Dismemberments
October 18th 2006 08:51
Admittedly, I was watching a Star Trek episode yesterday (and admittedly I like Star Trek), and there was one strange scene where Counsellor Deanna Troi, whose name I've spelt wrongly, looks in a mirror and starts screaming -- apparently the deal is that she sees a stranger's eyes staring back at her from her own face.
I don't know what the symbolism is, but I'd assume most people would feel the power of it. The image of the doppelganger echoes through literary history, as do images of people who lose control of different parts of their bodies, or images of separated parts becoming animate. I'd imagine, along the same lines, that most people were struck by the scene in the first part of "Saving Private Ryan" where a soldier hunts around in the water for his arm.
But it's not just a matter of symbolic communication: I doubt it's uncommon to experience similar sensations to the Counsellor. Even to have a numb leg, and then to touch it -- usually you both touch and are touched, but now the only sensation is in your hand. Picking up an ankle becomes little different from picking up a book or a pencil.
I think, looking at anyone, yourself included, you get into a groove, you look only in certain ways, see only certain aspects or details, interpret only in certain ways. And then, for some reason, one day you look differently. Your own thinking brings you to look at yourself as if for the first time. Or your body gets written on by other thoughts -- you listen to a lecture on skin cancer, and the moles on your arm become sinister.
Note 1: I think Borges remarks, incidentally, that there are only four themes in the literature of the fantastic: time travel, the work within the work, the dream that taints reality, and the doppelganger.
Note 2: Every part of the human body is, of course, intensely symbolic.
Note 3: For some reason, I've found that mature age students can easily infiltrate university. You assume they're just out of high school like you, until they mention they've just had a kid, and you look closer, and their features almost morph into a different face.
Note 4: Apparently Lacan makes comments on the imagery of dismemberment.
I don't know what the symbolism is, but I'd assume most people would feel the power of it. The image of the doppelganger echoes through literary history, as do images of people who lose control of different parts of their bodies, or images of separated parts becoming animate. I'd imagine, along the same lines, that most people were struck by the scene in the first part of "Saving Private Ryan" where a soldier hunts around in the water for his arm.
But it's not just a matter of symbolic communication: I doubt it's uncommon to experience similar sensations to the Counsellor. Even to have a numb leg, and then to touch it -- usually you both touch and are touched, but now the only sensation is in your hand. Picking up an ankle becomes little different from picking up a book or a pencil.
I think, looking at anyone, yourself included, you get into a groove, you look only in certain ways, see only certain aspects or details, interpret only in certain ways. And then, for some reason, one day you look differently. Your own thinking brings you to look at yourself as if for the first time. Or your body gets written on by other thoughts -- you listen to a lecture on skin cancer, and the moles on your arm become sinister.
Note 1: I think Borges remarks, incidentally, that there are only four themes in the literature of the fantastic: time travel, the work within the work, the dream that taints reality, and the doppelganger.
Note 2: Every part of the human body is, of course, intensely symbolic.
Note 3: For some reason, I've found that mature age students can easily infiltrate university. You assume they're just out of high school like you, until they mention they've just had a kid, and you look closer, and their features almost morph into a different face.
Note 4: Apparently Lacan makes comments on the imagery of dismemberment.
| 101 |
| Vote |
Add To: 
subscribe to this blog
Comment by PokerPro
Fascinating post, as always! On a practical level, I am fascinated by the premise that each of us has an exact double out there somewhere. I cannot decide whether this is supported statistically. I have heard strange stories though, from friends etc. One night in the city I was approached several times by people I have never met and addressed by a different name. Once I explained that I was not who they thought I was they were each individually freaked out. Unfortunately, I never got to see this other person. In my mind he would have been just like me. Yet, how superficial a hypothesis is that! His physical appearance would have no bearing upon his personality. In other words, simply because he looked like me would have no correlation, direct or otherwise, upon whether he "thought" like me. Or would it?
Indeed, if I can quote you from another post Adrian: "does this mean that looks are more central to who I am?"
Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
Thanks very much for the feedback, and thanks for the interesting story. I've never met my physical double, but I was freaked out once by my handwriting double, and I'm always surprised when I find someone who's "on the same wavelength", who seems uncannily to understand what my words mean.
What are the odds, do you think, that there is someone who thinks the same as you? (And what are the odds that you can find them on rsvp.com?)
There's a philosophy lecturer at Sydney Uni who plays a game to demonstrate that people aren't as rare as they imagine they are. I can't quite remember how it goes, but it's something like eliciting a piece of personal information, then going through the rest of the class one by one till a match is found -- and it's always surprising how soon the match occurs.