Chapter 3: Psychology During Mid-Millennium Transitions PSK301-History of Psychology Assoc. Prof. Okan Cem Çırakoğlu okanc@baskent.edu.tr
While there is no universally accepted theory to explain the global complexity of mid-millennium transitions, historians generally agree about Western civilization. They describe this period in terms of three fundamental developments: The Renaissance The Reformation The Scientific Revolution
The Renaissance Rebirth Historians associate the Renaissance with the reintroduction of major elements of Greco-Roman antiquity in arts, sciences, and education. 14-16th centuries in Italy 16th century in Northern European countries
Innovation Secularism Enthusiasm Rationality Good manner in behaviors and honor The Renaissance
The Renaissance Created an anti-scholastic mood New universities were established in Europa Ottoman Empire, Persia, and Central Asia contributed to science Mathematics Philosopy Physics History Literature
The Renaissance 17th century Western science challenged theology and Catholic church Islamic Middle East tradition connected to theology
Reformation As the advancing Reformation movement grew in Europe, religious faith was becoming increasingly a matter of individual conscience
Reformation Protestant church Individual responsibility for decisions Questioning authority Beliefs in human rights and individual freedom Individualism Martin Luther 1483-1546
Reformation Protestant Reformation Calling to read Bible outside churches Joint education of boys and girls However, no significant change in women s position in society, religion and education National languages in science rather than Latin
Scientific Revolution Scientific revolution: For the educated, the mysterious and unpredictable quality of nature was unfolding into something clear and quantifiable.
Isaac Newton (1643-1727) Laws of motion Applied to all physical bodies in the world Materialistic views of Greeks has been widely accepted
Scientific Revolution Johannes Gutenberg First book published by printing press in 1455 Many books in less time and cost Among upper class, reading and writing increased Scientists correspondence via letters with sponsors (inc. Kings and queens)
Scientific Revolution Renewed interest in gender Restricted social roles for women until 15th century This tradition has begun to change. More women education, literature, music, history, fine arts However, for only aristocratic women Not all areas of interest were open to women
Scientific Discoveries in 16-17th Centruies
Case In Point Girolamo Cardano (1501 1576) wrote a detailed autobiography (a relatively common practice among scientists), filled with meticulous details about his activities and psychological experiences including thought process, doubts, and anxieties. He provided an interesting account of therapeutic techniques, such as self-inflicted physical pain to reduce more serious psychological disturbances. Small pain or irritation, he believed, would overtake psychological anguish caused by a more serious disturbance.
Psychology in Mid-Millennium Scientific Knowledge 16-18 Centuries Human beings were part of the natural world A part of animal kingdom with a superiority of rational thinking Believed secrets of the nature are coded in mathematical formulas From divine and or spiritual to mechanical or chemical Galen s view of imbalance of the humors was mandatory in medicine
Psychology in Mid-Millennium Scientific Knowledge William Harvey 1578-1657 A general processing mechanism: sensorium Located in the brain Brain is sensitive root attached to sense organs Speculative views on human reproduction Active matter from men Passive matter from women
Psychology in Mid-Millennium Scientific Knowledge Scholars offered certain stable patterns of behavior and thinking Similar to today s personality traits Natural makeup of the body, the temperament was the source of psychological activities Character of the soul Soul imitates the complexions of the body Choleric people: active, ambitious, wrathful Sanguine people: even tempered and kindly Melancholics: depressed, envious but creative Phlegmatics: slow and slothful
Anatomy of Melancholy By Robert Burton published in 1621 was one of the earliest books devoted to anxiety and mood problems Identified specific environmental factors Rigorous diet Alcohol Biological rhythms Passionate love (persistent sadness) Melancholia as «love sickness» He discussed causes and symptoms of melancholia and treatment methods Avoiding the source of sadness Redirecting thoughts
Religion-based and Folk Knowledge Mysticism, a belief in the existence of realities beyond perceptual reflection or scientific explanations but accessible by subjective experience, remained a very important element in the lives of the Christian and Jewish communities in Europe and in the Muslim communities of the Middle East and North Africa. Witchcraft was part of human folk tradition supported by religious beliefs. From the evidence accumulated in printed sources, including The Malleus Maleficarum, we can infer that the work of the devil, and witchcraft in particular, was attributed to psychological and behavioral symptoms such as delusions, hallucinations, or manic episodes.
Prosecution of Women for Witchcraft Usually old women from lower classes 80 % of all accused people were women Why women?
The Influence of Literature
The Influence of Literature Contribution to psychological knowledge Shakespeare (1564-1616) Analysis of human characters, passions, rational decision making, psychological disorders Hamlet: detailed descriptions of major depressive episodes King Lear: age-related dementia Cervantes (Don Quixote), Moliere (Don Juan...), Lope de Vega (A Certainity for a Doubt)
Views of Basic Psychological Activities
Humanists Three major themes Dignity Independence from intellectual authorities (i.e. religious institutions) Human frailty (zaaf) Focuses on individual and individual goals Emphasis on free will
Scientific Rationalists Human beings as a part of the universe Orderly Predictable Mathematic and physics can explain mental processes Moral behavior was guided by principle of mechanics: People choose actions that bring satisfaction and avoid displeasure Machiavelli (1469-1527) Human motivation and self-interest
René Descartes René Descartes 1596 1650 Cogito ergo sum Anyone who thinks should exists There is no consciousness without body Sensation helps indivduals in gathering knowledge Human soul does not operate out of sensations alone The ideas are inborn External signals trigger existing knowledge
René Descartes Descartes believed that animal spirits are light and roaming fluids circulating rapidly around the nervous system between the brain and the muscles. Animal spirits come into contact with the brain and trigger, strengthen, or weaken affective states in the soul, or passions of the soul. Descartes distinguished six basic passions: wonder (surprise), love, hatred, desire, joy, and sadness.
Pineal gland the doorway between the soul and the body - signals go from senses to the pineal gland by means of animal spirits - the soul moves the gland - pushes the animal spirit toward the pores of the brain - different motions in the gland cause different passions - Animal spirits that move freely around the body could distort the commands from the gland - people have to learn their passions, otherwise, negative consequences can occur
René Descartes He described automatic bodily reactions Contributed to reflex theory (19th century) Automatic reactions do not necessarily require a thought process
Benedict Spinoza All existence is contained in one substance Nature, universe, God Mathematics and geometry can be applied to mental activities, esp. emotion Study of emotion Benedict Spinoza 1632-1677
Benedict Spinoza His views of emotions: We too often follow our impulses and become virtual slaves to our wishes We lose freedom because we are trapped in the continual search for gratification of our wishes without knowing why we do so To avoid this endless quest for pleasure, we should know more about the causes of our own actions This knowledge can make people free
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Psychological parallelism Physical and mental processes are set to develop in parallel courses 1646 1716 Monadolgy Universe is made up of an infinite number of spiritual forces Monads: windowless entities Each reflecting every other Each has potential of all the properties which come from past or may be exhibited in the future
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz According to Leibniz, the soul has an infinite number of monads and therefore perceptions. Monads can perceive, and the soul possesses little perceptions that are not conscious but could become so because of memory and attention. The soul possesses several areas of knowledge distinguished by the strength of apperception: clear knowledge, fragmented knowledge, and unconscious knowledge. Leibniz is one of the first scholars to have identified a category of unconscious psychological phenomena. Like Descartes, Leibniz believed in the existence of innate ideas because he felt it was impossible to derive certain abstract ideas directly from experience.
Thomas Hobbes (1588 1679) Hobbes believed that the essence of human behavior is in physical motion and that the principles of Galileo s mechanics could explain sensation, emotions, motivation, and even moral values. Unlike Descartes, Hobbes understood the soul as mechanical movements in the body.
Thomas Hobbes (1588 1679) His understanding of soul was a reductionist view Reductionism: Explaining nature of complex processes by reducing them to interactions of their elements or underlying processes i.e. psychological functions that are described as simple physiological reactions or reflexes. He laid foundations for the empirical branch of epistemology and psychology and supported empiricism, the scientific belief that experience, especially sensory processes, is the main source of knowledge.
John Locke (1632 1704) Locke believed that the child s mind is a clean board, or in Latin, tabula rasa. Experiences can be recorded in the mind in a fashion similar to the way in which teachers use a piece of chalk to write on the board. Following a tradition in epistemology, Locke continued to distinguish between the primary and secondary qualities of things. Primary qualities are inseparable from the body and reflect the qualities of objects; these included extension, motion, number, or firmness. Secondary qualities, such as color or taste, exist only in sensations. A materialist who believed in cause-and-effect relationship between the body and soul.
George Berkeley Sensory processes is the major source of knowledge To understand Berkeley is to comprehend his famous principle: to exist is to be perceived (esse est percipi in Latin). 1685 1753 Solipsism: the self as the only entity that can be known and verified (similar to Taoism and Buddhism) We always use our sensations to prove the desk s existence! Therefore, every object requires a perceiving mind.
David Hume (1711 1776) Hume contributed to psychology by developing pragmatic views in the fields of naturalism and instrumentalism. Naturalism refers to the view that observable events should be explained only by natural causes without assuming the existence of divine, paranormal, or supernatural causes such as magic or evil eye. Instrumentalism applied to Hume s works means that human action is reasonable as long as it justifies this individual s goals. Suicide is similar to dying because of an infection or by another cause. No religious crime should be associated with the suicide (A base for humanistic psychology)
Hume s Views of Personality He described four personilty types: 1. The Epicurean displays elegance and seeks pleasure. 2. The Stoic is a person of action and virtue. 3. The Platonist is the person of contemplation and philosophical devotion. 4. The Skeptic is the person of critical thinking.
Immanuel Kant 1724 1804 One cannot understand the world and order by relying on senses Each individual has innate abilities to understand reality from a programmed position Time and space are the innate concepts (or categories) that are not learned; they are installed in us A category is software that allows us to see the world as three-dimensional and organized in periods The world makes sense to us because we have innate tools to understand it
Immanuel Kant Golden Rule : act according to your rational will but assume that your action, to be considered moral, should become a universal law for others to follow. He believed that such a moral imperative should be innate, which means, in contemporary terms, that all human beings should have a natural predisposition for moral behavior. Many years later, founders and supporters of humanistic psychology and its many branches emphasize the moral side of human behavior and, like Kant, they celebrate moral act as a natural expression.
Paul-Henri Thiry (1723 1789) He believed that the brain is capable of producing within itself a great variety of physical motion called intellectual faculties. In his materialist outlook, the brain is the center of all activities attributed to the soul. To understand how the brain works, scientists should combine their efforts as physicians, natural philosophers, and anatomists. In addition to his publications, he was best known for hosting his famous salon -- a common name for periodic get-togethers of people of social status and intellectual merit.
Abbé de Condillac (1714 1780) All mental operations are forms of sensation The children should be educated according to the skills they developed at each stage and teachers hould adjust their methods accordingly A contribution to evolutionary and cultural theories of human development
Julien Offray de LaMettrie (1709 1751) In Man a Machine, he defended a view that a human being is just a complex machine. Each tiny fiber or part of a living body moves by a particular principle. People are trained to perform simple and complex tasks in the same way that animals are trained to look for food and protect themselves. A geometrician, according to La Mettrie, learns to perform the most complicated calculations in the same way as a trained animal learns to perform tricks. Even the most complex communications can be reduced to simple sounds or words Extreme reductionism
Jean-Jacques Rousseau He openly glorified the very early stages of human civilization, the view endorsed today by some cultural anthropologists and psychologists 1712 1778 Rousseau even coined the term, noble savage suggesting that people were essentially good when they lived under the rules of nature, before modern civilizations were created. Those rules, in his mind, stood for honesty, reliability, and spiritual freedom.