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Lacan and Science
The current volume represents an exciting collection of essays critically examining the relation between modern science and Lacanian psychoanalysis in approaching the question of mental suffering. Lacan & Science tackles more widely the role and logic of scientific practice in general, taking as its focus psychic processes. Constituting an invaluable addition to existing literature, this comprehensive volume offers a fresh insight into Lacans conception of the subject and its implications.
- GenresPsychoanalysisTheory
338 pages, Paperback
First published December 31, 2002
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February 12, 2026review text for 4415
August 13, 2018
Although Lacan and Science is a collection of essays, upon reflection I am a little baffled as to why its editors, Jason Glynos and Yannis Stavrakakis didn't expand their own thoughts into a collaborative monograph. Their contributions to this work are by far its most interesting content.
Glynos provides the opening two chapters in this collection. The first, reflecting on psychoanalysis's state as a science and its uncertain relationship to empiricism, is a solid enough work. Nonetheless, it is the second essay, in which he retraces Lacan's genealogy of the subject of science from Descartes and beyond that is really insightful. I particularly like the way he emphasizes how science, in neutralizing the question of desire, also mutes the importance of ethics.
The other highlight of the collection is a collaboration between Glynos and Stavrakakis that forms a detailed rebuttal to Sokal and Bricmont's critique of Lacan in Fashionable Nonsense. For some reason, this is the only essay in the book to deal with the Sokal hoax, even though it seems to me such a central event in the relationship between Lacan and science. Glynos and Stavrakakis do a pretty good job of defending Lacan, although I feel that their decision to limit themselves to Lacan and not the larger arguments of Fashionable Nonsense is a mistake.
The other essays in Lacan and Science are generally fine but hardly groundbreaking. Dany Nobus is insightful as usual, for instance, while Bruce Fink's chapter looks suspiciously like a draft for Lacan on Love: An Exploration of Lacan's Seminar VIII, Transference. As such, this collection probably deserves closer to three-and-a-half stars, but since that's not possible, it gets four.
Glynos provides the opening two chapters in this collection. The first, reflecting on psychoanalysis's state as a science and its uncertain relationship to empiricism, is a solid enough work. Nonetheless, it is the second essay, in which he retraces Lacan's genealogy of the subject of science from Descartes and beyond that is really insightful. I particularly like the way he emphasizes how science, in neutralizing the question of desire, also mutes the importance of ethics.
The other highlight of the collection is a collaboration between Glynos and Stavrakakis that forms a detailed rebuttal to Sokal and Bricmont's critique of Lacan in Fashionable Nonsense. For some reason, this is the only essay in the book to deal with the Sokal hoax, even though it seems to me such a central event in the relationship between Lacan and science. Glynos and Stavrakakis do a pretty good job of defending Lacan, although I feel that their decision to limit themselves to Lacan and not the larger arguments of Fashionable Nonsense is a mistake.
The other essays in Lacan and Science are generally fine but hardly groundbreaking. Dany Nobus is insightful as usual, for instance, while Bruce Fink's chapter looks suspiciously like a draft for Lacan on Love: An Exploration of Lacan's Seminar VIII, Transference. As such, this collection probably deserves closer to three-and-a-half stars, but since that's not possible, it gets four.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews