Freud as Philosopher

Using Jacques Lacan's work as a key, this groundbreaking work reassesses the philosophical significance of Freud's most ambitious general theory of mental functioning: metapsychology. Richard Boothby forcefully argues that this theory has been misunderstood, and consequently, Freud's impact on philosophy has been unjustly muted. Freud as Philosopher illuminates in a fresh and newly accessible way the central points of Freud's metapsychology -- including the guiding metaphor of psychical energy and the final, enigmatic theory of the twin drives of life and death -- through the three cardinal…