Marcuse rejected the innate death instinct in favor of life-preservation failing against circumstance

Evidence

This duality … is not one of two biologically inherent instincts, relatively constant and always battling with each other until the final victory of the death instinct, but it is one between the primary and most fundamental tendency of life - to persevere in life - and its contradiction, which comes into being when man fails in this goal. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 379

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies how Marcuse redefined Freud’s death drive as a contingent contradiction rather than a biological given.
• XREF: Connects to the Freud-Marx debate reconstructed across this book’s chapters on Fromm and Marcuse. — connects to: Marcuse and Horkheimer converged on the durability of a death instinct despite their differences — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 380; Fear of death ultimately reduces to thwarted biological survival instinct. — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core: On the Role of…, 42; Habit functions paradoxically as both a force of death and of life — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 301 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Marcuse and Horkheimer converged on the durability of a death instinct despite their differences #complicates (0.80) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 380
• Fear of death ultimately reduces to thwarted biological survival instinct. #corroborates (0.75) — Sheldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, Tom Pyszczynski, The Worm at the Core, 42
• Habit functions paradoxically as both a force of death and of life #expands (0.70) — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 301