Paul Ricœur’s hermeneutic approach to psychoanalysis stresses the interpretation of meanings revealed via the narratives woven through the discursive exchanges between analyst and analysand. Despite the tremendous influence Ricœur’s interpretation enjoyed both in philosophy and in psychoanalysis, his approach has been subject to severe criticism by Adolf Grünbaum who argues that Freud modeled psychoanalysis on the natural sciences, and therefore it should be judged according to natural scientific standards. I argue that Grünbaum incorrectly downplays the importance of speech and language (...) in psychoanalytic theory and practice, and moreover, that Ricœur’s approach offers important insights that deserve to be redeployed today. (shrink)

This book critically examines Freud's own detailed arguments for his major explanatory and therapeutic principles, the current neorevisionist versions of psychoanalysis, and the hermeneuticists' reconstruction of Freud's theory and therapy as an alternative to what they claim was a “scientistic” misconstrual of the psychoanalytic enterprise. The clinical case for Freud's cornerstone theory of repression – the claim that psychic conflict plays a causal role in producing neuroses, dreams, and bungled actions – turns out to be ill-founded for two main reasons: (...) Even if clinical data were valid, the method of free association has failed to support the psychoanalytic theory of unconscious motivation; Clinical data tend in any case to be artifacts of the analyst's self-fulfilling expectations, thus losing much of their evidential value. The hypothesis that psychoanalytic treatment is in reality a placebo poses a serious challenge to the assumption that insight is a key causal factor when therapy is successful. This challenge has yet to be met by psychoanalysts. Similar conclusions undermine the neorevisionist versions of psychoanalysis. The most influential hermeneuticists, on the other hand, are shown to have imposed an alien philosophy on psychoanalysis, partly through their reliance on gross misconceptions of the natural sciences. Karl Popper's criticism of the Freudian corpus as empirically untestable has misjudged its evidential weaknesses, which are more subtle. If there exists empirical evidence for the principal psychoanalytic doctrines, it cannot be obtained without well-designed extraclinical studies of a kind that have for the most part yet to be attempted. (shrink)

This book consists thematically of three broad sections: a lengthy introduction in which Grünbaum critically assesses the hermeneutic construal of psychoanalysis, as represented in the work of Habermas, G. S. Klein, and Ricoeur; a critical examination of Popper's assessment of both psychoanalysis and inductivism; and a logical analysis of core psychoanalytic ideas that constitute the foundation for much of psychoanalytic theory. This last section is, in my view, the heart of the book and therefore, it is that section on which (...) I will focus in this review. (shrink)

In this article, I try to reconstitute the inchoative debate that took place between Ricœur and Grünbaum concerning the epistemology of Freudian psychoanalysis. The debate was more inchoative than effective because of its asymmetry. First, I will underline the originality of Ricœur’s theory of motivation and causality. Then, I will examine the rest of Grünbaum’s objections: the overvaluation of clinical relationship and language, the ontological specificity of psychical reality, the narrative originality of the psychoanalytical explanation and the status of (...) symbol. I finally conclude by underlining the added value of the debate concerning the specificity o. (shrink)

이 논문을 통해 우리는 리쾨르 철학에서 프로이트의 현존(présence)을 확인하고 이것이 리쾨르 철학의 중요한 국면들에서 어떤 영향을 끼쳐 왔는지를 찾아보고 확인하는 작업을 하려고 한다. 리쾨르 철학의 관점에서 보면 프로이트 담론은 ‘현상학의 해석학적 변형’이고자 하는 리쾨르 자신의 마지막 철학적 단계에서 결정적 역할을 하는 방향타라고 볼 수 있다. 리쾨르를 현대 해석학을 대표하는 인물로 자리매김하는 데 핵심적인 내용을 제공해준 담론 역시 프로이트의 담론일 것이다. 물론 여전히 기술현상학의 틀과 한계 내에서 움직이고 있는 『의지의 철학 I』과 『해석에 대하여: 프로이트에 관한 시론』 사이의 결정적 차이는 “반성”이 일종의 (...) 해석학이어야 한다고 주장함으로써 “반성에 철저히 연계된 해석학적 방법”을 가져오는 데 있어 그가 프로이트 담론에 의존하고 기대었다는 것이다. 욕망의 선재성, 사유에 대한 ‘sum’의 선재성을 프로이트 담론이 설득력 있게 드러내는 이상, 반성은 그런 (욕망하는) 삶의 기호들을 해석하는 프로이트 담론을 만나지 않고 피해 가는 방법은 없었다. 리쾨르에게 프로이트는 필연적인 우회(détour)의 길이었다. 현상학적 철학의 한계와 근대적 반성철학의 전통에 새로운 전기를 마련하는 데 프로이트 담론의 독창적인 기여를 인정하는 차원이라고 보는 게 정확할 것이다. 리쾨르 철학의 긴 여정 속에서 1950년 전후에 프로이트 담론은 (기술현상학이라는) 제한된 관점과 전망 속에서 처음으로 도입되고, 1965년을 전후하여 확장되며 변형된 (해석학적) 대면과 도전의 차원에서 논의되며, 1990년 전후해 2008년까지는 이전의 도입과 대면의 지점을 넘어 충분히 성숙하여 침윤되어 그의 철학 안에 내면화되는 지점에 도달하게 되었다. (shrink)

The Freud Wars offers a comprehensive introduction to the crucial question of the justification of psychoanalysis. Part I examines three powerful critiques of psychoanalysis in the context of a recent controversy about its nature and legitimacy: is it a bankrupt science, an innovative science, or not a science at all but a system of interpretation? The discussion makes sense of the entrenched disagreement about the validity of psychoanalysis, and demonstrates how the disagreement is rooted in the theoretical ambiguity of the (...) central concept of psychoanalysis, the unconscious. This ambiguity is then presented as the pathway to a new way of understanding psychoanalysis, based on a mode of thinking that precedes division into mental and physical. The reader is drawn into a lively and thought-provoking analysis of the central issues: · What would it mean for psychoanalysis to count as a science? · Is psychoanalysis a form of hermeneutics? · How can mental and physical explanations coincide? Part II contains the source material for Part I: the influential critiques of psychoanalysis by Adolf Grünbaum, Thomas Nagel and Jürgen Habermas. No specialised knowledge is assumed, and the book is clear and accessible while still conveying the complexity and richness of the subject. It provides a fascinating introduction to philosophical thinking on psychoanalysis for students and practitioners of psychoanalysis, psychotherapy and philosophy. (shrink)

"Well over one half of this brilliant new Monograph constitutes a major sequel to Professor Grunbaum's highly influential 1984 book The Foundations of Psychoanalysis: A Philosophical Critique, which was labeled "magisterial" by Frank J. Sulloway, and "the most important book ever written on Freud's status as a scientist" by J. Allan Hobson. The importance of the present Monograph lies in the extent to which the author now goes beyond that earlier volume to offer new original ideas on fundamental themes." "Validation (...) in the Clinical Theory of Psycho-analysis: A Study in the Philosophy of Psycho-analysis contains Adolf Grunbaum's new basic critique of the psychoanalytic theory of transference in its role of an etiologic theory; it turns out that etiologic transference interpretations rest on fallacious causal inferences from so-called "meaning connections" between mental states: moreover, just these unsound inferences are the stock-in-trade of the "hermeneutic" reconstruction of psychoanalysis, which charges Freud with a "scientistic self-misunderstanding."" "This volume joins the issue with Marshall Edelson's defenses of the investigative viability of the single-subject case study method. As a spin-off from the import of the serious placebo challenge to psychoanalysis, this Monograph presents the author's widely recognized new account of the placebo concept across all of medicine and psychotherapy. Whereas Foundations of Psychoanalysis objected that Freud's dream theory was evidentially ill-founded, the burden of the present book is to give two new basic reasons for presuming the theory to be false. It also develops the import of the author's appraisal of psychoanalytic theory for the scrutiny of Freud's triadic psychology of religious belief in theism." "Since Sir Karl Popper's most detailed charge of pseudoscience against psychoanalysis in 1983 could not be examined for inclusion in the 1984 book, the present monograph shows in what ways it is wide of the mark as an incoherent diagnosis of the scientific liabilities of psychoanalytic theory. In addition, four important papers that had antedated Foundations by a few years and were scattered over diverse publications have been updated and integrated with the other chapters herein."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved. (shrink)

Psycholinguistic theories of meaning have developed within a univocal, explanatory model of science which is concerned with the use of language rather than its creation. Such a model is insufficient to deal with the complex data of human discourse with its multiple domains in speech, writing, reading, and interpreting. While recognizing the necessity of univocal explanatory procedures in the analysis of meaning the hermeneutic circle of explanation and understanding demands that "interpretation" occupy both a preliminary and a posterior place (...) within a scientific procedure. Problems of the univocal procedure in the study of language development, thought processes, and content analyses are more adequately handled by a hermeneutic model, such as the one developed by Paul Ricoeur on the works of Freud. Freudian psychoanalysis while approximating this model tends to be univocal rather than plurivocal in its treatment of the role of symbols in the creation of meaning. A hermeneutic model would place the crucial emphasis on a dialectic of both suspicion and affirmation. (shrink)

This collection brings together twenty-two later essays by Paul Ricoeur under the topics of structuralism, psychoanalysis, hermeneutics, and religion.

The topic of “Psychoanalysis and Theism” suggests two distinct questions. First, what is the import, if any, of psychoanalytic theory for the truth or falsity of theism? And furthermore, what was the attitude of Freud, the man, toward belief in God? It must be borne in mind that psychological explanations of any sort as to why people believe in God are subject to an important caveat. Even if they are true, such explanations are not entitled to beg the following different (...) question: Is religious belief justified by pertinent evidence or argument, whatever its motivational inspiration? Freud’s usage, as well as stylistic reasons of my own, prompt me to use the terms “religion” and “theism” more or less interchangeably, although in other contexts the notion of religion is, of course, more inclusive. (shrink)

"Well over one half of this brilliant new Monograph constitutes a major sequel to Professor Grunbaum's highly influential 1984 book The Foundations of Psychoanalysis: A Philosophical Critique, which was labeled "magisterial" by Frank J. Sulloway, and "the most important book ever written on Freud's status as a scientist" by J. Allan Hobson. The importance of the present Monograph lies in the extent to which the author now goes beyond that earlier volume to offer new original ideas on fundamental themes." "Validation (...) in the Clinical Theory of Psycho-analysis: A Study in the Philosophy of Psycho-analysis contains Adolf Grunbaum's new basic critique of the psychoanalytic theory of transference in its role of an etiologic theory; it turns out that etiologic transference interpretations rest on fallacious causal inferences from so-called "meaning connections" between mental states: moreover, just these unsound inferences are the stock-in-trade of the "hermeneutic" reconstruction of psychoanalysis, which charges Freud with a "scientistic self-misunderstanding."" "This volume joins the issue with Marshall Edelson's defenses of the investigative viability of the single-subject case study method. As a spin-off from the import of the serious placebo challenge to psychoanalysis, this Monograph presents the author's widely recognized new account of the placebo concept across all of medicine and psychotherapy. Whereas Foundations of Psychoanalysis objected that Freud's dream theory was evidentially ill-founded, the burden of the present book is to give two new basic reasons for presuming the theory to be false. It also develops the import of the author's appraisal of psychoanalytic theory for the scrutiny of Freud's triadic psychology of religious belief in theism." "Since Sir Karl Popper's most detailed charge of pseudoscience against psychoanalysis in 1983 could not be examined for inclusion in the 1984 book, the present monograph shows in what ways it is wide of the mark as an incoherent diagnosis of the scientific liabilities of psychoanalytic theory. In addition, four important papers that had antedated Foundations by a few years and were scattered over diverse publications have been updated and integrated with the other chapters herein."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved. (shrink)

This is a collection in translation of essays by Paul Ricoeur which presents a comprehensive view of his philosophical hermeneutics, its relation to the views of his predecessors in the tradition and its consequences for the social sciences. The volume has three parts. The studies in the first part examine the history of hermeneutics, its central themes and the outstanding issues it has to confront. In Part II, Ricoeur's own current, constructive position is developed. A concept of the text is (...) formulated as the implications of the theory are pursued into the domains of sociology, psychoanalysis and history. Many of the essays appear here in English for the first time; the editor's introduction brings out their background in Ricoeur's thought and the continuity of his concerns. The volume will be of great importance for those interested in hermeneutics and Ricoeur's contribution to it, and will demonstrate how much his approach offers to a number of disciplines. (shrink)

Using Grunbaum 1984 and 1993 as a springboard, Greenwood (this issue) claims to have offered several methodologically salubrious and exegetically illuminating theses on empirical evaluations of theoretical explanations of psychotherapeutic efficacy. According to his exegesis of Grunbaum's construction (1984, Ch. 2, Section C; 1993, 184-204) of Freud's "Tally Argument," that argument bespeaks a rife neglect of the epistemologically-significant distinction between empirical evaluations of the efficacy of psychotherapy and evaluations of theoretical explanations of that efficacy. Greenwood presents a defense of a (...) qualified version of Popper's critique of psychoanalysis against Grunbaum's objections to it (1984, Ch. 1B). Finally, Greenwood offers a clarification of the concept of a "placebo control" investigation, taking issue with Grunbaum's 1993 (84-87, 91-93). In the present paper, it is argued contra Greenwood that: (1) his purportedly "best" reading of Freud's Tally Argument and of its import founders, (2) the distinction that Greenwood bemoans as being neglected by mental health researchers actually is a commonplace in the literature on treatment-process and therapeutic outcome, (3) Greenwood's defense of Popper's critique of psychoanalysis is an anachronism, and (4) Greenwood's conceptual analysis of placebo controls is nebulous and misconceived. (shrink)

_Criticism and Conviction_ offers a rare opportunity to share personally in the intellectual life and journey of the eminent philosopher Paul Ricoeur. Internationally known for his influential works in hermeneutics, theology, psychoanalysis, and aesthetics, until now, Ricoeur has been conspicuously silent on the subject of himself. In this book--a conversation about his life and work with François Azouvi and Marc de Launay--Ricoeur reflects on a variety of philosophical, social, religious, and cultural topics, from the paradoxes of political power to the (...) relationship between life and art, and life and death. In the first of eight conversations, Ricoeur traces the trajectory of his life, recounting the origins of his convictions and the development of his intellect against the tragic events of the twentieth century. Declaring himself the "son of a victim of the First World War," Ricoeur, an orphan, sketches his early years in the house of stern but loving grandparents, and the molding of his intellect under the tutelage of Roland Dalbiez, Gabriel Marcel, and André Philip. Ricoeur tells the intriguing story of his capture and five-year imprisonment by the Germans during World War II, where he and his compatriots fashioned an intellectual life complete with a library and lectures, and where he, amazingly, was able to continue his dissertation research. Elegantly interweaving anecdotal with philosophical meditations, Ricoeur recounts his relationships with some of the twentieth century's greatest figures, such as Heidegger, Jaspers, and Eliade. He also shares his views on French philosophers and explains his tumultuous relationship with Jacques Lacan. And while expressing his deepest respect for the works of Claude Lévi-Strauss and Michel Foucault, Ricoeur reserves his greatest admiration for the narratologist Algirdas Julien Greimas. Ricoeur also explores the relationship between the philosophical and religious domains, attempting to reconcile the two poles in his thought. And readers who have struggled with Ricoeur's work will be grateful for these illuminating discussions that provide an invaluable key to his writings on language and narrative, especially those on metaphor and time. Spontaneous and lively, _Criticism and Conviction_ is a passionate confirmation of Ricoeur's eloquence, lucidity, and intellectual rigor, and affirms his position as one of this century's greatest thinkers. It is an essential book for anyone interested in philosophy and literary criticism. (shrink)

With respect to the reproach by habermas and ricoeur that freud will fall prey to a "scientistic self-misunderstanding" i submit that it was not freud, but these hermeneuticians themselves, who forced the clinical theory of psychoanalysis onto the procrustean bed of a philosophical ideology demonstrably alien to it. as against the generic "disavowal" of causal attributions advocated by some hermeneuticians, i maintain that it is a nihilistic, if not frivolous, trivialization of freud's entire clinical theory. far from serving as a (...) new citadel for psychoanalytic apologetics, the embrace of such hermeneuticians is, i submit, the kiss of death for the legacy that was to be saved. (edited). (shrink)

With his writings on phenomenology, psychoanalysis, Marxism, ideology, and religion, Paul Ricoeur has single-handedly redefined and revitalized the hermeneutic tradition. From Text to Action is an essential companion to the now classic The Conflict of Interpretations. Here, Ricoeur continues and extends his project of constructing a general theory of interpretation, positioning his work in relation to its own philosophical background: Hegel, Husserl, Gadamer, and Weber. He also responds to contemporary figures like K.O. Apel and Jürgen Habermas, connecting his own theorization (...) of ideology to their version of ideology critique. (shrink)

Incredible originality of thought in areas as vast as phenomenology, religion, hermeneutics, psychoanalysis, intersubjectivity, language, Marxism, and structuralism has made Paul Ricoeur one of the philosophical giants of the twentieth ...

By appealing to Paul Ricoeur’s view of interpretation as the dialectical process of understanding through explanation, Kenneth A. Reynhout contributes to the growing field of religion and science by developing an alternative understanding of interdisciplinary theology that is fundamentally hermeneutical.

Exploring Ricoeur’s hermeneutic theory of interpretation as a method of analysing research texts Increasingly, researchers use hermeneutic philosophy to inform the conduct of interpretive research. Congruence between the philosophical foundations of a study, and the methodological processes through which study findings are actualised, obliges hermeneutic researchers to use (or develop) hermeneutic approaches to research interviewing and textual analysis. Paul Ricoeur’s theory of interpretation provides one approach through which researchers using hermeneutics can achieve congruence between philosophy, methodology and method.Ricoeur’s theory of (...) interpretation acknowledges the interrelationship between epistemology (interpretation) and ontology (interpreter). Also, Ricoeur notes the way interpretation moves forward from naive understanding, where the interpreter has a superficial grasp of the whole of the text, to deeper understanding, where the interpreter understands the parts of the text in relation to the whole and the whole of the text in relation to its parts (the hermeneutic circle). In this way, Ricoeur’s theory of interpretation provides researchers with a method of developing intersubjective knowledge.Through exposition of the concepts of Ricoeur’s theory, which include distanciation, appropriation, explanation and understanding, guess, and validation, a hermeneutic approach to textual analysis is presented, discussed and critiqued. Examples from nursing research are also used to demonstrate points under discussion. It is suggested that, in conjunction with Gadamer’s hermeneutic of understanding, Ricoeur’s theory of interpretation warrants consideration as a method of textual analysis. (shrink)

The philosophical concept of anxiety, which is usually associated with Kierkegaard and Heidegger's existential philosophy, seems to be an underestimated notion in Paul Ricoeur's phenomenological hermeneutics, while its role is important - anxiety appears to serve as the grounding for hope in his hermeneutics of self. The article aims to show how the anxiety is explained in Ricoeur's philosophy through attention and recognition, and how the anxiety is reflected in the narrative forms, or descriptions of vivencia. These descriptions may be (...) seen as the verbal explanation of the so-called affective niche or affective scaffolding, which is a form of cultural adaptation, attempting to interpret and comprehend one's state of mind and way of the perception of the world as such in the given moment. The research and further dialogue based on these narrations may become an important source to recover from anxiety disorder, by discovering its existential meaning and, at the same time, accepting personal responsibility for it. Ricoeur's phenomenological hermeneutics made an important theoretical contribution in understanding the essential aspects of anxiety and hope; but it also developed prolific methods of interpretation, that could be practically applied in health care and psychotherapy; these can be shown on the example of the psychotherapeutic method of the usage of so-called 'anxiety protocols', which aim to arrange the hermeneutical co-research to help patient/client to recognize and overcome its anxiety disorders. (shrink)

Much of traditional rabbinic hermeneutics, what I call "midrashic interpretation," appears to be of such a bizarre nature as to require some sort of explanation, or even justification. This essay attempts to provide a philosophical foundation for midrashic interpretation by placing it in the context of the idea (vaguely neo-platonic) that God is only fully realized as the result of a certain process, a process of which midrashic interpretation is an essential part. In the final section I attempt to (...) spell out some connections between the specifically Jewish question of rabbinic hermeneutics and some more general ideas in philosophy and psychoanalysis. (shrink)

Paul Ricoeur's early appreciation of hermeneutics introduced a dynamic interaction between a reader and a text. Employing both explanation and understanding, aided by the catalyst of Kantian creative imagination, Ricoeur revitalized hermeneutics from being simply a method of interpreting the literal meaning of a text. Such an openness to the text, as a form of otherness, initiated new insights into human ways of being and acting. In time, however, Ricoeur became disheartened by the unmerited suffering that he witnessed human (...) beings were inflicting on other beings. He qualified his hermeneutic foundations so as to introduce compassion and justice as modes of action towards rejected and mistreated others. (shrink)

Hermeneutic and anti-hermeneutic sides in the debate about psychoanalysis are entangled in an epistemological and methodological antinomy, here exemplified by Grünbaum's and Spence's paradigmatic views. Both contain a partial element of truth, which they assert dialectically one against the other (§§ 1 and 2). This antinomy disappears only by reconciling an operationalist approach with man's ability to suspend the effectiveness of the‘laws’ applied to him (§ 3). The hermeneutic way in which the technical-operational criterion of truth works in psychoanalysis demands (...) that clinical and extra-clinical testing methods work synergically, through a fruitful self-correcting strategy, grounded on the very psychoanalytic object: the unconscious (§ 4). (shrink)

This book probes the texts of Paul Ricoeur and Edith Stein to disclose the role of silence in the creation of meaning. To understand and live out of contemplative awareness as a way to think through transformative human experience is an ethical and spiritual task, one that warrants explanation and interpretation.

This striking Lacanian contribution to discourse analysis is also a critique of contemporary psychological abstraction, as well as a reassessment of the radical opposition between psychology and psychoanalysis. This original introduction to Lacan's work bridges the gap between discourseanalytical debates in social psychology and the social-theoretical extensions of discourse theory. David Pavón Cuéllar provides a precise definition and a detailed explanation of key Lacanian concepts, and illustrates how they may be put to work on a concrete discourse, in this (...) case a fragment of an interview obtained by the author from the Mexican underground Popular Revolutionary Forces (EPR). Throughout the book, Lacanian concepts are compared to their counterparts in psychology. Such a comparison reveals insuperable incompatibilities between the two series of concepts. The author shows that Lacan's psychoanalytical terminology can neither be translated nor assimilated to the terms of current psychology. Among the notions in actual or potential competition with Lacanian concepts, the book deals with those proposed by semiology, Marxism, phenomenology, constructionism, deconstruction, and hermeneutics. Taking a stand on those theoretical positions, each chapter includes detailed discussion of the contribution of classical approaches to language; including Barthes, Bakhtin, Althusser, Politzer, Wittgenstein, Berger and Luckmann, Derrida, and Ricoeur. There is sustained reference in the body of the text to the arguments of Lacan and Lacanians, of Miller, Milner, Soler, and Zizek. At the same time, in the extensive notes accompanying the text, there is a systematic reappraisal and reinterpretation of debates and pieces of research work in social psychology, especially in a discursive and critical domain that has incorporated elements of psychoanalytic theory. (shrink)

This article reviews the relationship between psychoanalysis and hermeneutics through the lens of the work of several principal psychoanalysts and philosophers: Commencing with an analysis of Daniel Gerber’s interpretation of the subject, foregrounding essential elements of Freud’s oeuvre in support of Ricoeur’s inquiry, the propositions of Paul Ricoeur and Hans-Georg Gadamer are examined. Finally, the critiques of Jacques Lacan and Michel Tort are revisited to address the matter at hand.

In my paper, 'The science of psychoanalysis,' I make two assumptions. First, I assume that a 'hermeneutic science' is not a contradiction in terms. Second, I assume that explanations of why someone behaved as they did in terms of motives are a form of causal explanation, and therefore that inferring what someone's motives are from their behavior is a form of causal inference. In his commentary, Gipps objects to both of these assumptions, and this gives me the opportunity to (...) clarify them. Following the focus of Gipps's commentary, I shall concentrate primarily on the issue of science, and discuss causation only in relation to this.Herein, I am not concerned to defend a detailed positive theory of... (shrink)

Hermeneutics and narration: a way to deal with qualitative data This article focuses a hermeneutic approach on the interpretation of narratives. It is based on the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur's theory of interpretation but modified and used within a caring science paradigm. The article begins with a presentation of the theoretical underpinnings of hermeneutic philosophy and narration, as well as Ricoeur's theory of interpretation, before going on to describe the interpretation process as modified by the authors. The interpretation process, which (...) consists of several stages, is exemplified and discussed using a single case from a larger study on suffering. The results of that study indicate that the struggle of suffering is perceived as a struggle formed between shame and dignity, and that nurses must engage in the process of preserving and restoring the dignity of their suffering patients. The authors suggest that Ricoeur's theory of interpretation is useful when trying to understand narrative data if the researcher realises that the process of distanciation, although central in Ricoeur's thinking, is not the goal of the process but rather a means to deal with the researcher's pre‐understandings. According to Ricoeur, distanciation is accomplished by putting the context aside and dealing with the text ‘as text’ and thereby explaining its meaning. Explanation thus becomes the dialectic counterpart to understanding in the interpretation process. The researchers further argue that distanciation must be followed by reflection, where the interpretations are linked back to the empirical context. (shrink)

Grünbaum argues that psychoanalysis cannot justify its inferences regarding motives using its own methodology, as only the employment of Mill’s canons can justify causal inferences (which inferences to motives are). I consider an argument offered by Hopkins regarding the nature and status of our everyday inferences from other people’s behavior to their motives that seeks to rebut Grünbaum’s charge by defending a form of inference to the best explanation that makes use of connections in intentional content between behavior and (...) motives. I argue that Hopkins succeeds in defeating Grünbaum’s objection as it is presented, but that work in social psychology presents a further challenge. I discuss the extent to which the challenge can be met, and conclude that certain types of inference in psychoanalysis are justifiable, but others, including those which are the target of Grünbaum’s objection, cannot be justified by the methods defended by Hopkins. (shrink)

This is a collection in translation of essays by Paul Ricoeur which presents a comprehensive view of his philosophical hermeneutics, its relation to the views of his predecessors in the tradition and its consequences for the social sciences. The volume has three parts. The studies in the first part examine the history of hermeneutics, its central themes and the outstanding issues it has to confront. In Part II, Ricoeur's own current, constructive position is developed. A concept of the text is (...) formulated as the implications of the theory are pursued into the domains of sociology, psychoanalysis and history. Many of the essays appear here in English for the first time; the editor's introduction brings out their background in Ricoeur's thought and the continuity of his concerns. The volume will be of great importance for those interested in hermeneutics and Ricoeur's contribution to it, and will demonstrate how much his approach offers to a number of disciplines. (shrink)

"To explain more is to understand better". This is the mantra by which French philosopher Paul Ricoeur lived and worked, establishing himself as one of the twentieth century's most lucid and broad-ranging critical thinkers. A prisoner of war at 27, Ricoeur was also Dean of Paris X Nanterre during the student disturbances of 1968. In later years he became an outspoken champion of social justice. In work as in life, Ricoeur was committed to the challenges of conflict and the prospect (...) of authentic resolution. Deeply indebted to phenomenology and the hermeneutical tradition of Heidegger and Gadamer, Ricoeur was also an advocate of structural linguistics, of psychoanalysis, and a rare conversant with the Anglo-American analytic tradition. This volume explores how literature and the conflicts of literary-theoretical debate inform Ricoeur's theory of imagination and understanding, and how Ricoeur's unique mode of literary reflection resolves the conflicts of literature's theoretical heyday, presaging a new direction for literary studies. (shrink)

Paul Ricoeur is one of the most wide-ranging of thinkers alive today. Although nominally a philosopher, his work also cuts across the subjects of literary criticism, psychoanalysis, history, religion legal studies and politics. Its implications are even broader. Ricoeur works out a 'theory of reading' or hermeneutics, which extends far beyond the reading of literary works to build into a theory for the reading of 'life'. This volume looks at the contexts for Ricoeur's thought, his key ideas and their impact. (...) These key ideas include: good and evil' hermeneutics, psychoanalysis, metaphor, narrative, ethics, politics and justice. (shrink)

For Ricœur any study of Freud, or of psychoanalysis more generally, needs to take into account the crucial dimension of the analytic experience itself. Psychoanalysis, as a “mixed discourse,” aims to anticipate questions of meaning and explication alongside technical questions of energies, repression, displacement, and so on. The analytic experience is one which is practical and intersubjective, but which is also guided by various techniques or methods. These techniques, I will argue, should be understood as a type of techne, one (...) which is less concerned with hermeneutic questions of meaning than with quasi-scientific questions of force, feedback, struggle, and process. The practice of psychoanalysis, on the other hand, deals with the ways in which these forces or drives become meaningful for a particular subject, and within a singular context or history. This article will aim to draw out both the interrelationship between techniques and practical understanding, and also the productive incommensurability between the two. (shrink)

Freud is often credited with having revealed the irrational content of psychology and thus undermined traditional ideas of human rationality. This is only part of the truth. Psychoanalysis also questions traditional ideas of irrationality. It shows that dreams, neurotic symptoms and other apparently irrational psychological phenomena have a meaning and a rationality. Phenomenological (Laing) and hermeneutic (Ricoeur) accounts are criticized. Freud argues that there is a continuity between rationality and irrationality. He associates rationality with control by consciousness and freedom. However, (...) there are contradictions in Freud's account which enable it to be interpreted either as a conservative or radical social philosophy. (shrink)

In the realm of the humanities, Paul Ricoeur (1913–2005) is widely viewed as one of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth century. He published an impressive and comprehensive oeuvre that made an impact on almost all areas of the humanities. By combining the resources and insights of phenomenology and hermeneutics, he developed new perspectives on the text, on metaphor, on narrative, and on personal identity that pervaded theology, history, linguistics, psychoanalysis, ethics,(philosophical) anthropology, cognitive sciences, and so on. In light (...) of his centennial in 2013, the question arises whether his theories have a future and can be extended to capture new phenomena studied in the humanities: What is the impact and meaning of the oeuvre of Paul Ricoeur for the humanities? In particular, one may develop this question as follows: Which of Ricoeur’s major contributions can be expected to remain relevant for the humanities? In what way can we relate Ricoeur’s oeuvre to ideas and methods of other philosophers and scientists? Does Ricoeur’s paradigm of the text still provide a relevant framework for thinking about the basic questions that concern the humanities today? If so, how can we bring Ricoeur’s perspective in a fruitful tension or dialogue with other, competing paradigms? (shrink)

Nous tentons, dans ce livre, d’analyser le déplacement de l’herméneutique ricœurienne de la théorie du texte à la théorie de l’action et à celle de la traduction. Par cette analyse, nous visons premièrement à mettre en relief la dialectique, que Ricœur s’efforce d’établir, aussi bien dans la théorie de l’action que dans la théorie de l’histoire, entre comprendre et expliquer, entre herméneutique et sciences humaines. Tout en analysant la relation dialectique entre comprendre, expliquer et interpréter, le livre propose, deuxièmement, une (...) herméneutique du discours oral, en général, et du dialogue, en particulier. Cette herméneutique proposée dépasse relativement l'herméneutique de Ricœur qui exclut explicitement le discours oral de son herméneutique. Toutefois, elle est également considérée comme une extension de l'herméneutique ricœurienne, car elle est fondée sur son paradigme du texte et celui de la traduction. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to propose a hermeneutics of the judicial text based on Paul Ricoeur’s philosophy. For this purpose, the paper will propose, firstly, how to approach the judicial decision as text; secondly, the paper will argue from Paul Ricoeur’s notion of “Hermeneutic Arc,” how explanation and understanding as a hermeneutic method are given in the judicial decision. The final purpose is to show how in some cases the comprehension of ourselves could go through the hermeneutics (...) made to the judicial text. (shrink)

Collected and translated by John B. Thompson, this collection of essays by Paul Ricoeur includes many that had never appeared in English before the volume's publication in 1981. As comprehensive as it is illuminating, this lucid introduction to Ricoeur's prolific contributions to sociological theory features his more recent writings on the history of hermeneutics, its central themes and issues, his own constructive position and its implications for sociology, psychoanalysis and history. Presented in a fresh twenty-first-century series livery, and including a (...) specially commissioned preface written by Charles Taylor, illuminating its enduring importance and relevance to philosophical enquiry, this classic work has been revived for a new generation of readers. (shrink)

From 1959 until 1969, Heidegger lectured to psychiatrists and psychiatry students at the University of Zurich Psychiatric Clinic and in Zollikon. The transcriptions of these lectures were published as the Zollikon Seminars. In these seminars Heidegger is highly critical of psychoanalysis, because of its causal and objectifying approach to the human being. In general, Heidegger considers it an objectification or even an elimination of the human being to approach a patient from a causal perspective. In our view Heidegger has overlooked (...) the peculiar nature and complexity of psychotherapy and psychiatry, namely that psychiatry is not just a discipline that combines a hermeneutical approach and a natural science approach on a theoretical level, but it also deals with psychopathology in practice. We argue, also referring to Strawson and Gadamer, that in psychiatric practice causal explanation and hermeneutic understanding are no mutually exclusive approaches. We conclude that the encounter of philosophy and psychiatry in matters of causality and motivation could be particularly fruitful when the practical situation is addressed, recognizing the special character of psychopathology. (shrink)

This collection brings together twenty-two essays by Paul Ricoeur under the topics of structuralism, psychoanalysis, hermeneutics, and religion. In dramatic conciseness, the essays illuminate the work of one of the leading philosophers of the day. Those interested in Ricoeur's development of the philosophy of language will find rich and suggestive reading. But the diversity of essays also speaks beyond the confines of philosophy to linguists, theologians, psychologists, and psychoanalysts.

Philosophical engagements with psychoanalysis have taken several forms. Some have offered a philosophical re-vision of psychoanalytical understandings of human nature. Thus, we have Boss, Binswanger, Sartre, and Merleau-Ponty offering us existential-phenomenological; Ricoeur hermeneutic; Lacan structuralist; and Heaton, Elder, and Fingarette Wittgensteinian, readings of unconscious life and of therapeutic action. Such philosophical elaborations of the most apt reflective and the most fruitful revisionary understanding of dynamic unconsciousness also involve parallel critique of such aspects of psychoanalytical psychology's immanent self-understanding as...

This series provides short, accessible and lively introduction to the major schools, movements and traditions in philosophy and the history of ideas since the beginning of the Enlightenment. All books in the series are written for undergraduates meeting the subject for the first time. Hermeneutics concerns itself with the theory of understanding and the interpretation of language. The question of how to correctly interpret and understand others remains one of the most contested branches of philosophy. In Understanding Hermeneutics Lawrence Schmidt (...) provides an introduction to modern hermeneutics through a systematic examination of the ideas of its key philosophical proponents. Chapter 1 examines the ideas, of the Protestant theologian, Friedrich Schleiermacher, who argues that misunderstanding is always possible so we must always employ interpretation if we are to understnad correctly. Chapter 2 discusses the ideas of Dilthey, who maintains that understanding in the humanities is fundamentally different from explanation in the natural sciences, and who presents a methodology to judge what another person means or feels by means of their language and also their gestures, facial expressions, and manners of acting. Chapter 3 explores the ideas of Heidegger who radicalizes the concept by shifting its focus from interpreting texts to an existential interpretation of human being. In Chapter 4 the recent ideas of Gadamer are examined, which extend to examining the structures of hermeneutic experience and to question the supremacy of the natural sciences as models for truth. The final chapters consider some of the criticisms and controversies surrounding hermeneutics, including the work of Habermas, Hirsch, Ricoeur and Derrida, and the prospects for the future of hermeneutics. (shrink)

This article searches in this pages that follow to reflect on the uptake of symbols and meanings of texts from the perspective of the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur. For this, as foundation brings up the discussion of the elements that make up its hermeneutic phenomenology of associative manner, aiming, in turn, to go beyond the task of capturing the meaning of texts and symbols. Thus, the research notes that the philosopher seems to want to apply a legitimate effort in understanding (...) ourselves and, above all, in the world. However, this perspective, it is not easy to see relations between understanding and explanation, since his own notion of text has a certain recovery of the meeting remain regarding how to cope with such relationships. Finally, this article argues through existential notions, the ricouerian hermeneutical defense of philosophy as enlightening function, then going to be an attempt at expression and proclamation of the sense of the unsaid. (shrink)

This article aims to clarify the sharp contrast between the “short path” of Heideggerian ontology and the “long path” adopted by Ricoeur as a representation of the many necessary mediations in the constitution of his philosophical anthropology. Heidegger breaks into contemporary thought with the publication of his treatise “Being and Time” (1927) as a kind of direct settlement in the field of ontology. In contrast, Ricoeur is seen - and sees himself - as a thinker of conceptual mediations in his (...) long itinerary, since adherence to Husserlian phenomenology and subsequent hermeneutic inflection, passing through confrontations with Freudian psychoanalysis, structuralism and analytical philosophy, to the creation of the book “Oneself as Another” (1990). However, the two philosophers built their works on the common horizon of hermeneutics; therefore, are there possible points of convergence between them? And how could we interpret the relevance of this possible interlocution? These questions cannot be answered without a thorough comparative reading. This text does not intend to answer them, but only to suggest elements for further investigations. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hermeneutics, Neuroscience and PsychiatryMichael T. H. Wong, MBBS, MD, MA, MDiv, PhD, FRCPsych, FRANZCP, FHKAM (bio)Hermeneutic practice in mental health has been a theme in Philosophy, Psychiatry, & Psychology (PPP) since its very beginnings. In this essay I argue that hermeneutics, the theory and practice of interpretation, promotes therapeutic interaction between mental health professionals, patients and their family.Why does this patient present in such a way at this particular (...) point in time? The distressing symptoms are there. The changes in behavior are obvious. Impairments of functions are hurting. A mental illness clearly runs in the family. There were early losses of loved ones, physical abuse at home, bullying by peers and self-medication with drugs and alcohol. Three in four adults with a mental illness first experienced that before they turned 24. The brain goes through major reorganization during adolescence and early adulthood. If synaptic pruning went wrong, psychoses emerged. When stresses activated the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis the elevated cortisol level impacted the size and function of the hippocampus and amygdala in the genetically vulnerable; anxiety, depression, bipolar, and personality disorders developed. The patient needs a voice/language to describe all these experiences and events and the psychiatrist needs a discourse to make sense of them.Eisenberg laments the swings between "brainlessness" and "mindlessness" in psychiatry. Engel argues for a "biopsychosocial" discourse. The major challenge for psychiatry is how to organize clinical information of different nature (categories, dimensions, narratives; i.e., objective vs. subjective, personal vs. interpersonal) into a coherent and comprehensible account for us all. Mental illnesses are not only neuropsychiatric spectrum disorders but also dysfunctions of social relationship and environmental/ecological adaptation. Psychiatry as a clinical neuroscience per se lacks the semantics to address the rich interactions between the physical, psychological, social, cultural, and spiritual in the illness experience of our patients. Explanation in the diagnostic formulation (objective scientific discourse on cause and effect) and understanding in the patient narrative (subjective ordinary everyday discourse on significance and meaning) are irreducible to each other (Wong, 2018). They instead interact with one another to achieve an integrative formulation, not through merging different discourses into a single assertion/monologue but via the dialectic/dialogue of "explaining more in order to understand better," as Ricoeur puts it, and between "the whole and the parts," as Schleiermacher highlights.This "therapeutic hermeneutic circle" of "explanation vs understanding" and "the whole vs the parts" includes symptoms behavior function and life events. It correlates between bio-psychosociocultural-spiritual dimensions/perspectives and does not reduce them to any particular/single [End Page 13] stance. The whole integrates the parts and the parts enrich the whole. It explains but does not explain away. It understands through an articulation of meaning and significance. This discourse is a multilayered (bio-psycho-social-cultural-spiritual) personal narrative that formulates diagnosis and care in a correlative (linking different voices/discourses) and non-reductive (no particular voice/discourse is prejudiced against) manner that is comprehensible to us all (Wong, 2021).PPP will be an excellent forum for discussing clinical hermeneutics in the future. In this digital era of social media and virtual reality, hermeneutics has the never-ending task to tackle the unprecedented challenges to meaning illness and health posed by polarizing discourses.Michael T. H. Wong Michael T.H. Wong, MBBS, MD, MA, MDiv, PhD, FRCPsych, FRANZCP, FHKAM, is Hon Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry, School of Clinical Medicine, LKS Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong, HKSAR, China. Michael is Chair, Section of Philosophy & Humanities in Psychiatry, World Psychiatric Association. He is an Organizational Partner & International Lead with The Collaborating Centre for Values-Based Practice in Health and Social Care, St Catherine's College Oxford. He is Advisor to the Chinese Health Foundation of Australia.ReferencesWong M. T. H. (2018). Ricoeur and the third discourse of the person: From philosophy and neuroscience to psychiatry and theology. London: Lexington Books. Google ScholarWong, M. T. H. (2021). Values, meanings, hermeneutics and mental health. In Stoyanov, D., Fulford, K. M. W. F., Stanghellini, G., Van Staden, W., & Wong, M. TH. (Eds.), International perspectives in values-based mental health practice: Case studies and commentaries (pp. 341–349... (shrink)

This paper is a review article of Elyn R. Saks's book "Interpreting Interpretation: The Limits of Hermeneutic Psychoanalysis" published in 1999. In the article Saks's approach is criticized for lacking a proper background understanding of hermeneutics and its place in psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis, whether we name it hermeneutic or not, will always deal with both meanings and causes. The role of hermeneutics in psychoanalysis can, thus, not be to get rid of the metapsychology of the unconscious altogether, but rather to stress (...) that the causal explanations are enacted in a dialogue where new meaning is brought forth by interpreting the past. (shrink)

Eoin Carney | : Continuing on from recent discussions on the overlap between Paul Ricoeur’s philosophy and care ethics, this article will aim to clarify the status of practice in Ricoeur’s work. I will argue that even though Ricoeur’s philosophy is indeed marked by its “desire for a foundation,” as care ethicist Joan Tronto has pointed out, this aim is more of a fragile wager than a principle, and is always at risk of being overturned by practices and other worldviews. (...) I will demonstrate this point by arguing that Ricoeur’s hermeneutic approach to practice leads to the view that objective methods of knowledge and explanation are always grounded by the broader hermeneutic task of practical understanding and care for the self; in moral reasoning, Ricoeur’s analysis of the conflict between respect for the rule and respect for persons results in his prioritizing of respect for the singular other rather than the universal rule, meaning that the other can always disrupt and reorient universal or foundational modes of reasoning; and finally within healthcare relations Ricoeur aims to develop an alternative understanding of respect that places it in a dialectical relation with care. These practice-oriented readings of hermeneutics, morality, and respect aim to open up a dialogue between care ethics and philosophical approaches that have often been placed outside of care ethics. | : Poursuivant les récentes discussions concernant les recoupements entre la philosophie de Paul Ricoeur et les éthiques du care, cet article a pour objectif de clarifier le statut de la pratique dans l’oeuvre de Ricoeur. Je soutiendrai que même si la philosophie ricoeurienne est bien marquée par un « désir d’un fondement », ainsi que l’éthicienne du care Joan C. Tronto le souligne, cet objectif repose plus sur un pari que sur un véritable principe, et risque toujours d’être renversé par les pratiques ou d’autres visions du monde. Je démontrerai cela en soutenant trois arguments. 1) L’approche herméneutique de Ricoeur concernant la pratique mène à penser que les méthodes objectives de connaissance et d’explication sont toujours soutenues par une tâche herméneutique plus large de la compréhension pratique et du souci de soi. 2) En ce qui a trait au raisonnement moral, l’analyse de Ricoeur sur le conflit entre le respect de la règle et le respect de la personne accorde la priorité au respect de l’autre singulier plutôt que de la règle universelle. Ainsi, l’autre peut toujours perturber et réorienter l’universel ou les modes fondateurs du raisonnement. 3) Réfléchissant aux relations thérapeutiques, Ricoeur tend à suggérer une nouvelle compréhension du respect qui se place dans une relation dialectique avec le souci. Ces lectures – de l’herméneutique, de la moralité et du respect – orientées vers la pratique ouvrent la voie à un dialogue entre les éthiques du care et des approches philosophiques que l’on considère souvent éloignées de celles-ci. (shrink)

Apart from being a pervasive concept of present-day law, human dignity is a phenomenon regularly experienced by people in their lives. Yet before any protection for it can be advanced, it is imperative that an explanation of how human dignity is at all possible be established, including a description of its constitutive figures. Paul Ricoeur made a significant contribution to the lacking phenomenology of human dignity. Despite only rarely using the term dignity directly, he identified and described its three (...) constitutive and interdependent figures—self-esteem, self-respect, and recognition—and embedded them amongst such notions as self, identity, narrative, passivity, bodiliness, fragility, morality, and law. He activated the phenomenological, existentialist, and hermeneutic legacies in understanding human dignity and succeeded in modifying certain sharp-edged structures that have periodically been associated with the notion of human dignity. In this paper I argue that human dignity is a high-ranking topic in Ricoeur’s writings, identify and synthesize the phenomenology of human dignity scattered throughout his works, and reveal the profound existential aspects he attributed to it. Finally, I discuss and evaluate his phenomenological-existentialistic account of human dignity, particularly taking into consideration the contemporary use of human dignity in law and its associated discourses. (shrink)

French introduction to “Ricoeur and Psychoanalysis” – ERRS, 2016, 7, 1.