J. Mark Baldwin
Published: 2015-06-27
Total Pages: 541
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Excerpt from The Psychological Review, Vol. 1: 1895-96 The extent to which mental phenomena can be measured is not the least important of the many problems before Experimental Psychology. If one mental process is functionally related to another, it is possible for Psychology to become an exact science. If, however, the only measurable attribute of Mind is Time, Psychology can never hope to attain to the exactness of the physical sciences. The solution of this problem will be found only by experience. The psychologist should not, moreover, be discouraged because Herbart's heroic attempt to apply to Psychology the methods of Mechanics was an ultimate failure, nor yet because Fechner's famous logarithmic law is not now generally accepted. Even if the measurement of mental relations be yet an open question, exact methods may be applied to the investigation of the subjective correlatives of measurable physical phenomena. The most obvious problem of the kind is the relation between the intensity of stimulation and the corresponding sensation. But stimuli may vary in the time and area of application as well as in the intensity. If intensity be a measurable attribute of sensation, and if the time and area of stimulation be also related to the intensity of sensation, the relation of the four quantities may be expressed in the form of an equation: S = f (i, a, t) Only when such an equation is determined will the foundation be laid for the mathematical investigation of mental phenomena. For it is doubtful if exact methods can be applied to the study of mental relations, independent of physical phenomena, until the much simpler problems of Psycho-physics have been solved. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.