FREUD AND HOMEOSTASIS

Abstract

FREUD'S use of the concept of homeostasis, in the hypothesis that 'the nervous system is an apparatus having the function of abolishing stimuli ',' is of great interest, not only because it represents the pessimistic core of his materialism but also because it appears to anticipate by a quarter of a century the notions of cybernetics. Although it is usually overlooked in psycho-analysts' expositions of psycho-analysis, it is the unifying concept that links together the wish-fulfilment explanation of dreams,2 the defence-mechanisms of the ego 3 and the repetition compulsion.4 It also led Freud by a fallacious argument, to the notion of the death-instinct.? Dreams, according to Freud, were the efforts of the sleeping 'psychic apparatus' to cancel or compensate for stimuli which threatened to awake it. If the thirsty sleeper did not dream of drinking his thirst would awaken him : therefore he dreams of drinking.6 Later, Freud explained the various 'defence mechanisms' by which the ego defends itself against the demands of the instincts (repression, sublimation, etc.) as the efforts of the central nervous system to escape these internal stimuli : being unable to escape by flight, as it would from external stimuli, it has resort to these means of abolishing, or at least reducing their impact.' This was twenty years before W. B. Cannon 8 invented the word 'homeostasis' 9: but the notion is clearly developed in Freud's mind.'0