Transcript Slide 1

History of Psychology 2008
Lecture 4
Professor Cupchik
TA: Michelle Hilscher
Office: S634
Office: S142
Email: [email protected]
Email: [email protected]
Office hours: Wed 1-2; Thurs 12-1
Office hours: Wed 12-2 pm
Course website:
Textbook:
www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~cupchik
Benjafield’s History of Psychology
After Aristotle, naturalistic psychology gradually
disappeared from the scene. The centre of
learning shifted from Athens to Alexandria but
psychology was not pursued.
It gave way to a kind of practical and ethical
anthropology and later to a form of spiritistic
theology.
There were cultural and social reasons for this.
In Alexandria, a doctrine of inwardness and subjectivity prevailed
over an objective appreciation of psychological activities.
The intellectual systematization of the 4th century BC reflected the
unified Periclean Age. The cultural conditions which supported
Plato and Aristotle gave way to a new human condition - Hellenism.
The intellectual achievements of the Greeks were changed, diluted
and eventually transformed by the campaigns, conquests and
political manoeuvring of Alexander and his successors.
With one war after another, conditions discouraged an independent
and unbiased search for scientific meaning, and turned thinkers
toward mythology and superstition.
The decline of Hellenistic culture took place over a period of three
centuries.
The ensuing period is deeply involved in the search for religious
meaning. Some Christian thinkers, like St. Paul, were affected by
Platonic ideas. But these ages of physical turmoil left little room for
an intellectual interest of any kind.
St. Augustine (ca. 354-450 AD) influenced church
thought for the next 6 centuries.
* The soul controls a person’s acts. He develops
the first faculty psychology which includes
memory, imagination and will among the most
important faculties.
* The will is dominant as exhibited in attention since the will
selects from among the objects offered by the senses and these
become conscious. It also controls memory in light of reason.
* Imagination is intermediate in function between memory and
reason.
* The faculties are partially independent capacities. Each faculty is
like a person in a partnership, bound by the final decision of the full
group.
* St. Augustine searched for “truth” without presupposition. He
found certainty only in relation to inner experience. For him,
revelation was the only guarantee of truth.
* This is the religious version of what we call insight but it pertains
to spiritual matters.
The Christian theologians stressed revelation and introspection.
This differs from science which stresses inter-subjective evidence.
The period from St. Augustine to the 12th century AD was a Dark
Age for psychology in Europe. Thinking was discouraged since man
had little time left from political conflict and from meeting the bare
necessities of existence. There was no incentive for independent
thought.
Generally speaking, the classical schools were forgotten and many
of the works were destroyed lest they weaken Christian belief.
But the Arabs had preserved the writings of Aristotle after the
destruction of the library in Alexandria and continued to write
commentaries on them. By contacts with Spain, their influence
spread in some degree throughout Europe and, when the Moors
were driven from Spain in the late 15th century, copies of the works
of Aristotle became available to European scholars. Then came for
obscure stirrings of scientific and philosophical thought.
Systematic psychology reappeared in Western European culture in
the 13th century AD in the form of textual revival. The new
emphasis on natural and a modern scientific psychology involved
the adopting of observational, quantifying and experimental
techniques from the non-psychological sciences.
Scholasticism (10th & 11th centuries)
This was an approach to knowledge that stressed quibbling over the
details of a system whose basic assumptions are never seriously
challenged. Disagreements were over the correct interpretations of
Aristotle. The thinker was similar to an administrator - ideas like
that of church hierarchy had to be welded into a system that
would resist stresses from within and without.
Academic method: Writers engaged in
the study of theories and not of man.
This involved encyclopaedic learning and
subtlety of argument. Quote and define…
a kind of intellectual fencing.
The church was against any recognition of the fact that mental
powers depended on the body or that man might be similar to the
animal world.
The challenge to authority and rise of individualism
During the first 3/4 of the 13th century, scholarship was valued
more highly than originality. Scholars interpreted Aristotle and little
time was given to the study of nature.
We have opposite foundations for knowledge:
1. Experience and Mysticism
2. Experiment and Natural Science
Challenges to authority began as scholars looked more closely at
nature.
Leonardo da Vinci examined the
human forms that he depicted.
But the church was against any
form of autopsy.
Macchiavelli noted, in a dispassionate manner, the politics of the
15th and 16th centuries. He described religion as a useful form of
social cement. He saw society as a repressive agency from which the
genius or man of power escapes.
Cult of the Renaissance genius…Leonardo…Michelangelo…
The new naturalism was associated with an emphasis on what there
is and how we actually see it.
1. The decline of the Catholic church as a political and moral force
due to corruption - led to the establishment of Protestantism
(Luther, 1511). The Holy Roman Empire was crumbling…
The Bible was still quoted but to illustrate rather than prove.
2. World Exploration - the widening of outlook with the discovery of
America - greater autonomy of thought.
3. Improvement of communication
invention of the printing press.
and
the
4. Beginning of physical science (astronomy) with
optics and the development of the telescope… the
idea of experimentation became clearer… treating
the eye as an optical instrument.
5. We find curiosity for strange things as well as genuine
observation and a new power of seeing the meaning in ordinary
events.
6. There was a new focus on the living force of the individual…
human life as a force and not merely a relation between form and
matter.
7. Increasing knowledge about the human body…
dissection of human bodies was permitted in the 16th
century (e.g., Fissure of Sylvius, 1510)
Artists began anatomical charts that exhibited organs
accurately and old myths, such as a bone in the heart
were dismissed.
8. Revival of classical learning and a concern for how best to impart
knowledge - topics like memory and intellectual capacity were
examined.
9. Nations were being born - England, Spain, France and Portugal
were emerging from the feudal period - achieving a new selfconsciousness.
10. Scholarship was becoming secularized - the scholarly
community was growing in size and new universities were being
founded.
Scholarly interest was extending beyond the traditional subjects like
theology, law and medicine to include literature and the sciences.
The new Humanistic Movement (Erasmus, 1467-1536) demanded a
broadening of education to include all subjects of vital human
concern - aided by the printing press.
Latin remained the official language of scholars.
11. Fall of Constantinople (Istanbul) sent Greek scholars to Italy.
12. Use of gunpowder outmoded the feudal system.
13. Copernican theory - heliocentric theory (1) depreciated the
importance of man’s soul by multiplying the possibility of other
souls and (2) robbed man of a definite site for heaven.
New instruments, new crafts and new worlds meant that human
powers were not limited to the repetition of ancient theories.
In the 16th century there was a steady growth of interest in the
study of man as a part of nature but traditional ideas hampered
growth.
A belief in the infinite possibilities of nature was beginning to
supersede the older ideas of passive matter and limited
possibilities.
You could no longer deny something on the grounds that it was
impossible.
The dividing line between man and the rest of nature was becoming
less clearly drawn. Questions arose such as: “When does man
cease to be a man?” “What if he is born with 6 fingers or is
blind in one eye?”
Lemnius established the principle in 1574 that natural causes
explain all events. He argued that mind and body are subject to
changes due to climate and regions of the earth. Humours, not evil
spirits, cause disease.
But progress was limited by tradition.
Writers credited reports of old fables:
sirens, mermaids, headless men or men
with tails were faithfully described and
depicted.
The 16th century scientist was still terrorized by the church,
confused in his religious beliefs, worried about his livelihood, but
entranced by the world.
The Development of Science
Two theories of history:
(1) Personalistic emphasizes the great individual who helps science
forge ahead.
(2) Naturalistic emphasizes social and cultural changes that lay
the foundation for new developments.
We need to integrate the two viewpoints: The Zeitgeist (spirit of the
times) must be prepared for the crucial insight or else it will be lost.
Science involves the seeing of general relationships in nature.
In the modern sense, science is a social institution involving
cooperation that requires a written language to transmit
knowledge since oral communication is subject to change and
deterioration.
The early Greek civilization represented a major step (5th through
3rd centuries BC) in the systematization of knowledge. But it was
not adapted to the emergence of experimental science. It favoured
intuition, insight and intellectual processes but not the extraction of
secrets from nature by experimental techniques. That came 2000
years later!
In the Dark Ages (ca. 500-1200 AD) and the Middle Ages (ca. 12001500), although science was advanced in the Byzantine culture of
the East, the cultural life of Western Europe was dominated by
theological interest. Thoughts were on prospects for the soul.
Thinkers were concerned with truth but the values of the time led
them to believe that it would be revealed in accordance with the
divine will and so they looked at dogmas to guide them (i.e., the
authority of Aristotle).
So they accept 7 as a sacred number, g-d had put only 7 bodies in
the immediate celestial universe (earth, sun, moon, Venus, Jupiter,
Saturn, Mars).
Galileo’s discovery of 4 moons of Jupiter appeared sacreligious.
The Emergence of Modern Science…
Copernicus
(1473-1543)
Kepler
(1571-1630)
Laws of planetary motion
Galileo
(1564-1642)
Dynamics of moving bodies
Newton
(1642-1727)
Calculus, principle of gravitation, laws of motion,
white light as a mixture of light of different colours
In this new age scientists believed that nature rather than dogma
was the authority. They believed in the uniformity and stability of
nature. Cooperation among scientists was an important theme. This
required communication. Travel was difficult. Letters were not
common and journals were non-existent. Nor was publication in
books prompt. A book could be published after the death of its
author. The remedies lay in (1) correspondence and (2) societies of
scientists.
(1) Father Mersenne undertook to correspond with many of the
great scientists: Descartes, Hobbes, Gassendi, Galileo, Torricelli.
(2) Societies
Paris: Academie des Sciences in 1666 under Louis X1V
London: The Royal Society in 1610
Berlin: Akademie der Wissenschaften in 1700
These societies helped scientists to exchange ideas but also created
a social world for them and legitimized the role of the scientist in
society.
The first journals were reports of their meetings.
Royal Society - Philosophical Transactions, 1665
Academie des Sciences - Memoires, 1666
Galileo Galilei
Galileo Galilei (February 15, 1564 in Pisa January 8, 1642) was an Italian physicist,
astronomer, astrologer and philosopher who is
closely associated with the scientific revolution.
His achievements include improvements to the
telescope, a variety of astronomical observations,
the first and second laws of motion, and effective
support for Copernicanism.
He has been referred to as the “father of
modern astronomy”, as the “father of
modern physics” and as the “father of
science”. The work of Galileo is
considered to be a significant break from
that of Aristotle. In addition, his conflict
with the Roman Catholic Church is
taken as a major early example of the
conflict of authority and freedom of
thought, particularly with science, in
Western society.
Galileo Galilei
- Improved the telescope in 1610
- Humanist, son of a musician, charm, literary grace
- He said that wine was “light held together by
moisture”
Approach: Isolate a typical phenomenon and, after only a few
critical experiments, deduce by mathematical manipulation a vast
number of conclusions that go beyond those already revealed by
experience or experiment.
For example: The path of a projectile is a parabola and we can
demonstrate that the maximum range is achieved at a 45 degree
angle of launch.
- Concentrated on “pure cases” with systematic variations. This
differs from Aristotle’s collection of a great number of cases and
arriving at conclusions based on simple enumeration.
- He allowed a place for both sense observation and mathematical
reasoning (he stressed the latter).
Method:
1. Senses present us with a problem.
2. Think about the phenomenon and resolve it into sections (e.g.,
extension, figure and motion).
3. Quantify the variables and deduce general conclusions.
4. Confirm conclusions by experimental observation.
He reduced all nature to his primary qualities including figure,
number and motion.
Francis Bacon (1561-1626)
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St. Alban, KC (22
January, 1561-9 April 1626) was an English
philosopher, statesman and essayist but is best
known for leading the scientific revolution with
his new ‘observation and experimentation’
theory which is the way science has been
conducted ever since.
He was knighted in 1603, created Baron Verulam in 1618, and
created Viscount St. Alban in 1621; both peerage titles became
extinct upon his death.
He began his professional life as a lawyer, but he has become best
known as a philosophical advocate and defender of the scientific
revolution. His works establish and popularize an inductive
methodology for scientific inquiry, often called the Baconian
method. Induction implies drawing knowledge from the natural
world through experimentation, observation, and testing of
hypotheses. In the context of his time, such methods were
connected with the occult trends of hermeticism and alchemy.
- He has a complex character, was interested in public affairs,
accepted bribes but said that they would not influence him, had
desire for literary fame.
- Like Galileo he objected to syllogistic reasoning as a way of
understanding nature and he differed from Galileo in his distrust of
mathematics and abstract axioms.
- He favoured the collection of “well attested facts” or data without
any “anticipations of nature” or provisional hypotheses.
- Words should denote conditions not qualities. He emphasized the
role of precision in specific language.
- He held that proper method would guard against a tendency to
generalize too soon.
- He discouraged theory in favour of the accumulation of details.
- He discouraged abstract generalization in favour of natural
history.
- He would have none of Kepler, Copernicus, or Galileo or anyone
who would extend a few calculations into a system of the world.
- The form in the facts will be discovered if countless words or
instances are collected.
Method: Complete tables of instances, tables of presences,
absences, and degrees (e.g., in all examples of heat, motion is copresent, co-absent, and co-variant).
Through induction: motion is the form or generating nature of heat.
So scientists must start from facts or observations, preferably
measurements, collected carefully and cautious generalizations
should not go beyond the collected data. Bacon’s neglect of
hypotheses can be related to his disregard of deduction of which
mathematical deduction is the most precise form.
The orderly arrangement of data will make the right interpretation
obvious, there being no method for inventing hypotheses to
coordinate observations.
Fundamental Problem with Bacon
He failed to see that hypotheses
are essential to the collection of
data. How do we determine the
relevance of potential data
points? Scientific data are
always relative to the person’s
existing
knowledge,
his
interests
and
problems.
Expectations sensitize us to
data. (e.g., Darwin seeing the
meaning of a fossil).
More on Method:
1. Apply the inductive method - against scholastic science which
began with the principle and deduced the consequences. Bacon
would begin with the particular fact, with all relevant facts, and
rise by steps to the general principles.
He stressed the role of experiment - Experiments practice the
principle of the elimination of the irrelevant. “Nature when vexed
takes off her mask and reveals her struggles.”
2. Create a universal natural history - to use induction you need a
vast collection of particulars and so classification is the crucial
instrument.
3. Public organization of science - He believed that a complete
science is feasible. It should have a public designation and expense
since science will benefit humanity.
He reveals a
humanitarian.
materialist
commitment;
tough-minded
and
He wanted to demonstrate the worth and dignity of learning and so
he analyzed its obstacles.
In the Novum Organum (the new instrumentality for the
acquisition of knowledge) Francis Bacon classified the intellectual
fallacies of his time under four headings which he called idols. He
distinguished them as Idols of the Tribe, Idols of the Cave, Idols of
the Marketplace, and Idols of the Theatre.
An idol is an image, in this case held in the mind, which receives
veneration but is without substance in itself. Bacon did not regard
idols as symbols, but rather as fixations. In this respect he
anticipated modern psychology.
Idols of the Tribe are deceptive beliefs inherent in the mind of
man, and therefore belonging to the whole of the human race. They
are abstractions in error arising from common tendencies to
exaggeration, distortion, and disproportion. Thus men gazing at the
stars perceive the order of the world, but are not content merely to
contemplate or record that which is seen. They extend their
opinions, investing the starry heavens with innumerable imaginary
qualities. In a short time these imaginings gain dignity and are
mingled with the facts until the compounds become inseparable.
This may explain Bacon’s epitaph which is said to be a summary of
his whole method. It reads, “Let all compounds be dissolved.”
Idols of the Cave are those which arise within the mind of the
individual. This mind is symbolically a cavern. The thoughts of the
individual roam about in this dark cave and are variously modified
by temperament, education, habit, environment and accident. Thus
an individual who dedicates his mind to some particular branch of
learning becomes possessed by his own peculiar interest, and
interprets all other learning according to the colors of his own
devotion. The chemist sees chemistry in all things, and the courtier
ever present at the rituals of the court unduly emphasizes the
significance of kings and princes.
The title page of Bacon’s New
Atlantis (London, 1626) is
ornamented with a curious
design or printer’s device. The
winged figure of Father Time is
shown lifting a female figure
from a dark cave. This
represents truth resurrected
from the cavern of the intellect.
Idols of the Marketplace are errors
arising from the false significance
bestowed upon words, and in this
classification Bacon anticipated the
modern science of semantics. According
to him it is the popular belief that men
form their thoughts into words in order
to communicate their opinions to
others, but often words arise as
substitutes for thoughts and men think
they have won an argument because
they have out talked their opponents.
The constant impact of words variously
used without attention to their true
meaning only in turn condition the
understanding and breed fallacies.
Words often betray their own purpose,
obscuring the very thoughts they are
designed to express.
Idols of the Theatre are those which are due to sophistry and
false learning. These idols are built up in the field of theology,
philosophy, and science, and because they are defended by
learned groups are accepted without question by the masses.
When false philosophies have been cultivated and have attained a
wide sphere of dominion in the world of the intellect they are no
longer questioned. False superstructures are raised on false
foundations, and in the end systems barren of merit parade their
grandeur on the stage of the world.
Bacon used the theatre with its curtain and its properties as a
symbol of the world stage. It might even be profitable to examine
the Shakespearean plays with this viewpoint in mind.
Bacon took a chill while stuffing a
chicken with snow… his most famous
experiment… and died.
In March, 1626, Lord St. Alban came
to London. Continuing his scientific
research, he was inspired by the
possibility of using snow to preserve
meat. He purchased a chicken (fowl) to
carry out this experiment. While
stuffing the chicken with snow, he
contracted a fatal case of pneumonia.
He died at Highgate on 9 April 1626,
leaving assets of about about £7,000
and debts to the amount of £22,000. It
is said that the chicken still haunts
Pond Square in London.
Rene Descartes (1596-1650)
Great genius and a philosopher who spanned the
Ancients and Moderns.
He lived a long time in Holland. Trained in a Jesuit
College… in spite of this he acquired a skeptical
attitude which had become a fashion due to the
constant disagreement among theorists.
After the 18th century knowledge passes from philosophy to
science which assumes only uniformity of law and neither unity of
truth nor cosmic personality.
He was the last to make a major contribution out of a
metaphysical position. The image of infinite mechanics proved
ultimately to be irrelevant.
Science ranges between the unity of nature and the multiplicity of
phenomena.
From Descartes we conclude that atoms could never be
fundamental because space-matter is infinite in both ways, in
extension and in division.
Scientific Contributions
1. He developed the principle of inertia. It paralleled with
conceptions of infinity.
2. Analytic geometry - write equations that determine a geometric
form. Galileo turned time into a dimension - an abstract
parameter of the state of motion which science can measure.
Descartes crossed time at right angles with distance and space in
depth.
3. Correct laws of refraction.
4. Eliminates purposive organism.
Rational Method
1. Accept as true only that which presents itself to the mind with
such clarity and vividness as to remove the smallest element of
doubt.
2. Divide a problem into as many discriminable elements as
possible.
3. Work from a solution to the smallest to that of the greatest.
4. … to ensure the generality of the solution.
In relation to epistemology… Recognize the limits of the senses
and adapt a skeptical position that all is illusion. But even if the
body is an illusion; even if all our actions and experiences are
unreal, the ideas of the mind must exist or doubt itself is
impossible. Reason, not matter, therefore confirms existence.
Mind and matter are qualitatively different. Matter is res extensa
(extended substance) and Mind is res cogitans (thinking
substance). He followed Vesalius (1514-1564) who founded the
discipline of anatomy. He also knew of Harvey (1578-1657) who
founded physiology and worked out the exact connection of the
cavities of the heart with each other and with the lungs, the
arteries and the veins. This showed the way the blood must be
flowing. Descartes studied anatomy and made dissections.
He developed a model of reflex action based on the mechanical
models of the times. He was impressed by the clockwork types of
machines that were popular in the gardens of the aristocracy.
They had fountains constructed in such a manner that water
running through tubes would move manikins, play instruments or
even produce sounds like winds.
Descartes saw an analogy between these
water pipes and the tubes he thought the
animal spirits moved through. The absence
of voluntary movements in the statues was
seen as parallel to the movements of the
body which were executed without conscious
intention.
So he arrives at the theory of reflex action based on:
1. Knowledge that not all movements are voluntary and
2. Movements performed by decapitated animals.
Reflex Theory:
Eye - Sensory Nerve - Brain - Motor Nerve - Muscle…
1. Nerves were like hollow tubes and
2. The brain was like a sponge… porous…
The nervous system works through the actions of fluids. The fluid
or animal spirit is like a gas… not quite material.
When an impression is made on a sense organ, the sensory nerve
works like a bell wire, it pulls open the valve to which it is
attached and allows the animal’s spirits to flow down the
corresponding motor nerve to the muscle.
This form was the basis of all physiological psychology of the 17th
and 18th centuries.
But what about the soul? The body and soul are clearly separate.
1. The body is part of the world of matter peculiar to man.
Therefore, as matter it can be dealt with scientifically or
mechanically.
2. The soul does not move the body. Death is not due to the
absence of the soul from the body, when the bodily functions
cease, the soul disappears.
So Descartes removes the soul from every part of the concept of
physical life. Physical life is essentially movement which depends
on the muscles and these in turn depend on the nerves. The
corporeal principle of movement is a kind of fire, a natural heat
that resides in the heart.
Like Aristotle, Descartes recognizes two levels of conscious activity
(thinking/remembering and common sense/imagination/instinct).
How can the mind affect the body if it does not exist in space? As
the “seat of the soul” he selected the pineal gland probably
because of its uniqueness. The mind makes the pineal gland bend
thereby deflecting the animal spirits into a different channel.
Cogito ergo sum - “I think therefore I am.”
Dubito ergo sum - “I doubt therefore I am.”
Ideas:
1. The clearest ideas are those that give the most fundamental
truths and they are innate in the soul - the idea of G-d, self, and
axioms of mathematics.
2. The ideas of external objects come through the senses and
others, like hunger or thirst, or awareness of the emotions, arise
within the body and affect the mind.
3. He does suggest in some places that memories are connected
with traces left in the brain. In one place he describes the animal
spirits are running through the pores of the brain until they find a
specific memory desired by the mind.
Descartes does separate man completely from the animal world.
They are reduced to mere machines but later he admits that
animals may have sensations.
In sum, reason is only proper to man but humans and animals
overlap with the reflex theory. The human body is an animal
organism associated with a rational soul. Animals are bodies only.
The idea that, as a body, man belongs to the animal kingdom,
while as mind he belongs to another realm led to the study of man
being divided into (1) physiology and (2) psychology.
Final Summation:
1. He revolted against the ancients.
2. He revised the concept of the human mind as partly free and
rational and partly mechanical and automatic.
3. His is the father of dualistic thinking (separates mind and body)
and of the reflex arc.
4. He believed in a free unsubstantial soul and a mechanically
operated body.
5. He applied principles of physics to the body… mechanics of the
body.
6. He also anticipated projection theory… changes which occur in
the motion of the animal spirits may cause them to open certain
pores of the brain rather than others.
7. While he broke with ancient philosophy, he still adhered to a
deductive method - Rationalist.