In 1926: living at the edge of time - Monoskop

248 ARRAYS
ments lead us to a sympathetic view of telepathy, although they do not
yet provide ultimate certainty" (Freud, 29). Having gone this far, Freud
focuses on a number of clinical cases where, he postulates, psychoanalytic
theory can identify the convergence of certain preconscious predispositions
between two persons as a key condition for the occurrence of
telepathy: "On behalf of some experiments undertaken in a private
circle, I have repeatedly had the impression that the transference of
emotionally charged memories can be achieved without difficulty. One
may venture to say that the ideas, which are supposed to be transferred
during the course of analytic treatment, may come into harmony with
the ideas of another person in whom they would have otherwise remained
unrecognizable. Based on a number of such observations, I am
willing to conclude that such transferences come almost easily at the
moment that an idea emerges from the unconscious, when it crosses over
from 'primary process' to 'secondary process'" (31).
Freud's comment belongs to a larger tendency to redefine, as parts of
the empirical world, phenomena that have traditionally been categorized
as transcendental. [see Immanence vs. Transcendence] While telepathy
transforms the divine privilege of seeing the human soul from inside into
a psychological method, technical devices based on wireless communication
begin to transform the erstwhile divine privilege of omnipresence
into everyday reality. Both developments seem informed by a desire for
unrestrained immediacy in the sphere of human interactions. But despite
the idea underlying the military's utopian view of television, this is not
just a desire to be present as an agent, yet corporeally absent. It is also
a desire for closeness and company. A poster for a French radio called
the Radiola shows a clown standing behind a radio listener who sits in
a comfortable chair (Annees-memoire, 159). It is unclear whether the
clown's bodily presence can be perceived: he holds his hand over the
listener's head, without touching it. The immediacy of the electronic
media can go no further.
Related Entries
Airplanes, Boxing, Endurance, Reporters, Roof Gardens, Telephones,
Timepieces, Immanence vs. Transcendence, Individuality vs. Collectivity,
Silence vs. Noise, Sobriety vs. Exuberance, Center = Periphery (Infinitude),
Present = Past (Eternity)