No Woman, No Try? — Else Frenkel-Brunswik and the Project of Integrating Psychoanalysis into the Unity of Science

Abstract

After having studied the different developments within philosophy of science and psychoanalysis, we have to acknowledge that there is no reason to share Frenkel-Brunswik’s optimism. On the contrary: the situation has become worse, although especially the structuralistic school within philosophy of science integrates opportunities and new perspectives for psychoanalytical theories. But psychoanalysis failed to use these developments to its own advantage and therefore did not profit from them. One reason is that the nature of psychoanalysis as a discipline is itself a controversial item: Obviously, today even the desire to be a scientific enterprise is not commonly felt among those doing psychoanalytical work. One might persume that this circumstance would be the most painful fact for Frenkel-Brunswik herself.