The metasexual postulate

A new explanatory model for human sexuality…

Freud distinguishes two independent sexual functions: one appearing at puberty with the aim of reproduction; the other occurring from birth, consisting in “obtaining a gain of pleasure from different areas of the body”, which he sometimes calls “polymorphic function” given the multiplicity of erogenous zones and its instinctual manifestations. human sexuality would therefore have pleasure as its finality. This postulate, which is at the base of psychoanalysis and of all the current “device of sexuality” (term of Michel Foucault), contradicts what we know of all instincts.

The food instinct, for example, comes with pleasure, which functions as a form of self-stimulation or self-learning. But its goal is beyond pleasure and is to nourish the body. Studying food from the perspective of pleasure alone leads to an art: gastronomy, and not to a science. It is indeed necessary to know what is the finality of an instinct in order to construct a relevant system of explanation, for example to define what is its correct realization and what would only be a deviation from it. Seen from this angle, Freudianism appears as a “gastronomy of sexuality” … This would fundamentally explain why psychoanalysis has been refused the status of science.

The “drive > pleasure > finality” schema, valid for all instincts, would therefore be reduced, for the non-reproductive sexual function, to the paradoxical “drive> pleasure> pleasure” schema. Evolution would have endowed the human species with a function diverting the reproductive system from its biological purpose to assign it to a purely hedonistic purpose. This possibility cannot be ruled out a priori: it would reflect a sort of superiority of man over animals, human beings having evolved towards access to pleasure that has become independent of the constraints of survival of the species.

However, the laws of evolution does rule out the inclusion in a genome of a behavior whose stake in terms of reproduction does not induce sufficient selection pressure. It is unlikely that a pleasure-seeking function, which in itself represents a loss of energy and unnecessary exposure to danger, has been retained by genetic memory. The argument that polymorphic pleasures indirectly promote procreation is questionable, knowing that masturbation and homosexuality are part of it. The facts do not confirm either the idea of ​​a consolidation of the couple by pleasure, conjugal sexuality leading rather systematically to adultery and breakup.

Be that as it may, the question of a finality that escapes our form of culture cannot be rejected a priori. The diagram above would then be written: “drive> pleasure> ??”. That is to say that the important erotic activity which accompanies the whole of human life would have a goal independent of fertilization, a goal which would not have been formulated until then, or would have fallen into oblivion over the millennia.

We actually find at the beginnings of our culture, a philosophical work rich in teachings, which provides an answer to this question: the dialogues of Plato. Two of these dialogues, Le Banquet and Le Phèdre, are devoted to the problem of Eros, that is to say of love and sexuality (although the latter concept did not exist at the time in as a specific entity). Plato explains to us that there would be two Eros: a pandemic (or vulgar) Eros whose goal would be pleasure and reproduction, and an Uranian (or celestial) Eros, aiming to “grow the wings of the soul” so that ‘it can access the “Essences”’, divine food now inaccessible to men since they were driven from Olympus. This metaphor also recalls Genesis: Adam and Eve were driven out of paradise for having seized the fruit of the tree of knowledge, a sin whose content is manifestly sexual (to know also meant “to have sexual relations”: Adam " knew “his wife).

It is possible that Plato and the Bible tell us nonsense (although it remains necessary to know how to decipher it in terms of metaphors). If love worked satisfactorily in our form of culture, we could stop there.

However, an objective consideration of the general status of sexuality, adolescent love affairs, abortions, marriage, marital boredom, divorces, torn children, relational void in the elderly, neurosis (resulting from sexual repression), pornography, repressive morals, the status of homosexuality, crimes committed in the name of normality (murders or convictions of homosexuals), pedophilia, rape, murder of children, would rather encourage Candide to affirm that “everything is for the worst in the worst of possible worlds”.

Hence we are entitled, if not in duty, to wonder about the approach to the amorous and sexual phenomenon that our rationalist culture imposes on us (or that the Judeo-Christian culture already imposed) . Everyone knows that the equation “sexuality = reproduction” represents only a small part of the sexual activity specific to the human being. The key to the enigma could be hidden precisely in the incomplete formula “drive> pleasure> ??” specific to so-called polymorphic drives. What could this mysterious finality be? An order of phenomena to which we aspire without knowing how to define it? Certainly something not glaring in our value system, otherwise the connection would have been apparent a long time ago. If this purpose exists, we should find it in other cultures, and we can even expect to find some traces of it in our own. Now, what major differences can we see between traditional cultures and our modern culture?

A more in-depth reading of the texts of Plato teaches us that the “wings of the soul” and the “Essences” correspond, in the more prosaic language of Carl Gustav Jung, respectively to the metapsychic faculties and to the Archetypes. There are many misunderstandings in this regard, because the phenomena in question are difficult to access to rational analysis and scientific experimentation. Yet they were part of daily life in the majority of cultures that came before us, animist, shamanic, Egyptian, and even Greek cultures. They represented a form of communication with the divinity (as evidenced by the caduceus of the demigod Hermes). We find traces of it in our modern world, in the form of telepathic experiences, clairvoyance, premonitory dreams, on the borders of superstition and charlatanism. The Church has endeavored to claim them under the label of miracles, monopolized by its Saints. Parapsychology struggles to inventory them, because they are inexplicable and difficult to reproduce. They undergo a systematic rejection by the materialist sciences and philosophies, all-mighty in our world of consumption.

Rationalism, methodical doubt, the rules of objectivity undoubtedly represent an enormous progress compared to scholasticism, superstition, religion. However, the doubt must also apply to the accepted values, in particular to positivist dogmas and to the denial generally opposed to any phenomenon which does not relate to the matter. On the contrary, physics has shown to what extent the materialist model reducing the universe to a set of particles is fragile and changing according to the scales of observation. Some experiments have established that there is a transport of information by ways that cannot be explained by physics (EPR paradox), so that it would be irrational to deny a priori the existence of phenomena beyond our representation of reality.

This is not about relying on ancient texts to justify a theory. Only observation of facts and logical reasoning can guide reflection and support hypotheses. However, the comparison between the love and sexual experience under current food conditions and what they become with an “original” diet (as defined by instinctonutrition), shows that the hitherto deemed normal sexual behavior is modified by the exciting effect of various psychotropic substances present in common foods. The avoidance of these arousal factors effectively promotes the re-establishment of an “original psychodynamic equilibrium”, recognizable by the absence of conflict and suffering, and frequently leading to the development of extrasensory faculties.

It is therefore legitimate to formulate the following postulate: the non-reproductive amorous and sexual function would have metapsychic development as its purpose. Or, more precisely: to make accessible a form of metapsychic energy necessary for metapsychic structuring.

What are the possible verifications of such a postulate?

1. It must be in accordance with all recognized scientific data.
2. The accepted ideas which he contradicts must prove to be erroneous.
3. It must help to remove the contradictions of the current approach to human sexuality (in particular to explain the relationship between repressive morality and neurosis).
4. It must provide logical explanations for situations of conflict or suffering and help to remedy them.
5. It must explain the rarity of extrasensory manifestations in the current value system.
6. Anthropology should verify the correlation between sexual repression and the frequency of extrasensory manifestations (between different types of society, and different individuals).
7. Extrasensory phenomena should multiply in people who adopt a new love life accounting for this metasexual postulate and the associated rules of behavior. Carrying out experiments likely to confirm or invalidate these different points is obviously very difficult. Human beings do not allow themselves to be manipulated like laboratory animals; modesty and respect for private life make data collecting particularly difficult; morality and legislation, especially where they are opposed to natural behavior, constitute obstacles that are difficult to overcome.

The observations made over the past thirty years have, however, enabled me to observe on a sufficiently regular basis the relationship between the experience of polymorphic love and metapsychic development to propose the metasexual postulate for further reflection, in particular in the world of psychiatry and of psychoanalysis.