The collective unconscious: is it shared or copied?

[Tom Morton]

I'm reading Decoding Jung's Metaphysics. Very interesting so far.

Regarding the collective unconscious, it is not clear to me whether Jung regarded it as a single mental domain that we all share, or an individual mental faculty that is merely a close or near identical copy of that possessed by other human beings. I am also not sure if it is regarded as a mutable mental feature, and whether it is mutable over the course of a lifetime or across the timescale of evolution.

In Christopher M. Bache's book, "LSD and the Mind of the Universe: Diamonds from Heaven", he describes psychedelic trips involving (laborious and painful) healing of the "collective unconscious of humanity", which he clearly regarded as work that benefited everyone (therefore involving modifying a shared mental faculty). I find the concept of this kind of mutable, shared, collective unconscious hard to reconcile with my understanding of Bernardo's philosophy. Some types of brain activity are the partial image ego, but where is there a candidate for partial image of the shared, collective human subconscious? What boundary would prevent it being shared by all beings, not just humans? The partial image of the boundary that prevents our personal ego being shared by all beings is our skin. I can't imagine what would correspond to the boundary of a shared, collective human subconscious.

Discussion of archetypes and the collective unconscious in Decoding Jung's Metaphysics chapter 3 suggests that Jung did not view the collective unconscious as an actually shared, mutable mental faculty. Eg "As our common inheritance, they [archetypes] largely define our humanity" (p34), in which case there is no issue, though this isn't the understanding of Jung's collective unconscious that I had gleaned from previous (limited) exposure to his work.

[Simon Adams]

I'm reading Decoding Jung's Metaphysics. I find the concept of this kind of mutable, shared, collective unconscious hard to reconcile with my understanding of Bernardo's philosophy. Some types of brain activity are the partial image ego, but where is there a candidate for partial image of the shared, collective human subconscious?

Others here will be better able to answer than me, and I haven’t read his book on Jung, but I would expect Bernardo to say it’s “mind at large”, which is not specific to humans except that we are metaconscious in a unique way. So effectively the image is the universe...

The partial image of the boundary that prevents our personal ego being shared by all beings is our skin.

I think Bernardo would say that the “boundary” is in mind, and the body is the image of that person (across a transpersonal boundary). The skin is not the actual “boundary” stopping thoughts from being shared, although I guess it could be the image of the boundary.

[AshvinP]

I am only on Chapter 1, but I think its fair to say Jung comceived of it as a dynamic, evolving, and transpersonal matrix which gives rise to all being. It is a shared realm of meaning rather than a personal one, but its archetypes are expressed uniquely in every individual.

[Soul_of_Shu]

This quote from the Seth sessions channelled by Jane Roberts seems pertinent here ...

"Jung was correct in postulating a collective unconscious. But with his limited knowledge he did not see that this unconscious would exist outside of your three-dimensional system entirely, holding future as well as past, nor that it has such a cohesive effect upon humanity as a whole. It is the one Self with its origins within your system, but its existence outside.
The collective unconscious is not static however, and itself interacts and constantly changes. These are all phases of constant creativity within your system. You constantly add to the collective unconscious, and constantly receive from it. You change what you receive, however. Each physical object has a psychic effect on all other objects, and a psychic existence that is independent of its physical existence."
—The Early Sessions Book 8 Session 341 May 15, 1967

[Martin_]

I've been trying to figure out that one as well, and haven't found any clear answer yet.

Conclusions so far (this is all from memory):

• You can find validation for either position depending on which scholar you read.
• Jung's worldview changed during his lifetime. Later works hint towards a more transpersonal/magical ontology than his earlier works.
• His statements about synchronicity STRONGLY hints towards some kind of tranpersonal/shared collective unconscious:
  • Synchronicity acts through archetypes
  • Synchronicity is an acasual meaningful connection between an internal symbol/state and an external symbol/state
  • Synchronicity is as Real as Causality is:
  • This only works if the collective unconscious is shared