Did Ouspensky understand the idea of psychopathy?

[Altair]

I have just finished Ouspensky's "The 4th way". Right in the end of the book he made quite astonishing remarks.

Q. You speak of dead people recurring, but I thought essence could not die?

A. It can die relatively, in the sense that it cannot develop. Mechanically it may exist,
but it cannot grow, it can only deteriorate with time. Essence can die in many
different ways. It may die only for this life or it may die completely. It can die
completely only as a result of a long period of wrong actions, actions against
conscience. Killing essence means killing conscience. Or it can die in this life and be
born again, safe and sane, in the next. For instance, one can fall on one's head and
essence may die in the sense that it will not develop any further. But in the next life it
will live again. So in speaking about death of essence we must know which case we
mean, accidental or intentional.
In thinking about life, we forget that many people are dead and that sleeping people
easily fall under the influence of dead people.
Q. Are most people dead?

A. This question was much discussed in our group in St Petersburg. Some thought
that most people were dead, but I was always against this. Everybody is asleep, but
even in life you find pleasant people who may not work through laziness, lack of
opportunity, or something else. But they are not dead.
Q. How can dead people influence sleeping people?
A. In comparison with sleeping people they are very strong, because they have no
conscience and no shame. What makes ordinary people weak? Conscience and shame.
Besides, if people are asleep, anything can happen to them, they can be stolen out of
their beds.

As far as I know not even Gurdjieff himself has put it more clear. Or am I wrong?

 

[Altair]

Re: Did Ouspensky understood the idea of psychopathy?

I know that in the same book he rejected the idea of "conscious evil" as Laura put it in this thread http://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,215.0.html. Nevertheless I find his comments about "dead" people pretty close to the truth.

 

[Laura]

I agree. At least according to our present definition of psychopathy.

 

[Altair]

I'm halfway through the "Struggle of the Magicians" and I've found an interesting remark (p. 118):

During 1924, Uspenskii finishes the introduction to Fragments of an Unknown Teaching. In a passage concerning evil, later deleted, he writes that he asked Gurdjieff if there can be conscious evil. Gurdjieff says there certainly can be, though it is possible only in a very elaborate way, and in very rare cases.
"Anything that produces big phenomena can have mind and intelligence behind it", he says.
He pauses, then asks Uspenskii - "Why are you upset?"
"It means changing all I had thought before."
"It becomes even more interesting," says Gurdjieff. "It is one thing to have against you only mechanical forces and quite another to have intelligence; it is one thing to struggle with intelligence, and another to struggle with mechanical forces."

Even after G. stated, that there can be conscious evil Ouspensky refused to accept this. The corresponding passage was deleted from ISOTM and in "The fourth way" (published in 1957) he still stated that all the evil can only be of mechanical nature. Wishful thinking in action :)
Gurdjieff himself stated that conscious evil is "possible only in a very elaborate way, and in very rare cases.", which I think was misunderstanding as well. What do you think about that?

 

[axj]

Gurdjieff himself stated that conscious evil is "possible only in a very elaborate way, and in very rare cases.", which I think was misunderstanding as well. What do you think about that?

I think this may relate to what Ra said about 3D STS having to be 95% STS to graduate, while being 51% STO is necessary to graduate as STO. So it is indeed a very elaborate way, with lots of manipulation and repression necessary. I think that most people are STS but not 'consciously' evil as Gurdjieffs defines it.

 

[obyvatel]

Gurdjieff himself stated that conscious evil is "possible only in a very elaborate way, and in very rare cases.", which I think was misunderstanding as well. What do you think about that?

Gurdjieff took the word "conscious" differently from its popular understanding. In his view, most of humanity is in a state of sleep and therefore are not conscious. Sleeping humanity can be the instrument of evil but not its conscious originator.

Conscious evil requires conscious entities which are not abundant among humans. However, certain groups consisting of human beings aligned together can become less asleep and more conscious. If such a group is fundamentally aligned towards evil, then this becomes similar to the STS graduation criteria that axj mentioned and such a group can perhaps fall into the category of conscious evil at the human level.

Beyond that there is the hyperdimensional nature of evil (4D STS) - Gurdjieff did not express any deep understanding of this as far as I know or understand.

 

[Altair]

Thanks axj and obyvatel. I think I mixed up terms "conscious" and "intentional". Does it mean then that the most psychopaths do rather intentional than conscious evil? If a psychopath acts automatically out of greed or hunger for negative emotions then he acts mechanically, doesn't he? Because we can't apply the term "conscious" to somebody who is a broken organic portal which essence is dead (as Ouspensky stated). Is it correct?