Psychiatric Diagnosis and Classification - ResearchGate

148 PSYCHIATRIC DIAGNOSIS AND CLASSIFICATION
structured if something like identity over time is to be possible Not only are
we able to perceive enduring and temporally extended objects, but we are
also able to recollect on an earlier experience, and recognize it as our own.
Our experience of a temporal object as well as our experience of change and
succession) would be impossible if we were only conscious of that which is
given in a punctual now, and if the stream of consciousness would consequently
consist in a series of isolated now-points, like a line of pearls.
The phenomenological approach is to insist on the width of the presence.
The basic unit of perceived time is not a ``knife-edge'' present, but a ``duration-block'',
i.e. a temporal field that contains all three temporal modes,
present, past and future. Let us imagine that we are hearing a triad consisting
of the tones C, D and E. If we focus on the last part of this perception, the
one that occurs when the tone E sounds, we do not find a consciousness
which is exclusively conscious of the tone E, but a consciousness which is
still conscious of the two former notes D and C. And not only that, we find a
consciousness which still hears the two first notes it neither imagines nor
remembers them). This does not mean that there is no difference between
our consciousness of the present tone E, and our consciousness of the tones
D and C. D and C are not simultaneous with E, on the contrary we are
experiencing a temporal succession. D and C are tones which have been, but
they are perceived as past, and it is only for that reason that we can experience
the triad in its temporal duration, and not simply as isolated tones which
replace each other abruptly. We can perceive temporal objects because
consciousness is not caught in the now, because we do not merely perceive
the now-phase of the triad, but also its past and future phases.
There are three technical terms to describe this case. First, there is a moment
of the experience which is narrowly directed towards the now-phase of the
object, and which is called the primal impression. By itself this cannot provide
us with a perception of a temporal object, and it is in fact merely an abstract
component of the experience that never appears in isolation. The primal
impression is situated in a temporal horizon; it is accompanied by a retention
which is the name for the intention which provides us with a consciousness
of the phase of the object which has just been, and by a protention, which in a
more or less indefinite manner intends the phase of the object about to occur:
we always anticipate in an implicit and unreflected manner that which is
about to happen. That this anticipation is an actual part of our experience can
be illustrated by the fact that we would be surprised if the wax-figure suddenly
moved, or if the door we opened hid a stonewall. It only makes sense to
speak of a surprise in the light of certain anticipation, and since we can
always be surprised, we always have a horizon of anticipation. The concrete
and full structure of all lived experience is primal impression±retention±
protention. It is ``immediately'' given as a unity, and it is not a gradual,
progressive process of self-unfolding.