6 February 1960. Cogitations

Beset as he is by the examples in history of the many occasions on which men of great ability and integrity have been unable to maintain a grasp of the truth about the phenomena that they wish to investigate, and made further aware of the pitfalls attending his search by the fact that his study is itself an investigation of a most serious source of errors in human judgement, the analyst's problem is to find a method – if there is one – by which he can be aware that he is falling into error, and even (if possible) of what kind of error he has become the victim. The search for this method constitutes for the psychoanalyst the search for a scientific method. For him the scientific method is that procedure, or series of procedures, by which error is made to declare itself.

As we have seen, one area in which a solution might be sought is in situations in which common sense can be brought to bear. One of these situations is in analysis itself in so far as a personality is observed in changing conditions of mood, circumstances, and time. Features that appear constant amidst the changes may be accorded a certain degree of probability. What meaning we are to give such constant features, what use we are to make of them, and how we are to use them, must be debated further.

It must be noted that unfortunately it may not be the features that are remarkable for their constancy amidst change that are the analytically significant ones; it is likely that it is those phenomena we most wish to investigate (and are therefore associated with the observations, the truth of which concerns us most) that least lend themselves to the check of common sense. The other situation in which common sense is brought to bear is in the situation produced by publication. As we have already seen, this involves recording and communication, both of which are consequently seen once more to be matters that deserve serious study and constant work devoted to their improvement. Presumably no safeguards exist aga