Freud Evaluated The Completed Arc

698 Pages·1990·43.27 MB·English

by  Malcolm Macmillan (Eds.)

FREUD EVALUATED
The Completed Arc
ADVANCES
IN
PSYCHOLOGY
75
Editors:
G. E. STELMACH
P. A. VROON
NORTH-HOLLAND
AMSTERDAM NEW YORK OXFORD TOKYO
FREUD EVALUATED
The Completed Arc
Malcolm MACMILLAN
Dcpurtnient qf' Psychologv
Monusk University
Cluyton, Victor-iu,A ustrwliu
1991
NORTH-HOLLAND
AMSTERDAM NEW YORK OXFORD TOKYO
NORTH-HOLLAND
ELSEVIER SCIENCE PUBLISHERS B.V.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Macmillan. Malcolm, 1929-
Freud evaluated the completed arc / Malcolm Macmillan.
p. cm. -- (Advances in pSyChOlOgy , 75)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-444-88717-2
1. Psychoanalysis. 2. Personality. 3. Freud, Sigmund.
1856-1939. I. Title. 11. Series.
BF173.M353 1991
150.19'52--dC20 90-49 125
CIP
ISBN: 0 444 88717 2
0 ELSEVIER SCIENCE PUBLISHERS B.V., 1991
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PREFACE
Freud Evaluated had its origins in a series of lectures to undergraduate
students in the Department of Psychology at Monash University. In the
beginning the lectures had dealt separately with the twin themes of psycho-
analytic personality theory and the application of scientific method in
psychology but, as the series developed, it became apparent that aspects of
the evolution of the theory could be used to demonstrate some of the
principles of scientific enquiry. Both an earlier version of Freud Evaluated
and the present one reflect that aim.
Because the lectures relied so much on original sources it was hard to
provide reading and suitable reference material. I attempted to meet that
need by expanding my lecture notes into the manuscript of the first version
of Freud Evaluated. The work was begun during some spare time I found
during a sabbatical leave in 1972-73, in the Department of Physical
Education - Women at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and the final
draft was completed in Melbourne during the summer vacation of 1973-74.
Soon after its completion I found myself dissatisfied with what I had done
and was tempted to undertake a revision. It was one occasion on which I
should have resisted Oscar Wilde’s advice because, having yielded to that
temptation, I found myself gradually succumbing to another: that of
producing the most comprehensive critique of psycho-analytic personality
theory I could. Freud Evaluated is therefore very different from a simple
lecture supplement and is virtually a new work.
In the lectures I had avoided secondary sources and interpretative
accounts as much as I could and wherever possible drew on the publicat-
ions with which Freud was familiar, especially the works of Charcot,
Bernheim, Janet, Meynert, Jackson, and Darwin. Much of the light which
those works provided for illuminating Freud’s thinking in the lectures and
in Freud Evaluated was provided by the skilled translations of Lillias
O’Dea, North Melbourne, Drs. P. J. Weir and Andrew Wood, Melbourne,
and Dr. James W. Coleman, Department of German, University of San
Francisco. Lillias’ translations were especially important: her multi-
lingual skills enabled me to compare, among other things, the original of
Charcot and Bernheim with Freud’s German translations and with the
various English translations. Most of the re-translations are also hers.
To display a serious critical interest in Freudian theory in Australia is,
as elsewhere, to declare oneself a member of a special kind of minority:
one whose numbers guarantee intellectual isolation. Having written Freud
Evaluated in a virtual intellectual vacuum, I am therefore more than usually
appreciative of the encouragement which several of my colleagues and
friends gave me and of the critical reading which a number of them made
of draft chapters. I am particularly indebted to Emeritus Professor William
O’Neil, Professor Frank Cioffi, Professor Ross Day, and Dr. Dianne
vi Freud Evaluated: Preface
Bradley who each read all or almost all of them. The late Professor Oliver
Zangwill, who read the whole manuscript and discussed much of the detail
with me, was, of course, kindly and encouraging as well as penetrating and
direct in his criticism. Oliver and Professors E. R. (‘Jack’) Hilgard,
Stanford University, Max Coltheart, then of Birkbeck College, and John
Kihlstrom, University of Arizona were good enough to allow me to visit
their departments, mainly to use nearby libraries, and they also arranged for
me to give seminars. For helping make some of the drafts more literate,
and especially for improving my treatment of theoretically obscure points, I
am much in the debt of Liz Gallois and Lindsay Image of Melbourne. I am
also more than pleased to acknowledge much valuable information very
generously provided by Peter Swales.
I have been helped a great deal by the clerical, professional, and
technical staff of my own Department. Freud Evaluated could not have
completed had it not been for the typing, computer programming,
electronic, and photographic skills shared by Lesley Anderson, Nan
Appleby, John Dick, Mike Durham, Jan Gipps, the late Desi Green,
Vladimir Kohout, Lola Pasieczny, Lynne Steele, and Pam Ward. Help
from Graeme Askew and Graeme Ivey, of the Monash University
Educational Technology Service, and James Meehan, of my own
Department, made the camera ready copy possible and Dr. Garry Thorp
provided most of the assistance for the index. Cathy Cook and Cheryl
Roberts, Technical Officers in my Department, worked very hard at finding
references and Cathy, who had also carefully checked so many of the
drafts, worked just as cheerfully in the final stages at solving what
threatened to become an endless series of problems.
I have also to thank various Libraries, Librarians, and Library Staff for
the rapidity with which they were able to meet my requests. My special
thanks go to the Librarians and staff of the Biomedical Library of Monash
University, the Brownless Library of the University of Melbourne, the
Australian Medical Association Library, Melbourne, the Middleton and
Memorial Libraries of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, the Stanford
and Lane Medical Libraries of Stanford University, Cambridge University
Library, Birkbeck College Library of the University of London and the
British Library.
Finally, to two of my friends I am especially grateful. Professor Ross
Day, the Chairman of my own Department provided encouragement and
formidable critical advice as well as funds which defrayed the costs of
research assistance and translation preparation not met by Grants from the
Monash Special Research Fund. My very special thanks go to Dr. Leonie
Ryder not only for an enormous amount of critical help but also for
encouraging me to begin and, once having started, to persevere.
Box Hill and Clayton, Victoria, May 1990.
CONTENTS
Preface V
Introduction 1
PART I BEGINNING ASSUMPTIONS
Ch.1 Anna 0. and the origins of Freud’s personality theory 10
Ch.2 Charcot, hypnosis and determinism 32
Ch.3 Freud, determinism and hysteria 55
Ch.4 Freud’s adaptation of Breuer’s treatment method 74
Ch.5 Causes and the actual neuroses 122
PART I1 RRST THEORIES AND APPLICATIONS
Ch.6 Mechanisms of symptom formation 146
Ch.7 A theory of the neuroses 16 7
Ch.8 Expectations, actual neuroses and childhood seduction 200
Ch.9 Dreams and symptoms 232
Ch.10 A theory of sexuality 28 1
PART 111 THE FINAL SYNTHESIS
Ch.11 The ego and the ego-instinctual drive 328
Ch.12 The instinct theory finalized 368
Ch.13 The structures of the mind 430
PART IV EVALUATION
Ch.14 Psycho-analysis as theory and therapy 508
Ch.15 Psycho-analysis as a method 549
Ch.16 Psycho-analysis as science 577
REFERENCES 613
INDEX 66 1
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 668
This Page Intentionally Left Blank
INTRODUCTION
Alles Gescheite ist schon gedacht worden;
man muss nur versuchen, es noch einmal zu denken.
Goethe: Spriiche in Prosa. Manmen und Reflexionen, I.
Freud Evaluated: The Completed Arc is a critical evaluation of Freud’s
personality theory which, because it is historically based, provides an
evaluation very different from most. What I do is to describe the
observations which Freud made and set out the theoretical ideas he put
forward for explaining them. I then try to judge the adequacy of Freud’s
explanations against the logical and scientific standards of Freud’s own
time. It is largely this historical basis which leads me to believe that Freud
Evaluated is a justified addition to what seems to be veritable torrent of
books on Freud. My hope is that the historical perspective will give the
reader a sound basis on which to make a judgement about psycho-analysis
as a method of investigation and a theory of personality as well as a sense
of what Freud was about from Freud’s own standpoint.
Freud in context
I site Freud’s endeavour, particularly the first twenty years of it, in the
psychological and psychiatric context of the time. The period has not been
given the critical attention it warrants, despite the important work of
Andersson (1962)’ Stewart (1969) and Sulloway (1979). All of Freud’s
important assumptions and characteristic modes of thought are to be found
in this formative period. Many of the tests of his theoretical propositions
were also simpler then than they later became and the sources of many of
the current difficulties in psycho-analytic theory more readily identifiable.
By examining the early period, one sees more clearly the continuity of
Freud’s thought with that of his predecessors, especially with Charcot’s,
and that it was not until about 1900-1905 that he developed a theory
radically different from any that had gone before. Bringing out these kinds
of continuities is not meant to detract from Freud’s originality. What I
hope it does is to allow his contributions to be seen as the development of
already existing trends. To me, the specific characteristics of Freud’s
approach then seem more distinct than when they are related only to a
general intellectual context, as in Ernest Jones’ (1953-1957) account, or to
a general social context as in Ellenberger’s (1970) history.
Placing Freud in the psychological and psychiatric context of his day
also brings out more clearly the basis of a number of the unresolved
problems of contemporary psycho-analytic theory. For example, Breuer’s
original notes on Anna 0. show how he and Freud misinterpreted the