Re: Psych or fad

From: Brian D Williams (talon57@well.com)
Date: Thu May 18 2000 - 08:25:17 MDT


From: Brian Manning Delaney <b-delaney@uchicago.edu>

>But, actually, the main thing that Freud is valuable for, in my
>view, is understanding irrationality. For an extremely
>interesting, philosophically rigorous account of the
>psychoanalytic account of irrationality, see Sebastian Gardner's
>_Irrationality and the Philosophy of Psychoanalysis_. I have a
>few bones to pick with the book (which Jonathan Lear captured in
>his review of it -- don't know where the review was published).
>But it's the best defense of psychoanalysis I've seen.

I think Freud is valuable for postulating his entire theory. Prior
to his work we didn't have a giant tautology to work with. Sure
some parts haven't stood the test of time, some may have been
completely wrong, culturally biased, etc, etc. But at least he gave
us a huge starting point.

This of course is the essence of the scientific method.

Brian

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