C Block
Sigmund Freud: Genius or Fraud Though there are varying views on the validity of Sigmund Freud’s theories and findings, no one can debate the enormous impact he had on the field of psychology. He was one of the most influential people of his generation and his work with psychoanalysis, the unconscious mind, dream analysis, and many other topics helped shape modern day psychology. Freud was born in 1856 in the Czech Republic and went on to attend the University of Vienna. Freud explored the human mind in ways that no one prior to him could have even imagined. His research has had a major influence in psychology, along with many other topics such as art and literature. Perhaps Freud’s greatest accomplishment was the …show more content…
He believed that people refuse to acknowledge some events or desires because they may be too agonizing or terrifying so they repress these thoughts into the unconscious mind. Freud alleged that the unconscious mind has a much greater impact on behavior than most people suspect and the whole basis of psychoanalysis is to transform the unconscious into conscious. Though Freud did not invent the idea of the unconscious mind, he was a major reason for its popularity. The unconscious mind contains our biological instincts for primal urges such as sex and violence. We do not know the information that is accumulated in our unconscious mind and it is not accessible to the brain. Personally, I agree with and am fascinated by the theory of the unconscious mind. It makes me wonder what kind of information is stored in my unconscious mind and how it would affect me to acknowledge these thoughts that have been bottled up since my childhood. Though the validity of his work is often questioned, there is no question about his ingenious creativity to come up with all of the imaginative and things that he has. Freud elaborately studied defense mechanisms and their causes and effects on individuals. People deal with troubles in their lives with defense mechanisms, which are part of the unconscious mind and function to repress feelings that may be harmful. Probably the most important defense …show more content…
There is little to no scientific evidence for Freud’s findings. The unconscious mind cannot be perceived scientifically and cannot be tested for validity so the world is just supposed to take Freud’s word that its existence is bona fide. There have also been theories that Freud committed research bias, only recording data that helped proved his hypotheses. Also, he came up with most of his ideas from what he learned from himself and his patients, which does not necessarily mean that his findings would extend to a broader range of populations. After conducting my research on Sigmund Freud, I have determined that he is certainly an intelligent man with fascinating ideas, many of which have changed our world today; however, there is a lack of evidence with many of his findings and much of his work just seems implausible and thus has been disregarded. Overall, I enjoyed learning about Freud because his ideas are definitely more interesting than any other psychologist we have discussed in class and the controversy around his findings only serves to amplify his