On truth and clinical psychoanalysis

Abstract

Philosophers have enumerated three criteria of truth: coherence, correspondence and pragmatic. I shall define them and examine some of the relations among them. My overarching argument is that these three criteria of truth, when adequately defined, can be seen not to be at odds with each other but to work together in the search for truths in clinical psychoanalysis. I write 'truths' not because I think that truth is relative but because I do not subscribe to any metaphysical theory of absolute truth as in Plato, Descartes or Hegel.A secondary purpose is to sustain a distinction between two concepts of inter-subjectivity. The first concept is the one that we are familiar with in common sense, scholarship and science: an observation is intersubjective, if it can be made by any competent observer of the relevant domain of fact. What is intersubjective in observation is the opposite of what is subjective, i.e. opposite to what, in an observation, belongs to the idiosyncrasies of the observer and not to what is being observed. The second, very different notion of intersubjectivity is that it consists of inextricable transference and countertransference interactions that take place in the relation between analyst and analysand in psychoanalysis and which result in the co-creation of the analysand whose nature and history are formed by the analytic relation. This definition of intersubjectivity legislates the historical being of the individual, a being that is independent of the analyst, out of existence. To Aristotle's rhetorical question: 'That nature exists who can doubt?' contemporary subjectivist analysts reply: 'Psychoanalysts should doubt the independent existence of at least that part of nature that is psychic reality'. Subjectivism repudiates the epistemic independence of the patient in his or her relation to the analyst and, consistency would require, the same of the analyst in his or her relation to the patient. Of course, we analysts sometimes feel differently about different patients. The vignette below illustrates an exceptional anxiety in the analyst in response to a patient. But from these and similar facts it cannot be inferred that an analyst's capacity to know is inevitably altered by his or her responses to each patient. After all an appropriate affective response will normally quicken rather than compromise the analyst's observation and thought.To be sure, our work as clinicians reminds us of the manifold ways in which our own personalities, beliefs and affects can interfere with our clinical work. Our clinical observations and thinking are intrinsically fallible. But it does not follow that they are in principle subjective or that we are intrinsically snared in intersubjectivity of the second kind or that we can

Truths, Reveries, Internal Moments of Meeting: Reflections on the dialectics of the analytic relationship

“…Important contributions on truth personally selected include: Cavell 1998, Ferenczi 1913, Hanly 1990, Luz 2009, Putnam 1981, Renik 1998, Spence (1982 and Schafer (1992) on Narrative Truth Historical Truth, Stern 1985, Winnicott 1951.…”

Matte Blanco’s thought and epistemological pluralism in psychoanalysis

“…Focusing on what can be deduced from Matte Blanco’s propositions, I shall begin by recalling that the psychic fact in general, and psychoanalysis in particular (Green 1995, p. 292) are placed between nature and culture and raise questions pertaining both to the sciences of nature and those of the mind (Bell, 2009; Engel, 1996, 1997; Hanly, 2009). Speaking schematically, the first correspond to a hermeneutic approach, and the second to an approach based on observation, even if this dichotomy can be subject to major nuances (Wallerstein, 2009, p. 112).…”

“…What counts henceforth, then, is the coherence of the reasoning conducted (for the arguments concerning coherence, concordance and pragmatism as criteria of the truth in analysis, see Hanly, 2009); so this allows us genuine freedom to construct epistemologies in very large numbers. For example, we can develop a theory of the mind which is built on the cornerstone of the theory of the drives ; but equally we might just as well have pointed up the need for adaptation of living organisms in order to understand the primordial rules of the mind and to create another metapsychology.…”

What Constitutes Therapeutic Knowledge and How We Believe it is to Be Attained

“…Those who adhere to a reductive epistemological realism in the face of the new criticism (for example Brenner, 1994;Cavell, 1993Cavell, , 1998Friedman, 1997Friedman, , 1999Hanly, 1990Hanly, , 1999Lussier, 1991;Meissner, 2000;Richards, 1999) look upon relational epistemology as a corrective shift of emphasis rather than a qualitatively distinctive way of knowing, and sometimes preface their belief in realistic objectivity with adjectives such as "humble" or "critical." Friedman (1999), for example, writes that "when analysts disclaim their pursuit of a truth about the patient, careful reading usually shows that they are only being humble in its pursuit and acknowledging their inevitable input into what is found" (p. 420).…”

“…The reasoning process Renik advocates makes it impossible to distinguish mythology, religion, and more malevolent ideologies from science, or objectivity from value judgment (Eagle, Wolitzky, & Wakefield, 2001). There would be no "objective" reason for choosing psychoanalysis over other therapies or belief systems (Hanly, 1990;Lussier, 1991). Cavell (1998) makes a similar point when she imagines that the person imbedded in the myopic context and then exposed to the supraordinate one might say: "My claim was made from too narrow a base" (p. 1197).…”