Critical Analysis of the Elements of Psychic Functions—Part 1

In the 'heroic' phase of psychoanalysis when the discovery of new facts was at its peak, descriptions and formulations were obtained by facile adaptation of terms and concepts borrowed from various, sometimes very distant fields. In his paper, On Narcissism: An Introduction (1914), Freud defended this laxity of strict logical definition. Rejecting a logical clarification of the concepts he was using, he preferred a not very circumscribed, even vague presentation of his observations. He left, without regret, the logical fundamentals to speculation, hoping that the development of psychoanalytic science would lead to further factual clarification of his concepts. He held to the belief that honest observation of facts is preferable to a well-rounded speculative theory which is not the foundation, but the superstructure of a science, easily removable and replaceable by another.

We still believe that the observation of facts is the most important factor in building a science, considering that it provides the material from which the structure of the science is erected. But in the concepts which we use in describing observed facts may lie the germ of new observations if our concepts are true representations of the facts. We cannot recognize things, if we are not intellectually prepared to look for them. But if there is something awry in the formulation of an observation, then in this formulation lies the germ of a subsequent misinterpretation of newly observed facts.

Without denying that some of the clarification of ideas which Freud expected from the development of psychoanalysis has been accomplished, parallel with the clarification of many