ABSTRACT
In developing his metapsychology seeking for explanations of mental life and its phenomena, Freud ends up facing the old philosophical question concerning determinism and free will. It is clear that Freud’s approach in developing his theory is completely different from other fields of knowledge. However, the enigma was the same. What did the psychical phenomena studied by Freud mean to psychoanalytical theory? Were they the product of chance, of conscious freedom, or the result of some form of determinism? In this paper we investigate how the psychoanalytical concepts of the unconscious, psychical causality, overdetermination and choice relate to these questions.
Keywords:
psychoanalysis; determinism; choice; volition