Scientific Theory on the Couch

Scientific Theory on the Couch: A Response to Scott C. Taylor Randall Paulsen (bio) As I enjoyed wrestling with this rich and original paper a dream-like image came to my mind: Scott Taylor has placed science, itself, on the couch. As this body of science experiences being on the couch, it discovers that it has lost the ability to dismiss psychoanalysis as non-scientific because the psychoanalytic method now dwells inside it. The heartbeat of the psychoanalytic method (an observed relationship which provides a setting for dreams, associations, transference, and resistance) gives life to this body. In my response to Taylor, I would like to first touch upon the experience of individuals in psychoanalysis; then I will reflect on Loewald’s connection with Thomas Kuhn and psychoanalysis, before finally asking, has psychoanalysis ever been a “normal science”? The Individual in Psychoanalysis Experiencing Transformations We learn that Thomas Kuhn came from a psychoanalytic family. Alfred Adler had analyzed other family members and his mother recommended he try psychoanalysis because he was shy around young women. He found the over two-year experience “interesting as hell,” finished his thesis, and found his first wife. It would seem that his lasting debt to psychoanalysis came from his own experience of resistance, transference, and psychic restructuring which then endured as a heuristic method with which to study the dialectic evolution of science. As analysts, we listen to Taylor’s story of Thomas Kuhn on the couch from the vantage point of our own experience as analysands and analysts. We resonate to the sequence of “normal [End Page 405] science” as a “conflict-free period” in which data is gathered, which leads to resistance, followed by transference as a gateway to strangely familiar atavistic perceptions, becoming a private “scientific crisis.” At this critical moment, a transference-based interpretation becomes an experienced “Aha” which both clarifies and transforms simultaneously. Taylor’s, Kuhn’s, and then, Loewald’s unique appeal is that they provide a metaphorical framework in which the past is not so much overcome as transformed, and not only is the self changed, but also one’s perception of the world. Stephen Mitchell (2000) likens Loewald to an astronomer who believes that life begins with gestational density, birth likened to the Big Bang, from which differentiation, transformation, and integration proceed in a galactic manner. Kuhn appears to have experienced a good analysis in which his awareness of the process of psychological growth was cultivated. Being on the couch frees up awareness from the social vis-à-vis to the intrapsychic. One can even close one’s eyes. It is a bit like dreaming out loud with a trusted listener. But then the trust is shaken when the unseen listener appears to take on the guise of past personages, or the body becomes filled with troubling somatic memories. Objective and subjective experience repeat a dance over and over which gives the individual a new awareness of the patterns of self in evolution. I suspect Kuhn was able to experience this “framework” often enough that it became paradigmatic for him. I also found in Scott Taylor’s paper an implicit resonance between Thomas Kuhn and Wilfred Bion. They both have an interest in the similarities between intrapsychic life and group life. Kuhn’s notion of “normal science” can appear to involve a rule by orthodoxy. Many institutions of learning, psychoanalysis itself among them, can be seen as systems that oppress “thinking outside the box.” University faculty have lost their jobs in disagreements that exceeded the ruling paradigm. Bion also sees dependency, paranoia, and projection as forces that can bring a group’s capacity for useful work to a stop. A group, not unlike an individual, needs active, well-maintained self-awareness, in order to function and to adapt to changing conditions. [End Page 406] Loewald as a Bridge between Thomas Kuhn and Psychoanalysis Hans Loewald was born into a tragedy. His father died simultaneously with Hans’ birth. According to Stephen Mitchell (2000), Loewald’s mother placed the infant’s crib near the piano where she could both grieve and keep her infant son company by playing Beethoven sonatas. Loewald later framed a story that has accompanied me

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