ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author presents some diagnostic remarks on the scientistic mood and metaphysical prejudice of his times. He also presents a review of similarities and differences between Sigmund Freud and Ludwig Wittgenstein. The author discusses some details in the debate between Linda A. W. Brakel and Adolf Grunbaum about the scientific status of psychoanalytic theory. The debate between Brakel and Grunbaum illustrates well the kind of confusion that is unavoidable as long as naturalism about the mind is taken for granted. Naturalism is perhaps a natural concept only in philosophical debate. In the discussion of that opening quote the chief target of Wittgenstein’s criticism is the representationalism that is the counterpart in the philosophy of language to naturalism in metaphysics. The author argues that the problem with naturalism, also in debates about Freud, is not that it is logically, factually or metaphysically wrong or mistaken.
