Minor phenomena can reveal major hidden structures through feeble indications.

Evidence

It is true that psycho-analysis cannot boast that it has never concerned itself with trivialities. On the contrary, the material for its observations is usually provided by the inconsiderable events which have been put aside by the other sciences as being too unimportant – the dregs, one might say, of the world of phenomena. But are you not making a confusion in your criticism between the vastness of the problems and the conspicuousness of what points to them? Are there not very important things which can only reveal themselves, under certain conditions and at certain times, by quite feeble indications? — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 202

Categorization

• XREF: Freud’s justification of trivial objects prefigures Adorno’s turn to economics and to ‘dregs of phenomena’ — connects to the revisionist thesis that economics is immanently required by philosophy. — connects to: Symptomatic reading uses one vivid detail to expose a whole structure — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Nations, Classes, Literatures, 262

Broader Connections

• Symptomatic reading uses one vivid detail to expose a whole structure #exemplifies (0.85) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 262