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Sir Fred Hall, the famous astrophysicist and founding director of the prestigious Institute of Theoretical Astronomy at the University of Cambridge, commented on rigidity of institutional life in the “hard” sciences. He (1995) stated, “Science today is locked into paradigms…. Every avenue is blocked by beliefs that are wrong, and if you try to get anything published by a journal today, you will run up against a paradigm, and the editors will turn it down” (p. 47).
The fact that this meeting, with representatives of competing paradigms, is taking place at the New York Psychoanalytic Institute is a sign of the comparative health and vigor of psychoanalysis.
This meeting will focus on a subject about which there are very significant differences of opinion. Therefore it seems important to begin this introduction with a brief comment on the status of knowledge in psychoanalysis.