Interpretation and explanation in psychoanalysis
Master Thesis
1991
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University of Cape Town
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Abstract
By exploring the logical status of the psychoanalytic object of investigation, the compromise-formation, this dissertation suggests that although Freud's defence of Psychoanalysis as a natural science has been legitimately rejected as problematic, the reconstrual of Psychoanalysis as an interpretive or hermeneutic knowledge is likewise inappropriate to the psychoanalytic object. On the basis of the work of Donald Davidson and Arthur Dante, it is argued instead that the nature and status of Psychoanalysis as a knowledge is best understood and assessed in terms of a third alternative provided by the historical epistemology germane to the psychoanalytic object. In this way, the case against Psychoanalysis as a natural science is granted, while psychoanalytic epistemology is nevertheless defended as explanatory rather than interpretive.
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Bibliography: leaves 150-155.
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Stein, J. 1991. Interpretation and explanation in psychoanalysis. University of Cape Town.