Sigmund Freud: Critique Essay

Freud’s theories and methods of treatment he used caused disputes in Vienna in the 20th century and are still fiercely debated. Besides the ongoing debate in scientific and medical researches Freud’s ideas are often analyzed and discussed in literary and philosophical papers. Freud is often called a „father of psychoanalysis“, but psychoanalysis itself faced numerous difficulties in both treating patients, and in justifying the truth of its premises, which caused the permanent crisis of the psychoanalysis theory and practice.
Thus, Freud’s concepts and teachings were often banned in the USSR and Nazi Germany, as they did not conform to government ideals and conservative morals of totalitarian states. Freud’s concepts touch upon such sharp ethical issues as incest (Oedipus complex) and homosexuality (in Freud’s view, taboos on demonstration of such relations was a product of culture), reasons of taboos, leaderism phenomenon, the origin of the monotheistic religions (proposing his own version also was opposed by the religious citizens) (Hoffman, 2010; Dufresne, 2007).
It should be mentioned that the prerequisites of such a crisis of psychoanalysis were in the very foundations of the theory. They partly lied in the personal views of Freud, and partly in lacks of scientific knowledge at the time.
According to K. Horney, this was also partly reasoned by the fact that in the 19th century, the knowledge of cultural differences was very scarce, and the prevailing trend was in assigning specific features of one‘s culture to human nature in general. Developed in this way psychoanalytic schematization, tending to dogmatization, then spread to the phenomena of culture and social life of society, causing the increased non-confidence in psychoanalysis as scientific method among professionals in these areas. Not accidentally K. Horney, who criticized fundamentally many of the provisions of Freudianism, at the same time pointed out that the system of theories created by Freud was so consistent that, once entrenched in it, it became difficult to make observations, which would not be affected by his way of thinking (Dufresne, 2007).
The difficulty of obtaining reliable data in psychoanalysis is also related to its interpretive nature, determined by the fact that the object of study of psychoanalysis – the unconscious – is layered, and interpretation should detect this multiplicity of meanings. Thus, Peter Medawar described psychoanalysis as the greatest intellectual fraud of the twentieth century. Karl Popper wrote that Freud’s theories and psychoanalysis were not scientific because of their non-falsifiability: an analyst sees confirmation of his hypothesis in any anamnesis, just as a Marxist sees a confirmation of his hypothesis in any newspaper (Dufresne, 2007). Paul Bloom, professor of psychology at Yale University, pointed out that Freud’s statements were so vague that they could not be verified by any reliable method, and therefore could not be applicable in scientific point of view (Brooks & Woloch, 2000).
Alfred Adler criticized Freud’s sexual theory, viewing it as biologizing. He argued that Freud underestimated consciousness, giving too much emphasis on the unconscious sphere, also pointing to the ambiguity of the fundamental concepts of psychoanalysis (Dufresne, 2007). Modern psychoanalysts are increasingly united in the idea that in studying the mental life of a child the concept of interpersonal and object relations is important, and that it is impossible to speak about an infant only, since both biology and society dictate that affective (instinctive) life of a baby should be regulated by a dyad of mother-child. From this perspective, it becomes impossible to determine the amount of affection, for what is constitutional is always and instantly interacting with the behavior of the caring person in terms of manifestation of these tendencies (Brooks & Woloch, 2000).
According to the research by the American Association of Psychoanalysts, despite the fact that psychoanalysis is widespread in many humanities, departments of psychology treat it merely as a historical artifact. Modern psychoanalysts in studying the circumstances of mental illness will seek for changes in the environment and the object relations, i.e. will use clinical, rather than metapsychological way of explanation (Hoffman, 2010).
Indeed, most contemporary analysts do not recognize the repressed sexuality the source of all mental disorders; the primarily sexual meaning of images in dreams is also being questioned (Dufresne, 2007). At the same time, the concept of the unconscious introduced by Freud, the method of analysis of the hidden causes of symptoms, and economic consideration of the mental processes as interaction of isolated instances lie in the basis of most schools of contemporary psychoanalysis, psychotherapy, and personality theories. The idea that art works can be seen as the result of neurotic experience of their creator and a manifestation of the deep unconscious had a huge impact on the culture of the 20th century (Brooks & Woloch, 2000).
In terms of constructing new models of psychoanalysis, one of the most modern versions of psychoanalysis should also be mentioned – an intersubjective approach, the creators of which are trying to find a new language of psychoanalysis, critically rethinking the basic psychoanalytic concepts (Brooks & Woloch, 2000; Hoffman, 2010).
In conclusion, it should be noticed that there is still a large and prolonged work to be done for psychoanalysis to gain the status of the scientific theory, and one of its phases should be a comprehensive assessment of existing concepts in order to select the worthy ones for future research. Moreover, any psychoanalytic ideas should be considered critically, which is the necessary prerequisite for a scientific approach. In addition, the research needs combined and systematic approach. Thus, psychoanalysis, on the way of acquiring the status of scientific theory, faces difficult tasks in both clinical and in theoretical areas.