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Article
P S YCH OA N A LYSI S I N T I M E S O F
S C I E N C E : A -VO I D - A N C E VE R S U S
C R E AT I V I T Y
Pa u l Ver h a e g h e a n d S t i j n Va n h e u l e
Ghent University, Belgium
Correspondence: Professor Dr Paul Verhaeghe, Department of Psychoanalysis and Clinical Consulting,
Ghent University, H. Dunantlaan 2, B-9000 Ghent, Belgium
A b s t ra c t
Psychoanalysis can be considered from three different viewpoints: first as a science and a
theory of psychic functioning, secondly as an ethical system, and thirdly as a clinical
practice. In this paper, we argue that these three perspectives are deeply inter-related, since
they have everything to do with a fundamental structural underlying lack. We discuss why
and how psychoanalytic ethics need to assume this lack, how the original contribution
psychoanalysis can make to science is related to the study of it, and how psychoanalytic
practice is faced with the continuous challenge of starting from the lack as a source of
creativity.
Ke y wo rds
Freud; Lacan; ethics of psychoanalysis; psychoanalytic research; psychoanalytic
practice
I n tr oduc ti on
P
sychoanalysis can be considered from three different viewpoints: first
as a science and a theory of psychic functioning, secondly as an ethical
system, and thirdly as a clinical practice. Obviously, these three
perspectives are deeply inter-related. After all, the particular ethics of psycho-
analysis have everything to do with its clinical praxis; even more so, they can be
considered to be a direct result of a structural failure of all master discourse at
the clinical level. This failure is an issue one can not just get round: clinical
practice implies a discontent producing lack and one can not but deal with this
lack, either by assuming it or by defending against it. All efforts for constructing
theories too, as well the way we study science, are also related to this
determining lack.
Fro m f a il u re to a n e th i c s o f l ac k
very last works – his will so to speak (Freud, 1939, 1964) – he has to revise his
self-constructed myth on the primal father as well. A couple of years before
(Freud, 1937, 1964) he had already concluded that there are three impossible
professions: governing, educating and psychoanalyzing; impossible, because
they require a continuous master discourse; and impossible since this aim
inevitably fails.
The implicit link to ethics comes into the open with Lacan, who links the issue
of impossibibilty to desire and jouissance (see Verhaeghe, 1996). For him every
psychopathology has to do with desire and jouissance, meaning that it is
impossible for any kind of psychotherapy to avoid ethical questions. The usual
way to avoid them is by providing an answer to them, mostly a ‘‘scientistically’’
endorsed answer. In his seminar XVII (‘‘L’Envers de la Psychanalyse’’) Lacan
(1991) coins the Oedipus complex as ‘‘Freud’s dream’’ and ‘‘strictly unusable’’,
because the master discourse is exactly the opposite of the analytic discourse.
On top of that, each discourse demonstrates both the impossibility and the
incapability of the subject in matters of desire and jouissance, meaning that
there is no final answer. Freud was right to focus on castration, although his
theory remained within the Imaginary in this respect. Lacan introduces us to the
notion of symbolic castration and the resulting structural lack caused by the
inadequacy of representation – that is, of the Symbolic – on those crucial points
where the drive enters the scene (femininity, sexual rapport, authority).
The consequences for both clinical practice and analytical theory are far
reaching. In Lacan’s opinion the precise nature of the impossibility we have to
deal with is strictly ungraspable by means of the Symbolic: it ‘‘does not stop of
not being written’’ (Lacan, 2001, p 559). The psychoanalytic treatment – as it is
based on free association and hence on representation – must necessarily meet
with this lack in the Symbolic and becomes truly ‘‘interminable’’, yet not
without a finality. The aim shifts towards a necessary creativity. After having
articulated the lack and the resulting conflicts in his/her own words, the subject
faces a situation in which s/he might create a solution of his/her own, that is his/
her own ‘‘sinthome’’ (Verhaeghe and Declercq, 2002).
This is diametrically opposed to the way lack is usually dealt with in
contemporary society, where the void is avoided as much as possible: the lack is
denied, repressed, foreclosed. These illustrate psychopathological mechanisms
at the level of society. Western capitalism has created the illusion that every lack
can and must be filled. Within the same line, psychotherapy has become a
commodity for ‘‘clients’’ who are in need of the right answer: it is just a matter
of finding the right ‘‘workshop’’ in order to ‘‘develop’’ the necessary ‘‘skills’’ and
everything will be fine. On the socio-cultural level, a perverse super-ego obliges
the subject to enjoy as much as possible, filling in every desire before it is even
articulated. The net result becomes clearer and clearer: the increasing frequency
of depression, where desire itself is structurally occulted. As Lacan noticed in
‘‘Television’’, depression is a ‘‘moral failing’’ (Lacan, 1990, p 22).
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T h e f u t u r e o f a di s i l l u s i o n : p s y c h o a n a l y s i s a n d i t s s c i e n t i f i c
c h a l l e nge
this respect, they are inherently uncomfortable and prone to being repressed
from thought. On the other hand, the most interesting contributions psycho-
analysis can make to intellectual life and other scientific disciplines are precisely
situated at this level (Derrida, 2000; Derrida and Roudinesco, 2001).
However, it would be all too comforting to attribute the cause of
psychoanalysis’ scientifically marginalized position to the bad outside world.
Psychoanalysis undoubtedly suffers from an internal corruption of its own
system, which also leads it to lose track of its originally subversive message. Due
to wrong tactics, psychoanalysis often positioned itself in a sterile or ‘‘auto-
immune’’ (Derrida, 2000) position. Derrida (in: Derrida and Roudinesco, 2001,
pp 293–294) criticizes its institutionalization, its ‘‘mercantilization’’, and its
useless fights with psychopharmacological approaches and (other) psychother-
apeutic theories. To this, we can add that psychoanalysts all too often
conceitedly retreat into the comforting world of their own jargon, which leads
to a position of isolation, and that the shattering group-fights among all kinds of
schools prevent(ed) exchange between intellectually interesting entities and
promote(d) navel-gazing (for an interesting analysis of the group-dynamics at
hand, see Žižek, 2000).
We can, however, make a step beyond these difficulties, focus on psycho-
analysis’ scientific future, and check how psychoanalysis can indeed stay in
touch with the lack that founds its object. In this respect, we think that a key
role is reserved for dialogue with current intellectual reflection and research. An
example can be taken from Freud and Lacan, who dialogued with the scientific
and intellectual movements of their time. Indeed, through a dialectical
discussion with other disciplines, psychoanalysis can develop itself beyond old
saws. In order to keep the lack on which it is based alive, its original discoveries
need to be re-invented again and again. By earlier giving the example of the
difference between the unconscious of cognitive science versus the unconscious
of psychoanalysis, we do not mean to say that both disciplines can not have
fruitful interchanges; the opposite is true: dialogue enables scientific and
conceptual re-invention. What we do mean to say is that differences should not
be flattened out; on the contrary, the void must be kept open. Psychoanalysis
should not bargain away its own object. Exactly by starting from difference,
new insights can arise that cross the borders of the paradigms that fixate us in
the activity of understanding.
Concerning research, we think, on the one hand, that psychoanalysis is not
able to get around empirical studies – in order to count as a discipline at the
academic level, the development of its own empirical tradition is needed – and,
on the other hand, that the empirical field precisely constitutes the touchstone
for psychoanalytic theory. A major challenge for psychoanalysis, however, lies
in the development of its own methodological strategies for empirical research,
strategies that are transparent and acceptable to other scientific disciplines, but
also that maintain the unique richness of psychoanalysis’ traditional clinical
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method. We think that the speech of the divided subject is that from which all
thinking on empiricism should start. Only by starting from the speech of a
particular subject can the object of psychoanalysis be studied (see e.g. Vanheule,
2002; Vanheule et al., 2003).
O n t h e a p p l i c a t i o n o f t h e p s y c h oa n a l y s t
and to work through the dimension of lack with them, such that it becomes an
instance of possible creativity (see Gherovici, 2003). In other words, it is not
psychoanalysis that should be applied in current therapeutic settings, but the
psychoanalyst him/herself, with the lack and the analytic desire he/she is
characterized by (see Cottet, 2002).
Conclusion
A b o u t th e a ut h o r s
Re fe r e n ce s
P a u l Ve r h a e g h e a n d S t i j n Va n h e u l e
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