January 15, 1985

THE scientific credentials of psychoanalysis are being weighed anew in what some see as an effort to demolish its intellectual status, and what others see as a defense of its viability. More than 25 years ago in an influential statement on the nature of science Sir Karl Popper dismissed psychoanalysis, along with Marxism and astrology, as a self-confirming, nonscientific theory. Now, in a detailed refutation of Sir Karl, Adolf Gr"unbaum, a philosopher of science at the University of Pittsburgh, has proposed that psychoanalytic theory may be scientifically respectable, but he finds it poorly served by most attempts to support it. ''Its scientific foundations are impoverished,'' Dr. Gr"unbaum said in an interview. He grants that many, perhaps most of Freud's clinical observations and the theories that followed from them may be accurate. His point is that they have not been proved by Freud, or anyone else, in a way that meets the basic standards of the scientific method. Thus no one knows which aspects of the theory may be true, and which false.

The Israeli Cabinet approved a plan today to withdraw the Israeli Army from Lebanon in three stages, beginning within five weeks. The action came after 11 hours of discussions on Sunday and today. The vote was 16 to 6 in favor of the Defense Ministry's withdrawal plan. Prime Minister Shimon Peres said he hoped the plan would be completed within ''six to nine months.''

Stock prices surged yesterday in a rally reinforced in the final hour of trading by news that a major bank had cut its prime rate a quarter point. The Dow Jones industrial average, up 7.51 at 3 P.M., finished the day with a 16.45-point rise, to 1,234.54. It was the blue-chip barometer's second-largest gain of 1985, after its 20.76 rise last Thursday. Other key stock market indicators also moved solidly ahead.

A map published yesterday with a dispatch about a rare snowstorm in south Texas transposed the cities of San Antonio and Austin. San Antonio is southwest of Austin.

NAME the country drained by the Amazon River, American college students were asked in a 1950 survey, and 77.5 percent of them correctly said Brazil. The same question was posed last fall in a statewide college exam in North Carolina, and this time only 27 percent of the students got it right. The apparent deterioration of geographic knowledge evident in the North Carolina survey and in similar tests around the nation has prompted two professional organizations of American geographers and educators to devise a set of guidelines for the teaching of geography in elementary and secondary schools. The guidelines, just published by the National Council for Geographic Education at Western Illinois University in Macomb and by the Association of American Geographers in Washington, explain the nature of geographic inquiry and recommend a systematic learning sequence for use in a geography curriculum from kindergarten through the 12th grade.