Psychopathology, somnambulism and animal life: a Biranian approach

Luís António Umbelino

Chapter 3 in Memory, Trauma and Narratives of the Self, 2024, pp 65-77 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: The main goal of this chapter is to analyse Maine de Biran’s philosophical interest in “magnetism and artificial somnambulism”. Biran’s interest in this theme is linked, at least implicitly, to the questions raised by the “enigma of influence”, a concept which the mesmerists will contribute to secularization by linking it to the “interiority of individuals” (the “autoscopic” occurrences during the “crises of somnambulism”, the sixth sense or “internal sense” and so on) and “the secrets of the relationships they maintain with each other”, namely, in the context of the therapeutical encounter. Such questions, answered by Biran in a way that, in our view, remains particularly interesting, would be the following: what characteristics can we assume in the state of hypnosis or “crisis of somnambulism”? Through which signs is communication accomplished in this state? How is the communication between the magnetizer and the magnetized explained, namely in its therapeutical contexts?

Keywords: Politics and Public Policy Sociology and Social Policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.elgaronline.com/doi/10.4337/9781035337972.00009 (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:elg:eechap:23522_3

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.e-elgar.com

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Chapters from Edward Elgar Publishing
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Darrel McCalla ().