The existential source of antipsychiatry conception of the subject in philosophy of S. Kierkegaard

Abstract

The article reveals how S. Kierkegaard’s philosophy as the existential source of the concept of subject in anti-psychiatry answers the current questions about the nature of mental disorder and can serve as a certain methodology of humanities research.

It is proved that classical psychiatry provides wrong idea of the inner world of the mad person. Philosophy of S. Kierkegaard implemented the alternative view on the nature of mentally ill person by means of deep penetration into the person’s experience. The way of being of human world including the mad one as the structure of the relationship which the person creates himself is identified there in the article. On the assumption of this unity it is possible to consider mental disorders as an extreme degree of inauthenticity, remoteness from the free-transcending, when probabilistic nature of existence is not apparent, and statically complete worlds are created. The reason for applying to the existential ideas of S. Kierkegaard is that in his philosophy the beginning of dethronement as orientation on a purely internal states, without saving the external communication and social boundaries (which is observed in psychiatric patients), as well as orientation of the external - compliance of social norms, wearing of social masks (which is typical for «normal» people) was laid. But the one and the other state may be ontologically false. Only the subject, that correctly identifies itself and is able to communicate, can be in ontological safety. But the problem here is not just in a separate subject, but also in the culture as a whole, which can often move in the ontologically wrong way. Soren Kierkegaard offers a methodology that is used and actively developed by some modern anti-psychiatrists - through the awareness oneself’s fear and despair to overcome the disease and come to personal freedom