While your point that Biden's gaffes should elicit more compassion than ridicule is valid, your assertions that they find meaning based on Freud's assertions about the unconscious as a doorway to truth are questionable. Freud's theories have long been criticised for their lack of scientific validity as they are unable to be falsified; this places them more in the realm of pseudoscience. However, this is not to say that Freud's contributions are entirely worthless as his psychoanalytic approach has been fundamental to talk therapy. The idea that the content of the gaffes signifies an alternate and deeper meaning is a valiant attempt at attributing meaning where there likely is none. Sometimes a gaffe is just a gaffe; particularly when the speaker is advanced in years and likely experiencing excessive stress.
I completely agree. In the 1980s I took a course as part of my Philosophy degree at the University of Essex under the late, truly great Professor Cioffi - 'Philosophy and Psychopathology'. A stellar course, in which Cioffi showed beyond doubt Psychoanalysis was a pseudoscience and the whole notion of the subconscious was more of a literary, heuristic device that was in use well before Freud - e.g. Nietzsche and Dickens (and later Joyce and Proust) all made narrative use of the concept of the unconscious. The unconscious was part of the literary and intellectual milieu of the late 19th century.
The case studies ('Wolf Man', 'Rat Man' etc) are entertaining works of literature and a good read - but that is all. On all criteria they lack the necessary rigour to qualify as scientific studies of the mind. And the same for the so-called Oedipus complex confected by Freud. As Freud himself said in regard to symbolism - sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And by the same token a gaffe is sometimes just a gaffe.
I once attended a meeting to discuss the provision of support for people with dementia and their loved ones (usually a spouse) who had become socially isolated as a result of the condition. For obvious reasons this is a very hard group of people to connect with. They are not able to organise on a local level and present a vocal united front in the way many charities have become very adept at doing, and yet they desperately need help.
Though I am sure there are those in the higher echelons of public healthcare in the UK who might, upon eyeing the budget sheet, be inclined to turn a blind eye and allow nature to run its course, there are also health and social care workers at ground level who will take up the fight on behalf of those who find themselves marginalised as a result of an illness. I have been watching this class of individual slowly vanish as the NHS progresses towards its reinvention as a private/public venture, that is restrictive when it should allow freedom to make judgement calls and alarmingly lax when professionalism should be the order of the day. You will not know what you have lost until people like this have been expunged from the service in the name of corporate interests.
The meeting was held in a room at the foot of a tower block of council flats; one of those liminal spaces, that the local authority has access to, that seem to phase in and out of existence like Brigadoon. Despite arriving early, I ended up being a quarter of an hour late because I couldn't find the place. I remain convinced that it only cycled into our plane of existence after I had walked around the foot of the block the requisite number of times.
The severity of the problem under discussion was made glaringly obvious by the fact that the healthcare professionals in attendance outnumbered the members of public who had turned up; the latter amounting to an elderly couple who lived just down the road.
I was very pleased to reacquaint myself with a speech and language therapist with whom I had formed a good working relationship while I was employed at Southend Hospital. During a break, she asked me to identify which of the elderly couple was the one with dementia. Though I answered correctly, it was more of an educated guess.
I understand that there is a phenomenon related to dementia called 'masking' where a spouse or a family member will, often subconsciously, assist in concealing the mental decline of a loved one, by covering for their missteps or, in extreme cases, by adopting a similar demeanour so the condition is less obvious. It is as touching as it is tragic. The kindest thing that you can do for a friend or family member who you suspect may have dementia is to steer them towards a diagnosis and treatment at the earliest possible opportunity.
I don't dispute that slips of the tongue are interesting and a potential revelator of hidden truths. However, I've been around enough dementia patients to recognise advancing cognitive decline when I see it. While I have no love for Biden (whose family make the Kennedys look like The Waltons by comparison) the collective masking of his deteriorating mental state, by his party and a complicit media, amounts to out in the open elder abuse, on a par with that experienced by the Marvel Comics founder, Stan Lee, during his final years. It is a cynical move aimed at ushering a clearly ailing man into the starting gate of a two horse race, so that whoever has been running the United States over the past four years can continue to do so.
But this is not what the American public is interested in right now, any more than the British public was interested in the fact that Tony Blair had been called Bush's Poodle and then Boris Johnson came along actually looking like a shaggy dog. We see what we see.
Whoops I thought it was you! Anyway it was brilliant. I am so fucked off with people slagging Joe and thereby enabling the l to Ignore the lying rapidity fraud they and the hill fucking billy seem to want to put in the White House xxxn
Vance isn’t really from Appalachia, he’s from Ohio (if that’s what you mean by hillbilly) and his stupid book about it is about how they deserve to be poor bc they have PROBLEMS lol
This is so smart and true Hanif! Did you see Biden’s address to the NACCP? Inspiring and making reference to history particularly Truman which shows just how aware he is. You’re a great man Hanif. Let’s meet very soon and love to Isabella.
Biden has a stutter. This means he is consciously trying to control that as well as the content of what he is trying to say. He tries to speak quickly so that he sounds fluent. He then, under pressure, has to remember what he had been told to say. Then he is having to think on his feet. He's racing ahead so the instructions, names, after next are piling into his brain. Biden, as he gets older, is, I think, finding it difficult to do all that. Some people without senility find it hard to do that. Is his decision making flawed or just his speech?
I believe, that the finding and the pronunciation of Biden mishaps are also a result of bad marketing, or that management of his parties communication. Trump is providing an open flank in exactly the same regard. He’s stammering misunderstanding, and confusing names and facts constantly in his speeches. Funny though it’s hard to find sources that really reveal it, non-withstand that I don’t see a really widely spread discussion about the same:
Based on the search results provided, there are several instances of Donald Trump mixing up names or making verbal gaffes during his speeches. Here are some key points:
1. Critics highlighted 32 instances from two recent campaign speeches where Trump allegedly mispronounced words, mixed up names, forgot names, and rambled nonsensically[1].
2. Specific examples of Trump mixing up names include:
- Mistaking Nikki Haley for Nancy Pelosi[1]
- Confusing Joe Biden with Barack Obama[1]
- Wrongly identifying Viktor Orbán as the leader of Turkey[2]
- Confusing former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush with his brother, President George W. Bush[2]
3. Trump has a history of verbal slips, including recent incidents where he appeared to mistake Nikki Haley for Nancy Pelosi and confused Joe Biden with Barack Obama[1].
4. These gaffes have been noted to occur frequently enough that they've become a point of discussion in the media and among critics[1][2].
5. Interestingly, Trump has claimed that when he mixes up names, it is intentional[3]. However, this claim is not substantiated by the evidence presented in the search results.
It's worth noting that while these instances are reported, there isn't a specific count or frequency provided for how often Trump mixes up names in his speeches. The reports suggest it happens regularly enough to be noticeable, but an exact rate is not given in the search results.
Exactly. Because we live in a world of 'us and them' we can't recognise that Biden's stammer is as responsible for his delivery as his age, whilst also thinking that he has to be replaced.
Can't get enough of Darian Leader, always excited to read him on here. One the biggest slips that comes to mind is George Bush saying "Iraq" instead of Ukraine.
Thank you for your interesting observations on slips and how the public/press read them. Slips can mean so many different things due to the way they resonate in each person or collectivity. It is what you build around them that has a meaning here and now. And these symbolic or medical post-constructions are numerous.
Well we are interested but dominated by news and reporting that has turned into a magazine article a Chat about it all - I think intelligence has gone missing. Yes (from
A Jungian perspective) nothing we do is without the meaning explicit or hidden and Biden is a player as well as you know who. But Biden is being brought down and the other one built up. No wonder his meaning is so close to the surface - so much at stake for America . And we’re just watching.
While your point that Biden's gaffes should elicit more compassion than ridicule is valid, your assertions that they find meaning based on Freud's assertions about the unconscious as a doorway to truth are questionable. Freud's theories have long been criticised for their lack of scientific validity as they are unable to be falsified; this places them more in the realm of pseudoscience. However, this is not to say that Freud's contributions are entirely worthless as his psychoanalytic approach has been fundamental to talk therapy. The idea that the content of the gaffes signifies an alternate and deeper meaning is a valiant attempt at attributing meaning where there likely is none. Sometimes a gaffe is just a gaffe; particularly when the speaker is advanced in years and likely experiencing excessive stress.
I completely agree. In the 1980s I took a course as part of my Philosophy degree at the University of Essex under the late, truly great Professor Cioffi - 'Philosophy and Psychopathology'. A stellar course, in which Cioffi showed beyond doubt Psychoanalysis was a pseudoscience and the whole notion of the subconscious was more of a literary, heuristic device that was in use well before Freud - e.g. Nietzsche and Dickens (and later Joyce and Proust) all made narrative use of the concept of the unconscious. The unconscious was part of the literary and intellectual milieu of the late 19th century.
The case studies ('Wolf Man', 'Rat Man' etc) are entertaining works of literature and a good read - but that is all. On all criteria they lack the necessary rigour to qualify as scientific studies of the mind. And the same for the so-called Oedipus complex confected by Freud. As Freud himself said in regard to symbolism - sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. And by the same token a gaffe is sometimes just a gaffe.
I once attended a meeting to discuss the provision of support for people with dementia and their loved ones (usually a spouse) who had become socially isolated as a result of the condition. For obvious reasons this is a very hard group of people to connect with. They are not able to organise on a local level and present a vocal united front in the way many charities have become very adept at doing, and yet they desperately need help.
Though I am sure there are those in the higher echelons of public healthcare in the UK who might, upon eyeing the budget sheet, be inclined to turn a blind eye and allow nature to run its course, there are also health and social care workers at ground level who will take up the fight on behalf of those who find themselves marginalised as a result of an illness. I have been watching this class of individual slowly vanish as the NHS progresses towards its reinvention as a private/public venture, that is restrictive when it should allow freedom to make judgement calls and alarmingly lax when professionalism should be the order of the day. You will not know what you have lost until people like this have been expunged from the service in the name of corporate interests.
The meeting was held in a room at the foot of a tower block of council flats; one of those liminal spaces, that the local authority has access to, that seem to phase in and out of existence like Brigadoon. Despite arriving early, I ended up being a quarter of an hour late because I couldn't find the place. I remain convinced that it only cycled into our plane of existence after I had walked around the foot of the block the requisite number of times.
The severity of the problem under discussion was made glaringly obvious by the fact that the healthcare professionals in attendance outnumbered the members of public who had turned up; the latter amounting to an elderly couple who lived just down the road.
I was very pleased to reacquaint myself with a speech and language therapist with whom I had formed a good working relationship while I was employed at Southend Hospital. During a break, she asked me to identify which of the elderly couple was the one with dementia. Though I answered correctly, it was more of an educated guess.
I understand that there is a phenomenon related to dementia called 'masking' where a spouse or a family member will, often subconsciously, assist in concealing the mental decline of a loved one, by covering for their missteps or, in extreme cases, by adopting a similar demeanour so the condition is less obvious. It is as touching as it is tragic. The kindest thing that you can do for a friend or family member who you suspect may have dementia is to steer them towards a diagnosis and treatment at the earliest possible opportunity.
I don't dispute that slips of the tongue are interesting and a potential revelator of hidden truths. However, I've been around enough dementia patients to recognise advancing cognitive decline when I see it. While I have no love for Biden (whose family make the Kennedys look like The Waltons by comparison) the collective masking of his deteriorating mental state, by his party and a complicit media, amounts to out in the open elder abuse, on a par with that experienced by the Marvel Comics founder, Stan Lee, during his final years. It is a cynical move aimed at ushering a clearly ailing man into the starting gate of a two horse race, so that whoever has been running the United States over the past four years can continue to do so.
Wow, that's very interesting. Why is his wife, who is clearly a loving partner, allowing this to proceed?
Because she likes being the wife of the president.
No matter who wrote it! The arguments are valid, but unfortunately a lot of people don’t do nuance.
Beautifully written, persuasive argument. Hope the US voters can see all that! (Doubtful, sadly).
But this is not what the American public is interested in right now, any more than the British public was interested in the fact that Tony Blair had been called Bush's Poodle and then Boris Johnson came along actually looking like a shaggy dog. We see what we see.
Whoops I thought it was you! Anyway it was brilliant. I am so fucked off with people slagging Joe and thereby enabling the l to Ignore the lying rapidity fraud they and the hill fucking billy seem to want to put in the White House xxxn
Vance isn’t really from Appalachia, he’s from Ohio (if that’s what you mean by hillbilly) and his stupid book about it is about how they deserve to be poor bc they have PROBLEMS lol
This is so smart and true Hanif! Did you see Biden’s address to the NACCP? Inspiring and making reference to history particularly Truman which shows just how aware he is. You’re a great man Hanif. Let’s meet very soon and love to Isabella.
Hi Nigel, this piece is a contribution from Darian Leader.
Biden has a stutter. This means he is consciously trying to control that as well as the content of what he is trying to say. He tries to speak quickly so that he sounds fluent. He then, under pressure, has to remember what he had been told to say. Then he is having to think on his feet. He's racing ahead so the instructions, names, after next are piling into his brain. Biden, as he gets older, is, I think, finding it difficult to do all that. Some people without senility find it hard to do that. Is his decision making flawed or just his speech?
I believe, that the finding and the pronunciation of Biden mishaps are also a result of bad marketing, or that management of his parties communication. Trump is providing an open flank in exactly the same regard. He’s stammering misunderstanding, and confusing names and facts constantly in his speeches. Funny though it’s hard to find sources that really reveal it, non-withstand that I don’t see a really widely spread discussion about the same:
Based on the search results provided, there are several instances of Donald Trump mixing up names or making verbal gaffes during his speeches. Here are some key points:
1. Critics highlighted 32 instances from two recent campaign speeches where Trump allegedly mispronounced words, mixed up names, forgot names, and rambled nonsensically[1].
2. Specific examples of Trump mixing up names include:
- Mistaking Nikki Haley for Nancy Pelosi[1]
- Confusing Joe Biden with Barack Obama[1]
- Wrongly identifying Viktor Orbán as the leader of Turkey[2]
- Confusing former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush with his brother, President George W. Bush[2]
3. Trump has a history of verbal slips, including recent incidents where he appeared to mistake Nikki Haley for Nancy Pelosi and confused Joe Biden with Barack Obama[1].
4. These gaffes have been noted to occur frequently enough that they've become a point of discussion in the media and among critics[1][2].
5. Interestingly, Trump has claimed that when he mixes up names, it is intentional[3]. However, this claim is not substantiated by the evidence presented in the search results.
It's worth noting that while these instances are reported, there isn't a specific count or frequency provided for how often Trump mixes up names in his speeches. The reports suggest it happens regularly enough to be noticeable, but an exact rate is not given in the search results.
Sources
[1] Donald Trump's String of Gaffes Over Weekend Raises Eyebrows https://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-campaign-speech-gaffes-errors-mistakes-virginia-north-carolina-1875462
[2] False or misleading statements by Donald Trump - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_or_misleading_statements_by_Donald_Trump
[3] Trump says when he mixes up names it is on purpose - Reuters https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-says-when-he-mixes-up-names-it-is-purpose-2024-02-15/
[4] 4 Trump speeches analyzed: He talks a lot about immigration ... - NPR https://www.npr.org/2024/01/23/1226251744/4-trump-speeches-analyzed-he-talks-a-lot-about-immigration-and-himself
[5] Donald Trump's strange speaking style, as explained by linguists - Vox https://www.vox.com/2016/8/18/12423688/donald-trump-speech-style-explained-by-linguists
Exactly. Because we live in a world of 'us and them' we can't recognise that Biden's stammer is as responsible for his delivery as his age, whilst also thinking that he has to be replaced.
Simplest explanations: a loner with problems attacked Trump. Biden’s slips suggest early senility. Most of his slips follow no pattern.
Can't get enough of Darian Leader, always excited to read him on here. One the biggest slips that comes to mind is George Bush saying "Iraq" instead of Ukraine.
How do you explain Biden calling himself the first black woman to serve under a black president? There’s a rich Freudian seam to mine there!
Thank you for your interesting observations on slips and how the public/press read them. Slips can mean so many different things due to the way they resonate in each person or collectivity. It is what you build around them that has a meaning here and now. And these symbolic or medical post-constructions are numerous.
Well we are interested but dominated by news and reporting that has turned into a magazine article a Chat about it all - I think intelligence has gone missing. Yes (from
A Jungian perspective) nothing we do is without the meaning explicit or hidden and Biden is a player as well as you know who. But Biden is being brought down and the other one built up. No wonder his meaning is so close to the surface - so much at stake for America . And we’re just watching.
Oops!
Good piece xx