Dear Editor:

E Fuller Torrey takes his place in the long and ever-extending line of psychoanalysis- and Freud-bashers (1). At issue in these ceaseless attacks is why they continue to occur. The cover of the Journal containing this debate has a photo reminiscent of phrenology, a long-discarded theory of mental functioning, but no one bothers to bash phrenology these days. If psychoanalysis is equally unproven, futile, outmoded, and dead, why has it not been similarly discarded? Virtually every attacker ignores the scholarly evidence failing to support his claims or deals with such evidence in a superficial and dogmatic manner. Thus critics fall prey to their own criticism: they do not use an evidence-based approach. I am refering to more recent attackers cited by Glen O Gabbard (2) (Fuller Torrey and Frederick Crews) and Joel Paris (3). These writers sound more like armchair philosophers or friends arguing over beer than scientists examining facts. Fuller Torrey relies on a study conducte