Science or Hermeneutics? Psychoanalysis in Search of Self-Definition

The debate over whether psychoanalysis is a branch of natural science or whether it is a hermeneutic endeavor currently divides the psychoanalytic community. One view, held by writers like Mackay (1989), Meadow (1992, 1995), and Brenner (1980), is that psychoanalysis is, as Freud always insisted, a scientific discipline whose findings are, in principle at least, verifiable empirically. Opposing this view is the position held by Gill (1976, 1978), Schafer (1976, 1983), Steele (1979), and others, which maintains that psychoanalysis is not amenable to the research methodology of empirical science, and that it is really a hermeneutic discipline concerned with intentionality and meaning rather than causation. The conflict between these two opposing factions has taken on a rigid, “either-or” complexion which threatens the integrity of psychoanalysis more than does any outside criticism. Both strains—the hermeneutic and the natural scientific—can be found in Freud's work. Indeed, this breadth and complexity is a hallmark of Freud's writing, and bespeaks an awareness on Freud's part that psychoanalysis is both Naturwissenschaft and Geisteswissenschaft. The polarization of attitudes in the debate over what kind of discipline psychoanalysis really is has led to infighting which is unnecessary and harmful to the field, and which deprives each side of the enrichment of the insights of the other.