I got a note from Ken indicating that he's "working on...a carefully constructed
post [and will] try to veer it toward JH," so I'm expecting a long rejoinder.
But I need to say that I'm not looking forward to dwelling more soon with
psychoanalysis and JH's early career. Here's a philosopher who's very alive and
engaged with contemporary issues, having a major essay available on free will,
etc., which no one has suggested interest in discussing (apart from my
excitement about it)---a philosopher who comes out with new books in English
regularly, which no one here discusses.

It's been about 30 years since JH was involved with psychoanalytic psychology (a
thesis that evidently fell on deaf ears through the at-least-54 relevant
postings between Ken and I, 1999-2000). JH's interest in cognitive developmental
learning (his overt disengagement with psychoanalytic ego psychology) was
followed, after _TCA_ (a so-called "magnum opus" that has nothing to do with
psychoanalysis), by the critique of subject-centered reason, echoed later in JH'
sense of individuation through socialization. There may be fascinating relations
between an appeal of psychoanalytic cultural critique and subject-centered
reasoning. *There*'s something to discuss.

But a more interesting feature of JH's development, for me, is the
anthropological sense of lifeworld, echoed in his very recent engagement with
contemporary science of "mind" in "nature".

Then, I associate with *all* that the longstanding departure from psychoanalytic
modeling by developmental psychology itself (which has even departed from
Piaget---not to mention the important Jungian break with Freud related to
interest in healthy individuation, which is not about Jungianism so much as it's
about the incompatibility of Freud's work with interest in healthy development)
and prevailing trends in professional therapy, mentioned earlier this week
(which I would continue in terms of cost/benefit concerns about efficacy of
psychoanalytic practice). Altogether, these developments provide a rich basis
for thinking differently than "psychoanalysis" does (as best I can see) about
whatever issue.

Besides, what *is* psychoanalysis---as if its some singular rubric? There *is*
no such creature.

Is one talking about the psychology that someone's "psychoanalysis" proffers? If
one thinks about what a psychology has to be in order to be properly called
"psychoanalytic," is one talking about something other than an era in the
intellectual history of understanding mental disorder? In other words, has
specifically-"psychoanalytic" psychology been antedated by its own influence on
developmental psychology?

When one speaks globally about "psychoanalysis," is one talking about
*practices* that began in classical psychoanalysis, but are now parts of
eclectic psychotherapy? What kind of *effiicacious*practice is it that is
properly psychoanalytic?

With "psychoanalysis," is one talking about things associable with
psychoanalystS (the live bodies), but which aren't especially "psychoanalytic,"
i.e., features which just as well apply to practitioners who aren't
psychoanalysts (e.g., concern for self-efficacy, mental health, development,
imagination, dreams, fantasy, projection, object relations, etc.)?

Or, last but not least, is one talking about psychoanalysis as a mode of inquiry
(a favorite with cultural theorists, which JH has long left behind)---or,
rather, is psychoanalysis-as-inquiry some mix of modes of inquiry? What is
properly "psychoanalytic" here *as inquiry* that's not better understood as
structured interviewing (via clinical psychology generally) and hermeneutics
(which was JH's interest)? What makes a mix of modes of inquiry especially
interesting as properly "psychoanalytic"? How does all this compare with normal
work in philosophy of mind? Look at JH's recent essay on free will, etc., and
let's ask what JH thinks philosophy of mind is about.

I have no doubt that lots of interesting things can be said by the subindustry
in cultural studies that attends to "psychoanalysis", as it's an important topic
of intellectual history, especially as cultural hermeneutics of marginality and
social pathology. (Derrida was married to a psychoanalyst, but that didn't make
deconstruction especially psychoanalytic. Now *there*'s an interesting topic:
psychoanalytic reading and deconstruction---something I was intimately involved
with a long time ago, but still do sometimes via response to postings). But I
would argue that insight about marginality and social pathology isn't being led
toward *dissolution* of these conditions/situations by new promise within
"psychoanalytic" theorization.

(By the way, the reality of Ken's desire for rejoinder is that he has soon to
appear a book version of his dissertation on psychoanalysis, Habermas, and
whatever else---revised dissertation, I imagine---and my giving psychoanalysis
short shrift is a personal affront.)

--------------------------------------------------------

So little can be said constructively via the short-reading expectations of this
medium, the email posting. (Who has even read this far? I'll give you $1000, if
you send a postcard to....)

I think of Habermas broadly relative to interests in bridging progressive
practice in the actual world with progressive inquiry in interdisciplinary
studies.

What holds appealing promise for helping us understand healthy human
development, efficacious psychotherapy, or educational excellence? What might be
piloted for practical dissemination to do substantial good for public health,
education, community, etc.? This relates to my comments about efficacy in
therapy.

What has great promise for fostering interdisciplinary inquiry and communication
related to cognitive science or the evolutionary nature of mind?

I'm trying to make time to better understand things I can't articulate in
Habermasian terms, while knowing of no philosopher who is more exemplary of
what, I believe, philosophy should be about.

So, I give scarce free time to a Web spot that honors Habermas' career, and I
defend him against critique as best I have time to do---maybe sometimes managing
to imagine his tenability beyond his own arguments, as something appropriately
associable with his Project (my legacy of his influence mapped back into the
reading of others reading him). I stay eager for interaction that really
stimulates thinking, but so want to move on from the same old topics. I have 50+
books nearby I want to find time to read---if only more great stuff didn't
arise. (Hey, I'm *not* at risk of losing focus.)

I seek to somehow hold good some progressive pragmatism, between idealism and
realism, that may make some constructive difference, and here, I don't find
psychoanalysis helpful—or I'm dwelling with what seems to interconnect exciting
new kinds of inquiry (like "evolutionary cognitive neuroscience," MIT Press,
2006—what a discursive formation!)—wanting to make some post-postmodern way to
enhance prospects for grandly open-ended discourse that also stays intimate with
the interest in improving actual lives (not *as* discourse, but relative to my
labyrinthine "Theory/theory/practice" complex that I've sketched). I have no
good ending for this long posting because I feel excitement about beginnings.
Besides, healthy ("authentic") existential time is led by its futurity, not
remembrance.

Gary




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