Freud's metapsychological speculations

Abstract

In this paper, the author seeks to analyse the nature and function of metapsychological theory in Freudian psychoanalysis. He shows that Freudian psychoanalytic theory is composed of an empirical part‐the psychology of clinical facts‐and a speculative part‐metapsychology. Freud considers this latter part as being a speculative superstructure of value that is only heuristic, capable of being supplanted by other superstructures of the same type. The author sustains the idea that this metapsychology is the fruit of speculative method, whose foundations were elaborated by philosophers and epistemologists before Freud, including Immanuel Kant and Ernst Mach. He concludes with considerations regarding the future of metapsychological theorisation, presenting criticisms of Freudian metapsychology offered by both philosophers and psychoanalysts, and pointing to the perspective opened by Donald W. Winnicott of a psychoanalysis without metapsychology.

Key words:

• drives [Triebe]
• dynamic point of view
• heuristic
• metapsychology
• speculation

1. This paper is a synthesis of the results obtained in my doctoral thesis, partially funded by CNPq and the The speculative method in Freud (in Portuguese), supplemented with other considerations that indicate the continuity and the consequences of that type of historico‐critical interpretation of psychoanalysis. The perspective here developed is inserted into the line of research of the research group in philosophy and psychotherapeutic practices (GFPP)of the clinical psychology postgraduate studies programme of the Ponti. cal Catholic University of So Paulo (PUC‐SP), based on the works of Zeljko Loparic. This text is a slightly modi. ed version of Fulgencio (2003). I thank Zeljko Loparic and translator, George T. Nurse, for their great help in the establishment of the English version of this paper

1. This paper is a synthesis of the results obtained in my doctoral thesis, partially funded by CNPq and the The speculative method in Freud (in Portuguese), supplemented with other considerations that indicate the continuity and the consequences of that type of historico‐critical interpretation of psychoanalysis. The perspective here developed is inserted into the line of research of the research group in philosophy and psychotherapeutic practices (GFPP)of the clinical psychology postgraduate studies programme of the Ponti. cal Catholic University of So Paulo (PUC‐SP), based on the works of Zeljko Loparic. This text is a slightly modi. ed version of Fulgencio (2003). I thank Zeljko Loparic and translator, George T. Nurse, for their great help in the establishment of the English version of this paper

Notes

1. This paper is a synthesis of the results obtained in my doctoral thesis, partially funded by CNPq and the The speculative method in Freud (in Portuguese), supplemented with other considerations that indicate the continuity and the consequences of that type of historico‐critical interpretation of psychoanalysis. The perspective here developed is inserted into the line of research of the research group in philosophy and psychotherapeutic practices (GFPP)of the clinical psychology postgraduate studies programme of the Ponti. cal Catholic University of So Paulo (PUC‐SP), based on the works of Zeljko Loparic. This text is a slightly modi. ed version of Fulgencio (2003). I thank Zeljko Loparic and translator, George T. Nurse, for their great help in the establishment of the English version of this paper