3 - Precursors of psychology Flashcards
Descartes’ key idea(s) regarding knowledge/mind?
- The only certainty is that of doubt and this happens in the mind
- As one can doubt anything that is material, but not the existence of the mind, it must therefore be immaterial (aka his dualism)
- Relation of the idea of perfection (yet the inability to be so) to God necessarily existing
- God is perfect > idea of God is innate > the world we perceive exists bc God doesn’t fool use as he is perfect (cool reasoning dude)
- Rationalist
Descartes’ ideas propose problems, why and which?
Mind-body problem = what is the relationship between the mind and the body
Interaction problem = how can the immaterial affect the material- Descartes posed the pineal gland
John Locke’s key ideas?
- Tabula rasa
- A lot of his rationalism refutation based on the above (aka psych. observation in children)
- All knowledge gained through experience aka empiricist
Berkeley’s key ideas?
- All knowledge must enter through the senses (bases on Locke)
- Concludes that we can only be certain of our perceptions and thus properties of reality depend on the mind (idealism)
- Assumes that material objects cannot cause ideas (material cannot cause immaterial), ideas also cannot cause ideas (they are passive), ourselves cannot either (we cannot choose our perceptions) aka it must be some other spirit (God)
- Empiricist bc perception based
David Hume’s key ideas and their influence on science?
Analysis of causality:
- Proximity of cause and effect (aka proximity of time and space) is met when inferring causality
- Cause precedes effect, also met with inference
- Necessary connection between cause and effect (aka necessity of the cause) is not met with inference
- The induction problem is that of a generalization of observed cases to all cases (aka the assumption of necessity of cause?)
- This = a logically invalid (the conclusion does not necessarily follow from the premises)
- Still: All knowledge comes from experience (empiricist)
- However, causal relations cannot come from experience alone and thus should not play a role in empirical reality
This poses a general threat to knowledge and still plays a large role (aka a response of methodology)
Kant’s key ideas and his solution to the induction problem?
- There are examples of necessity (math) > humans bring concepts such as space, time and causality (priori knowledge) to perception
- That is to say; Humans bring reason to understand and structure their perceptions and perception is necessary to guide reason (interaction empiricism-rationalism)
“One may perceive how, by degrees, afterwards, ideas
come into their [new born babies’] minds; and that they
get no more, nor other, than what experience, and the
observation of things that come in their way, furnish
them with.”
Who said this?
Locke
“If I had existed alone, and independently of every other
being, so as to have had from myself all the perfection,
however little, which I actually possessed, I should have been
able, for the same reason, to have had from myself the whole
remainder of perfection, of the want of which I was
conscious, and thus could of myself have become infinite,
eternal, immutable, omniscient, all-powerful, and, in fine,
have possessed all the perfections which I could recognize in
God.”
Who said this?
Decartes
Four factors playing a role into increased individualization after the middle ages?
- Complexity of society increased
- Control by the state increased
- Christianity promoted individualism
- Mirrors, books and letters increase in availability (idk man, narcissus who)
What did Wolff introduce?
Rational psychology (axiom and deduction) and empirical psychology (introspection) > to be made a loop likened to the empirical cycle
Kant and Comte’s critiques against Wolff? Consequences?
Kant:
- Psych not a proper science with its basis of introspection
- Intro changes the state of the mind, cannot be math formulated and inner observations cannot be separated and recombined at will
Comte:
- One cannot both be the observer of reason and the reasoner at once
> > Psych and introspection would not be picked up until later
What were the first two “branches of psych study”?
was not really regarded as psych
Studies on human perception + the time needed to perform tasks and the speed of signal transmission in the nervous system
