Time to take a position! I have taken a lot of time explaining Freudian theory in much detail. Was that time well-spent? Based on the text and the articles you read, tell us if you think Freud was a "fraud" and I have misused the limited time we have in Psychology. Or do you think Freudian theory is still relevant today and should continue to be an important part of any Psychology curriculum. What parts of his theory deserve time and what parts should be completely scrapped? Cam said Freud should be taken out of Psychology and placed in an Anthropology course. Do you agree? Explain.
So there is a lot of stuff to discuss. You may go in any or all directions in your response.
Please post by Tuesday, October 18.
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Sigmund Freud is quite an interesting man to say the least. His theories are monumental, and shape some of the things that we do to this day. I feel that Freud has been somewhat of a symbol of psychology as a whole, and that his accomplishments should be celebrated. However, i find that that whole Oedipus complex thing is really really messed up. You know if Freud loved his mother in that way then fine, but he should speak for himself, and not for all of men, just saying.
ReplyDeleteI feel that we have spent enough time on freud, but there is still a lot to understand, and it would be difficult to learn everything about freud in a lifetime. I feel that we need his theories, and it is very important to know about him, because he is one of the bases of psychology as we know it. I like Freud, and METHINKS HE'S A COOL GUY
The above was From Robbie
ReplyDeleteMitchell Stevens
ReplyDeleteAfter reviewing all that Freud has to offer, I can say that he is not a fraud. His theory's might lack real "Scientific evidence" but when you look at in everyday life terms, his theory's are true. When Freud talks about Psychosexual Stages, I partially understand and accept it. I believe that form birth to one year old, babies get pleasure by having things in its mouth. It true, just look at every year old, when they encounter anything new, they want to stick it into their mouths. Also, when a baby feeds, sometimes their eyes roll back, showing their pleasure in this activity. I also believe about the Genital stage. Every teenager wants to have sex with the other sex. You can see it anywhere teenagers dwell. Although, his theory's of having a relation with your mother is rather disturbing, and me personally, don't think that to be true. His theory of penis envy could be true. The only reason I am saying this, is due to I've been a boy all my life and have never been a girl. Overall, Freud has a lot of good ideas, and a lot of them are true.
I'm not exactly sure what to believe when it comes to Freud. The whole idea about babies getting pleasure from putting things in their mouth it kind of dumb. They're babies...they put things in their mouth because they don't know not to. Once again..they're babies. And what Mitchell said about babies getting pleasure from feeding, they obviously enjoy it, they're getting fed. I like eating too. And..the whole thing about having a sexual attraction to the opposite sex parent is frankly idiotic. I don't even think i need to explain myself. And, its not called the genital stage, its puberty.
ReplyDeleteI think freud was a bit of a waste of time. His ideas were a bit far fetched. Speaking for myself and hopefully the rest of the class, i have no desire/ am sexually attracted to my opposite sex parent. I pretty sure this is frowned upon in most of the world. I believe his ideas are strange and dont really relate to many people, therefore i believe frued was a waste of time
ReplyDeleteLast was from
ReplyDeleteEvan
Regardless of whether people agree with Freud’s theory or not, I believe that the 3 weeks were well spent. I certainly gained a better understanding of Freud and why he came about the theories he did. After these three weeks, I can certainly see why Freud is disliked by many. The controversy he created among many people was big reason why many disliked him. But regardless, even though I think some of his theories are not 100% valid, I do think it was beneficial to learn about him. He provided me with new perspectives and ways of thinking.
ReplyDeleteI agree with myself, in that Freud is not an important part of psychology, but is instead an important figure of human history, as his theories really revolutionized what it meant to live in the twentieth century. He was the original "Dr. Mehmet Oz", the original people's doctor, one who was fantastic in the literal sense, and one who played to the public opinion. He was a sensationalist to be true, and one whose theories really brought the world from traditional 19th century prudishness into today, where every ad, television show, and poster is sexual in nature. We, today, take the concept of a subconscious for granted, but this stems from Freud. How many times have you said "I subconsciously..."? Thank Freud for each one. Freud not only revolutionized modern thought and society, but he made sex vogue in a way that it hadn't been in the 19th century.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, Freud the psychologist was what is known in certain circles as a "troll". He basically decided, based on his own circular logic, that everything he said was right, and if you disagreed with him, there was a clause in his theory that accounted for it. An enemy of Freud couldn't win. Granted the whole nicotine > oral fixation concept for me kindof caused me to lose respect for Freud, as did the concept of the other psychosexual stages. The way that Mr. Yip presents it makes sense. It is logical. That is not how Freud presented it. I feel as though this unit has been even a misrepresentation of Freud, for there is a reason he is the butt of tons of jokes in the psychological community. Freud basically said that every time a baby breast fed, he had a baby's version of an orgasm. Then, every time he went to the bathroom in the next stage, oops, another orgasm. Because, according to Freud, a two week old baby sucking on the breast of it's mother is gleaning sexual pleasure from it. In Mr. Yip's version, the baby is content. In Freud's version, the baby needs to go smoke a cigarette afterward.
(Notice how I refrained from making an "oral fixation joke)
Mr. Yip didnt really teach Freud. Instead, he taught a user friendly, easy to understand, and edited for content Freud that wasn't really him at all. If he had taught a real Freud, people would have been calling "bullfeces" from slide one.
I believe that Freud should honestly be ignored in psychology. Talk about Jung, or others if you want. They were less insane. But truly, I feel as though it is the neuroscience that is more important. people are bags of chemicals. If you put different chemicals in us, our moods change. Its why pot makes us happy and heroin makes us feel like gods. It is why people lust after orgasms, they release dopamine in the brain. It's all about chemicals, and not whether or not my father plans on removing my reproductive anatomy.
SO yeah, anthropology course, not psychology.
ReplyDeleteI think that saing that Freud was a 'waste of time' would be little strong but I dont agree with the way he would diagnois specific areas of a childs life. Along with everyone, I think the theory tht attracts a child to his oppisite sexed parent is rediculous but I think that he also had great theorys on dreams as well as the Defense Mechanisms
ReplyDeleteChanelle.
i think that freud used very flawed logic when he looked at many aspects of the human psyche. for instance he interpreted oedipus' mother killing herself and oedipus gauging out his own eyes after realizing their kinship as meaning that he was lusting after her because she was his mother. a more fair conclusion freud could have drawn was that people are sexually attracted to members of the opposite sex that are similar to themselves or their parents. using freud's logic of saying that we have deep seated desires for things which on the surface repulse us could be used to say just as easily that people have a subconscious desire for castration(in men), hemophobics have a desire for blood, and we all just love vomit.
ReplyDeleteobviously none of these things are true, we're disgusted by these things because they're disgusting, not because we're protecting our sensibilities from our subconscious.
certain parts of freud's theory are in fact very true though, such as the division of the mind into the conscious and unconscious, the effects of unresolved conflicts(once you take the sex out of the equation), dreams, and the stages of psychological(NOT sexual! except the genital stage) development.
despite my distaste for Freud's extreme focus on sex, it was fortunate that he was so off the deep end on it because it largely desensitized the population to talk about sex, and we owe our ability to converse about it casually today to Freud's crack science.
i believe Freuds theories are relevant to learn in psych but i don't like freud every much. i believe that Freuds theories of the mind is very scientific and has deep meanings. but i believe Freud might secretly be gay because he hates on on women throughout his theories and this makes me believe he is secretly gay. Even though he focuses on sex a lot i believe its all an act to cover up a deeper meaning. i believe the reason he talks about sex and early childhood is because one of the things we talked about in school happened to him. so he uses sex to cover it up a deeper meaning within his thoughts.
ReplyDeleteWhen it comes to Freudian theories, I believe though they were very far fetched, they made sense. I do believe everyone goes through sexual stages in the erogenous zones... though there is no real scientific evidence to back it up. You can't accuratley determine if an infant gets pleasure from the oral and anal stages because they cannot communicate for themselves. Freud's theory about the Odiepus complex was very shocking to me.. I have never been sexually attracted to the parent of the opposite sex, and I don't understand where he got that idea from.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, I do understand the importance of his exploration of the unconcious mind. I believe that our actions and behaviors are all because of underlying emotions and we are driven by our subconcious minds. For example, if you were to make fun of someone or say "you hate them" subconciously, you see them as a threat, or they have something that you do not. Freud used many methods to delve into the unconcious mind that were ahead of his time, but also widely criticized. Now because of these efforts and experiments, we have "talk therapy" which is a very crucial and important treatment method for patients with mental illnesses. Discussing someone's struggles with them allows you to interpret their stories/reasonings for their actions and use reverse psychology to suggest real underlying motives.
I believe if Freud was presented to a high school pychology class in the way he presented himself 100 years ago, he would be considered a psychotic and students would disregaurd his theories. But the way Mr. Yip presented Freud was a way for us to look on the outside and have insight into what Freud was truly getting at. Teaching Freud is important because he formulated the basis of modern psychology, but I do not think such an extensive amount of time should be spent on him because it gets boring after a while and I want to know how other psychologists took Freud's theories and used them in their practices.
I personally wouldn't call it a waste of time but, I do think we spent a lot of time on Freud. I think he does have some interesting theories but some are a little weird. I don't think I have ever/ would ever be sexually attracted to my opposite sex parent. Like Cam said, I think this would fit better into Anthropology instead of Psychology.
ReplyDeleteMarissa Nero
Although Freud is an important part of phycology and should continue to be, I don't believe in much of what he says. Not eveything that is accomplished is because of sex. Sure, it's an important part of society and always will be, but I don't agree that humans use it as a distraction to get away from something or someone,which as he says, leads to the accomplishment of everything that has been created. I also agree with Cam, that learning about Freud would be more of a benefit if he were to be taken out of Psychology and put into Anthroplogy considering he tackles human behavior as more of a whole than individually.
ReplyDeleteMiranda W
I think Freud is extremely important for psychology and still should be studied today. I think he set a great base for modern psychology today. He started everything off. Even though he isn't one hundred percent right, and many people do not believe in his theory, Freud had the guts to at least try and explain sexuality and how it tied into development. Freud should still be studied today.
ReplyDeleteI honestly think freud was not a huge part of psychology. He was very sexist and his views of people revolved around sex. There was some true to parts but a majority of what he said I really thought was wasteful. Although Freud had the guts to come out and say what he wanted about sexuality and people, it doesn't change the fact his theory was based on a weird perverted view of society. As some of the the comments above had said I think Freud should have gone into anthropology because he studies the broader issue of human behavior and many people don't fit into his narrow sexist theory.
ReplyDeleteI feel that Freud has a lot of very vital ideas and theories that help us understand the unconscious. Even thought he explained the unconscious there was no hard evidence that there was even such a thing called the unconscious. Personally i believe that freud is correct but on the other hand i can understand why others do not.
ReplyDeleteI also feel that Freuds theory of defense mechanisms are very relevant in a society that we live in. We unconsciously use them to protect ourselves. For example one might use denial to hide the fact that as a child the had an oral fixation. Their ego would have been damaged if they had not used it.
Sara
ReplyDeleteWhen looking at Freud’s theories I’m torn about my opinions. I find that I view many of his theories make sense, such as his defense mechanisms, but his psychosexual stages honestly loses me. Yes I believe that sex is important, but I disagree with the developmental stages of his theories because of the sexual fixation. The way that his theory was explained in class made some sense however, it wasn’t how Freud really thought. Mr. Yip said it himself that if Freud heard the way he was explaining his stages that he would disagree vehemently. Looking at Freud’s theories the way he intended them to be viewed, I would have to disagree due to the fact that I believe that not every aspect of our existence is focused on sex, babies are innocent not sexually driven creatures. Personally, I feel as though Freud had a problem, or a sexual obsession rather, and his theories are simply trying to extend his addiction onto the rest of society.
Marissa M
ReplyDeleteI'd hate to say i'm on the fence, but for the most part I am. I do believe that Freud was a significant part of the development of psychology and the theories that go with it, but at the same time some of them are over the top and ridiculous. We have spent a large amount of time on him, and thus far I don't dislike him. I just think that some of his theories are absurd. However, I agree with robbie that It'd be difficult to understand all of Frued within just a semester class. Like psychology it's self, Freud is a complex make up of all different ideas, theories and rationalizations yet to be defined.
Psychologists today still use some of his technques, like when people go see a therapist, you sit and talk all your problems out and they teach you how to deal with them. Also, he has the whole "dream" thing down pat, along with the whole child hood experiences. Therefore, I do think he had a significant impact on our human society, but at the same time some of his ideas are out there.