Jung's Interpretation of UFO Phenomena: Collective Unconscious View, Guías, Proyectos, Investigaciones de Psicología

¡Descarga Jung's Interpretation of UFO Phenomena: Collective Unconscious View y más Guías, Proyectos, Investigaciones en PDF de Psicología solo en Docsity! Postmodern Openings ISSN: 2068-0236 | e-ISSN: 2069-9387 Covered in: Web of Sciences (WOS); EBSCO; ERIH+; Google Scholar; Index Copernicus; Ideas RePeC; Econpapers; Socionet; CEEOL; Ulrich ProQuest; Cabell, Journalseek; Scipio; Philpapers; SHERPA/RoMEO repositories; KVK; WorldCat; CrossRef; CrossCheck 2018, Volume 9, Issue 4, pages: 44-53 | doi: https://doi.org/10.18662/po/44 The Ufology in the Version of C.G. Jung’s Psychoanalytical Thinking Marius Constantin CUCU1, Oana Elena LENŢA2 1 PhD Lecturer, “Ştefan cel Mare” University, Suceava, Romania. 2 PhD research assistant, “Ştefan cel Mare” University, Suceava, Romania, oanalenta@yahoo.com Abstract: Reports about the appearance of unidentified flying objects became in the 20th century not only a constant of press texts, but also the basis for interpretations and speculations that swing between the alarmist scepticism and the ecstatic optimism. We do not know with certainty whether it is a physical or psychological phenomenon. From the perspective of Jungian analytics, people have been insisting on the thesis that implies that we are witnessing a process of projection of unconscious archetypal structures. This idea is not opposed to the possibility of existence of a physical, real basis, but it insists on the connection between such a basis and the unconscious projective collective dynamics. You can start, therefore, from a perception of a real physical phenomenon so as archetypal structures to be triggered and later designed as the image of a complex global phenomenon, a phenomenon whose image is distorted by the modern mobility of the rumour. Thus, in the present work, we will expose how Jung chose to respond to this issue arousing interest in post-modernity, even more so as the dilemma is not solved, the query is still lacking a clear answer and Jung, although he provides his own interpretative opinion, urges to a caution specific to analytical wisdom in thought and action. Keywords: Archetype, archetypal projection, UFO, ufology, observation, collective emotion, press rumour, myth; How to cite: Cucu, M.C., & Lenta, O.E. (2018). The Ufology in the Version of C.G. Jung’s Psychoanalytical Thinking. Postmodern Openings, 9(4), 44-53. https://doi.org/10.18662/po/44 Postmodern December, 2018 Openings Volume 9, Issue 4 45 1. Introductory benchmarks The issue of an objective approach of the phenomena that can affect the dynamics and the perspectives of an era remains an open and intractable theme. In general, an important appearance in the era, an appearance that may generate changes or resurrections at the level of the overall mentality is perceived and interpreted in relation to the cultural and perspective environment of that particular receiver. Thus, the subjective assumption manifests itself intensely, with the efforts of lucid and equidistant analysis being relegated to second place. For Carl Gustav Jung’s psychoanalytic thinking, the phenomenon known as Unidentified Flying Objects, phenomenon that reveals the presence, in different geographic areas of the world, of some spherical objects that cannot be identified through the modern technical means, it can fall in the area of the processes labelled, with too much ease, as being retrieved and interpreted subjectively. It provides definitions and explanations of this phenomenon which are not essentially other than expressions of individual and most of all, collective mental states. Basically, on a phenomenon extremely abstract and enigmatic are projected dynamics and drives of the collective and individual unconscious. From these interpretations and perspectives on the phenomenon of unidentifiable flying objects, UFOs, the psychoanalyst can crystallize some conclusions relating to the mobility and the direction towards which is moving the entire complex of the collective unconscious (Jung, 2011: 336-337). Referring to this topic, Jung recalled that on the eve of the great world wars that have ravaged the first half of the twentieth century there were enough clues of psychoanalytic nature that announced or foreshadowed those particular global catastrophes. The dreams, the premonitions, the ecstatic revelations referred to accumulations of destructive drives at the level of the collective unconscious designed to unleash in an apocalyptic way, erupting through the layers of consciousness (Jung, 1996: 213). From this perspective, argued Jung, these phenomena of UFO-type occurrences could be openings for certain events, such as the collective unconscious processes that are symbolic, transferred to the area of symbolic operability. Calling for the astrological and mythological tradition of mankind, Jung warned that the passage from a given zodiac area under another one does not represent anything other than the transit through the whole block of the collective unconscious from another psychological dimension with some parameters of the psychic energetic dynamics in another sphere of unconscious influence and rhythmicity. For Jung, the twentieth century was under the impact of the switch from the sign of the psychic symbolism of Pisces, The Ufology in the Version of C.G. Jung’s Psychoanalytical Thinking Marius Constantin CUCU, Oana Elena LENŢA 48 whole crowds testified about emergences of UFOs, Jung recalled that the typology of this kind of collective vision is not new in the human history. Thus, the collective visions of the Crusaders besieging the fortress of Jerusalem, that of the soldiers on the battlefield at Mons, in the First World War or of faithful Christians gathered at Fatima are outstanding examples supporting the reality of such a psychic phenomenon. Jung mentioned in this context examples from his personal experience of psychoanalyst, during which several witnesses reported the perception of a common vision while he, as an observer alongside them, did not notice and did not have any alteration of this kind in that particular environment. But its location outside of such a process does not entitle the denial of the common viewing experience of others and either any suspicion that they might have been under the shadow of a neurotic significant trauma. What is apparent, from the psychoanalytic perspective, is the appearance of an intense collective emotion under the impact of a common vision that plays an unconscious archetypal symbolism whose resources may not be completely known.(Frunză, 2011: 182-202) In the same way, in the case of the UFO phenomenon, it is possible that these collective visions might not be open to all witnesses present but this fact does not justify the effective denial of that vision as a collective psychic phenomenon. It is assumed that the vision, which may be a mere hallucination or an opening with powerful unconscious meaning took place and a certain part of the witnesses have experienced it. Therefore, the psychological reality of such a vision cannot be denied and it turns, gradually, into a visionary rumor, in a symbolically charged information whose contents can be blamed or accepted but whose existence cannot be denied effectively from the perspective of the subject who gives an affective charge to his personal experience. The reports about the UFO phenomenon intensified in particular with the second world conflagration that ravaged mankind in the twentieth century. The mysterious flying objects were, supposedly, according to testimonies, joining the military aircraft, and they executed movements and maneuvers that defy physical laws that were, until then, assumed by the rational understanding. Then, in the decades that followed, the number of such reports has increased significantly, while maintaining some constant characteristics among which: the objects in question were behaving like ships driven more by an analytical curiosity, their emergence was confirmed in all geographical areas of the Earth, but there was an intensification of these appearances in the area of nuclear installations, the supposed occupants of these flight systems being discrete and avoiding contact with people regardless of the geographical environment of emergence of these Postmodern December, 2018 Openings Volume 9, Issue 4 49 subjects. From the psychoanalytic perspective, one may observe, stated Jung, a mental involution of the nervous tension related to such information. Thus, if in the early stages of the spread of data about the UFO phenomenon, the mass hysteria seemed to be an eminent danger, concepts such as the invasion or the extermination of the human race being gradually developed, with the amplification of the number of narratives and interpretations of this phenomenon, has developed a balanced perspective on such an event which is freed from the apocalyptic image and reintegrated into a progressive and analytical portrayal. Thus, the UFO phenomenon tends to no longer generate a state of panic and even collective anxiety but rather an excitement, a challenge to research and consistent definitions. Gradually, the UFO phenomenon tends to mutate from a dangerous and destructive event in the entire mankind in a laboratory topic, in a deep research theme. In this context, understanding it as a visionary rumor cannot be abandoned because it is an obsolete psychological approach, but on the contrary, it is precisely under the new conditions that one can prove the importance of the UFO phenomenon and the approach from this point of view. Thus, if originally, such a phenomenon could have been a catalyst of certain unconscious obsessive anxieties, maybe later on, these fears have been exceeded or dimmed and their place has been taken over by other neurotic obsessions projected symbolically on the frameworks offered by the UFO event. We are witnessing, according to Jung, the materialization of the psychological process of causality that calls for any manifest a specific cause. These projections of the unconscious levels focused on the emergence of UFOs have, according to the principle of mental causation, a cause at the level of the collective unconscious. One of these reasons could be, according to Jung, the accumulation of the collective anxieties relating to world conflagrations, hidden fears as regards the possibility of radical devastation tougher than those developed in World War Two. The reality of the Cold War, the threat of an apocalyptic nuclear conflict could generate an unconscious collective atmosphere of terror and maximum tension which, in its turn, has been the source of perspectives on the perimeter of emergence of the UFO phenomenon. Thus, it became a visionary rumor, precisely because it wore the insignia of the hidden collective psychic realities. In this rumor, a multitude of people have recognized, symbolically, their own inner mental anxieties and their syncopations that were related to the image of a mass extermination and subjugation by a possible superior species. The lack of confirmation of these fears did not lead directly to the cancellation of the transfer and psychic projection of this kind of negative psychic information, but only to the replacement of such data with other data which, in turn, can The Ufology in the Version of C.G. Jung’s Psychoanalytical Thinking Marius Constantin CUCU, Oana Elena LENŢA 50 be projected within the frames of the UFO phenomenon. Therefore, other anxieties and unconscious tensions were and are possible information that can be transferred towards the area of the occurrence and development of the UFO phenomenon. The collective and individual unconscious, stated Jung, feel intensely the need for unloading the information through the symbolic projection, especially in the case of those negative that exert a considerable inner pressure, tension capable to generate neuroses, sometimes without healing. For the accomplishment of this approach of mental relaxation through the projection of the negative unconscious surplus, shall be involved agents who should be credible, rational witnesses, whose accounts could be assumed as credible coverage. 4. The symbolic transfer Thus, the process of symbolic transfer and unconscious unload may follow and complete the process, regardless of whether we are witnessing the understanding of the UFO phenomenon as a phenomenon that will prepare a global extinction of mankind or as a challenging conundrum for the laboratory research (Jung, 2011: 344-345) The process of transfer of unconscious information joined, according to Jung, the whole evolution of mankind, this information having a strong emotional nature.(Jung, 2014: 144-147) Thus, the religious dimension includes this dynamics of protection of unconscious data on forms which have been recognized and postulated as having a divine nature. Then, the extensive space of mythical reports was founded on the same necessity of psychic transfer. In modern times, with the renouncement to calling to the religious and mythological universe, the phenomenality of the retransfer of unconscious contents was not dimmed, but only became more subtle. Thus, reminded Jung, the two destructive ideologies of the twentieth century, the Nazism and the communism, have speculated intensely the tendency of psychological projection of the collective unconscious, offering different patterns and frameworks through which the energies of the unconscious could be attracted and used negatively. The UFO phenomenon has evolved towards the status of such frameworks within which it was possible to find the suffocating projection of unconscious data generated by the modern man's anxieties, starting from the fear of nuclear disaster and reaching up to the phobia caused by the congestion of global population, by the ontic limits supported by the lack free space amid the massive growth in the number of other people. From a psychological viewpoint, Jung compared the collective phobia related to the UFO phenomenon with the generalized hysteria which appeared at the end