Validation in the Clinical Theory of Psychoanalysis: A Study in the Philosophy of Psychoanalysis.

The scientific validation of psychoanalysis is the concern of philosophers, and many psychoanalysts ignore this debate altogether. However, the psychoanalyst Philip S. Holzman, in introducing Adolf Grunbaum's latest book, argues that Freud's scientific claims for psychoanalysis must be addressed by psychoanalysts for the sake of the discipline. Grunbaum, a philosopher of science, currently presents the most brilliant, yet ultimately, a niggardly foil. He came to the controversy, after having distinguished himself as a philosopher of physics, in order to counter Karl Popper's assertion that psychoanalysis was nothing more than a pseudoscience. (p. xix)

In fact, along with his interlocutors, Grunbaum still is immersed in answering the question Sidney Hook posed at a conference in 1958 on Psychoanalysis, Scientific Method, and Philosophy. In an article entitled "Determinism and Freedom in the Age of Modern Science," he stated :

Since psychoanalysis does claim to

function as a therapy, its clinical successes

and failures seem to me to be

highly televant in evaluating the

truth of its theories. If it has no

clinical successes and if it is not

confirmed by experimental findings,

then it has no more scientific

standing than any other consistent

mythology. Since the experimental

findings are unclear, it seems to me

of the first importance . . . to assess

the clinical experiences of psychoanalysts

. . . . Unless psychoanalysis has

better clinical or experimental successes …