The Attic of the Brain

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Thomas thinks that psychiatry’s effort to "straighten out and tidy up" (Thomas 76) the human unconscious may be "one of the great errors of our time" (Thomas 76). He suggests that the unconscious mind should remain free from the influence of rational thought. Furthermore, Thomas condemns the attempt of “shepherding your mind” (Thomas 76) which is a result of the delusion that we can possibly understand the functioning of our brain. Thomas admits that he is not sure what the unconscious is built to contain. Yet as a biologist, he believes "the unconscious mind ... should be regarded as a normal structure, installed wherever it is for a purpose" (Thomas 77) and takes for granted that the unconscious is a "useful, probably indispensable organ of thought" (Thomas 77).

This essay illustrates Thomas' romantic-scientific orientation toward the unconscious. On the one hand, as a biologist, he relies on a rational scientific perspective which assumes that all natural phenomena can be explained, and these phenomena serve a useful function in the perfectly ordered universe. Particularly, Thomas claims to be "impressed by the usefulness of everything alive" (Thomas 77) and suggests that the unconscious, though presently beyond the scope of scientific understanding, is likely to serve a useful function in human psychology. As a romantic, on the other hand, Thomas fears that science’s effort to unravel the mystery of the unconscious may eventually destroy the essence of human psychology. Specifically, he views the unconscious as "a mysterious apparatus" (Thomas 77) whose continued exposure to the rational exploration of psychiatry might cause humans to "lose, ultimately, the marvelous conviction that being human is the best thing to be” (Thomas 77).

Work cited

“The Attic of the Brain,” by Lewis Thomas. The Brooklyn Reader, 3rd ed., Pearson, 2017, pp. 75-77