For a psychoanalytical semiology of passion in greek antiquity and its addictive and toxic meanings

Abstract

This is a literature review research. It aimed to produce a psychoanalytical semiology of passion in Greek Antiquity. the central hypothesis which compares passion to addiction and toxin was discussed. The following aspects were analyzed: 1st- The senses and the etymological origin of passion in Aristotle. We have highlighted passion here, in a broader sense, as the fact of undergoing an action passively and, in a restricted sense, as the fact of suffering a painful action passively; 2nd- The senses of passion in Plato. We have accentuated here, in a general sense, passion-sensitive as the fact of undergoing an action passively and, in a specific sense, passion as blindness to reality, as a sensorial illusion and as submission to an action coming from the outside world onto the body; 3rd- Would the paradoxical sense of passions in Plato remain from the Renaissance, especially in Descartes and in Freud? and 4th- Would the Platonic phármakon be the semiological origin of the toxic and paradoxical senses of passions in general?