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As I have come to expect of their work, Stolorow, Orange and Atwood's reply to my article is logically and epistemologically lucid, rigorous, and clever. However, much of their reply addresses assertions I did not make and beliefs I do not hold. It creates a cartoon version of projective identification, then attempts to punch holes in that.
First of all, many of their criticisms seem to be aimed at the preposterous notion that the analyst's visceral states can always be directly attributed to the patient's unconscious intentionality. I do not believe this. I believe that some of the analyst's experiences are strongly influenced by the patient—at the same time that they are always shaped by the analyst's unique psychology. I believe that we must be very tentative and humble in exploring who did what to whom. The patient's unconscious intentionality is of course but one part of a “dynamic system of intercoordinated elements” determining any interaction. And, yes, of course the analyst's projective identifications affect the patient's experience as well. In short, I think Stolorow et al. and I agree theoretically on the intersubjective, nonlinear, and dynamic nature of all interaction; where we disagree is in the arena of how such intersubjective influence comes about.
Indeed, Stolorow et al. appear to oscillate between two contradictory positions—on the one hand, their theoretical stance of intersubjectivity, including “reciprocal mutual influence,” and, on the other hand, their more emotional stand that analysts should take sole responsibility for their own troublesome affect states. They seem to be arguing for intersubjectivity and “isolated mind” at the same time. They assert throughout their work that patients and analysts influence