What Makes Humans Unique

Through an integrated multi-disciplinary theory, Michael Robbins proposes that the human mind consists of two mental structures, the one we share with other animate creatures, and a capacity for reflective representational thought which is unique.

Autorentext

Michael Robbins is a psychoanalyst, member of the American and International Psychoanalytic Societies, former professor of Clinical Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and author of 5 previous books and more than 40 articles in refereed journals.

Inhalt

1. Psychoanalysis and the Structures of Mind 2. The Mental Structure Humans Share with Other Primates and the Structure that is Unique 3. History of the Concept of Two Mental Structures from Psychoanalysis and Other Disciplines 4. The Distinctive Languages of Each Mental Structure 5. The Structure Common to All Species and its Manifestations 6. Acquisition of the Second Mental Structure During the Separation Phase of Development 7. Limitation of the Biological Theory of Evolution in Understanding the Origins of the Second Mental Structure 8. Efforts to Fit What Makes Humans Unique into the Biological Theory of Evolution Lead to the Need for a Revision 9. The Origins of Social Structure from Mental Structure: The Social Organization Derived from the Primordial Structure 10. History of the Parallel Evolution of the Second Mental Structure and the Movement of Human Social Organization from Socio-Centric to Self-Centric 11. The Structural Difference Between Neurosis and Psychosis 12. Mental Structure, Social Organization, and the Complex Interplay of Socially Constructive and Destructive Phenomena Arising From Them 13. Mental Structures and the Evolution of Homo Sapiens