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101-441: The associated term "ideo- dynamic response" (or "reflex") applies to a wider domain, and extends to the description of all bodily reactions (including ideo-motor and ideo-sensory responses) caused in a similar manner by certain ideas, e.g., the salivation often caused by imagining sucking a lemon, which is a secretory response. The notion of an ideo-dynamic response contributed to James Braid 's first neuropsychological explanation of

202-431: A Scot, employed as a traveller for Scarr, Petty and Swain, a firm of Manchester tailors, invited Braid to move his practice to Manchester , England. Braid moved to Manchester in 1828, continuing to practise from there until his death in 1860. Braid was a well-respected, highly skilled, and very successful surgeon, Braid was a member of a number of prestigious " learned societies " and technical/educational institutions:

303-661: A capacity congregation; and, according to most critics, it was a poorly argued and unimpressive performance. M'Neile's core argument was that scripture asserts the existence of "satanic agency"; and, in the process of delivering his sermon, he provided examples of the various instantiations that "satanic agency" might manifest (observing times, divination , necromancy , etc.), and claimed that these were all forms of "witchcraft"; and, further, he asserted that, because scripture asserts that, as "latter times" approach, more and more evidence of "satanic agency" will appear, it was, M'Neile asserted, ipso facto , transparently obvious that

404-510: A cogent system that is regarded by some as the beginning of modern scientific psychology. William Shakespeare explored the role of the unconscious in many of his plays, without naming it as such. Western philosophers such as Arthur Schopenhauer , Baruch Spinoza , Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz , Johann Gottlieb Fichte , Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel , Karl Robert Eduard von Hartmann , Carl Gustav Carus , Søren Aabye Kierkegaard , Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche and Thomas Carlyle used

505-460: A considered opinion of Lafontaine's work. He was neither a closed-minded cynic intent on destroying Lafontaine, nor a deluded and naïvely credulous believer seeking authorization of his already formed belief. Braid was amongst the medical men who were invited onto the platform by Lafontaine. Braid examined the physical condition of Lafontaine's magnetised subjects (especially their eyes and their eyelids) and concluded that they were, indeed, in quite

606-486: A critique of the Freudian unconscious. He argues that the Freudian cases of shallow, consciously held mental states would be best characterized as 'repressed consciousness,' while the idea of more deeply unconscious mental states is more problematic. He contends that the very notion of a collection of "thoughts" that exist in a privileged region of the mind such that they are in principle never accessible to conscious awareness,

707-525: A different physical state. Braid always stressed the significance of attending Lafontaine's conversazione . Braid attended two more of Lafontaine's demonstrations; and, by the third demonstration (on Saturday 20 November 1841), Braid was convinced of the veracity of some of Lafontaine's effects and phenomena (see Yeates, 2018b, pp. 56–63). Lafontaine’s technique was a combination of physical contact, mesmeric passes, and eye-fixation. It began with operator and subject facing each other. The operator held

808-422: A list of the more important sources of error which, he said, ought always to be kept in mind by the operator. These … should be placed in a prominent position in every hypnotic laboratory: (1) The hyperæsthesia of the organs of special sense, which enabled im- pressions to be perceived through the ordinary media that would have passed unrecognised in the waking condition. (2) The docility and sympathy of

909-406: A matter of interpretation of the facts. That there are common elements is not in question, but that there is full identity in questionable and basically untestable . – Weitzenhoffer (2000, p. 3; emphasis added). Also, in relation to the clinical application of "hypnotism", Although Braid believed that hypnotic suggestion was a valuable remedy in functional nervous disorders, he did not regard it as

1010-899: A member of both the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association , a Corresponding Member of both the Wernerian Natural History Society of Edinburgh (in 1824), and the Royal Medical Society of Edinburgh ( in 1854 ), a Member of the Manchester Athenæum , and the Honorary Curator of the museum of the Manchester Natural History Society .     The first who investigated

1111-449: A newspaper account of a lecture he had delivered on the preceding Wednesday evening (13 April) at Macclesfield, and a cordial invitation (plus a free admission ticket) for M'Neile to attend Braid's Liverpool lecture, on Thursday, 21 April. Yet, despite Braid's courtesy, in raising his deeply felt concerns directly to M'Neile, in private correspondence, M'Neile did not acknowledge Braid's letter nor did he attend Braid's lecture. Further, in

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1212-592: A number of experiments with self-hypnotization upon himself, and, by now convinced that he had discovered the natural psycho-physiological mechanism underlying these quite genuine effects, he performed his first act of hetero-hypnotization at his own residence, before several witnesses, including Captain Thomas Brown (1785–1862) on Monday 22 November 1841 – his first hypnotic subject was Mr. J. A. Walker. ( see Neurypnology , pp. 16–20. ) The following Saturday, (27 November 1841) Braid delivered his first public lecture at

1313-740: A pamphlet; which he did on Saturday, 4 June 1842; a pamphlet which, in Crabtree's opinion is "a work of the greatest significance in the history of hypnotism, and of utmost rarity" (1988, p. 121). Soon after, he also wrote a report entitled "Practical Essay on the Curative Agency of Neuro-Hypnotism", which he applied to have read before the British Association for the Advancement of Science in June 1842. Despite being initially accepted for presentation,

1414-505: A philosopher, and a medical professional. He claimed that Braid and Lafontaine were one and the same kind. He also threatened Braid's professional and social position by associating him with Satan; and, in the most ill-informed way, condemned Braid's important therapeutic work as having no clinical efficacy whatsoever. The sermon was reported on at some length in the Liverpool Standard , two days later. Once Braid became fully aware of

1515-440: A phraseology more appropriate, as applicable to a wider range of phenomena." In this opinion I quite concurred, because I was well aware that an idea could arrest as well as excite motion automatically, not only in the muscles of voluntary motion, but also as regards the condition of every other function of the body . I have, therefore, adopted the term monoideo-dynamics , as still more comprehensive and characteristic as regards

1616-399: A rival to other forms of treatment, nor wish in any way to separate its practice from that of medicine in general. He held that whoever talked of a "universal remedy" was either a fool or a knave: similar diseases often arose from opposite pathological conditions, and the treatment ought to be varied accordingly. – John Milne Bramwell (1910) Braid was born on 19 June 1875, the third son, and

1717-578: A significant paper, "On the influence of Suggestion in Modifying and directing Muscular Movement, independently of Volition", to the Royal Institution of Great Britain (it was published later that year).     I shall conclude this [lecture] by a very simple mode of illustration, as respects the different points of view in which the mesmerists, the electro-biologists, and myself, stand toward each other in theory , by referring to

1818-544: A single (thus, "dominant") idea. In 1855, Braid explained his decision to abandon his earlier term "mono-ideo-motor", based on Carpenter's (1852) "ideo-motor principle", and adopt the more appropriate and more descriptive term "mono-ideo-dynamic". His decision was based upon suggestions made to Carpenter (in 1854) by their friend in common, Daniel Noble , that the activity that Carpenter was describing would be more accurately understood in its wider applications (viz., wider than pendulums and ouija boards) if it were to denominated

1919-486: A small bright object held eighteen inches above and in front of the eyes. Braid regarded the physiological condition underlying hypnotism to be the over-exercising of the eye muscles through the straining of attention. He completely rejected Franz Mesmer 's idea that a magnetic fluid caused hypnotic phenomena, because anyone could produce them in "himself by attending strictly to the simple rules" that he had laid down. The (derogative) proposal that Braidism be adopted as

2020-421: A small bright object, and which were different from those of the so-called magnetic trance, Braid gave the name of Hypnotism …      W. T. Preyer (1880: address to British Medical Association 's Annual Meeting). Braid first observed the operation of animal magnetism , when he attended a public performance by the travelling French magnetic demonstrator Charles Lafontaine (1803–1892) at

2121-569: A synonym for "hypnotism" was rejected by Braid; and it was rarely used at the time of that proposition, and is never used today. Nearly a year after the publication of Neurypnology , the secretary of the Royal Manchester Institution invited Braid to conduct a conversazione in the Institution's lecture theatre on Monday, 22 April 1844. Braid spoke at considerable length to a very large audience on hypnotism; and also gave details of

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2222-407: Is being thought by a thinker or that it could be thought by a thinker. Processes that are not causally related to the phenomenon called thinking are more appropriately called the nonconscious processes of the brain. Other critics of the Freudian unconscious include David Stannard , Richard Webster , Ethan Watters , Richard Ofshe , and Eric Thomas Weber. Some scientific researchers proposed

2323-451: Is consistent with their expectations". They also show that suggestions that can guide behavior can be given by subtle clues (Hyman 1977). Some operators claim to use ideomotor responses to communicate with a subject's " unconscious mind " using a system of physical signals (such as finger movements) for the unconscious mind to indicate "yes", "no", "I don't know", or "I'm not ready to know that consciously". A simple experiment to demonstrate

2424-421: Is demonstrably true, without offering any violence to reason and common sense, or being at variance with generally admitted physiological and psychological principles. Under these circum- stances, therefore, I trust that you will consider me entitled to your verdict in favour of my MENTAL THEORY . James Braid (26 March 1851) Unconscious mind In psychoanalysis and other psychological theories,

2525-417: Is essentially self-conscious. Sartre also argues that Freud's theory of repression is internally flawed. Philosopher Thomas Baldwin argues that Sartre's argument is based on a misunderstanding of Freud. Erich Fromm contends that "The term 'the unconscious' is actually a mystification (even though one might use it for reasons of convenience, as I am guilty of doing in these pages). There is no such thing as

2626-410: Is incoherent. This is not to imply that there are not "nonconscious" processes that form the basis of much of conscious life. Rather, Searle simply claims that to posit the existence of something that is like a "thought" in every way except for the fact that no one can ever be aware of it (can never, indeed, "think" it) is an incoherent concept. To speak of "something" as a "thought" either implies that it

2727-555: Is not conscious, but rather that which is actively repressed from conscious thought. In the psychoanalytic view, unconscious mental processes can only be recognized through analysis of their effects in consciousness. Unconscious thoughts are not directly accessible to ordinary introspection, but they are capable of partially evading the censorship mechanism of repression in a disguised form, manifesting, for example, as dream elements or neurotic symptoms . Such symptoms are supposed to be capable of being "interpreted" during psychoanalysis, with

2828-521: Is strongly associated with the practice of analytical hypnotherapy based on "uncovering techniques" such as Watkins' "affect bridge", whereby a subject's "yes", "no", "I don't know", or "I don't want to answer" responses to an operator's questions are indicated by physical movements rather than verbal signals; and are produced per medium of a pre-determined (between operator and subject) and pre-calibrated set of responses. James Braid (surgeon) James Braid (19 June 1795 – 25 March 1860)

2929-438: Is the focusing of the energy of several ideas into one, and displacement is the surrender of one idea's energy to another more trivial representative. The manifest content is thus thought to be a highly significant simplification of the latent content, capable of being deciphered in the analytic process, potentially allowing conscious insight into unconscious mental activity. Allan Hobson and colleagues developed what they called

3030-575: The Manchester Athenæum on 13 November 1841. In Neurypnology (1843, pp. 34–35) he states that, prior to his encounter with Lafontaine, he had already been totally convinced by a four-part investigation of Animal Magnetism published in The London Medical Gazette (i.e., Anon, 1838) that there was no evidence of the existence of any magnetic agency for any such phenomena. The final article's last paragraph read: And, along with

3131-424: The vibratory theory, whilst the mesmerists and electro-biologists contend for the emission theory. But my experiments have proved that the ordinary phenomena of mesmer- ism may be realised through the subjective or personal mental and physical acts of the patient alone ; whereas the proximity, acts, or in- fluence of a second party, would be indispensably requisite for their production, if

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3232-461: The activation-synthesis hypothesis which proposes that dreams are simply the side effects of the neural activity in the brain that produces beta brain waves during REM sleep that are associated with wakefulness. According to this hypothesis, neurons fire periodically during sleep in the lower brain levels and thus send random signals to the cortex . The cortex then synthesizes a dream in reaction to these signals in order to try to make sense of why

3333-418: The attentional blink ) or through distracting stimuli like visual masking . An extensive line of research conducted by Hasher and Zacks has demonstrated that individuals register information about the frequency of events automatically (outside conscious awareness and without engaging conscious information processing resources). Moreover, perceivers do this unintentionally, truly "automatically", regardless of

3434-456: The unconscious mind (or the unconscious ) is the part of the psyche that is not available to introspection. Although these processes exist beneath the surface of conscious awareness, they are thought to exert an effect on conscious thought processes and behavior. Empirical evidence suggests that unconscious phenomena include repressed feelings and desires, memories, automatic skills, subliminal perceptions , and automatic reactions. The term

3535-410: The unconscious; there are only experiences of which we are aware, and others of which we are not aware, that is, of which we are unconscious . If I hate a man because I am afraid of him, and if I am aware of my hate but not of my fear, we may say that my hate is conscious and that my fear is unconscious; still my fear does not lie in that mysterious place: 'the' unconscious." John Searle has offered

3636-544: The "Father of Modern Hypnotism"; however, in relation to the issue of there being significant connections between Braid's "hypnotism" and "modern hypnotism" (as practised), let alone "identity", Weitzenhoffer (2000, p. 3) urges the utmost caution in making any such assumption: It has been a basic assumption of modern (i.e., twentieth century) hypnotism that it is founded on the same phenomenology it historically evolved from . Such differences as exist between older versions of hypnotism and newer ones being reduced largely to

3737-508: The "ideo-dynamic principle": In order that I may do full justice to two esteemed friends, I beg to state, in connection with this term monoideo-dynamics , that, several years ago, Dr. W. B. Carpenter introduced the term ideo-motor to characterise the reflex or automatic muscular motions which arise merely from ideas associated with motion existing in the mind, without any conscious effort of volition. In 1853, in referring to this term, Daniel Noble said, " Ideo-dynamic would probably constitute

3838-432: The 'gaze', 'charisma', or 'magnetism' of the operator; all it needed was a subject's 'fixity of vision' on an 'object of concentration' at such a height and such a distance from the bridge of their nose that the desired 'upwards and inwards squint' was achieved. And, at the same time, by using himself as a subject, Braid also conclusively proved that none of Lafontaine's phenomena were due to magnetic agency. Braid conducted

3939-536: The City of Edinburgh , the Lic.R.C.S. (Edin), in 1815, which entitled him to refer to himself as a member of the college, rather than a fellow. Braid was appointed surgeon to Lord Hopetoun 's mines at Leadhills , Lanarkshire, in 1816. In 1825, he set up in private practice at Dumfries , where he also "encountered the exceptional surgeon, William Maxwell, MD (1760–1834)". One of his Dumfries' patients, Alexander Petty (1778–1864),

4040-631: The Manchester Athenæum, Braid explained his terminological developments as follows: It is important to recognize three things; namely, that: Although Braid was the first to use the terms hypnotism , hypnotise and hypnotist in English, the cognate terms hypnotique , hypnotisme , hypnotiste had been intentionally used by the French magnetist Baron Etienne Félix d'Henin de Cuvillers (1755–1841) at least as early as 1820. Braid, moreover,

4141-420: The Manchester Athenæum, in which, amongst other things, he was able to demonstrate that he could replicate the effects produced by Lafontaine, without the need for any sort of physical contact between the operator and the subject. On the evening of Sunday, 10 April 1842, at St Jude's Church, Liverpool, the controversial cleric Hugh Boyd M'Neile preached a sermon against Mesmerism for more than ninety minutes to

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4242-528: The Rationale of Nervous Sleep Considered in Relation with Animal Magnetism... , his first and only book-length exposition of his views. According to Bramwell, the work was popular from the outset, selling 800 copies within a few months of its publication. Braid thought of hypnotism as producing a "nervous sleep" which differed from ordinary sleep. The most efficient way to produce it was through visual fixation on

4343-407: The alternative term "Carpenter effect". Carpenter was a friend and collaborator of James Braid, the founder of modern hypnotism. Braid soon adopted Carpenter's ideo-motor terminology, to facilitate the transmission of his most fundamental views, based upon those of his teacher, the philosopher Thomas Brown , that the efficacy of hypnotic suggestion was contingent upon the subject's concentration upon

4444-415: The brain is sending them. However, the hypothesis does not state that dreams are meaningless, it just downplays the role that emotional factors play in determining dreams. There is an extensive body of research in contemporary cognitive psychology devoted to mental activity that is not mediated by conscious awareness. Most of this research on unconscious processes has been done in the academic tradition of

4545-403: The brain structure of every individual". In addition to the structure of the unconscious, Jung differed from Freud in that he did not believe that sexuality was at the base of all unconscious thoughts. The purpose of dreams, according to Freud, is to fulfill repressed wishes while simultaneously allowing the dreamer to remain asleep. The dream is a disguised fulfillment of the wish because

4646-421: The claims of the mesmerists and animal magnetists could be examined in any way, or any of their findings investigated, or any confidence be placed in any of the recorded results of any of their experiments – that the entire process of the research that they had conducted, the investigative procedures that they had employed, and the experimental design that had underpinned their enterprise must be closely examined for

4747-547: The context of manifold, jumbled sense data that the mind organizes at an unconscious level before revealing it as a cogent totality in conscious form." Eduard von Hartmann published a book dedicated to the topic, Philosophy of the Unconscious , in 1869. Sigmund Freud and his followers developed an account of the unconscious mind. He worked with the unconscious mind to develop an explanation for mental illness. It plays an important role in psychoanalysis . Freud divided

4848-477: The differences between conscious and unconscious perception. There is evidence that whether something is consciously perceived depends both on the incoming stimulus (bottom up strength) and on top-down mechanisms like attention . Recent research indicates that some unconsciously perceived information can become consciously accessible if there is cumulative evidence. Similarly, content that would normally be conscious can become unconscious through inattention (e.g. in

4949-460: The effects of hypnotism were "quite reconcilable with well-established physiological and psychological principles" (viz., they were well connected to the prevailing canonical knowledge), it was highly significant that none of the extraordinary effects that the mesmerists and animal magnetists routinely claimed for their operations – such as clairvoyance, direct mental suggestion, and mesmeric intuition – could be produced with hypnotism. So, he argued, it

5050-454: The exhibitions of Lafontaine and Braid, in Liverpool, at that very moment, were concrete examples of those particular instantiations. He then moved into a confusing admixture of philippic (against Braid and Lafontaine), and polemic (against animal magnetism), wherein he concluded that all mesmeric phenomena were due to "satanic agency". In particular, he attacked Braid as a man, a scientist,

5151-492: The existence of unconscious mechanisms that are very different from the Freudian ones. They speak of a "cognitive unconscious" ( John Kihlstrom ), an " adaptive unconscious " ( Timothy Wilson ), or a "dumb unconscious" (Loftus and Klinger), which executes automatic processes but lacks the complex mechanisms of repression and symbolic return of the repressed, and the "deep unconscious system" of Robert Langs . In modern cognitive psychology , many researchers have sought to strip

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5252-406: The face of all the evidence Braid had presented, and seemingly, without the slightest correction of its original contents , M'Neile allowed the entire text of his original sermon, as it had been transcribed by a stenographer (more than 7,500 words), to be published on Wednesday, 4 May 1842. It was this 'most ungentlemanly' act of M'Neile towards Braid, that forced Braid to publish his own response as

5353-501: The fact that many of the mesmerized individuals are quite unable to open their eyes.     Braid was much puzzled by this discovery, until he found that the "magnetic trance" could be induced, with many of its marvellous symptoms of catalepsy, aphasia, exaltation and depression of the sensory functions, by merely concentrating the patient’s attention on one object or one idea, and preventing all interruption or distraction whatever.     But in

5454-424: The help of methods such as free association , dream analysis, and analysis of verbal slips and other unintentional manifestations in conscious life. Carl Gustav Jung agreed with Freud that the unconscious is a determinant of personality, but he proposed that the unconscious be divided into two layers: the personal unconscious and the collective unconscious . The personal unconscious is a reservoir of material that

5555-445: The hidden or disguised meaning of the events and elements of the dream. It represents the unconscious psychic realities of the dreamer's current issues and childhood conflicts, the nature of which the analyst is seeking to understand through interpretation of the manifest content. In Freud's theory, dreams are instigated by the events and thoughts of everyday life. In what he called the "dream-work", these events and thoughts, governed by

5656-424: The highest importance." In 1890, when psychoanalysis was still unheard of, William James , in his monumental treatise on psychology ( The Principles of Psychology ), examined the way Schopenhauer , von Hartmann , Janet , Binet and others had used the term 'unconscious' and 'subconscious.'" German psychologists, Gustav Fechner and Wilhelm Wundt , had begun to use the term in their experimental psychology, in

5757-405: The ideomotor effect is to allow a hand-held pendulum to hover over a sheet of paper. The paper has words such as "yes", "no", and "maybe" printed on it. Small movements in the hand, in response to questions, can cause the pendulum to move towards the words on the paper. This technique has been used for experiments in extrasensory perception , lie detection , and ouija boards. This type of experiment

5858-549: The imagination in hypnosis, which instantly invest- ed every suggested idea, or remembrance of past impressions, with the attributes of present realities. (7) Deductions rapidly drawn by the subject from unintentional suggestions given by the operator. (8) The tendency of the human mind, in those with a great love of the mar- vellous, erroneously to interpret the subject's replies in accordance with their own desires. (Bramwell, 1903, p. 144.) In his presentation Braid stressed that, because he had clearly demonstrated that

5959-495: The important differences he had identified between his "hypnotism" and mesmerism/animal magnetism. According to the extensive press reports, "the interest felt by the members of the institution in the subject was manifested by the attendance of one of the largest audiences we ever recollect to have seen present".     Braid successfully demonstrated that many of the alleged phenomena of mesmerism owed their origin to defective methods of observation. He drew out

6060-434: The information processing paradigm. The cognitive tradition of research into unconscious processes does not rely on the clinical observations and theoretical bases of the psychoanalytic tradition; instead it is mostly data driven. Cognitive research reveals that individuals automatically register and acquire more information than they are consciously aware of or can consciously remember and report. Much research has focused on

6161-484: The instructions they receive, and regardless of the information processing goals they have. The ability to unconsciously and relatively accurately tally the frequency of events appears to have little or no relation to the individual's age, education, intelligence, or personality. Thus it may represent one of the fundamental building blocks of human orientation in the environment and possibly the acquisition of procedural knowledge and experience, in general. The notion that

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6262-412: The matter [of mesmerism] in a scientific way, and who deserves more honour than he has yet received, was … James Braid, a Manchester surgeon. At first a sceptic, holding that the whole of the so-called magnetic phenomena were the results of illusion, delusion, or excited imagination, he found in 1841 that one, at least, of the characteristic symptoms could not be accounted for in this manner: viz.,

6363-510: The mechanism of repression : anxiety-producing impulses in childhood are barred from consciousness, but do not cease to exist, and exert a constant pressure in the direction of consciousness. However, the content of the unconscious is only knowable to consciousness through its representation in a disguised or distorted form, by way of dreams and neurotic symptoms, as well as in slips of the tongue and jokes . The psychoanalyst seeks to interpret these conscious manifestations in order to understand

6464-481: The mental and visual eye" The concept of the mind's eye first appeared in English in Chaucer's Man of Law's Tale in his Canterbury Tales , where he speaks of a man "who was blind, and could only see with the eyes of his mind, with which all men see after they go blind". as a means of engaging a natural physiological mechanism that was already hard-wired into each human being: In 1843, he published Neurypnology; or

6565-414: The mind into the conscious mind (or the ego ) and the unconscious mind. The latter was then further divided into the id (or instincts and drive) and the superego (or conscience ). In this theory, the unconscious refers to the mental processes of which individuals are unaware. Freud proposed a vertical and hierarchical architecture of human consciousness: the conscious mind , the preconscious , and

6666-595: The nature of the repressed. The unconscious mind can be seen as the source of dreams and automatic thoughts (those that appear without any apparent cause), the repository of forgotten memories (that may still be accessible to consciousness at some later time), and the locus of implicit knowledge (the things that we have learned so well that we do them without thinking). Phenomena related to semi-consciousness include awakening , implicit memory , subliminal messages , trances , hypnagogia and hypnosis . While sleep , sleepwalking , dreaming , delirium and comas may signal

6767-432: The newspaper reports of the conglomeration of matters that were reportedly raised in M'Neile's sermon, and the misrepresentations and outright errors of fact that it allegedly contained, as well as the vicious nature of the insults, and the implicit and explicit threats which were levelled against Braid's own personal, spiritual, and professional well-being by M'Neile, he sent a detailed private letter to M'Neile accompanied by

6868-402: The notion of the unconscious from its Freudian heritage, and alternative terms such as "implicit" or "automatic" have been used. These traditions emphasize the degree to which cognitive processing happens outside the scope of cognitive awareness, and show that things we are unaware of can nonetheless influence other cognitive processes as well as behavior. Active research traditions related to

6969-412: The paper was controversially rejected at the last moment; but Braid arranged for a series of Conversaziones [1] at which he presented its contents. Braid summarised and contrasted his own view with the other views prevailing at that time: By at least 28 February 1842, Braid was using "Neurohypnology" (which he later shortened to "Neurypnology"); and, in a public lecture on Saturday, 12 March 1842, at

7070-400: The part of those making these erroneous claims. In Braid’s view (given that many of the proponents of such views were decent men, and that their experiences had been honestly recounted), the only possible explanation was that their observations were seriously flawed. To Braid, these faults in their investigatory processes were "the chief source of error". He urged the audience – before any of

7171-543: The phenomenon of " table-turning " and clearly confirmed Michael Faraday 's conclusion that the phenomenon was entirely due to the ideo-motor influences of the participants, rather than to the agency of "mesmeric forces" – as was being widely asserted by, for example, John Elliotson and his followers. On 12 March 1852, convinced (as both a scientist and physiologist) of the genuineness of Braid's hypnotism , Braid's friend and colleague William Benjamin Carpenter presented

7272-417: The poet and essayist Samuel Taylor Coleridge (in his Biographia Literaria ). Some rare earlier instances of the term "unconsciousness" ( Unbewußtseyn ) can be found in the work of the 18th-century German physician and philosopher Ernst Platner . Influences on thinking that originate from outside an individual's consciousness were reflected in the ancient ideas of temptation, divine inspiration, and

7373-716: The predominant role of the gods in affecting motives and actions. The idea of internalised unconscious processes in the mind was present in antiquity, and has been explored across a wide variety of cultures. Unconscious aspects of mentality were referred to between 2,500 and 600 BC in the Hindu texts known as the Vedas , found today in Ayurvedic medicine. Paracelsus is credited as the first to make mention of an unconscious aspect of cognition in his work Von den Krankheiten (translates as "About illnesses", 1567), and his clinical methodology created

7474-421: The presence of unconscious processes, these processes are seen as symptoms rather than the unconscious mind itself. Some critics have doubted the existence of the unconscious altogether. The term "unconscious" ( German : unbewusst ) was coined by the 18th-century German Romantic philosopher Friedrich Schelling (in his System of Transcendental Idealism , ch. 6, § 3 ) and later introduced into English by

7575-456: The presence of what he termed "sources of fallacy". In the process of delivering his lecture, Braid spoke in some detail of six "sources of fallacy" that could contaminate findings. – Yeates, (2013), pp. 741–42. In 1903, Bramwell published a list of eight "sources of fallacy" attributed to Braid; the final two having been directly paraphrased, by Bramwell, from other aspects of Braid's later works (see text at right). In 1853, Braid investigated

7676-737: The principle of Occam's Razor (that 'entities ought not to be multiplied beyond necessity'), and recognising that he could diminish, rather than multiply entities, he made an extraordinary decision to perform a role-reversal and treat the operator-subject interaction as subject-internal, operator-guided procedure; rather than, as Lafontaine supposed, an operator-centred, subject-external procedure. Braid emphatically proved his point by his self-experimentation with his "upwards and inwards squint". The exceptional success of Braid's use of 'self-' or 'auto-hypnotism' (rather than 'hetero-hypnotism'), entirely by himself, on himself, and within his own home, clearly demonstrated that it had nothing whatsoever to do with

7777-421: The principle through which suggestion operated in hypnotism . With the rise of Spiritualism in 1840s, mediums devised and refined a variety of techniques for communicating, ostensibly, with the spirit world including table-turning and planchette writing boards (the precursor to later Ouija boards). These phenomena and devices quickly became the subject of scientific investigation. The term ideomotor

7878-440: The rules of language and the reality principle , become subject to the "primary process" of unconscious thought, which is governed by the pleasure principle , wish gratification and the repressed sexual scenarios of childhood. The dream-work involves a process of disguising these unconscious desires in order to preserve sleep. This process occurs primarily by means of what Freud called condensation and displacement . Condensation

7979-638: The seventh and youngest child, of James Braid ( c.  1761 –1840s) and Anne Suttie ( c.  1761 –?). He was born at Ryelaw House, in the Parish of Portmoak , Kinross , Scotland on 19 June 1795. On 17 November 1813, at the age of 18, Braid married Margaret Mason (1792–1869), aged 21, the daughter of Robert Mason (?–1813) and Helen Mason, née Smith. They had two children, both of whom were born at Leadhills in Lanarkshire: Anne Daniel, née Braid (1820–1881), and James Braid (1822–1882). Braid

8080-416: The state thus produced, none of the so-called higher phenomena of the mesmerists, such as the reading of sealed and hidden letters, the contents of which were unknown to the mesmerised person, could ever be brought about.     To the well defined assemblage of symptoms which Braid observed in patients who had steadily gazed for eight or twelve minutes with attention concentrated upon

8181-627: The strong impression made upon Braid by the Medical Gazette's article, there was also the more recent impressions made by Thomas Wakley 's exposure of the comprehensive fraud of John Elliotson's subjects, the Okey sisters , Braid always maintained that he had gone to Lafontaine's demonstration as an open-minded sceptic, eager to examine the presented evidence at first hand – that is, rather than "entirely [depending] on reading or hearsay evidence for his knowledge of it" – and, then, from that evidence, form

8282-422: The subjects, which tended to make them imitate the actions of others. (3) The extraordinary revival of memory by which they could recall things long forgotten in the waking state. (4) The remarkable effect of contact in arousing memory, i.e. by acting as the signal for the production of a fresh [state of hypnotism]. (5) The condition of double consciousness or double personality. (6) The vivid state of

8383-481: The subject’s thumbs. Lafontaine stressed the importance of the initial physical contact, and the subsequent operator-imposition of 'mind control' once 'rapport' had been established . Although generally successful with his assistants, he was rarely successful with volunteers (only successful in "one in four or five cases" ); and was, very often, forced to abandon his attempts after some 30 minutes or so of intense effort. – Yeates (2018b), p. 57. In particular, whilst Braid

8484-431: The theory of the electro-biologists were true.     There is, therefore, both positive and negative proof in favour of my mental and suggestive theory, and in opposition to the magnetic, occult, or electric theories of the mesmerists and electro-biologists. My theory, moreover, has this additional recommendation, that it is level to our comprehension, and adequate to account for all which

8585-399: The theory of the mesmerists were true. Moreover, my experiments have proved that audible, visible, or tangible suggestions of another person, whom the subject believes to possess such power over him, is requisite for the production of the waking phenomena; whereas no audible, visible, or tangible suggestion from a second party ought to be required to produce these phenomena, if

8686-695: The true mental relations which subsist during all dynamic changes which take place, in every other function of the body, as well as in the muscles of voluntary motion. Scientific tests by the English scientist Michael Faraday , Manchester surgeon James Braid , the French chemist Michel Eugène Chevreul , and the American psychologists William James and Ray Hyman have demonstrated that many phenomena attributed to spiritual or paranormal forces, or to mysterious "energies", are actually due to ideomotor action. Furthermore, these tests demonstrate that "honest, intelligent people can unconsciously engage in muscular activity that

8787-400: The two theories of light contended for at the present time. Some believe in a positive emission from the sun of a subtile material, or imponderable influence, as the cause of light; whilst others deny this emission theory, and contend that light is produced by simple vibration excited by the sun, without any positive emission from that luminary. I may, therefore, be said to have adopted

8888-403: The unconscious mind —each lying beneath the other. He believed that significant psychic events take place "below the surface" in the unconscious mind. Contents of the unconscious mind go through the preconscious mind before coming to conscious awareness. He interpreted such events as having both symbolic and actual significance. In psychoanalytic terms, the unconscious does not include all that

8989-436: The unconscious desire in its raw form would disturb the sleeper and can only avoid censorship by associating itself with elements that are not subject to repression. Thus Freud distinguished between the manifest content and latent content of the dream. The manifest content consists of the plot and elements of a dream as they appear to consciousness, particularly upon waking, as the dream is recalled. The latent content refers to

9090-629: The unconscious include implicit memory (for example, priming ), and Pawel Lewicki 's nonconscious acquisition of knowledge. Ellenberger, in his classic 1970 history of dynamic psychology. He remarks on Schopenhauer's psychological doctrines several times, crediting him for example with recognizing parapraxes, and urges that Schopenhauer "was definitely among the ancestors of modern dynamic psychiatry." (1970, p. 205). He also cites with approval Foerster's interesting claim that "no one should deal with psychoanalysis before having thoroughly studied Schopenhauer." (1970, p. 542). In general, he views Schopenhauer as

9191-468: The unconscious mind exists at all has been disputed. Franz Brentano rejected the concept of the unconscious in his 1874 book Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint , although his rejection followed largely from his definitions of consciousness and unconsciousness. Jean-Paul Sartre offers a critique of Freud's theory of the unconscious in Being and Nothingness , based on the claim that consciousness

9292-527: The word unconscious. In 1880 at the Sorbonne , Edmond Colsenet defended a philosophy thesis (PhD) on the unconscious. Elie Rabier and Alfred Fouillee performed syntheses of the unconscious "at a time when Freud was not interested in the concept". According to historian of psychology Mark Altschule, "It is difficult—or perhaps impossible—to find a nineteenth-century psychologist or psychiatrist who did not recognize unconscious cerebration as not only real but of

9393-440: Was a Scottish surgeon , natural philosopher , and " gentleman scientist ". He was a significant innovator in the treatment of clubfoot , spinal curvature , knock-knees , bandy legs , and squint ; a significant pioneer of hypnotism and hypnotherapy , and an important and influential pioneer in the adoption of both hypnotic anaesthesia and chemical anaesthesia . He is regarded by some, such as Kroger (2008, p. 3), as

9494-630: Was apprenticed to the Leith surgeons Thomas and Charles Anderson (i.e., both father and son). As part of that apprenticeship, Braid also attended the University of Edinburgh from 1812 to 1814, where he was also influenced by Thomas Brown , M.D. (1778–1820), who held the chair of Moral Philosophy at Edinburgh from 1808 to 1820. Braid obtained the diploma of the Licentiate of the Royal College of Surgeons of

9595-431: Was clear that their claims were entirely without foundation. However, he also stressed to his audience that, whilst it was, indeed, entirely true that these effects could not be produced with hypnotism – and whilst the claims of the mesmerists and animal magnetists were, ipso facto , entirely false – one must not make the mistake of concluding that this was unequivocal evidence of deception, dishonesty, or outright fraud on

9696-444: Was coined by the 18th-century German Romantic philosopher Friedrich Schelling and later introduced into English by the poet and essayist Samuel Taylor Coleridge . The emergence of the concept of the unconscious in psychology and general culture was mainly due to the work of Austrian neurologist and psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud . In psychoanalytic theory , the unconscious mind consists of ideas and drives that have been subject to

9797-587: Was entirely convinced that a transformation from, so to speak, condition 1 to condition 2 , and back to condition 1 had really taken place, he was also entirely convinced that no magnetic agency of any sort (as Lafontaine emphatically claimed) was responsible for the (veridical) events he had witnessed at first hand. He also rejected outright the assertion that the transformation in question had "proceeded from, or [had been] excited into action by another [person]" ( Neurypnology , p. 32). Braid then performed his own experimentum crucis . Operating on

9898-467: Was first used by William Benjamin Carpenter in 1852. In a scientific paper that specifically discussed the means through which James Braid's "hypnotism" produced its effects, Carpenter derived the word ideomotor from the components ideo , meaning "idea" or "mental representation", and motor , meaning "muscular action". In the paper, Carpenter explained his theory that muscular movement can be independent of conscious desires or emotions; hence

9999-623: Was once conscious but has been forgotten or suppressed, much like Freud's notion. The collective unconscious, however, is the deepest level of the psyche, containing the accumulation of inherited psychic structures and archetypal experiences. Archetypes are not memories but energy centers or psychological functions that are apparent in the culture's use of symbols. The collective unconscious is therefore said to be inherited and contain material of an entire species rather than of an individual. The collective unconscious is, according to Jung, "[the] whole spiritual heritage of mankind's evolution, born anew in

10100-465: Was the first person to use "hypnotism" in its modern sense, referring to a "psycho-physiological" theory rather than the "occult" theories of the magnetists. In a letter written to the editor of The Lancet in 1845, Braid emphatically states that: In his first publication (i.e., Satanic Agency and Mesmerism Reviewed , etc.), he had also stressed the importance of the subject concentrating both vision and thought, referring to "the continued fixation of

10201-456: Was used by Kreskin and has also been used by illusionists such as Derren Brown . A 2019 study of automatic pendulum movements using a motion capture system showed that pendulum effect is produced when the fingers holding the pendulum generate an oscillating frequency close to the resonant frequency of the pendulum. At an appropriate frequency, very small driving movements of the arm are sufficient to produce relatively large pendulum motion. It

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