Reflections on Suffering and Survival

During wartime occupation of Norway, a rugged mountaineer, lawyer and philosopher named Peter Zapffe published several essays on the nature of human suffering entitled, The Task of the Theatre (1932), The Last Messiah (1933) and On the Tragic (1941).

His starting point is a common observation: “Humanity suffers constant tension… an undulating battle …between what drains our will to live and what builds it up^.”[1]

Zapffe then describes four types of adaptive behaviour explaining how we endure and resolve suffering: anchoring, isolation, distraction and sublimation. ^[2]

The following article explores Zapffe's original four domains adding four counterpoints: dislocation, saturation, immersion and confrontation. These are reflections on human suffering in relation to the success or failure of the four primary adaptive domains.

Peter Zapffe’s original categories are not inherently moral or amoral behaviours. They are, however, punctuated with unanswered questions about choice and morality; questions that eventually confront us and cannot be avoided. In this regard, some believe that good use of scientific knowledge could eventually resolve the worst forms of human suffering. Others say that while it informs our choices, scientific knowledge is always limited and incomplete. It would appear that in spite of its many contributions to health care and technology, science does not guarantee good governance, wise choices or relief from suffering, either personally or collectively.

In the following essay, readers will notice contemporary expressions like ‘grounding’ or ‘attachment’.It is a work in progress, relies heavily on internet sources, and has not been peer reviewed. Reflections are informed by my professional background in the field of mental health as a post graduate trained clinical social worker, primarily in psychiatric settings. Related terms are employed, not as synonyms and not to confuse, but to allow the fullest possible explanation of each primary domain and its counterpart. The construct of ‘self’ is used in this article instead of the analytic term 'ego'. ^[3]. Direct quotes are in italics.

ANCHORING versus DISLOCATION

Anchoring

The mechanism of anchoring … serves from early childhood; parents, home, the street become matters of course to the child and give it a sense of assurance. This sphere of experience is the first, and perhaps the happiest, protection against the cosmos that we ever get to know in life; a fact that doubtless also explains the much debated ‘infantile bonding’. …. When the child later discovers that those fixed points are as 'arbitrary' and ‘ephemeral’ any others, it has a crisis of confusion and anxiety and promptly looks around for another anchoring. ^[4]

Anchors include physical, cognitive and social structures which establish our presence in the external world. We anchor our ‘selves’ to ideas, people and institutions: to our temple or church, a set of laws, a set of values, a political party, a marriage, a family, to the name and reputation of a firm, a corporation or a university, a cultural history or group. Most importantly we anchor our ‘selves’ in relationship with others.

In our relational anchors we discover the human capacity for empathy, love and social connectedness. Their very expression refutes the idea that humanity’s primary biological drive is for his or her own personal survival. Our survival depends on the ways in which we are anchored to our physical and social world. The basic biological survival of one person depends on the survival of others. Therefore, if there is an instinct for self-survival, there must be an equally strong instinct for social survival. Many anchors are necessary to sustain and enrich human life. Any external anchor (person or object) often acquires equal or superior value to one’s own life. The evidence is that men and women have in all ages, laid down their lives for their country, their spouses, children and sometimes even for strangers.

Anchors are more or less symmetrical with our primary cognitive paradigm or world view. As physical objects or structures, anchors make our ‘selves’ more visible. They enlarge our presence in the external world, but not simply to make ourselves larger than life, nor to deny our own mortality. Anchoring makes the individual ‘self ‘more accessible to other‘selves’ thereby creating affiliation. In a positive light we call this healthy bonding or attachment. In a negative light, affiliation can also be a master-slave relationship, each bound to the other, but not equally nor perhaps consensually.

Consider how readily we identify our 'selves' with certain organizational structures: a work space, a school crest, social club, housing district, surname, a lineage. These anchors preserve, frame and guide how we think. They shape our social behaviours, persona, rank , livelihood, physical safety and life expectations. Anchors express the conscious meaning and purpose of our individual and collective lives.

This leads us to problems of responsibility, choice and free will. How do we choose the people, ideology and organizations that become our anchors? The construct of choice assumes a great deal. It assumes we are aware of having choices, it assumes we are free to make choices. Some anchors are with us when are born. We cannot, after all, choose our parents, or whether we are born into wealth or poverty. The idea of choice also assumes that its outcome will sufficiently motivate and reward that choice. It assumes there is no grey zone which obscures the moral implications of one choice over another. The notion of choice assumes a great deal about the individual and social conditions in each one of primary and secondary domains.

The construct of responsibility is equally complex. Humanity has a valuable repertoire of behaviours and emotions in which to frame personal and social responsibility, such as regret, sorrow, retribution, rewards, forgiveness and healing. These constructs are also anchors which help us contend with suffering.

ISOLATION versus SATURATION

Isolation

By isolation I here mean a fully arbitrary dismissal from consciousness of all disturbing and destructive thought and feeling. ( Engstrom: "One should not think, it is just confusing.") A perfect and almost brutalizing variant is found among certain physicians, who for self-protection will only see the technical aspect of their profession^.[7]

Zapffe is not referring to social isolation as such. He is referring to a rigid or closed cognitive schema that rejects alternative, dissenting or threatening ideas. A behavioural hallmark of cognitive isolation, for example, is to sneer and mock others. Cognitive isolation also employs many logical fallacies in order to sidestep a dissenting opinion. A straw man argument for example, can be very convincing, if the listener is bamboozled into to accepting it as an honest response to the question at hand. A straw man argument distracts the listener and disrupts dialogue, by shifting the focus of debate to a similar but entirely different point.

Cognitive isolation is expressed by denial and selective hearing. It is the process by which we listen to what suits us, deny what threatens us, and fantasize about what appeals to us. It is practiced both upon one’s self and upon others. When practiced upon others, for example, an innocent ‘scapegoat’ might appear and be blamed for causing another’s personal distress. Blaming the victim is another expression of cognitive isolation. These practices avoid thoughtful critical analysis, and favour ideas that preserve one’s personal or collective cognitive schema.

There are very chilling examples of cognitive isolation in the testimony of Adolf Eichmann who remained anchored to his former role as co-architect of the ‘final solution’. During his trial in Jerusalem for war crimes. Eichmann denied all criminal charges against him. To exonerate himself, he always pointed to some error in translation, or to the responsibility of more senior officers, or to his oath of office. He appears psychologically unable to confront his own participation in the calculated atrocity of the ‘final solution’. These activities of deflection, denial and avoidance are expressions of cognitive isolation. The following excerpt from the court transcripts , illustrate just how difficult it can be to exchange one ideological anchor for another, and how cognitive isolation is exercised and expressed in discourse.

Attorney General: In 1957 you still expressed your regret about the fact that Jews had managed to survive in Hungary. Is that correct?

Eichmann: In 1957? In any case, my handwritten notes say no such thing.

AG: In 1957 you also said the following - pay attention: "No, I have no regrets at all, and I am not eating humble pie at all. In the four months during which you have recorded the whole matter, during which you have endeavoured to refresh my memory, a great deal has been refreshed...it would be too easy, and I could perfectly reasonably, for the sake of current opinion, play a role as if a Saul had turned into a Paul. But I must tell you that I cannot do that, because I am not prepared to, because my innermost being refuses to say that we did something wrong. No - I must tell you quite honestly that if, of the 10.3 million Jews shown by Korherr, as we now know, we had killed 10.3 million, then I would be satisfied and I would say all right, we have destroyed an enemy." Is that what you said?

Eichmann. No, I did not say that, I did not say that at all. That has been patched together from a mixture of fact and fiction. But there is one thing I did say: Regrets do not do any good, regretting things is pointless, regrets are for little children. What is more important is to try and find ways and means of making such events impossible in the future. That was the general tone of the conversation. ^[8]

Saturation

The counterpart of cognitive isolation is saturation. It occurs when we are unable to isolate or maintain boundaries around our thoughts. This is the difference between rigid, impenetrable ideas and permeable boundaries that can be re ordered, re directed very easily. The ideal is an elastic cognitive schema which Piaget describes as the capacity to assimilate and accommodate new forms of information. It is our ability to grasp new information and to rationally design new ways to understand the world.

If we are easily saturated with competing ideas, we are unable to construct and maintain a stable self-impression. Cognitive saturation appears in the form of obsessive cognitive distortions, we magnify obstacles out of proportion, we are haunted by the worst case scenario, we ruminate or perseverate on the pros and cons of our ideas. We are constantly second guessing our own thoughts and perceptions. There may be high levels of anxiety surrounding ideas which conflict with those around us. If we cannot endure these cognitive challenges, we may become overwhelmed, easily swayed by the introduction of new ideas .

A good example of saturation is the Stockholm Syndrome, during which a person is usually under duress, or is a prisoner. During captivity, the victim is ‘re-educated’ to change their cognitive frame of reference and to accept their captors point of view. Saturation can confuse, challenge and change our innermost values and ideals.

Another example of cognitive saturation is deprogramming. First a cult enforces ideological and physical isolation from familiar relational and ideological anchors. The cult member is saturated with new beliefs, and the value of their previous anchors recedes. Deprogramming involves the same process in reverse, where a cult member’s original cognitive schema is by similar means, restored.

Saturation weakens our cognitive frame of reference. We become trapped in angst, like the proverbial hamster in a wheel from which there is no escape. Saturation, like a bottomless pit, may deepen our sense of hopelessness and dislocation in relation to others and the external world. This may lead to suicide or to externalized anger in assault, abuse or homicide. We are no longer grounded in a familiar system of belief or allegiance. Our minds become saturated with competing ideas that forever challenge each other.

Returning to the previous exchange during Eichmann’s trial in Jerusalem, the defendant was asked for his personal opinion of the final solution, which was the extermination of all Jewish residents in the German sphere of influence. Although he is clearly evasive, Eichmann’s remarks convey the pressure he felt to reformulate his political ideology and to revisit his role in the events of World War II. In this exchange, he reflects on struggling with a ‘new conception of the world” but admits that he cannot express regret, nor entirely relinquish his ideological anchor in the Nazi war machine.The exchange reflects how cognitive isolation is expressed in discourse, but also how saturation can intrude on this domain.

Q. I asked you if that was your opinion in 1957 - you will please reply to that.

A. I can only answer this question if I can say...if I can point out that I also said this morning that, in the years in which I was working out a new conception of the world, I also had relapses, relapses which were the temporary results of external causes, and if I am given alcohol and put in the right conditions, then normally a person does not know what he is saying. Because that is how things were and all sorts of other things. That is why I must in principle dissociate myself from these matters.

Q. You are not answering my question; I am asking whether that was your attitude in 1957.

A. No, that was not my attitude in 1957.

Q. That is what I want to know.

A. May I add something further to this?

Presiding Judge: Yes.

Accused: If this question could be disposed of in one single word, which would be the equivalent of lip-service. But if someone, as I was, has all these years been in these infernal events, thrust into them, bound by his oath, bearing the burden of conflicts of conscience and other conflicts, if one wants to try and select...if one wants to find some path along which one can move, if one is looking for some internal strength, this is very difficult for a human being, unless he is a philosopher by nature - and I am not a philosopher - to be able here to find for himself some road which will be permanent and lasting. And that all takes time, that is not the sort of thing which happens overnight - otherwise, in my opinion, that is just empty lip- service^[9]

DISTRACTION versus IMMERSION

Distraction

Distractions can be as simple as a game of solitaire or as complex as chess. Distractions include board games like Monopoly, communal events like national hockey or global spectacles like the Olympic games. Not incidentally, these activities can also promote pro-social behaviours such as humility, graciousness, and good manners. They often appeal to our emotions through aesthetics of grace, movement, discipline, beauty.

Ultimately though, these are distractions which allow us to set aside our pain and suffering for a short while. Distractions allow us to experience victory and fame, enlarging ourselves, for a moment, on the world stage. Through distractions, we experience victories we have not ourselves won, gain social status we do not have and simulate belonging without membership. As sports fans, for example, we enjoy vicarious participation in a communal culture. We engage on the fringe of these events by painting our faces, holding victory parties, waving team flags.

Here we might also employ psychodynamic terms like projection or the postmodern expression ‘externalising the problem. ”Zapffe wrote, for example, about theatre:

“There is something eerie ….about sitting down to watch ‘our’ own mode of existence and characteristics. But the idea is clear. In the theater, the battleground is moved from the mind onto the stage. We become mere spectators, relieved for a time of the burden of existence. Our own secret distress is seen to be borne by others and brought to solutions that comfort and soothe us, be they direct or indirect ones, elementary or involving high ideals; either familiar or new.” ^[10]

Immersion

Immersed in distraction we construct a lifestyle that is filled only with distractions. Immersion is akin to addiction and over indulgence. Obsessive pleasure seeking, avoidant, dependent behaviours even procrastination are hallmarks of some form of immersion -- and this behaviour is not a necessary feature of either wealth or poverty.

The craving for material goods (power) is not so much due to the direct pleasures of wealth, as none can be seated on more than one chair or eat himself more than sated. Rather, the value of a fortune to life consists in the rich opportunities for anchoring and distraction offered to the owner.^[11]

Generally, immersion is characterised by a passive posture in relation to external stimuli, material gain, or physical pleasure. In the cycle of addictions, any cessation of drug or pleasure seeking behaviours may witness promising new behaviour, such as starting a new job. However, the ultimate intent of brief behaviour change, may be to secure greater access to distractions for eventual re-immersion. This is a constant challenge in the cycle of addictions, where the addict recovers briefly during which time they prepare financially or in other ways for re- immersion in their preferred addiction.

Alternatively, as Zapffe writes in the lexicon of his time: “When all distractive options are expended, spleen sets in, ranging from mild indifference to fatal depression^”[12] This can be understood to mean that when immersion fails to relieve suffering, the dialectic motion of life is re-experienced, resurrecting painful depression, anxiety and other calamities. This is consistent with Buddhist notions of pleasure and pain as illusions which obscure the path to enlightenment, the essence of which is balance, peace, and a release from suffering.

SUBLIMATION versus CONFRONTATION

Sublimation

The fourth remedy against panic, sublimation , is a matter of transformation rather than repression. Through stylistic or artistic gifts can the very pain of living at times be converted into valuable experiences? Positive impulses engage the evil and put it to their own ends, fastening onto its pictoral, dramatic, heroic, lyric or even comic aspects. ^[13]

Sublimation then, is a conscious translation of suffering into creative or intellectual activities such as film, art or literature. This is unlike Freud’s expression of unacceptable ego impulses in representational and less harmful forms. An example of Freudian sublimation is the appeal of violent video games to safely express an otherwise unacceptable aggression, the urge to harm others. In Zapffe’s definition of sublimation, evil refers to personal and social suffering, not a wicked impulse. Suffering itself is evil in so far as it is painful and precipitates harmful behavior. In this sense, sublimation is a cognitive device which allows us to ignore or diminish the impact of suffering. It is also a survival skill to protect us from physical or psychological annihilation by nourishing the meaning of our personal lives. Zapffe’s idea of sublimation, is similar to the postmodern idea of ‘externalizing the problem’ to separate that problem from the person. The problem is defined in terms of an obstacle, or a paradoxical situation which is confusing and which diminishes the person’s life meaning and satisfaction.

Confrontation

The counterpart of sublimation is direct confrontation. We observe this among social activists, protesters, journalists and many spiritual leaders. Dietrich Bonheoffer, for example, refused to be silenced during the rise of National Socialism in Germany. He spoke out on the radio; he began his own congregation of dissident ministers, was eventually imprisoned and executed. Bonheoffer sang from the rooftops, he lectured in the United States and actually returned to the fray in his own country. Similarly, Martin Luther King did not shyly or metaphorically protest his personal and collective suffering. He confronted the ‘evil’ of suffering directly, remained anchored in his spiritual faith, mobilized that faith in the civil rights movement, and was similarly martyred.

In contrast to sublimation, whistleblowers employ confrontation. One of the most famous twentieth century whistleblowers was Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked top secret information on the Vietnam war, owned by the United States Department of Defense, known as the Pentagon Papers.

I felt that as an American citizen, as a responsible citizen, I could no longer cooperate in concealing this information from the American public. I did this clearly at my own jeopardy and I am prepared to answer to all the consequences of this decision.

— Ellsberg on why he released the Pentagon Papers to the press. ^[14]

Conclusion:

This essay considers four domains of adaptive behaviour based on the work of Peter W. Zapffe. Each domain suggests a corollary or counterpoint: Anchoring vs. Dislocation; Isolation vs. Saturation; Distraction vs. Immersion, and Sublimation vs. Confrontation. These ideas emerge from existential philosophy as it appeared in the early 20^th century, blossoming into several important schools of psychotherapy.

References:

[1] Zapffe, Peter, W. (1932). The Task of the Theatre: Seen in the light of a biological outlook. Translated from Norwegian by Sorroco. Downloaded on April 28, 2011. http://sirocco.blogsome.com/2006/05/23/peter-zapffe-on-the-theater/

[2] Zapffe, Peter, W. (1933) The Last Messiah.Gisle R. Tangenes for the March/April 2004 issue (Issue 45) of Philosophy Now. Downloaded on April 28, 2011. http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/The_Last_Messiah

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self

[4] Zapffe, P.W. (1933). The Last Messiah. Translated by Gisle R. Tangenes for the March/April 2004 issue (Issue 45) of Philosophy Now. Downloaded on April 28, 2011. http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/The_Last_Messiah

[5] Freedman, Dov. , Director. (2009) . The Last Nazi’s, Episode 2. Downloaded from Documentary Storm, April 28, 2011. http://documentarystorm.com/history-archaeology/the-last-nazis/2/

[6] Frankl, Viktor (1946) Man's Search for Meaning. Downloaded May 5, 2011. http://www.rjgeib.com/thoughts/frankl/frankl.html

[7] Zapffe, P.W. (1933). The Last Messiah. Translated by Gisle R. Tangenes for the March/April 2004 issue (Issue 45) of Philosophy Now. Downloaded on April 28, 2011. http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/The_Last_Messiah

[8] The Trial of Adolf Eichmann. (July 13, 1961) Session 96. Part One of Four: The Nizkor Project. http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/people/e/eichmann-adolf/transcripts/Sessions/Session-096-01.html

[9] Ibid.

[10] Zapffe, Peter, W. (1932). The Task of the Theatre: Seen in the light of a biological outlook. Translated from Norwegian by Sorroco. Downloaded on April 28, 2011. http://sirocco.blogsome.com/2006/05/23/peter-zapffe-on-the-theater/

[11] Zapffe, Peter, W. (1932). The Task of the Theatre: Seen in the light of a biological outlook. Translated from Norwegian by Sorroco. Downloaded on April 28, 2011. . http://sirocco.blogsome.com/2006/05/23/peter-zapffe-on-the-theater/

[12]Zapffe, P.W. (1933). The Last Messiah. Translated by Gisle R. Tangenes for the March/April 2004 issue (Issue 45) of Philosophy Now. Downloaded on April 28, 2011. http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/The_Last_Messiah

[13] Ibid

[14] Wikipedia: The Pentagon Papers. United States–Vietnam Relations, 1945–1967: A Study Prepared by the Department of Defense. Downloaded April 18, 2011. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentagon_Papers