980) thesis that unconscious mental events are neural events: “Unless we are prepared to get bogged down in the well-nigh impenetrable mist of a dualistic view of unconscious events, we must accept the notion that unconscious mental events in fact are neural events by another name” (p. 13).
In approaching this issue, I will attempt to bypass the philosophical mind-brain problem for the following reason. My reading on this ancient philosophical controversy leads me to conclude that there is no consensus among philosophers on this question nor any immediate prospect of a forthcoming solution. Therefore, it seems most wise not to link scientific theory to a specific position on a possibly insoluble philosophical conundrum.
A simple way of evading the mind-brain problem is to begin with the generally accepted empirical correlations between brain events and mental events without committing ourselves on the precise nature of the relationship that underlies this