Greenberg prefaces his discussion with comments on some recent "attacks" on the validity of psychoanalytic propositions (Grünbaum, Daniel Stern). He suggests that some analysts seek a measure of safety in associating with an "adjacent" discipline rather than bearing the intractable ambiguity of our clinical work.

On this score, Greenberg lauds the exquisite sensitivity of the above presenters, Sandler and Pine, to the vulnerabilities of their patients. He underscores their concerns about people who may be disorganized by the interpretive process and be unable to maintain self-cohesion. But he suggests there may be a "developmental morality" here (Kohut). Developmentalists, under the guise of the "holding environment," or "ego defect," may fail to negotiate with their patients the textured transactions of needs and wishes in the analytic setting, i.e., with appropriate abstinence. Greenberg emphasizes, "We don't tend to think why some people need abstinence." We rationalize our departures as due to developmental needs.