In his later works, Freud abandons the aim of the Project of a scientific psychology (1895) of formulating specific hypotheses about the neural basis of psychical phenomena, but continues to conceive this basis as real. He did not adopt a dualist position concerning the mind-brain problem, as can be confirmed by innumerous quotations. This does not lead him, however, to try to substitute physiological concepts for psychological ones, but enables him to attribute to psychical processes natural causality, a quantitative dimension and a spatial (topographic) structure. The Freudian conception of the mind-brain relation may be considered as a double-aspect theory or a psychoneural identity theory.
psychoanalysis; mind-brain problem; dualism; monism; Freud