Religious belief as a product of the human mind: Sigmund Freud

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Religious belief as a product of the human mind: Sigmund Freud
Religious beliefs are a product of the human mind.
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What was Freud's approach of explaining human behaviour?
Biological rather than metaphysical
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What started happening during Freud’s time?
Religious beliefs started to be questioned by psychology
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What did psychology do?
Attempted to discover laws about human behaviour and to find reasons why people hold their beliefs.
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Why can psychology be disconnected from God?
He believed that human behaviour, experiences and beliefs can be explained without the recourse to the idea of God.
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What is the psyche?
Psyche is personality, and Freud studied ideas about it.
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What are the 3 divisions of the psyche according to Freud?
Id, ego, superego- w/c all develop @ different stages of life.
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What is the id according to Freud?
Primitive and impulsive part of our psyche which responds to our instincts.
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What is the super-ego according to Freud?
Moral part of the personality w/c includes the conscience and the ideal-ego.
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What is the ego according to Freud?
The decision-making part of the personality
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Describe the ego?
The conscious self that is created by the dynamic tensions and interactions between the id and the super-ego. It has the task of reconciling their conflicting demands with the requirements of external reality.
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What did Freud think was the connection between ego and neurotic symptoms?
The ego experiences moral conflicts, which are reflected in dreams and neurotic symptoms.
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What paper did he publish in 1907?
‘Obsessive actions and religious practices’
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What did he say was the similarity between people who are religious and people with obsessional neurosis?
Both involved compulsive repeated actions. Both experience guilt when the action is not completed, e.g rosary. Both have particular meticulous detail to how the task should be conducted.
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What did he say was the difference between obsessional neurosis people and religious?
He believed that obsessional neurosis people did not understand the meaning of their actions, while religious people did.
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What is psychoanalysis?
A method of studying the mind and treating mental and emotional disorders by analysing the unconscious mind.
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What did he argue through psychoanalysis?
That obsessional neurosis did have a meaning
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What is obsessional neurosis caused by and its meaning?
Unconscious motives derived from past events of the intimate life of a patient, and these repressed instinctual impulses (such as the sexual urges) led to a sense of guilt
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What did the repeated actions symbolise to Freud?
He interpreted them as an unconscious protective measure against temptation to release instinctual (sexual impulses)
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How did he describe instinctual impulses within religion?
The instinctual impulses of the religious person was ‘self-seeking’, (i.e doing things purely for the individual and not for God), which ended up in them feeling a sense of guilt because of continual temptation.
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Explain what Freud meant by a displacement?
In both the obsessional neurosis and religion there is a displacement between the important thing and another object
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Give an example of religious displacement.
Doing something God disapproves of then moving onto prayer or confession to rebuke your mistake.
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Why do religious practices become essential to people?
To remove the feeling of guilt of not doing it and to displace the previous act that God disapproved of.
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Because religious practices have become essential religion is described as…..?
‘Religion as a collective neurosis.’
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Why is religion called a collective neurosis?
The neurotic impulses and religious rituals are found universally ∴ its called a collective neurosis.
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Why caused religion to become a neurosis?
Deep traumas in the psyche.
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When did Freud write Totem and Taboo?
1913
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Who did Freud base his totem theory from?
Charles Darwin
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What belief did Freud adopt from Darwin?
Humans originally lived in small hordes or groups
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Who dominated the horde for generations?
Single dominant males, who seized the women for themselves and drove off their rivals, even their sons.
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What is the primal horde symbolic of in the animal world?
The single alpha male surrounding a harem of women mimics dominant silver-back gorillas.
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What happened to the band of pre-historic brothers or sons when they came back?
They killed the alpha male.
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How did the sons feel towards their fathers in general?
Love, respect and fear
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When they killed their father what did it allow them to do?
Became dominant and seized the women for themselves.
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What did the sons feel after they killed the father?
Guilty because they feared him but loved him
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What happened between the men after the father died?
Became rivals, started competing for women. Caused the breakdown of social order.
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Why did the brothers feel the need to form a tribe and totem?
Guilt and breakdown of social order
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What was the totem typically?
An animal or plant which is the symbol of the tribe.
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What did the totem symbolise and what did it do for the tribe?
Father→ w/c united the tribe
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What did Freud have an interest in?
Social anthropology.
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What did Freud examine with Australien Aborigines?
The system of totemism.
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What did every Australien Aborigines clan have?
A totem which was usually an animal
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What were the Australian Aborigines not allowed to do?
Marry someone who has the same totem as them.
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What did Freud believe about why people were not allowed to marry someone with the same totem as them?
To prevent incest
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How did the totem influence the tribe?
Influenced certain norms for behaviour, going against this would be taboo
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What did Freud say about eating totem flesh? (quote)
‘Forbidden to eat the flesh of the totem animal, were only allowed to do this on certain occasions….eating [was] a form of ceremony.’
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Freud saw a __________ between totemism and Darwin's primal horde.
Correlation
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Through psychoanalysis of the totem ceremony what did the totem animal represent in reality?
It was a substitute for the father who was both loved, feared and respected.
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What happened to the reputation of the slaughtered father?
It has divine connotations.
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What did people do to the totem and what did it become?
They worshipped it and it became their God.
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What happened at the yearly commemoration of the totem?
Ritual of killing and eating of the totem animal
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What did the eating of the totem and drinking symbolise?
Fellowship and mutual obligation
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Freud think guilt has been _____?
Inherited.
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How is guilt inherited?
It results from a perpetuated memory, which has been passed down for thousands of years, of the father being killed or having entertained such thoughts.
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What did Freud believe about the role of Christ?
Christ replaced the role of the father and became central to the belief system through this act of atonement.
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What is the symbolism of the holy eucharist?
Holy communion has replaced the totem meal and is identified with the son rather than the father.
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Many people think Freud’s belief in the ____ horde is _______ as an account of the _____ of human beings. And the connection between the father complex and belief in ___
Primal horde, unconvincing, God.
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Why do many people dismiss the primal horde as the origin of human beings and the belief in god?
Evidence is lacking.
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This theory of the ______ complex received more positive reactions as an account of the origins of the _____ complex and belief in ___ in the individual?
Oedipus, father, God.
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What emotion plays an important role in the psyche and the way people operate unconsciously?
Guilt
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What is the most basic human instinct and the one that is most capable of causing psychological problems?
Sexual drive (libido)
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What two things did the libido represent according to Freud?
Desire to have sex but also the body’s desire for satisfaction that orginiated for the id.
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By using the account of the primal horde, what did freud believe the sons felt towards the fathers that caused the conflict?
Bitterness because of sexual frustration.
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Why did the sons feel sexual frustration in the primal horde because of their father?
The fathers kept the women to themselves.
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What 3 things are hidden in a child's unconscious?
Sexual frustration, conflict with the father and feeling of guilt.
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When can sexual frustration, conflict with the father and feelings of guilt be identified within the child’s psycosexual development?
Between ages 3- 6
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What is the oedipus complex?
The stage between 3-6 when a child starts to become sexual and recognises itself as a sexual being.
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What happens to the child during the oedipus complex?
The child develops a distinct sexual identity and recognises the physical and societal differences between a man and woman. This changes the dynamic between the child and parent.
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What was the term ‘Oedipus complex’ named after?
The character in the Sophocles Greek tragedy, Oedipus Rex
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What was the climax within the Greek play?
Oedipus unwittingly killed his father and committed incest with his mother
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What did Oedipus do after the crimes he commited?
Gouged out his eyes in despair.
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Why did Freud think the greek play about Oedipus gained so much popularity through the ages?
Because of the existence of the underlying oedipus complex in all adults. They all experienced that unconscious anxiety from it.
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What did Freud think about the relationship between 3-6 years old and their mothers?
A mutual love affair
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Why does a child between 3-6 years old feel rivalry towards his father?
Because there is a love affair between the child and mum, the father is a competitor for the mother’s love.
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What does the mother feel towards a child between 3-6?
Her attention and affections want to replace the husband for the child, but she’s scared of the consequences.
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What happens to the child when this mother fails to replace the father with him?
Has an unconscious anxiety or even a castration complex (fearing the loss of this genitals)
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Give 3 reasons why the child experienced the castration complex.
Through weaning the child lost the mother breast, something he thought belonged to him. The child got caught exploring his penis and his parents were upset at this ∴ he felt the threat of losing his penis. Discovered that some people didn’t have a
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What happens if the oedipus complex is unsolved and repressed?
Develops neurotic behavior. He already argued that beliefs and practices within religion were merely expressions of neurotic behaviour.
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What is the similarity between the primal horde and the oedipus complex?
Both share desire to eliminate the father and seize the mother.
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What did Freud think the primal horde and the oedipus complex were explanations for?
The guilt and anguish that is often repressed and hidden and ultimately gives release to neurotic symptoms that are expressed through belief and practices of religion.
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Other cards in this set

Card 2

Front

What was Freud's approach of explaining human behaviour?

Back

Biological rather than metaphysical

Card 3

Front

What started happening during Freud’s time?

Back

Preview of the front of card 3

Card 4

Front

What did psychology do?

Back

Preview of the front of card 4

Card 5

Front

Why can psychology be disconnected from God?

Back

Preview of the front of card 5
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