Proposition pour une physiologie de la jouissance

Abstract

Objectives(1) This article aims to articulate the Lacanian concept of jouissance in view of applying this definition to the physiological sphere. (2) It aims to develop a proposal for an instantiation of jouissance in the physiological sphere. Methods(1) Distinction is made, with reference to Freudian and Lacanian texts, of four different aspects of the concept: for the body (a) drive, (b) the experience of satisfaction, and (c) excess body tension, and for the history, (d) the historical imprint. (2) This interpretative framework is applied to the domain of the neurosciences. Results(1) Jouissance at once entails the following: (a) the bodily tension underlying the action that satisfies the drive, (b) the experience accompanying the inaugural satisfaction event, (c) the accumulation of body tension due to the encounter with das Ding or to the revival of the wishful state, and (d) the inscription in the body of the history of its commemoration, which drives it to re-enact. (2) The mesolimbic dopaminergic system, linking the most archaic parts of the brainstem with the most developed motor cortices, via the nucleus accumbens in the limbic system, underpins each of these four distinct aspects of jouissance: (a) it was previously characterized as the instantiation of the Freudian drive; (b) dopamine release rewards each unanticipated satisfaction; (c) subsequently, each new encounter announcing the renewal of the satisfaction leads to dopamine release which puts the body under tension to act; (d) more specifically, this system can generate long-term neuronal adaptations leading to hypersensitivity towards actions that were previously mediated by dopamine release. In addition, this system, dissociating the action from its result, structurally implies its own derailment, the so-called autoshaping, just as jouissance implies a derailment in clinical terms. DiscussionWhile we propose here a “physiology of jouissance”, the idea is not to present this physiological correlate as actually being the Lacanian jouissance. Indeed, this jouissance is a clinical concept and, in the proposed epistemological approach, while the clinical approach enables an interpretation of the physiology, the reverse is not true – physiology does not enable an interpretation of what is played out at mental level. ConclusionThe mesolimbic dopaminergic system appears as a good candidate for an instantiation of the concept of jouissance on a physiological level. Consequently, this physiological instantiation corroborates the coherence of this clinically-derived theoretical concept.