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Psychology is a field of many paradoxes. Since its earliest beginnings as a natural science, psychologists have been in search of their proper subject matter. Today they are in less agreement than ever. In this classic text, originally published as What Man Has Made of Man, Mortimer J. Adler goes to the root of the problem. He shows that psychology is simultaneously a particular social science and a branch of philosophical knowledge. These two parts must be distinguished from, yet related to, each other if sound philosophical analysis is to replace bad "philosophizing," which scientific psychologists too often use to describe their research findings. Adler also examines the scientific contribution of psychoanalysis by distinguishing it from Freud's meta-psychology, which he shows to be an inadequate statement of the traditional or classical philosophical positions. Adler believes that psychology is crucially important in modern culture. It is theoretically important because it is central to the errors of modern philosophy. It has practical significance because economic, moral, and political doctrines are determined by the view that man reviews his own nature. To understand the history of modern times, and to correct its normative deviations, we must, according to Adler, consider what man has made of man. This engaging analytical study will be a valuable tool for psychologists, psychoanalysts, philosophers, and sociologists.
What Man Has Made of Man CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ix AUTHORS PREFACE xvii LECTURE i. THE CONCEPTION OF SCIENCE IN THE MODERN WORLD 3 LECTURE 2. THE POSITION OF PSYCHOLOGY IN PHILOSOPHY AND AMONG THE NATURAL SCIENCES 31 LECTURE 3. THE HISTORY OF PSYCHOLOGY 61 LECTURE 4. PSYCHOANALYSIS AS PSYCHOLOGY 94 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES 124 EPILOGUE 235 LIST OF PRINCIPAL NOTES 245 vu INTRODUCTION BY DR. FRANZ ALEXANDER IT is unusual to write an introduction to a book of an author whose conclusions, approach to his problems and whole outlook are diametrically opposite to those of the author of the introduction. Why did I then accept Mr. Adlers suggestion to write an intro duction to his book and why did Mr. Adler ask me to do so, are both questions which require an explanation. The circumstances under which these four lectures originated will elucidate this para dox. Engaged in psychoanalytic teaching and clinical studies for a long period of time, I gradually came to the conviction that in this field as in others where students are using a highly standardized technical procedure and are mainly absorbed in minute observa tion of facts, briefly in all preeminently empirical fields, the stu dents are apt to lose perspective towards their own work. This conviction goes back to those early days that I spent as a research worker in physiology in an experimental laboratory. There, I became first acquainted with the characteristic mentality of mod ern scientific research. There I learned the mores and virtues of modern research and first recognized the danger which con fronts the scientific worker of the present day. This danger is not restricted to scientific laboratories, it is a general problem of the presentage. Man, the inventor of the machine, has become the slave of the machine, and the scientist, in developing highly refined methods of investigation, has become not the master but the slave of his laboratory equipment. An extreme amount of specializa tion of interest and mechanization of activity has taken place and a scotoma for essentials has developed a naive belief in the magic omnipotence of specific technical procedures leads to a routine, often sterile submersion in details without interest in or under standing of larger connections. IX INTRODUCTION It is no exaggeration to say that in many scientific centers not the interest in certain fundamental problems but the fortuitous possession of some new apparatus directs the research work a new laboratory technique is introduced which spreads like a f ad to all laboratories then everywhere problems are selected which can be approached by this new technique or apparatus. Scientific inter est in the fundamentals is lost, research is dictated more or less at random by the technical facilities at the workers disposal. This attitude necessarily must lead to that caricature of scientific ethics which regards suspiciously everything that entails reason ing and not merely observation and is contemptuous about theories, not to say hypotheses that are not as yet proven. There is a naive adoration of pure facts which are collected without any leading ideas. Psychoanalysis is a highly empirical field in which the student is exposed to an extreme variety of observations and in a certain sense unique facts, as every patient presents a unique combina tion of common elements. Today the psychoanalytic clinician is undergoing a healthy reaction againstthe present abundance of theory and generalizations. He is in the process of accepting the mentality of the natural scientist and is assuming all the virtues and weaknesses of our era of laboratory research. Like his other clini cal colleagues also he uses a highly standardized and refined tech nique but pays a high price for his technical skill he is gradu ally losing perspective and correct judgment regarding the validity and limitations of his technique and of his scientific work in general...
Psychology is a field of many paradoxes. Since its earliest beginnings as a natural science, psychologists have been in search of their proper subject matter. Today they are in less agreement than ever. In this classic text, originally published as What Man Has Made of Man, Mortimer J. Adler goes to the root of the problem. He shows that psychology is simultaneously a particular social science and a branch of philosophical knowledge. These two parts must be distinguished from, yet related to, each other if sound philosophical analysis is to replace bad "philosophizing," which scientific psychologists too often use to describe their research findings. Adler also examines the scientific contribution of psychoanalysis by distinguishing it from Freud's meta-psychology, which he shows to be an inadequate statement of the traditional or classical philosophical positions. Adler believes that psychology is crucially important in modern culture. It is theoretically important because it is central to the errors of modern philosophy. It has practical significance because economic, moral, and political doctrines are determined by the view that man reviews his own nature. To understand the history of modern times, and to correct its normative deviations, we must, according to Adler, consider what man has made of man. This engaging analytical study will be a valuable tool for psychologists, psychoanalysts, philosophers, and sociologists.
A history of ideas about mind, knowledge, the self, ethics, and free will, and their importance as more than just precursors of current thinking.
The Platonic tradition in Western philosophy is not just one of many equally central traditions. It is so much THE central one that the very existence and survival of Western civilization depends on it. It is like the Confucian tradition in Chinese culture, or the monotheistic tradition in religion, or the human rights tradition in politics. In the first of his eight lectures, Peter Kreeft defines Platonism and its "Big Idea," the idea of a transcendent reality that the history of philosophy has labeled "Platonic Ideas" or Platonic Forms. In the second lecture, he briefly explores Plato's two basic predecessors or sources, myth and Socrates; and then looks at 12 applications of the Forms in Plato's own dialogues. The third lecture covers the three most important modifications or additions to Plato himself in the Platonic tradition: Aristotle, Plotinus, and Augustine, each of whom gave the Forms a new metaphysical address. The fourth lecture explores six Christian Platonists, three in the New Testament and three philosophers, Justin Martyr, Bonaventure, and Aquinas. The next three lectures explore the consequences of the modern abandoning of Platonism, beginning with William of Ockham's Nominalism, as the source of nearly all modern philosophical errors, and its results in the Empiricism of Locke and Hume, the so-called Copernican Revolution in philosophy in Kant, the so-called "analytic philosophy," which still dominates English and American philosophy departments. In the sixth essays, Kreeft looks at 13 influential kinds of positivism or reductionism in modern thought: in method, history, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, sociology, politics, logics, linguistics, sex, psychology, and theology, exemplified by Descartes, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Marx, Kant, Comte, Rousseau, Rawls, Ayer, Derrida, Freud, Skimmer, Nietzsche, and Sartre. Lecture 7 looks at the results of abandoning the Platonic tradition in ethics, the values vacuum, or nihilism, in Ecclesiastes, Pascal, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoi, Marcel, and Buber. In the last lecture, Kreeft looks at some experiential evidence for Platonism, doors out of the cave that are still open, signals of transcendence.
Bem and de Jong present complex ideas in an accessible manner. Theoretical Issues in Psychology gives undergraduate psychology students all the resources they need to begin reflecting on the most pressing conceptual issues in their discipline. - Stuart Wilson, Queen Margaret University The 3rd edition of Theoretical Issues in Psychology provides an authoritative overview of the conceptual issues in psychology which introduces the underlying philosophies that underpin them. It includes new insights across the philosophy of science combined with increased psychological coverage to show clearly how these two communities interrelate, ensuring an integrative understanding of the fundamental debates and how they link to your wider studies. Key features of this new edition include: Concise paragraphs, multiple examples and additional summaries throughout to help you focus on key areas of knowledge. Textboxes with definitions and key concepts to help your understanding of the main debates and ideas. New content on the philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, cognition and cognitive neuroscience. New up-to-date material on consciousness and evolutionary psychology. For lecturers and teachers, PowerPoint slides are available for each chapter. Sacha Bem & Huib Looren de Jong′s textbook remains essential for students taking courses in conceptual and historical issues in psychology, the philosophy of psychology or theoretical psychology.
Acclaimed philosopher and novelist Rebecca Newberger Goldstein provides a dazzlingly original plunge into the drama of philosophy, revealing its hidden role in today's debates on religion, morality, politics, and science.
A new edition of the bestselling classic – published with a special introduction to mark its 10th anniversary This pioneering account sets out to understand the structure of the human brain – the place where mind meets matter. Until recently, the left hemisphere of our brain has been seen as the ‘rational’ side, the superior partner to the right. But is this distinction true? Drawing on a vast body of experimental research, Iain McGilchrist argues while our left brain makes for a wonderful servant, it is a very poor master. As he shows, it is the right side which is the more reliable and insightful. Without it, our world would be mechanistic – stripped of depth, colour and value.
"James Lamiell is a creative, sophisticated, and careful thinker, one whose ideas are deserving of broad attention....The book should be of interest to scholars and practitioners, along with advanced graduate students." --Kenneth J. Gergen, Swarthmore College Beyond Individual and Group Differences: Human Individuality, Scientific Psychology, and William Stern′s Critical Personalism examines the history of psychology′s effort to come to terms with human individuality, from the time of Wundt to present day. With a primary emphasis on the contributions of German psychologist William Stern, this book generates a wider appreciation for Stern′s perspective on human individuality and for the proper place of personalitic thinking within scientific psychology. The author presents an alternative approach to the logical positivism that permeates traditional psychological thought and methodology making this an innovative, ground-breaking work. Feature and Benefits: Provides book-length treatment of the concept of human individuality in twentieth century scientific psychology, highlighting the historical contributions made by the German psychologist and philosopher William Stern (1871-1938). Critically appraises contemporary thinking about personality in light of historical and methodological considerations. Challenges readers to rethink the problem of human individuality with research that mounts a direct empirical challenge to the long-standing belief that it is meaningless to characterize individuals without comparing them with one another. Concludes with a general discussion of the potential of personalistic thinking both as a foundation for personality theory and as a framework for social thought. Beyond Individual and Group Differences is a dynamic book for academics and scholars in the areas of personality psychology, individual differences, and the history of psychology.
I was asked and, alas, with little reflection on the magnitude of the task, thoughtlessly consented, to take on the 'simple' job of writing a preface to the collection of essays comprising this volume. That I was asked to carry out this simple task was probably due to one consideration: I was the main representative of the host institution (Clark University) for the 1991 ISTP Conference, at which the talks, foreshadowing and outlining the 'extended remarks' here printed, were originally presented, and hence, as a token of gratitude, I was vouchsafed the honor of setting the stage. It did not dawn on me, until I began piecemeal to receive and accumulate, over a period of months, the remarkably diverse and heterogeneous essays precipitated by the conference, how mind-boggling it would be to pen a preface pertinent to such an aggregate of prima/acie unrelated articles. Typically, prefaces to collections of essays from different hands are attempts by the prefator or a pride of prefators to provide an overview, a concise map, of the complex terrain which readers are invited to enter; or to direct the attention of potential readers to what the editors take to be the essential or central themes of each of the variegated articles: a practice which, not infrequently and often not unjustifiably, irritates and even enrages individual authors, who object to the complexity, profundity, and nuanced character of their thought being reduced to clicMs and editorial equivalents of sound bites.