“Because man has consciousness, a development of this kind [individuation] does not run very smoothly; often it is varied and disturbed, because consciousness deviates again and again from its archetypal, instinctual foundation and finds itself in opposition to it. There then arises the need for a synthesis of the two positions. This amounts to psychotherapy even on the primitive level, where it takes the form of restitution ceremonies. As examples I would mention the identification of the Australian aborigines with their ancestors in the alcheringa period.”

C G Jung (Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, pp. 39-40)

Guest Speaker :

Gary Clark

Orthodox evolutionary theory interprets ritual as an evolved adaptation. However, ritual often involves reduced activity in the most recently evolved brain systems involved in our evolutionary success: those that subserve metacognition and ego consciousness, which effectively go offline during the altered states of consciousness induced by ritual activity.

Jung saw ritual life as an example of individuation and an attempt to integrate evolutionary ancient brain systems with more recently evolved brain systems. His theory provides a richer, and explanatorily more powerful approach to ritual, than those offered by orthodox ‘adaptationist’ accounts.

In Jung’s view ritual life among ancient humans represented a primitive form of psychotherapy and individuation, linking ancient human cultural practises to modern clinical theory and practice. Consequently, clinical practise informed by Jungian evolutionary anthropology provides an alternative framework to orthodox Darwinian approaches to mental illness, such those developed by evolutionary biologists and psychologists.

Gary’s talk tonight will reference Analytical Psychology, Human Origins and the Adaptationist Paradigm, Clinical Practice and Evolutionary Neuroscience.