Lacan's Egos | Psychoanalysis of Jacques Lacan

Thought in Motion is a series dedicated to the seminars of Jacques Lacan. This video covers pages 129 - 142 in Seminar I, lecture 11. Today I discuss 1) elaborations upon the optical schema, including the virtual subject, 2) the ideal ego, ego-ideal, superego, and their respective registers, processes, and functions, 3) consider love and its impact on the ego-ideal in its relationship to the ideal ego.

#Lacan #Psychoanalysis #Captation #Projection #Introjection #repression #sublimation #Lacanian #Lacanseminars #Freud

[redwanelyaagoubi]

That episode is abundant in lacan's arty-tectural

[Mrrr.P]

Thank you for your remarkable interpretation, sir. The problem as to the one mirror schema is well addressed in your next video. And I have two questions about this lecture. First, is aggressivity invoked in the mirror phase related to masochism/sadism that first appears in the Oedipal crisis? Secondly, I can't find texts that attest to madness which occurs when "the ego ideal" meets the ideal image, which you said at the end of this video. In his "On Narcissism, " Freud depicts a situation where the fulfillment of the ego ideal fails and the patient thus seeks a substitute for the satisfaction he once enjoyed whether in ego ideal or ideal ego. And this substitute is a sexual object, that is to say, a lover. When the situation gets worse, as in transference neurosis, the patient projects an excessive amount of libido onto the lover and is incapable of drawing it back. Hence an impoverishment of the ego. This is, I think, what Lacan refers to as madness or suicide. Otherwise, Freud says in the same essay that love, in its normal sense, is an activity of the ego, just like any other activities, which contains a flowing over and drawing back of libido of the ego so as to keep it at a constant level. Could you please explain the encounter of the ego ideal with the ideal image?

[illusizzy]

First of all, I'm not using both english and french as my mother tongue, so my expression may be inaccurate.
"The optical model also illustrates the function of the ideal ego, which is represented in the diagram as the real image, in opposition to the ego-ideal, which is the symbolic guide governing the angle of the mirror and hence the position of the subject (S1, 141).", which is from the introductory dictionary of Lacanian psychoanalysis(P.134), has claimed that ideal ego is the real image in the optical model and the function of ego-ideal. However, due to Lacan's opinion and thoughts are changing during the seminars, I guess in the way that the video series are presented, such seem-to-be-confusing expressions in the video are important, though it might not as good as for the viewers who want to have a "clearer" understanding.

[borisluzin]

If I'm not mistaken, in Seminar XVII Lacan later develops his Mirror Stage theory and underlines the role of the Desire of the Mother in the process of identifications with your own reflection. Can we assume that the Symbolic law that controls the angle of the mirror and helps the subject to create a unified image of his ego is the Desire of the Mother? She must be the one who introduces the child to the world of the Other. Then it introjects her position and forms its own ego-ideal (?).

[borisluzin]

I hope that by Lecture XI Lacan had scribbled his optical schema on the board, because, when he firstly introduced it, he only described it orally. His poor audience!

So, if ego-ideal is SV on the scheme, what is ideal ego? It must be the virtual image, am I right? (supposing that a subject sees not a bouquet but his own body, of course).

[quentin]

Did you found a real life experiment with this setting. I still can't grasp what I see😭. When I see in the plane mirror what do I see and how does the spheric mirror effect the image what I see. Where sees the Subject what ?

According to physics 101 plane mirrors create virtual images because the image can only be seen when your eye sees the reflected light. Real images have a light source themselves. But I don't know how I can implement this knowledge.

[quentin]

I don't know what he means with law. He doesn't explain this very well. Has the law a forcing power to the subject so he has to do this ? Do you also can translate this as an Appell ( You have to do this !) ?