ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to take steps towards a unifying theory of the psychology, psychoanalysis, and science behind the aggressive drive. Evolutionary theory through Darwin, Freud’s dual-drive theory of the mind, modern neuroscience and neuropsychoanalysis, and biology draw together to explain the different angles on this paradoxical drive of preservation-aggression. Emergent mental systems can become perverse in humans, enabling scalable aggression and specicide, as well as suicide and self-destruction. This warrants a complex fusion of paradigm integration to make proper sense of this anomaly in human life that humans aggress against their own species, in apparent violation of evolutionary theory. The data is not just about social catastrophic violence – individual symptoms and relationship conflicts are driven by the same dynamics. The same drivers as those leading to inhumanity to others can also be seen in personal symptoms and domestic and marital conflicts. Clinical symptoms of stress, depression, anxiety, PTSD, or other syndromes are often driven by the fixations of the aggressive drive. Implications for treatment are discussed. Couple conflict and why psychotherapy can often fail are explained in this chapter.
