Views on Freud: Civilization and Its Discontents Chapter 1 Part 4

Freud – “Further reflection tells us that the adult’s ego-feeling cannot have been the same from the beginning. It must have gone through a process of development, which cannot, of course, be demonstrated but which admits of being constructed with a fair degree of probability. An infant at the breast does not as yet distinguish his ego from the external world as the source of sensation flowing in upon him.”

What? How is he supposed to distinguish anything at all?

In order to distinguish anything from anything there first needs to be experience so how could he be able to distinguish?
“He gradually learns to do so, in response to various promptings.”

Oh, ohhhh so he can distinguish. Wait, when? Oh, when he has something to distinguish with and from, huh, how odd, because if that is the case, why assume he can distinguish without these “various promptings” in the first place?

“He must feel strongly impressed by the fact that some sources of excitation, which he will later recognize as his own bodily organs, can provide him with sensations at any moment, whereas other sources evade him from time to time – among them what he desires most of all, his mother’s breast – and only reappear as a result of his screaming for help.”

An infant who lacks all experience will be surprised by all sensations and stimulations since they are all foreign to him. “Impressed” is the wrong word since it requires the experience of comparisons of certain constants across many different experiences, the underestimation of a certain experience which is based on the same type of experiences, and the polarization of that instant.

And why does he desire his mother’s breast? Why does he care? His internal, yet undefined, need yearns in order for the baby to continue its existence.

“In this way there is for the first time set over against the ego an ‘object’, in the form of something which exists ‘outside’ and which is only forced to appear by special action.”

The ego has hardly been established, there is no acknowledgement of anything at all, because, again, in order for there to be awareness there needs to be a certain amount of experience something to “ignite” the already known facts.

The whole “outside” VS “inside” thing is irrelevant. The only thing relevant is our need to survive, and the most efficient way of doing so, which always boils down to control. Control over our body over objects over ideas. All those which we learn during infancy from our environment that seem to us that they enable control, we will follow as adults who need to survive on their own. If 300 years ago it was physical strength in order to work the fields, today it is mental strength in order to find lucrative jobs which inexplicitly seem to make us think will cause us happiness.