Reading: Modern Man in Search of a Soul (C. Jung): Ch. 9 The Basic Postulates of Analytic Psychology

Starting out the essay, Jung disparages the false dichotomy of materialism and spirit. In contrarian fashion, he argues that psyche is not merely the results of biochemical reactions, in essence arguing for the separate existence of a psychological reality within humans. This seeks to accomplish a legitimation of his work and others like his as scientific. His science would go beyond what can be touched or seen - the merely rational. Mind is the great unknown quantity, forever eluding capture by precise measurement. It takes a different form of investigation to understand the contours of mind, one that involves human meaning. His science then is a science of the breakdown in human meaning that results always and everywhere in suffering. He sums it up: "To grant the substantiality of the soul or psyche is repugnant to the spirit of the age, for to do so would be heresy" (p. 176). He continuous on: "We can perhaps summon up the courage to consider the possibility of a "psychology with the psyche"--that is, of a field of study based on the assumption of an autonomous psyche." (p.180) Interesting, Jung divides the psyche from the soul: Psyche is the sum of conscious and unconscious mental processes; Soul is equivalent to the personality.