Bion's Sources

The shaping of his paradigms

Nuno Torres, R.D. Hinshelwood, Nuno Torres, R.D. Hinshelwood

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Topic: Psychology
• eBook ISBN:
  9781136772634
• Subtopic: History & Theory in Psychology
• Index: Psychology

There are an increasing number of publications concerned with the work of Wilfred Bion (1897-1979). Many have sought new ideas from his writing however, little attention has been paid to the intellectual context in which Bion wrote.

Bion's Sources traces where Bion's new ideas came from, what job he required of them, how successfully he used his context and how that has fertilised psychoanalysis. Expert contributors provide chapters on areas of the intellectual context separate from or adjacent to clinical psychoanalysis in Britain which have clearly influenced the texts Bion left (those published in his life time, or subsequently). Chapters explore the influences deriving from Wilfred Trotter, Henri Bergson and process philosophy, Kurt Lewin and group dynamics, Immanuel Kant, R. B. Braithwaite and the philosophy of science, the mathematics of notation and transformation, as well as the work of psychoanalysts who have applied their theories to social science, psychosomatics, and literature and the humanities.

By contextualising Bion in the wider culture of ideas, and removing him from the exclusive world of Psychoanalysis, Bion's Sources aims to moderate his 'genius' by showing how it was shaped by very wide influences. This book will be of interest to psychoanalysts, clinicians and those interested in the history of psychoanalytic ideas.

Chapter 1

Introduction

Nuno Torres and R.D. Hinshelwood

The photograph on the fly leaf of All my Sins Remembered (Bion 1985) shows Wilfred Bion reading a book, titled Plato. His widow’s claim in selecting this photograph appears to be an assertion of Bion’s erudition, and breadth of reading. Our volume of papers on various aspects of Bion’s interests which we are introducing goes along with Francesca Bion’s claim.

It therefore also goes against O’Shaughnessy’s assessment:

Earlier in his book Bléandonu discusses Bion’s importing of terms from other disciplines to introduce new models through their penumbra of ‘other’ meaning. In this regard, I suspect Bléandonu may be a little too French in the degree of understanding he attributes to Bion of these ‘other’ fields, especially philosophy: such knowledge, I think, occurs more often in France than in specialist England.

(O’Shaughnessy 1995, p. 857)

At the very least our book provides some research and thought about which of the claims is most valid. The question posed in this way is bound up with general cultural discussion about whether a genius draws on others’ work, or whether he is graced with profound ideas that come from nowhere else. We would subscribe to the former view. But we intend to help the reader make up his/her own mind on the basis of what we have placed between these covers.

O’Shaughnessy poses the core question, a contentious issue, she calls it: ‘How shall we view Bion’s highly original work? As a development of what was there before? Or as a radical discontinuity?’ (O’Shaughnessy 2005, p. 1926). She makes reference to Roy Schafer (1997) and agrees with him. Schafer asserted that ‘Change is best approached as a matter of transformation. Consequently, we should think of ourselves as engaged in the study of transformations in theory and practice rather than radical discontinuities’ (Schafer 1997, p. x). O’Shaughnessy however attributes Bion’s sources to Freud and Klein, and tends not to look further.

It is very likely that philosophy was one of Bion’s main foundations, since he emphasized the need for a psychoanalyst’s philosophical background due to the many problems presented by psychoanalysis that involve philosophical issues (Bion, 1962, p. i; 1967a, pp. 151–152). Actually, J.O. Wisdom was one of the common references in Bion’s books (1962, 1963, 1965) and also acknowledged for revisions and suggestions of earlier works (Bion, 1965). Wisdom was an important contributor to philosophy and to psychoanalysis – former president of the Society for Psychosomatic Research –who become interested in the power of psychoanalysis to explain not only mental disorder but also the yearning for what was traditionally thought of as metaphysics (Jarvie 1993). As Bion was interested in the psychoanalytic observation, notation and interpretation of non-sensuous data (empirical data that cannot be directly received by the sense organs [e.g. 1967a, pp. 165–166]), he was troubled by metaphysical issues such as the limits of reason to access noumenon (‘things-in-themselves’) addressed by Kant.

In all his work Bion contrasted intuition with reason, in order to deal with the limitations of knowledge based both on sense impressions and on previous theories about the mind. Additionally, he was also interested in the body–mind relations, which bring about the philosophical controversies on the relations between matter and the mind (e.g. Popper and Eccles 1977), and the issue of materialistic reductionism inherent to the biomedical model in which Freudian psychoanalysis was originated (Sulloway 1979). Bion strongly criticised the implicit medical model of ‘symptomatic cure’ and the mechanistic models in psychoanalysis (e.g. 1962, pp. 24–27; 1967a, pp. 151–157; 1970, pp. 6–26), and proposed to replace them with the notion of ‘mental growth’ based on a model of biological growth inherent to the flux of life (e.g. 1962, p. 70; 1963, p. 63; 1965, pp. 37–46; 1967a, p. 137; 1970, p. 71).

Like Freud, whose development was shaped by the major issues within medicine in the late nineteenth century, so Bion was also influenced by the currents in medicine and psychology in the first half of the twentieth century. Freud’s Vienna was at the forefront of the development of medicine under the influence of nineteenth-century scientific achievement. Medicine moved dramatically towards an interest in causes of illnesses (aetiology), thus becoming medical science. And medical treatment aimed at the eradication of causes rather than the eradication of symptoms. In this context, Freud developed psychoanalysis. We can consider similarly those contextual developments in science, medicine and psychology which formed the background to Bion’s own development from the 1930s to 1960s.

There is a growing interest in Bion Studies, around the world, with a steady growth in publications (for instance: Bion Talamo et al. 1998; Bion Talamo et al. 2000; Pines 2000; Lopez-Corvo 2005; Sandler 2006, 2010; Mawson 2011; Brown 2011). Much of this is expository, aiming to tell the reader what exactly Bion’s ideas were. We want this book to reach into the penumbra of ideas and currents of opinions which form the context out of which Bion’s ideas came.

Scientific thought developed in specific ways during the period between the First and Second World Wars. During this time, Bion studied history and philosophy at Oxford, and medicine at University College London. This was a time when the philosophy of science was itself debated in critical fashion with the return to Hume’s suspicion of induction, and Popper’s complete indictment of induction and turn to a deductive reasoning paradigm, the hypothetico-deductive method (Popper 1959).

Bion was alert to the implications of these epistemological concerns, and studied scientific thinking in comparison with schizophrenic thinking; ‘The scientist whose investigations include the stuff of life itself finds himself in a situation that has a parallel in that of the patients I am describing’ (Bion 1962, p. 13). But just as important to him was another development, which led him to Braithwaite (1953) rather than Popper.

Twentieth-century science evolved in the aftermath of the extraordinary mathematical predictions of relativity, and sub-atomic particles. The convergence of mathematics with physical science clearly looked like the way ahead for all science, and Bion absorbed that interest in higher and higher levels of abstract knowledge. He studied the possibilities of notation, via the logic of mathematics, but settled on the ‘grid’¹, that took its schema from physical chemistry (Mendeleev’s table).

The first half of the twentieth century was a period of great development in psychology as well, and for a time psychoanalysis was in the forefront. Although Bion was himself occupied for long periods with his own issues of a career, money and his own self-confidence, he was learning medicine, psychotherapy and psychoanalysis which were themselves embedded in the wider scientific culture. It is known for instance that he was interested in Kant when at Oxford, deriving from the influence of H.J. Paton,² later professor of philosophy, and an authority on Kant, and whilst a medical student he was very impressed with the surgeon Wilfred Trotter who knew Freud and Ernest Jones, and had written a work in social psychology (The Herd instinct in Peace and War – 1916), which Freud had taken seriously (Freud 1921). These represent a much broader cultural canvas which Bion had access to implicitly through his teachers and colleagues.

This book is not just about Bion’s contributions to psychoanalysis. Those are now acknowledged and described by many people in an increasing number of publications of varying standards of reliability. It is easy enough to make one’s own interpretation of what he is trying to say, and so we end up with a plethora of different Bions. Already two fairly clear-cut traditions are becoming apparent. At their extremes, one is a solid follower of Melanie Klein who advanced her body of ideas, especially with the theory of linking, containment and the conjunction of pre-conceptions with realisations as the basis for thinking. At the other extreme is a much more mystical man who read St John of the Cross, was committed to the ‘unknown’, and who radically changed our understanding of reality to suggest it is merely extended dream-work. Such categorisations are extreme and for the purpose of making the point that we see the Bion we want to make of him; and thus to put emphasis on the fundamental need to take good care of the communication processes that take place (or not) between analysts.

Our aim, however, is different, and not simply to make a new interpretation of Bion’s ideas. He did work hard at understanding the problems he was faced with, the difficulties in the clinical work, the difficulties in establishing a coherent framework of concepts, and above all how to find effective ways of communicating between analysts about those problems and their possible solutions; and to these ends it is clear Bion was an active reader with a substantial library. We know, especially from his notebooks, Cogitations (Bion 1992), that he looked to his reading of others for inspiration. Hence, it is possible to study what Bion takes from others, what problem he is tackling at the particular time he is reading, what ideas he harvests for the problem, what he did with the ideas he found, and what use it turned out to be for him.

If we do not situate Bion within his context of problems and available ideas to be used for solutions, and we do not make an assessment of the success of his problem-solving, then we risk the empty achievement of legend-building, which is gaseous, lighter-than-air, and ultimately easily collapsible, a frequent state of psychoanalytic discussion of which Bion was the first to complain. We need more substance than legend, and Bion was very emphatic that our discussions ‘must be a genuine confrontation and not an impotent beating of the air by opponents whose differences of view never meet’ (Bion 1970, p. 55). By recognising where some of the ideas came from, and why and how they are used, we hope to promote a more potent form of debate within the psychoanalytic world.

Notes

1  Editors note: The ‘grid’ is available originally in the first page of the following publications: Bion (1962, 1963, 1965, 1967b, 1970 and 1977 [1989]).

2  Herbert James Paton, 1887–1969. White’s Professor Emeritus of Moral Philosophy, Oxford.

Chapter 2

Gregariousness and the Mind

Bion and Trotter, an Update¹

Nuno Torres

Nothing can be more contrary than such a philosophy to the supine indolence of the mind, its rash arrogance, its lofty pretensions and its superstitious credulity. Every passion is mortified by it, except the love of truth; and that passion never is, nor can be carried to too high degree.

Hume, in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1758)

If we divide Bion’s work into two major periods – the ‘group period’ and the ‘psycho-analytic period’ – they are clearly linked to his psychoanalysts John Rickman and Melanie Klein. One of Rickman’s aims, which Bion shared, was to apply psychoanalytic knowledge to the study of groups (Bion and Rickman, 1943 [1961]; Rickman, 1950 [1957]). Later on, Bion would follow Melanie Klein’s advice and abandon the group studies to dedicate himself to individual psychoanalysis.²

The aim of this paper is to show that there was a third major influence on Bion’s ideas and one that can be considered no less fundamental in his professional training, but mainly in his stream of thought: Wilfred Trotter. As Bion acknowledged at the end of his life in All My Sins Remembered: “Trotter listened with unassumed interest as if the patient’s contributions flowed from the fountain of knowledge itself. It took me years of experience before I learned that this was in fact the case” (Bion, 1985, p. 38). Trotter’s influence is apparent both in the group and in the psychoanalytic periods of Bion’s thinking: we can find the roots of several of Bion’s original propositions in Trotter’s ideas, which provide a sense of coherence to the notions of group phenomena and the functioning of the individual mind.

These notions were foreign to earlier psychoanalytic theories before Bion, and represent some of his many original contributions to the enrichment of psychoanalysis. In this paper I will deal with the following notions:

• man as a gregarious and political animal,
• the mind’s need for certainty, and the problem of intolerance of uncertainty,
• the focus on the “development of the mind” instead of the alleged “cure”,
• the conflicts between the new ideas and the Establishment the status quo),
• the crucial need for a suitable system of communicating ideas in psychoanalysis, and
• biological-organic concepts opposed to mechanistic ones) to examine mental functioning.

Who was Trotter?

Wilfred Trotter (1872–1939), a general surgeon,³ had a pioneering and central role in the history of the British psychoanalytical movement: he attended the first International Congress of Psychoanalysis in 1908 in Salzburg, and took its ideas to England (Jones, 1945). He was a great friend and loyal supporter of Ernest Jones, “apart from Freud the man who mattered most in his life” (Gillespie, 1979). In Trotter’s obituary in the International Journal of Psychoanalysis, Jones relates he was

one of the first two or three in England to appreciate the significance of Freud’s work, which I came to know through him […] he followed the development of Psycho-Analysis to the end of his life (he revised the translation of the Moses book, for instance) […]. He was a member of the Council of the Royal Society that conferred their Honorary Membership on Professor Freud and he attended him medically after his removal to England

(Jones, 1940, p. 114)

Trotter was also a pioneer of social psychology. In his 1916 masterpiece, Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War, the main idea was that besides the instincts of sex, self-preservation and nutrition there was one additional instinct that had not yet been described by psychology: the herd instinct. Following Pearson’s ideas on the evolution of co-operation, and those of Sidis on the bio-psychological significance of gregariousness, Trotter’s herd instinct represented the general tendency of some biological organisms to gregariousness: multiple-cell organisms (Metazoa), swarms, herds, societies. The assumptions underlying Trotter’s concept of herd instinct were:

1. gregariousness is advantageous to the social species in facing natural selection;
2. the human mind is highly susceptible to the effects of the herd instinct;
3. the main problem of the human species is the conciliation of the rational mind with the irrational facets of greg...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of contributors
• Foreword
• Preface
• 1. Introduction
• 2. Gregariousness and the mind: Bion and Trotter, an update
• 3. Intuition and ultimate reality in psychoanalysis: Bion’s implicit use of Bergson and Whitehead’s notions
• 4. The wider medical culture of Bion’s bio-psycho-social framework
• 5. The Tavistock years
• 6. Bion’s concept of the proto-mental and modern panpsychism
• 7. The psycho-social field dynamics: Kurt Lewin and Bion
• 8. Bion’s analysts
• 9. Letters to John Rickman: transition 1939–1951
• 10. Freud’s influence on Bion’s thought: links and transformations
• 11. Thoughts, thinking, and the thinker: Bion’s philosophical encounter with Kant
• 12. Braithwaite and the philosophy of science
• 13. Notation, invariants and mathematical models
• 14. Investigating Bion’s aesthetic turn: A Memoir of the Future and the 1970s
• 15. Conclusion: Bion’s nomadic journey
• References
• Index