The importance of psychology.
Since the dawn of philosophy with Socrates, the fundamental assertion of philosophers passionate about their profession has been that life ought to be examined. Up until the nineteen hundreds there was no clear profession for philosophers to fundamentally speak of what Plato and Socrates called the soul or psyche.
Nowadays we know very well, that the study of the human psyche is done through psychology. It is a profession that isn't exact or as scientific as other professions, but, is still important to the discovery of one's self. I do think, that it is interesting to notice that modern day psychology was profoundly influenced by the Stoics in their appeal for a more rational mind to operate with, with the advent of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or Rational Emotional Behavioral Therapy.
With no further introduction to give, I ask the reader whether they think psychology is an important field or whether any of the above makes sense to assert about the importance that philosophers purported was the examination of one's life?
Can or ought this be done through psychology, why or why not?
Nowadays we know very well, that the study of the human psyche is done through psychology. It is a profession that isn't exact or as scientific as other professions, but, is still important to the discovery of one's self. I do think, that it is interesting to notice that modern day psychology was profoundly influenced by the Stoics in their appeal for a more rational mind to operate with, with the advent of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or Rational Emotional Behavioral Therapy.
With no further introduction to give, I ask the reader whether they think psychology is an important field or whether any of the above makes sense to assert about the importance that philosophers purported was the examination of one's life?
Can or ought this be done through psychology, why or why not?
Comments (203)
Quoting tim wood
Some of the most important work in personality theory (Gendlin, Rogers , Kelly) offers a powerful critique of the concept of ‘real’ science , otherwise known as physics envy. It will likely take a few more generations before mainstream psychology realizes that rather than psychology trying to emulate the approach to science taken, physics, it is physics that needs to learn from what personality theory has discovered about the foundations of empiricism in subjective experience.
As Piaget wrote:
“…physics is far from complete, having so far been unable to integrate biology and a fortiori the behavioural sciences within itself. Hence, at present, we reason in dififerent and artificially simplified domains, physics being up to now only the science of non-living, non-conscious things. When physics becomes more 'general’- to use C.-E. Guye's striking expression-and discovers what goes on in the matter of a living body or even in one using reason, the epistemological enrichment of the object by the subject, which we assume here as a hypothesis, will appear perhaps as a simple relativistic law ot perspective or of co- ordination of referentials, showing that for the subject the object could not be other than it appears to him, but also that from the Object’s point of view the subject could not be different.”
What do you think about old Socrates and the unexamined life not worth living? What claim does psychology have over leading an edifying and fulfilling life as philosophy would prescribe?
I propose that the matter of individual development requires a psychological register. There are various theories concerning what should be regarded as fundamental conditions that produce one person or another. What is more important than any explanation is a way to understand causes.
We cause things to happen and how much degree of freedom to do this or that is what consumes every waking hour.
Quoting Joshs
Sounds about par for the course... Damned if we do, damned if we don't.
As per Plato's tripartite soul, the emotional and desiring parts of one's psyche, unless understood and controlled, will inhibit one's ability for reason.
If only there wouldn't be so many schools of psychology, so many different theories about the same thing!
Quoting Shawn
:up: Genius!
Luckily or not, you decide, psychology seems chockablock with multiple theories that seem to lack overlap zones giving nothing for theorists who want some sorta unification to work on. It's all blind people shooting in the dark - mostly guesswork, imaginative sure but true, probably not.
The soul was generally the purview of religion. It certainly wasn't ignored. Ethics and morals are heavily influenced by psychological factors, and they weren't ignored either.
Quoting Shawn
Psychology is a science as much as any other. No, it's not as exact as physics, but neither are geology, paleontology, evolutionary biology, or archeology. There are certainly things to criticize about some psychology, but much is important and fascinating. There is also lots of harder science that has legitimacy problems, e.g. scientific studies run by pharmaceutical companies are heavily skewed toward finding that drugs being tested are safe and effective. It's also important that you separate psychology from psychotherapy. They're not the same thing, although they are related.
Quoting Shawn
Psychology is not "examining one's life." It is the study of (mostly) human behavior.
https://royalsociety.org/news/2020/08/medals-and-awards-winners-2020/
I count five psychologists, and that's just 2020.
Well then I should put in a call to Edinburgh University immediately, they'll be dismayed to learn of the imposters they have as the emeritus professor of their department of psychology.
:up:
Exactly.
Which is why we have novels and can gain some insight into the human experience.
Nothing about deontological or consequentialist ethical theories really incorporate the psyche into their analysis. The trolley dilemma neither does incorporate the analysis of the biases of the lever switcher into the conceptual landscape. Don't these issues mean that philosophy still is in need of a rational analysis that is non-economic and calls for more psychological insights or is this an issue that psychology faces as a field that simply doesn't adhere to the same sort of analysis philosophers require(?)
Quoting T Clark
Yet, when a patient enters the office of a psychologist, they would sit there and recollect questions they have to the psychologist about their life. It's important for a psychologist to be asked questions about one's life and provide a narrative from an unbiased observer about them. In my opinion, it seems naive to say that they only are there to provide support as their profession is about the importance of external or internal factors that are causing the patient to feel unwell or mentally ill.
@unenlightened, do you know why this is, if I may be so bold?
There are also countless theories in physics, until we settle on the best one. Then we continuously revise.
And psychology does not “enjoy them all”. You don’t see people taking B. F. Skinner’s theory about language acquisition seriously anymore for example.
Psychology hasn’t had a Newton or Einstein yet, it’s still in its infancy.
I think Tim has fallen victim to the No True Scottish Psychologist fallacy.
And that's one of the reasons so much of the philosophy of ethics is baloney.
Quoting Shawn
I've said this before - psychology is not psychotherapy. Psychology is the scientific study of behavior. But you're right, some, but not all, forms of psychotherapy do involve self-examination.
There are those who would say that Freud was that person, including Freud. A lot of people would laugh at that. I think there's a case to be made though. Before Freud and some others at the beginning of the 20th century, it was widely believed that people acted for motives and by methods that are mostly conscious and self-conscious. Freud showed that people are not aware of much of what goes on in their minds. That's a profound idea and one that's at the bottom of any understanding of the human mind and human behavior.
That's pretty scary, no? That people have to think of reasons to love another nowadays.
Quoting T Clark
How much of this does it differ from other aspects of psychology? Seems interesting to point out that psychology or psychotherapy aren't that distinct from another since one can be more theory based, with the other much more hands on and active.
Quoting T Clark
That's actually funny to talk about, since that's by definition behaviorism. I don't think behaviorism is the same as psychology, as is cognitive science the same as the study of thinking.
Quoting T Clark
It would be interesting to note, that what types do not involve this form of analysis?
I'm not sure if I understand the question. When I was a psych major many (many, many, many) years ago, the classes I liked the best were in cognitive psychology and the psychology of language and for the exact reasons we're discussing. They were the most "scientific" of the types of psychology. Even better, they dealt mainly with healthy human minds and healthy human behavior. In the intervening 50 years, cognitive psychology has expanded and been joined by cognitive science to provide a very powerful way of looking human cognitive function.
Although when I was in college in the 1970s I had thoughts of being a therapist, I was never satisfied by those classes in that aspect for the reason we are discussing. They had trouble separating out the facts of human behavior and the methods for intervening in human mental problems. I think that's where a lot of the criticism about psychology comes from.
Quoting Shawn
No. The definition of "behaviorism" is "The theory that human and animal behavior can be explained in terms of conditioning, without appeal to thoughts or feelings"
Quoting Shawn
Much of psychotherapy these days uses drugs with or without talk therapy. Even the talk therapies vary in the amount of self-awareness involved. Some of them focus directly on problem behaviors and how to improve them directly without necessarily using self-awareness. I am not a psychotherapist, so I we've come to the end of my specific knowledge.
I've been trying to decide whether I should try to make a comprehensive case for psychology as a scientific discipline. I'd considered doing that in the past but never got around to it. That would be the only potentially effective way for me to respond to your skepticism, but it will take some effort. Let me think about whether I've got the energy to do it right now.
See my previous response.
Yeah, a shockingly poor argument from here.
Psychology is not a science.
Some psychologists do practice scientific methods sometimes.
But when they do so, they're not doing psychology.
Why? - because psychology is not a science.
It's the sort of circularity a five year old could spot.
Listen carefully, I will say this only once (on each psychology thread).
Science operates on the assumption that atoms do not understand atomic theory - in general that the objects of scientific study are not altered by the theory on has of them. At the quantum level, this becomes difficult because the act of observation itself affects the observed and this leads to the uncertainty principle. However, in psychology, the objects of observation are themselves observers, scientists, and psychological theorisers. Their theories of psychology radically affect their own psychology.
So, for example, Freud's theories of sexual repression stemmed from observations of 'hysterical' wealthy women. It led to a change of mind of Western society, and eventually a sexual liberation, to the extent that sexual dream imagery is widely used in films and sexual repression has declined to the extent that hysteria is not even a thing. It happens whenever a psychological theory becomes popular, that the psychology of the populace adapts to it. And this is something no theory can account for in advance.
Therefore, the methods of science cannot be reliably used in psychology, and when they are, theories run in fashions, each one becoming obsolete as it has its influence on the population.
As someone who works in the area of mental illness and addiction (and complex trauma), I would say that psychology (in the broadest sense of that word - counselling/psychiatry/therapy) saves lives on a daily basis. So it is important. It helps people get in touch with who they are and who they want to be. It helps them manage their emotions and experiences. Yes, there is an overlap with some philosophy.
Psychology is split into a myriad of sectarian divisions - from high theory psychotherapies, to practical no bullshit modalities. It's an absolutely vast area, with good and bad practitioners. Like any activity.
One thing's for sure, many people are fearful of and resent psychology, often because they are suspicious of disciplines which purport to 'understand' human behaviour and which may also be used by military and advertising to persuade people to do things against their interests. And there's people who hold a view that psychology is fatally constricted and is devoid of spirituality - its knowledge derived from a meaningless scientism of 'rats and stats'.
In my experience good psychology does not project a theory or viewpoint upon the person in treatment - it helps them to identify what's important to them and how to build a more sustainable emotional life, with enhanced relationships.
As far as it being science, I would say, of course - but it can depend on the modality or particular theory. Psychology is a vast and uneven area. Susan Haack (a leading philosopher of science) reminds us that:
[i]There is no “Scientific Method,” I argue: i.e., no mode of inference or procedure of inquiry used by all and only scientists, and explaining the successes of the sciences. There are only:
The inferences and procedures used by all serious empirical inquirers (make an informed guess as to the explanation of some puzzling phenomenon, check how well it stands up to the evidence you have, and any further evidence you can get); these are not used only by scientists.
The special tools and techniques gradually developed by scientists over the centuries (instruments of observation, the calculus, statistical techniques, models and metaphors, computers and computer programs, social helps such as peer-review, etc., etc.); which, being often local, and always evolving, are not used by all AND:
The involvement in scientific work of many people, who may be thousands of miles, or centuries, apart.[/i]
Rarely. We usually use students!
Quoting unenlightened
Which would be a theory of psychology, so we'll just presume it'll become obsolete soon as fashion changes, yes?
Quoting unenlightened
Good example. Got a second? Try it with ACT-R, for example, how's that theory 'radically affected' the psychology of the subjects it is being tested against. Or how about the fast-mapping approach to language acquisition? Or the declining attentional resource theory of age-related memory loss. Or Dual Coding Theory? Or, in fact, any psychological theory from at least this fucking century.
Quoting unenlightened
Even if your theory had a shred of evidence from nearer than a hundred years ago, you've not shown at all how it would actually prevent the application of the scientific method, only that it would present the field with some unique challenges.
Yes indeed. you demonstrate it very well! As soon as you know what the theory is, you make a new presumption and of course presume that "we" will also make it. But it hasn't become fashionable yet really has it? As long as you disagree with it, it has a chance. :razz:
Quoting Isaac
Oh it does. The list of defunct mental illnesses and defunct psychological theories is a very long one. But I do not require evidence to do conceptual analysis, and you have just demonstrated that you understand how the concepts work together.
@tim wood and I get along pretty well, philosophically, except when we don't. He has some pretty strong... opinions that always get me started - his antipathy towards religion and psychology are prime examples.
I'm always happy to get to use "antipathy" in a post. Antipathy, antipathy, antipathy.
[i]Say it loud and there's music playing,
Say it soft and it's almost like praying[/i]
But in the meantime, there are real consequences for people from psychologists. People get stigmatized with psychological diagnoses, lose jobs, get their reputations smeared.
There being a multitude of theories in a particular field is fine, as long as there are no serious harmful consequences for people on account of that.
That they're defunct doesn't lend any support to your theory. There are lots of defunct theories in physics too. The aspect of your theory which most stands in need of evidence is that prevailing theories in psychology affect the subjects of future studies. It seems obvious to me (from this site alone) that the vast majority of people are completely unaware of the vast majority of theories in contemporary psychology.
Yeah, I didn't mean the quip as a personal insult, but the logic here is childlike, even if the personalities aren't.
Quoting T Clark
Who isn't!
The issue is applied psychology, as it is applied by people in positions of power, whether they have a degree in psychology or not, and the legal power that these people have.
And this isn't even about "the few bad apples". It's that someone in position of power can tell you "who you really are" and "what your problem is", issue a legally binding document that stigmatizes you, and you're supposed to accept all this, like the obedient sheeple that you're supposed to be.
In the abstract, the field of psychology is interesting and seems relevant enough. But when actually applied, it's an entirely different story altogether.
Yes, definitely a very difficult and contentious issue in clinical psychology. What do you propose as an alternative?
It seems that psychology has largely taken over the role that religion/religiosity used to have. So that it is now psychology that prescribes to people what they are supposed to believe is real and what isn't, what is morally good and what isn't.
The authoritarianism and the dogmatism have, of course, remained the same.
If they are supposed to have that same measure of legal power, then psychologists should get their act together and agree on one theory and enforce it, one objective system of measurement.
Far too much is left to the whimsy of the individual psychologist and their personal preferences.
It's absurd, given the measure of legal power they have, and yet can afford so much whimsy.
The problems with applied psychology have nothing to do with whether or not psychology is a science. There are problems with applied physics that have the potential to destroy humanity, but that doesn't change physic's status as a science.
What a strange thing to say. Science is science. If something is indeed a science, then it should be science all the way down.
But in practice, it so often isn't. Take, for example, the measuring of IQ in preschool children, which is so important for making decisions about their future. The child is tested once, and yet so much hinges on that one result. Children are sent to special education schools, their futures cemented, all based on the results of one test. This is not scientific.
Pick up any introductory book on the theme of scientific methodology, and you'll see the first chapters are devoted to errors in measurement and how to minimize them. One of the main ways to do so is to repeat the measurement several times and then calculate the mean. In practice, this isn't the norm.
Applied science is another phrase meaning "engineering." Engineering is in no way science.
Quoting baker
Again, that's science. Engineering is not science. Hitting a nail with a hammer is not a hammer. Applied psychology is not psychology.
What about people who got harmed because we had false theories in physics?
I will certainly grant you that. And i will also grant that this ignorance gives much psychology the semblance of truth. But once you have granted the principle, which seems obvious enough, that people (and societies) are altered by the prevailing psychology of the time, which you seem not to dispute in principle, then it is but a semblance. What is clear enough, surely, is that electrons are not affected significantly by the theories we have about them, but people most certainly are. this means that if there is something like an understanding of the human psyche to be had, it is not of the same order as physics.
Now we're doodling around with language. It doesn't matter what the diploma says. It matters what people actually do. To be fair, I think the confusion you and I are having is something psychologists of all kinds are not very aware of. Maybe that's Freud's fault.
Quoting tim wood
Now you've just gone out and ruined my brilliant metaphor or aphorism or whatever it is.
Quoting tim wood
You're just itching for a scrap and you're impatient waiting for me to decide whether I want to get into it.
Do you consider geology, paleontology, evolutionary biology, ecology, astronomy, and oceanography to be sciences?
Is this subjectivism or relativism at its core? Just wondering, unenlightened-dono.
You wrote previously.
Quoting tim wood
The sciences I listed do not generally have "replicable results from experiments" any more than psychology does. These are called "observational sciences." Here is some text from an article in American Scientist. I don't offer this as proof, but rather as a description of what I'm talking about.
I think we both agree that there is some work in psychology which matches the description of experimental science, but much doesn't.
Well for a start they have the DSM, but aside from that, I really don't see how further unifying the criteria (even if it could be done) will help reduce either stigma or false diagnoses, you'll have to lay out for me a bit more clearly how you see that working.
Indeed. Psychology has a unique challenge in that respect with regards to the small proportion of its theories that become part of mainstream culture. Still not seeing an argument that this challenge renders the entire field unscientific. As you rightly pointed out, physics is facing a similar challenge, is physics thereby rendered unscientific?
The very title of the web page shows that you fond a list of 'personality theorists', not a list of psychologists. His are we to take this as anything less than willful ignorance in the light of the post above where I already showed you the error in your definition?
And for all your pretence at philosophy, you've yet to address the very basic counter argument I raised at first.
If all you've got is that some of psychology is unscientific ,then you have, by fundamental logic, failed to make the case that psychology sensu lato is unscientific. Again, it's really hard to infer anything short of malice if you deliberately overlook such a fundamental logical principle in order to maintain your attack.
:up: Psychology is exactly as you describe it - more, some even might want to say mere, speculation than anything substantive. A poster even compared Jung's psychology to mysticisim and to tell you the truth that such a comparison is possible speaks volumes about the lack of credibility vis-à-vis psychology taken as a whole.
Coming to Freud, the alleged person who put psychology on the map, one only needs to look at how his theory is centered around the so-called Oedipus complex. Oedipus being the perfect analogy for Freud's theories is a dead giveaway - psychology is simply mythology in modern form.
I'm not one for 'isms - call it what you like. But my philosophy always prioritises the relation as fundamental; the observer and the observed are both united and only exist in the observation. The observation is reality; the observer and the observed are 'aspects'.
Science is about the observed aspect with the observer's influence 'stripped out, and psychology is about the observer with the world stripped out. Neither has a complete grasp of reality, but psychology falls apart rather quicker when it pretends to be science. Science is the selfless observation of the world, and one cannot have a selfless observation of the self.
For fuck's sake.
https://www.psychol.cam.ac.uk/research/research-centres
What of that list looks anything even vaguely resembling Jung and Freud.
Do you people bother to do even a shred of research before vomiting up your ad hoc reckons?
Which is it?
If psychology is not scientific at all, does that mean there are no psychological facts?
If so, how do you explain psychological patterns? Eg, research shows overwhelmingly that serial killers are psychopaths. Is "psychopathy" just a theory?
This is starting to sound like an anti-science person who says evolution is "just a theory"
Most people are embodied minds. This might be confusing some. There is a totally legitimate science of the body as object, which I like to call physiology, brain science, and so on.
The mind is not a physical object. Thus psyche is not amenable to scientific study; rather it requires insight. It is the absence of insight that makes this appear controversial obscure and difficult to make sense of. The education system teaches the ignoring and denying of insight as "unscientific" - which of course it is.
Well said. Apart from the rather nebulous use of 'insight', I couldn't agree more.
As can be seen clearly from the research the Cambridge School of Psychology includes in its remit (cited above), Psychology studies both the psyche and its assumed substrate.
I said what I wanted to say. It's obvious that psychology is far from being a science at par with physics or even for that matter biology. Why else all the controversy surrounding its scientific status? No smoke without fire is how I see it.
Did you think that was in some doubt?
Quoting TheMadFool
What an utterly stupid thing to say - your chosen side in any controversy is automatically right simply by virtue of there being a controversy.
Why is it [s]stupid[/s] wrong?
Criteria for accepting expert testimony:
1. The expert must be unbiased
2. The expert's comments must be limited to his area of expertise
3. The expert must be reliable
4. There should be consensus among experts (no controversy)
Ergo, if experts don't see eye to eye on an issue, here psychology, I'm warranted to doubt the claims of psychologists that what they're doing is science.
1. Quote an expert claiming that the whole of psychology is not a science and we might then have something to go off, other wise bringing up expert testimony is useless.
2. "I'm warranted to doubt the claims of psychologists that what they're doing is science" is not the same as "psychology is simply mythology in modern form" is it? Not by a very long margin.
If there were an expert in the field who claimed that the whole of psychology was not a science, then you would have cause to doubt that the whole of psychology is not a science. Since you've neither provided such an expert, not limited your claims to just doubt I can't see what relevance your little syllogism might have to the matter at hand.
I don't get why it has to be one or the other. By observing people's behavior and analysing it, and testing my analyses, I can arrive at insights, indirectly, about the psyche. There is no strict formula for arriving at a discovery. It requires both rigor as well as flexibility. It's an art and a science. I think this is true of any field of inquiry.
Only replication is strictly rigorous.
And it seems like throwing out the baby with the bathwater. If psychology can't be a strict science, then it is merely an art? Or what would you call it? A path to insight?
But there are definitely topics that can be and must be tackled in scientific methods such as diagnosing depression anxiety problems. For these problems, they carry out lots of scientific experiments and tests on the mass of people with the suspected symptoms. They have the clearly and fully established theories to the causes, symptoms and also possible treatments for the problems. In that regard, it is a fully established science.
Psychology is a wide area with the large number of different topics, branches of disciplines and schools. Some are classic mysticism forms, and some are fully scientific. A diverse and flexible subject.
I'm sorry, I'm too tired to search for references to that effect. Suffice it to say they exist and a Google search will take you to numerous criticisms of psychology especially on the matter of its pretence to science.
Quoting Isaac
That's a distinction without a difference. If it isn't science and some explanatory theory is being posited, it's just mythology in disguise. Psychology is a giant leap indeed but unfortunately backwards to a time before Thales of Miletus when myths dominated the lives of people.
Quoting Isaac
Google. The truth is out there.
I have to use the language we have, but I'll try and concretise it a bit for you. Science begins and ends with observation, and in the middle is knowledge, theory, hypothesis records etc. Observation demands the separation of observer and observed. I could call it "out-sight".
Insight can be contrasted as demanding the unity of observer and observed. Thus, if I notice that someone is identified with 'psychology' and gets angry and defensive when it is questioned or criticised, that is an observation; whereas if I notice my own defensiveness and identification, that is insight. But I must be careful here, because it is easy to misunderstand. I can make such observations of myself in memory; looking back in the thread I might see something like that, but it would not then be an insight. Insight is in the present because the observer is the observed, an awareness of awareness that does not separate. My defensiveness notices itself.
Psychology is science, observational science.
Quoting Yohan
Although you are overstating the case, there is some truth in what you've written.
For me psychology and philosophy go hand by hand. The similarities, in the issues they both deal with (even in a different way), are way to much from any other field. Their main field of exploration is human.That's their common center. The more we know about psychology, the better philosophical theories we can propose. For me since historically philosophy came first. I see psychology as a child of philosophy. It's the wonder of the unknown that fuelled philosophy genesis and same happened with psychology also. The curiosity!
Is it a science? I wonder the same too. Don't know. I will put another question though. Can philosophy be considered as a science too then? I think the main problem with psychology and its role, is that it deals with an extreme vague issue. Soul.I had opened a discussion here,some time ago,about Spirit, and one of the main things that I noticed from the answers, was that most people don't believe neither at Spirit or Soul existence.
So how can they consider psychology as a science if they actually don't recognize the main issue that psychology deals with. Soul!
I will disagree with what mentioned about psychology's Einstein. There was and was Freud. Or should I call him Jordan of psychology for making it so famous? In any case, for me at least, he is a great philosopher also. And I think that says a lot about how close connected psychology and philosophy are.
This is like basing your entire opinion regarding philosophy on just Parmenides or something. Both his contemporaries and his succesors where involved in entirely different projects.
Freuds work can be seen as being in line (as in: line of inquiry) with the project started by von Krafft-Ebbing, what with his focus on sexual psychopathology... Both William James and Wilhelm Wundt where active during the same period, and their lines of inquiry involved the first experimental psychological laboratories. Neither actually had anything to do with psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis might have been in vogue for a while, but this was later replaced by behaviorism as the dominant paradigm. There also is the line which eventually lead to gestalt psychology (Brentano> von Ehrenfels> Wertheimer> Koffka> Kohler...), and these boys didn't have anything to do with psychoanalysis either. But sure, mythology. Even though they mostly talk about phenomenological accounts of sensory perception.
If you can't be bothered to defend your defamation of an entire field of research, perhaps consider not publishing it.
As I said to @unenlightened, and have clearly evidenced using the example of Cambridge School of Psychology, psychology considers itself the study of the human psyche, including it's assumed substrate (the central nervous system). What you or I say is it's proper subject is immaterial.
Quoting tim wood
I do indeed consider them psychologists. Your claim was not that psychology has aspects which are unscientific, your claim was that the whole of psychology is unscientific, as such, seeking out what you knew in advance was a specific subset of psychology for your evidence was biased at best, if not deliberately disingenuous.
Quoting tim wood
I judge the whole by all of its parts, as would seem the rational thing to do. As such the conclusion is that psychology is a mixture of scientific and non-scientific approaches (as well as some in between). The company it keeps is irrelevant, else philosophy is damned by no less a sin.
Are anger and defensiveness not aspects of the psyche? You seem to be saying here that you can do psychology but psychologists can't. I think I understood you better before the explanation!
Quoting unenlightened
I agree with the sentiment, it's something central to much of my work, that we only really know our own thoughts through the memory of having them (which is necessarily modulated by cultural narratives - but that's a whole other story). But the way you've phrased it here seems to leave that which you define as 'insight', very little to do. Observing the psyche of others ( or inferring it from behaviour) is not insight, neither is analysis of one's own thoughts (necessarily post hoc recollections). What's left?
I thought you meant something more like a gut feeling - 'insight' as in the building of castles in the air, hoping there's some foundations for them. That's where I see the study of psyche, a feeling about in the dark, with much speculation on the form of that which one is grasping blind. But even here, I find it hard to see how good attempts at limiting confounding factors and good statistical analysis isn't going to be at least an improvement on mere armchair speculation.
The thing about psychology (as opposed to other speculative enterprises like, say, evolutionary biology), is that one has to have a theory. We can't just postpone speculation until we've honed the method to a properly scientific one, we interact with other people all the time, we make decision which affect them. Every time we do this we do so on the basis of some theory about their psyche which dictates how we think they'll respond. So we can't do without psychology, we're all psychologists. It's just a question of whether we can do anything to even slightly improve the utility of our models.
Aspects of what? Aspect of a relation?
Quoting unenlightened
I'm not entirely sure why; but, Buddhism seems like a way of life originating from a selfless observation of the self by Buddha. Why isn't Buddhism more popular in psychology?
Yes, you probably did. :cry:
Well you are the psychologist; perhaps you should say what is the psyche. But from my side, I would say that what one can observe is behaviour and perhaps brain imagery with equipment, and these are not psyche. Psyche is inner; psyche is the immediacy, the presence that makes the present present.
Quoting Shawn
Yes of course aspects of the relation that is observation.
Quoting Shawn
I'm not sure if you are just using words slightly differently here. I am trying to be clear and consistent in the way I use them, so I would say that meditation should be a practicing of presence, what I am calling insight rather than observation. If one observes oneself in the normal way of observing, one has to separate oneself from the self one observes.
There is some interest in buddhist practices in current psychology, but I do not think there is much understanding. They want to measure enlightenment. :death:
You're responding to a post I made to Yohan. Did you read my previous post to you where I discussed that?
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/568425
I didn't see any response from you on that. I'll take one more shot at this and then I'm done.
There is a contradiction here.
As I said, I'm done with this discussion for now. I've laid out my definitions and arguments and you've waved your arms and repeated your claims without addressing what I've written.
Just pointing you in the right direction as I did would be doing you a big favor - you would be disabused of your erroneous view that psychology has anything worthwhile. As I mentioned earlier and as some other posters have already mentioned psychology resembles mysticism and mythology and that's like someone telling you that you look like a monkey - definitely not a compliment.
This is really pitiful.
Fair enough.
Quoting unenlightened
This is only what I would call awareness. Psyche, as far as Psychology is concerned is the entire set of functions carried out to derive behaviour from external stimuli (or internal ones, depending which school you follow). We take observations of external stimuli, observations of behaviour and then use models of psyche to make predictions about the relationship, test those predictions and refine the models accordingly. Nowadays, these models are mostly pre-refined by ensuring they fit within the confines of what neuroscience tells us is possible.
Please, you're embarrassing yourself.
Blue=research with scientific methodology.
Yellow=research with unscientific methodology.
Paint the wall both yellow and blue in stripes. The wall's not blue (scientific) - genius. It's not fucking yellow either is it? Moron.
Granted, psychology is not as rigorous as physics--and why would it be, considering it's subject matter, and the capacity of its subjects (you and me) to deceive themselves and others? Neurology, physiological brain science, etc. have rigor, but they don't help us know ourselves.
Brother Wood will, like as not, doubt the worth of psychology (and sociology as well, most likely) no matter how solid your defense. People who think psychology should be a hard science like physics or chemistry need their heads examined, as well as their lives.
Psychology can not be a science like chemistry because its subject matter -- the minds of human beings -- are not directly observable, and moreover consists of billions of individuals who are all capable of obfuscation, deceit, dishonesty, distrust, willful stupidity, and more (as well as brilliant understanding and very sharp perception). One can with considerable accuracy measure how fast a person can read, how much they can remember, how quickly they can learn a skill, and the like. When it comes to examining a life in all its neurotic splendor, whether it's ones own or someone else's, one enters a funhouse of uncertainty.
Despite all that, there are many (not sure its more than a billion) people who seem to be healthy, well grounded, clear headed, honest, open, and cooperative. They, of course, do not end up on the psychotherapeutic couch. Psychology would probably learn more if it spent more time analyzing all the happy people who are alike, and less on the unhappy people who are all different and totally screwed up.
That's exactly the point! Psychology isn't/can't be a science. For it to come anywhere close to being a science, it needs people to be honest when reporting their thoughts, feelings, intuitions, whathaveyou and as we all know, honesty is (not) the best policy.
I do feel the aspiration to make psychology a science was/is in good faith, authentic in every sense of the word. However, sometimes reality doesn't match expectations - there's many a slip between the cup and the lip as they say.
A few issues that thwart the psychologist's attempts to make psychology into a science:
1. The data is unreliable. People will lie and inconsistently at that, a spanner in the works. Need I say more?
2. The mind is under the influence of multiple ideas, some, probably most, mutually contradictory. The upshot: no clear-cut thinking patterns. Our minds are chaotic - one moment we're theists, the next we're atheists, and at other times, agnostic. There's no telling which is which.
3. If we do detect thought patterns, we'll need to come up with a hypothesis to explain them. However, unlike patterns in physics which are inviolable (laws), those in psychology are statistical i.e. all we might be able to say is most people think a certain way. What then about the exceptions, the oddball who doesn't quite fit in with the rest? In scientific circles this would be treated as a failure of a posited hypothesis but in psychology they'll be ignored or even tolerated.
Psychology isn't a science.
I was responding to your claim that "psychology is simply mythology in modern form". The stuff I mentioned provided enough points to show that no, it isn't, and it never was. Only a very narrow reading of the entire field would give such an impression. Anyway, I take it that you're conceding this point since you didn't bother to respond to the issues I raised.
Note that I didn't say a word about if psychology as a whole is in line with your particular demarcation criteria though. Why? Because I don't think we see eye to eye on that topic. But an actual discussion on demarcation criteria would fall outside of the scope of this thread, since that would involve more than just psychology and it's importance. And no, I don't think the issue boils down to a simple "Kuhn vs. Popper" and/or a "Polanyi vs Feyerabend" discussion; the findings of Latour and Woolgar, as documented in their book "Laboratory Life" significantly muddy the waters when it comes to demarcation criteria (The science wars of the 90s are a good illustration of what I'm getting at).
Oh, the irony.
The reality is that psychologists themselves act as if psychology _is_ a hard science like physics or chemistry. That's how much credit is given to psychology, that's how much credit they believe they deserve.
Psychology might not be a hard science like physics or chemistry, but in society, and by law, it certainly gets the credit of being such.
Psychology assumes additionally that certain external realities correlate with certain internal states (brain activity etc corresponds to mental states)
For peer review to work, you also have to assume a psyche, and trust your peer's behavior correlate with their psyches.
Truth be told, the idea that one finds best describes one's own ideas is a hint as to what one's own ideas are. Freud was under the impression that the mythology of Oedipus fit his theory of human psychology like a glove - that's why he settled on it, no? This, to me, is the clearest indication that something's wrong with Freud's theory - if it looks like a duck (mythology) and quacks like a duck (mythology), it must be a duck (mythology).
Quoting Ying
You're beating around the bush. I'll make it easy for you: name one psychological theory that matches up to a scientific theory and we can begin to discuss it.
I already mentioned completely different lines of inquiry which started with the fathers of the field in my initial post in this thread. If you keep on insisting that the entire field of psychology can be summed up in Freuds psychoanalysis then you're just ignorant about psychology as a discipline. Remember, you stated that "psychology is simply mythology in modern form." You weren't just talking about Freuds theories. I'm noting this again since it seems to me like you're trying to move the goalposts here. Very intellectually honest of you. :rofl:
Right. Talking about what distinguishes a scientific theory from a non scientific theory (you know, demarcation crfiteria) is "beating around the bush". Whatever. :lol:
Many inventions started out as science fiction. Eg, cordless phones, and video calls. If modern inventions sound like, look, and behave like science fiction, it's therefore science fiction?
How about astronomy. The planets are named after Roman Gods. Is astronomy therefore based, in part, on mythology?
:rofl: Honestly, honesty ain't the best policy! Take that Pembroke scholars!
Truth be told, my criticism is particular in being directed against Freud but I'm using military tactics - liquidate high value targets. Attacking Freud successfully as I think I've done leaves psychology leaderless. Psychology should collapse unless psychology is the mythical Hydra. :wink:
Quoting Ying
You've ignored my request. I'll take that as confirmation of there being no psychological theories that are scientific.
Naming something from mythology is not the same as relying on it produce an explanatory hypothesis.
Yes, lets stop beating around the bush. What does it mean for a theory to be scientific in light of the works of Popper, Kuhn, Feyerabend, Polanyi, Woolgar and Latour? I have no interest in discussing if a particular theory is scientific or not if the notion of "scientific theory" isn't both well informed and clearly defined. This is the reason why I didn't bring this topic up in the first place and why I only focussed on your claim that "psychology is simply mythology in modern form".
What does it mean for a theory to be scientific if we don't ignore most of the relevant literature? Not an easy answer, to be sure.
A scientific theory shouldn't be/can't be compatible with both the truth of a prediction and the falsehood of that prediction i.e. it should be falsifiable. A psychological theory would have to explain both the trends in thinking patterns and the exceptions in those patterns. In other words, a psychological theory would have to explain why most people like chocolate while some don't. This, as you can see, means psychological theories can't be falsified (the exception proves the rule is not gonna work).
Yeah, when psychologists say such things to people, this really helps to improve the reputation of psychology!!!
That's not the only problem. It's that a person has so many thoughts about a certain topic, often contradictory ones, as one can tell from one's own experience. So what is it that a person really thinks about something?
Correlation with myth doesn't tell us anything about reality or viability. Myth can be based on reality and reality can be based on myth. Hence my science fiction - science reality comparison.
I think people in general are far saner and more resilient than psychology has been giving them credit for. I appreciate George Bonanno's work on this.
And what would that help? It seems that most well-adjusted people have as their foundation a functional and relatively happy childhood; so it's not something that can be replicated for adults with problems.
So, just Popper. OK then. What's behind the event horizon of a black hole? Is it a singularity or a fuzzball? How would you empircally verify this? Not to say that both hypotheses aren't scientific though. They obviously are in line with scientific models. Anyway, point being, falsification isn't the sole criterion for a theory to be scientific. It also needs to fit the relevant paradigm in regards to method (in this case, the math). Moreover, there have been scientific theories which where rejected by the scientific community at the time, only to be rehabilitated at a later date as was the case with catastrophism in geology.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_singularity
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuzzball_(string_theory)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catastrophism
Why do I bring these issues up? Because there's more at play than a singular abstract criterion. There also are paradigmatic, methodological and sociological issues at play. We could just stare at our navels and be content with falsification as the prime criterion for demarcation but this wouldn't be very empirical. Scientific theorycrafting and experimentation in the real world is much more messy (though no less "scientific"). Again, I'm not saying falsification isn't a criterion. It is. I'm just saying it's not the only one, or that it's even a necessary one.
"No process yet disclosed by the historical study of scientifc development at all resembles the methodological stereotype of falsifcation by direct comparison with nature. That remark does not mean that scientists do not reject scientifc theories, or that experience and experiment are not essential to the process in which they do so. But it does mean—what will ultimately be a central point—that the act of judgment that leads scientists to reject a previously accepted theory is always based upon more than a comparison of that theory with the world. The decision to reject one paradigm is always simultaneously the decision to accept another, and the judgment leading to that decision involves the comparison of both paradigms with nature and with each other."
-Thomas Kuhn, "Structure of Scientific Revolutions", p. 77
But this is precisely what psychology attempts/aspires to be: a third party to tell you who you really are.
I'm talking about what would justify the same great measure of legal power that they have.
As for false diagnoses, there is a number of issues:
For one, the medical model of disease that assumes that psychological problems exist due to a physical/organic problem.
For two, the model of disease that assumes that psychological problems exist in the same way as physical problems; as discrete, enduring entities that can be objectively identified.
Thirdly, a relatively short time frame for observation of a person, in a very limited and specific social context, yet making definitive judgments based on such observation.
Fourthly, the power differential between the psychologist and the patient/observed person. People are expected to open up to a stranger who has the legal power to make their life very very hard, and worse. What could possibly not go wrong??
As for the stigma: It seems the stigma of a psychiatric diagnosis is part of the intention for a diagnosis to begin with, a form of punishment for being different, for not living up to other people's expectations, or for simply being so weak that one ends up as the scapegoat of others. Scapegoating is normal, societies seem to need it to feel sane and normal -- "Look at him, he's bad, he's not normal! While we are good and normal!"
Like I said above, I think people are far more resilient and saner than psychology has given them credit for. Yes, people occasionally have hard times, but they can climb out of them. But if that process is interrupted, forced into a mold prescribed by someone in position of power, simply on account that they have the power to do so, then the person's problems last longer and become more severe than they would without such interruption.
Also, many times, a person's problems aren't actually due to their faulty psychology, but due to external factors, like poverty or abuse by other people; situations where any sane person would eventually go crazy. But it doesn't seem to be in psychology's interest to acknowledge this.
Yes, it is blind prejudice. On thing I've noticed - when people criticize the softness of psychology, I point out that what was called cognitive psychology has grown to include a very hard branch called "cognitive science." They then claim that cognitive science isn't psychology. So, soft psychology isn't science, we harden it up, and then it's not psychology any more. So, clearly it has nothing to do with the hardness of the science. It has to do with the intrusion of touchy-feely girly-man stuff into the bastion of maleness.
Quoting Bitter Crank
Long, long ago, in that golden age when you and I were what is now known as "young," I was a psych major. I took abnormal psych, social psych, be-mean-to-rats psych, psych testing. I found them all pretty unsatisfying. Then, in my sophomore year, I took cognitive psychology followed by the psychology of language. Those focused on exactly the people you describe - the more-or-less happy, functional people in the world. Even unhappy, less functional people still have minds that work pretty well most of the time. In those classes, this math and science guy found what he was looking for.
Now, now. You're getting all excited again.
This is complete bullwinkle. So, you say that if a subject is difficult to study, it can't be science. That just shows your lack of understanding of science, psychology, and human nature.
Again, this shows your ignorance of science, even "hard" science like physics. Many, most, of the important properties in physics are statistical. Once you get above particle physics, physical laws are based on statistical laws of mass behavior. They call it "statistical mechanics." Entropy is a purely statistical property. Pressure is a purely statistical property.
Maybe some do, but most don't. Most recognize that much of psychology is an observational science like geology or evolutionary biology, i.e. primarily descriptive as opposed to analytic.
Name one geological, or ecological, or paleontological, or evolutionary biology theory that matches up to what you call a "scientific theory."
Please elucidate.
You aren't "using military tactics - liquidate high value targets." As Ying noted:
Quoting Ying
A scientific theory needs to be falsifiable. If any of the branches of knowledge you mention contain such theories, they are scientific. If not, these aren't sciences.
We'll see who's ignorant.
[quote=Wikipedia]Metascience
Metascience involves the application of scientific methodology to study science itself. The field of metascience has revealed problems in psychological research. Some psychological research has suffered from bias,[254] problematic reproducibility,[255] and misuse of statistics.[256] These findings have led to calls for reform from within and from outside the scientific community.[257]
Confirmation bias
In 1959, statistician Theodore Sterling examined the results of psychological studies and discovered that 97% of them supported their initial hypotheses, implying possible publication bias.[258][259][260] Similarly, Fanelli (2010)[261] found that 91.5% of psychiatry/psychology studies confirmed the effects they were looking for, and concluded that the odds of this happening (a positive result) was around five times higher than in fields such as space science or geosciences. Fanelli argued that this is because researchers in "softer" sciences have fewer constraints to their conscious and unconscious biases.
Replication
Further information: Replication crisis § In psychology
A replication crisis in psychology has emerged. Many notable findings in the field have not been replicated. Some researchers were even accused of publishing fraudulent results.[262][263][264] Systematic efforts, including efforts by the Reproducibility Project of the Center for Open Science, to assess the extent of the problem found that as many as two-thirds of highly publicized findings in psychology failed to be replicated.[265] Reproducibility has generally been stronger in cognitive psychology (in studies and journals) than social psychology[265] and subfields of differential psychology.[266][267] Other subfields of psychology have also been implicated in the replication crisis, including clinical psychology,[268][269] developmental psychology,[270][271][272] and a field closely related to psychology, educational research.[273][274][275][276]
Focus on the replication crisis has led to other renewed efforts in the discipline to re-test important findings.[277][278] In response to concerns about publication bias and data dredging (conducting a large number of statistical tests on a great many variables but restricting reporting to the results that were statistically significant), 295 psychology and medical journals have adopted result-blind peer review where studies are accepted not on the basis of their findings and after the studies are completed, but before the studies are conducted and upon the basis of the methodological rigor of their experimental designs and the theoretical justifications for their proposed statistical analysis before data collection or analysis is conducted.[279][280] In addition, large-scale collaborations among researchers working in multiple labs in different countries have taken place. The collaborators regularly make their data openly available for different researchers to assess.[281] Allen et al.[282] estimated that 61 percent of result-blind studies have yielded null results, in contrast to an estimated 5 to 20 percent in traditional research.
Misuse of statistics
Further information: Misuse of statistics and Misuse of p-values
Some critics view statistical hypothesis testing as misplaced. Psychologist and statistician Jacob Cohen wrote in 1994 that psychologists routinely confuse statistical significance with practical importance, enthusiastically reporting great certainty in unimportant facts.[283] Some psychologists have responded with an increased use of effect size statistics, rather than sole reliance on p-values.[284]
WEIRD bias
"WEIRD" redirects here. For other uses, see Weird.
See also: Cultural psychology, Indigenous psychology, Transnational psychology, and Cross-cultural psychology
In 2008, Arnett pointed out that most articles in American Psychological Association journals were about U.S. populations when U.S. citizens are only 5% of the world's population. He complained that psychologists had no basis for assuming psychological processes to be universal and generalizing research findings to the rest of the global population.[285] In 2010, Henrich, Heine, and Norenzayan reported a bias in conducting psychology studies with participants from "WEIRD" ("Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic") societies.[286][287] Henrich et al. found that "96% of psychological samples come from countries with only 12% of the world’s population" (p. 63). The article gave examples of results that differ significantly between people from WEIRD and tribal cultures, including the Müller-Lyer illusion. Arnett (2008), Altmaier, and Hall (2008) and Morgan-Consoli et al. (2018) view the Western bias in research and theory as a serious problem considering psychologists are increasingly applying psychological principles developed in WEIRD regions in their research, clinical work, and consultation with populations around the world.[285][288][289] In 2018, Rad, Martingano, and Ginges showed that nearly a decade after Henrich et al.'s paper, over 80% of the samples used in studies published in the journal Psychological Science employed WEIRD samples. Moreover, their analysis showed that several studies did not fully disclose the origin of their samples; the authors offered a set of recommendations to editors and reviewers to reduce WEIRD bias.[290]
Unscientific mental health training
Some observers perceive a gap between scientific theory and its application—in particular, the application of unsupported or unsound clinical practices.[291] Critics say there has been an increase in the number of mental health training programs that do not instill scientific competence.[292] Practices such as "facilitated communication for infantile autism"; memory-recovery techniques including body work; and other therapies, such as rebirthing and reparenting, may be dubious or even dangerous, despite their popularity.[293] These practices, however, are outside the mainstream practices taught in clinical psychology doctoral programs.[/quote]
I'm not happy, not happy at all that I had to do your homework for you.
Psychology could cure cancer, find the Holy Grail, and win England the World Cup and it's reputation would remain unaltered amoung the ranks of the bizarre crusade this thread is on.
If literally nothing I say is contributing to the collective thought process anyway then I might as well swear like a sailor.
When posting Cambridge University School of Psychology's definition of what psychology covers hasn't budged people an inch from their lazy, puerile assumption that psychology is "Freud 'n that init", what more could I possibly do? Lobotomy?
In English, Science means those subjects which use hypotheses, tests, observations, experiments and then establish theories such as physics, chemistry and biology.
But in German, Science = Wissenschaft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wissenschaft
means any subject such as art, literature, social science, philosophy .... etc that can be studied and learned.
Wissenschaft
/?v?s(?)n?aft/
=
the systematic pursuit of knowledge, learning, and scholarship (especially as contrasted with its application).
Let's not then. What would you replace that power with. Criminals all get treated the same regardless of their mental health? The judge just guesses? We put it to a vote? What is it you think we should be doing instead of making diagnoses based on educated guesswork?
Or am I? We couldn't possibly infer my mental state from my actions, that'd be basically witchcraft.
It seems to be a hybrid of formal science (such as when psychologists measure response time, learning rates, memory, etc.) and a mix of the humanities -- philosophy, history, literature, et al. It also has a practical streak: "Just what, exactly, is your problem and how can you solve it?" Some psychologists are really good at this and others are not, just like one's friends might be good problem solvers, or not.
What the hell is economics, for that matter? Economists study behavior but they seem to be no better than anybody else at predicting the next economic disaster. If you can't tell me when the next collapse is coming, what good are you? How about "political science"?
All of the behavioral sciences suffer from an inability to surreptitiously observe enough people closely enough long enough. Picky ethicists disapprove of bird-watching people, and doing rat-maze experiments on our fellow man. Put the fussy ethicists out to pasture and we might be able to get something done (90% just joking).
Some workers in the field have actually done some first rate bird-watching; thinking here of Laud Humphreys and his public toilet sex study. Great work, Tearoom Trade. Another such study was done by Prof. Jack Weatherford of Washington, D.C. adult book stores. Extra, extra, read all about it. Porn Row.
Both of these sociologists / anthropologists got up close and personal without compromising anyone's identity or safety. Others have observed gangs, punk rockers, drug users, etc. etc. It's slow, sometimes dangerous work. Most prospective PhDs (for some odd reason) don't want to hang around in gangs or mahogany paneled suites for years on end studying the local fauna.
Maybe an antidepressant would help?
And psychologists have certainly done a fine job on that project!
"The entire set of functions" - I want to be sure we are disagreeing here as to substance and not just the words: Are you saying functions of the mind that produce behaviour, but not strictly behaviour itself? If you are saying, as it seems, that psyche is something one theorises in others, not something one observes directly, then we are substantially in agreement.
Let me tell you my favourite psychological theory; it's Personal Construct Theory. It is what one might call a psychological theory of the individual as a psychologist. As such, it comes as close as can be to taking into account the effect of psychological theory on the psyche. It at least acknowledges that the way one thinks about other people and of course oneself - ones psychological theory - is a major, crucial influence on one's behaviour.
"We take observations of external stimuli, observations of behaviour and then use models of psyche to make predictions about the relationship, test those predictions and refine the models accordingly"
That's what I do with psychologists! I poke them and watch them squirm. :wink:
What you've written may provide a case that some psychology is bad science, but provides no evidence at all that psychology as a discipline is not a science.
But that is precisely what any competent psychologist would do. One important part of psychology is assisting people to deal with extraordinary situations, like recovery from war or rape or poverty/deprivation or child abuse. I have seen this work well (in most cases) for decades and I've seen it provide people with a greatly enhanced life. It focuses on people's strengths and upon what is important to them. The first thing a competent psychologist would do is acknowledge the situation and impact of this on the person.
I think some people have seen movies like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest too many times.
I am sure there are countries where power is abused and psychology (along with other disciplines) is used against people. I am sure there are bad practitioners. I am sure that there are unscientific schools, modalities and elements. But psychology and psychiatry is vast and complex and like most human activities it holds the good, the bad and the indifferent.
I'm not sure how to and I imagine it depends on the type of psychology and the definition of science one uses.
:rofl: So, it's me and not them who's (mentally) ill? :lol:
I guess you missed the point then. :smile:
I mentioned philosopher Susan Haack in my first response to this issue.
Haack argues that it's a hallmark of scientism to be preoccupied with the demarcation between what is and is not science. It's actually not that certain. Here are some excerpts from her influential essay Six Signs of Scientism.
[i]The fact is that the term “science” simply has no very clear boundaries: the reference of the term is fuzzy, indeterminate and, not least, frequently contested.
I might say, as a first approximation, that science is best understood, not as a body of knowledge, but as a kind of inquiry (so that cooking dinner, dancing, or writing a novel, isn’t science, nor pleading a case in court). At a second approximation, I would add that, since the word “science” has come to be tied to inquiry into empirical subject-matter, formal disciplines like logic or pure mathematics don’t qualify as sciences, nor normative disciplines like jurisprudence or ethics or aesthetics or epistemology). And at a third approximation, to acknowledge that the work picked out by the word “science” is far from uniform or monolithic, it makes sense to say, rather, that the disciplines we call “the sciences” are best thought of as forming a loose federation of interrelated kinds of inquiry.[/i]
Like natural-scientific inquiry, social-scientific inquiry will follow the underlying pattern of all serious empirical inquiry. Like natural scientific inquiry, it will benefit from internal social arrangements than encourage good, honest, thorough work, and discourage cheating. But at least many of the special tools and techniques of which it will have need are likely to be very different from the special tools and techniques most useful in the natural sciences.
I think Haack would argue that psychology does qualify as a science. She may well argue that some of it is poor science.
Yes, that is precisely what I'm saying. Even without psychology proper (the academic field of research) we observe the behaviour of others, see how it is similar to our own, and infer the sorts of thoughts we have might motive them too. Psychology infers that the levels of consistency seem indicate that this process is amenable to modelling, at least to an extent. different schools differ as to what data points should be included in that modelling (just behaviour, behaviour and personal reports, behaviour and neurological imagery, behaviour and evolutionary function,.... and so on). But to my knowledge, there's not one school out there which thinks it can 'see' psychological processes directly, nor which assumes self-analysis provides reasonable data, so it's all about inferring and it's all about collecting data from others.
Which brings us on to...
Quoting unenlightened
I have a lot of sympathy with Kelly (et al), but my issues (small as they are), is that the degree to which his psychological approach is radically different from any other, is overstated. Again, the emphasis (as it has been throughout, here) is on psychotherapy, not psychology. In the former, Kelly's approach really does stand out - it's lead to things like Person Centred Therapy, which is almost the only therapy I'd actually ever recommend. But that's not Psychology. His approach to psychology (constructivism) has been taught in mainstream degrees since I can remember (and I'm a dinosaur). It's pretty much the foundation of developmental psychology (thanks to Piaget), it's overwhelmingly the dominant theory in all forms of cognitive psychology, almost to the exclusion of anything else, psychologists like Lisa Feldman Barrett have extended it into what's left of personality psychology... basically, I think you'd struggle to find a psychologist working in research today who didn't have at least some background assumptions of constructivism, maybe a few diehard evolutionists and one or two leftover behaviourists, but I've not met any.
Quoting unenlightened
Yep. Personal narratives. I've worked on little else for the last 25 years. Maybe that's given me too selective a view of psychology, maybe I've simply surrounded myself with like-minded research groups and forgotten the rest of my field, I don't know. Seems unlikely, but it's possible I suppose. From where I'm stood, most of research psychology seems that way.
Quoting unenlightened
That's what I do with everyone...is that not normal...
Exactly.
Quoting tim wood
Instead of making wild accusations and then expecting one's opposition to do all the legwork to prove you wrong, why don't you actually trouble to support your own position.
Here's the first five preprint papers in my review feed. Why don't you explain why their methodologies don't amount to science, then we can fully understand what you're talking about.
https://psyarxiv.com/3wg5j/
https://psyarxiv.com/c46jt/
https://psyarxiv.com/xhbty/
https://psyarxiv.com/sh3xz/
https://psyarxiv.com/eh5pb/
Thank you for this. Your post has made a better case for psychology being a science than my last 10 posts in this discussion have. I've downloaded Haack's essay.
@Isaac - It's a lost cause. Tim will just go on redefining the question, moving the goal posts as they say. Now we don't have to show that psychology is a science in general. We have to show that every psychological study ever done is legitimate science.
This from Wikipedia:
No true Scotsman, or appeal to purity - One attempts to protect their universal generalization from a falsifying counterexample by excluding the counterexample improperly. Rather than abandoning the falsified universal generalization or providing evidence that would disqualify the falsifying counterexample, a slightly modified generalization is constructed ad-hoc to definitionally exclude the undesirable specific case and counterexamples like it by appeal to rhetoric. This rhetoric takes the form of emotionally charged but nonsubstantive purity platitudes such as "true, pure, genuine, authentic, real", etc.
Sometimes it just makes sense to give up.
That seems like a good description of the Boulder Model, which is the basis for training "scientist-practitioners." From what I have heard from clinical psychologists, many institutions handle cases as teams, consisting of a number of disciplines to develop diagnosis and response. Taking responsibility for treatment is a demanding and complicated process.
That seems like a big issue in psychology for psychology to address its origin or magnitude in effects towards drugs that treat many mental disorders, no?
Sorry to keep harping on this but how about Albert Camus and the myth of Sisyphus? Will you call out philosophy as being a mythology?
Camus' myth of sisyphis is an illustration. Freud's Oedipus complex is an explantion.
You're absolutely right, of course, but I did ask him to look at the papers (though I should not have), so feel obliged to, so...
Quoting tim wood
You claimed psychology is not a science, yes? Or did I misinterpret that? Such a claim is contrary to conclusion of almost every university in the world, The UK Royal society (the oldest scientific institution in the world), the US National Academy of Sciences, as well as those of almost every country in Europe.
So yes, it's a wild accusation. To be honest, too much time has already been spent dismissing such a ludicrous notion in the light of the disagreement of virtually every science institution in world.
Quoting tim wood
Seriously? "I know you are, but what am I?", might have worked if I was five. You made an analogy that because psychology mixed unscientific and scientific methods it could not be called 'scientific' (was not all blue so could not be called 'blue'). Exactly the same applies to the term unscientific. it's not all yellow so can't be called 'yellow' either. It was a stupid analogy and it's revealing of the blinding bias in your assessment that you didn't notice it. I called that out.
Quoting tim wood
You've done no such thing at all. You've asserted that in order for a field to qualify as a science, every activity done under the name has to be completely scientific. You've offered us not even so much as a sentence justifying that assertion.
Quoting tim wood
Why?
Quoting tim wood
Ahh, the classic - I don't understand how a thing can be done, therefore it can't be done. Shall I point you in the direction of the appropriate textbook, or are you looking to enrol on a degree course?
Quoting tim wood
Have you ever read a scientific paper? You think none ever produce results which only suggest?
Quoting tim wood
Can't beat the Susan Haack definition already given (thanks @Tom Storm).
Quoting tim wood
Ten how do you explain the position of almost every academy and school of science in the world? Are they all wrong and only you right?
Quoting tim wood
Again, offered without any justification at all.
___
But as T Clark has already warned, there's little point in continuing to bang my head against blind prejudice.
An interesting connection I've not made before. There are a number of issues with the Boulder Method which I think would run counter to the model as well though, such as the slightly reductionist view of the research>practice routes, but overall, I can see the link.
Myths are illustrative, yeah. I don't agree Freud would think myths are more than that. But I'll let it go.
I deeply appreciate your kind gesture to "...let it go..." but Freud's theory is, as I've now repeated for the umpteenth time, based off of Oedipus and his rather, to put it mildly "unconventional" relationship with his mother. To state the obvious, Oedipus is the index case of the so-called Oedipus complex.
Camus' Sisyphus on the other hand is merely an analogy employed to illustrate the futile nature of human existence.
Do you see the difference now?
Even if the theory is based on the myth, which I doubt, I don't see how that makes it a myth nor reliant on the myth. I don't get you at all.
The Oedipus complex and the Oedipus Myth describe the same thing, that's all. The myth doesn't explain the theory, it describes it. (Although technically description is a preliminary step in the explanation process)
Quoting TheMadFool
The myth of Sisyphus is a metaphor.
The myth explains why human life is futile. It doesn't just fit a description, it explains the reason.
Camus explanation of WHY human life is futile is analogous with the explanation of the futility of Sisyphus' predicament.
Quoting TheMadFool
Oedipus complex ? Myth of Oedipus
Human futility ? Myth of Sisyphus
This is why I asked what the difference is.
Until you correct this there's no point in further discussion. Virtually every university in the world offers psychology (or some cognitive equivalent) as a bachelor of science where it is offered at all. The Royal Society lists psychology as a science. The US National Academy of Sciences list psychology as a science. The German, French and Swedish Academies all list psychology as a science (those were the one's I bothered to look up), psychology papers are published in the journal 'Science', by the American Academy for the Advancement of Science, psychologists win awards for science awarded by academies to support science, I get grants from the government's science research funding...
The only relevant question for you to be asking is where your error is, not where the error is in every university, academy, research institute and funding initiative in the world. If they're all using 'science' in such a way as to include psychology, it's you who've misunderstood what the word means, not they who are remiss in not consulting you before using it.
Quoting tim wood
Use. Use. Use. It is the threshold of where we would commonly use the word 'car' and where we would not. There's no God-given dictionary in the sky which tells us what words 'really' mean in advance of us using them. They mean exactly what they are used to mean. As above, 'science' is clearly used in such a way as to include psychology. So you're either mistaken about psychology, or mistaken about the meaning of the word 'science'.
@Isaac - I reiterate my advice to you. Time to give up.
I'm not saying the Oedipus myth explains the Oedipus complex. I'm saying it is the Oedipus complex and thus serves as the explanation for so-called psychological issues people have. In other words, the Oedipus myth can be used in and of itself to conduct a Freudian analysis if that's what it's called without having to read even a single word of what Freud wrote about it. Freud's work is in that sense superfluous and redundant. In other words Freud's theory is simply the Oedipus myth retold.
Quoting Yohan
So, now you're changing tack. The "metaphor" explains the human condition. Do you get a kick out of this? I ask because you really aren't making any sense here.
I'll give you the same advice I gave Isaac. It's time to give up. You'll never convince TMF.
You're right. Nothing here but constantly shifting ground and a willful ignorance of what psychology actually entails. But the essence is this...
Quoting tim wood
If you create an unusual, idiosyncratic (and self-immunised) definition of a word, then it's going to yield unusual, idiosyncratic consequences. I can't see why they'd be of any interest to anyone outside of your esoteric cabal of language users.
Here's my personal take on psychology for your consideration.
Psychology is the study of mind and behavior according to Wikipedia and that's, to my reckoning, answering two important questions:
1. How do people think/behave? Seeking patterns in thoughts and deeds much like how physicists extract the so-called laws of nature from observation. Answering this question will lead to laws of thinking/acting. Just as the laws of nature help us plan and manipulate our environment, the laws of thinking/acting too will prove to be of utmost value in "manipulating" people :down: & :up: but more :down: than :up: I suppose.
2. Why people think/act the way they do? This level of explanation is missing in physics (or is it?). Newton after developing his theory of gravity famously declared, hypotheses non fingo when asked, I'm guessing, why there's gravity? Albert Einstein, 300 years later, provided one explanation for gravity - mass causing spatial curvature.
However, as you would've already noticed, this leads to an infinite regress of explanations. Why does mass cause space to curve?, is the next thing that requires an explanation, so on and so forth. Thus, the extreme but palpable reluctance among physicists to provide explanations for the laws of nature.
Coming to psychology, let's suppose a theory X exists that explains,why people think/act the way they do? Not only have the laws of thinking/acting been discovered and enumerated in detail, now we also know why there are such laws at all. Is theory X possible/impossible? Is this question even the right one to ask? Even if it were possible, the specter of infinite regress looms over our heads - theory X explains the laws of thinking/acting asserting, say, that it's because of, if you'll permit me to simplify for the sake of convenience, sexual issues (Freud) but this itself needs further explanation, right? Why do sexual issues cause the laws of thinking/acting to be as they are?
Psychology is doomed if it devotes any amount of time and energy trying to answer question 2. why people think/act the way do? This, if I'm not mistaken, is exactly the question psychology wants answered and thus marks the point it diverges from physics (note I'm using physics as the best representative for science). In this sense psychology isn't science - it brushes aside the infinite regress of explanations problem that all scientists know all too well to get sucked into.
Another thing is...
Psychology, from what I've gathered, is the study of human nature. What are humans like (the laws of thinking/acting)? Why are they like that (the theory that attempts to explain the laws of thinking/acting)? Setting aside the fact that controversy surrounding human nature - does it even exist? - psychologists can, at the very least, say that almost all/most people think/act in a certain way in a specified situation. This, as you know, is a statistical claim and this particular strain of knowledge is notorious for its uncertainty - even if 90% of Indians are Hindus, it doesn't necessarily mean that the Indian you met at a friend's house-warming party is a Hindu. It's likely, yes, but not certain and therein lies the rub.
Science is certain, ignoring the problem of induction, about the laws of nature - they're inviolable and if they're broken, it's back to the drawing board.
Statistical claims like those found in psychology tolerate errors in prediction - if 90% of people would donate to charity and I find out you don't, it isn't an issue at all because you could be one of the 10%. Return now to the theory X I talked about earlier - it has to explain both why 90% donate to charity and why 10% don't. Immediately we come to the realization that X has to be compatible with both a random person Y donating to charity and also refusing to do that. If so, Y's thoughts/actions have no effect on theory X - whatever Y does, the theory X remains unmolested which, in Popper's universe, means theory X is unfalsifiable and ergo, is unscientific for that reason. Another way to understand this Gordian knot in psychology is that exceptions (the 10% who don't donate to charity) are exceptions precisely because the theory that explains the majority behavior (90% who donate to charity) can't explain them.
That's as far as I could get with the little that I know.
You often have interesting and useful things to say on the subjects we talk about on this forum. On the other hand, it makes no sense for you and me to continue discussing this issue.
@tim wood
I won't object to that. Different strokes for different folks. Who knows, there must be a psychologist out there, either a forum member or not, who's mining forum threads like this one and others for information they could use. How do I think? How do you think? How do other members think? Valuable data as far as I can tell. As to what conclusions they draw, I'm uncertain but one thing's for sure, there's just too much disagreement insofar as this thread is concerned for any pattern in our thinking to be discernible. No pattern, no human nature, no psychology. :lol:
There's a YouTube link in my psyche. Can't insert it here as media so that it starts at the right place, but
https://youtu.be/rLmMchi2aAQ?t=220
The source is even more genius than the reappropriation. Extract only, but the audio will be familiar to some (losers).
And what's the definition of philosophy according to Wikipedia? "Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental questions", which ought to answer two other questions?
So if psychologists can't give a definition then they can't know any psychology but are just technicians following a custom? Where have I heard that argument before?
OK
Leaving definitions to Socrates,
1. Psychology is what psychologists do
2. Psychology is a range of professions from theoretical, experimental, to applied areas like clinicians and industrial administrators. Which one is in question?
3. If psychology is a science then what is a science? Is it just some dogma curricular for high schools and wikis or is there specialized education and trained practice to be learned and certified? Why isn't an economist or archeologist a psychologist?
I went back and changed what I wrote after I first posted it to this:
You often have interesting and useful things to say on the subjects we talk about on this forum. On the other hand, it makes no sense for you and me to continue discussing this issue.
The way I originally wrote it, the way you quoted it in your post, was unnecessarily snotty.
I do think it's more than different strokes for different folks. I think you and I have a fundamentally different idea of what it takes to justify an argument.
Quoting magritte
Quoting magritte
Quoting magritte
Quoting magritte
Quoting magritte
I'm curious, how many different ways to justify are there that we don't see eye to eye?
Quoting TheMadFool is a bullshit question, being neither philosophy nor psychology.
Quoting TheMadFool is just ignorant. No science is certain, nor can any science ever be certain.
Quoting TheMadFool Same as for all science. Even the strongest laws of physics are statistical when applied to the world.
Let's just agree to disagree. To each his own.
Quoting magritte
I'm afraid you're mistaken. Please visit the relevant websites.
Quoting magritte
You've quoted me out of context.
Quoting magritte
So, sometimes rivers flow upwards. What utter nonsense!
For its part, psychology has no essential definition because definitions in psychology are ultimately not conventional or even philosophical. Psychological concepts are defined 'operationally' by their specific methods of measurement to convert them to public scientific observables.
WTF? :chin:
Oh Jesus.
For example, I once trained to be a school teacher. I got to see from up close the way school psychologists treat children. Yes, I understand there is not enough time, they are understaffed, and so on, but their professional ethics should be better than that of a witch hunter.
That's the thing: Scientific studies usually give suggestions in terms of probability, plausibility, not in terms of certainty.
What makes the difference is the way public discourse of the topic at hand turns that probability, plausibility into certainty, treating it as if it were a fact, and using it as grounds to stigmatize anyone who doesn't fit in to those prospects.
For example, the summary finding of a scientific study says something like "Listening to music can improve productivity".
Public discourse turns this into "Listening to music improves productivity" and "In order to be more productive, listen to music while working!" And there we go, some smartass turns on the radio while we work, and accuses us of refusing to be productive if we don't like it.
One of the biggest banes of psychology is that it has so little power over its devotees. But what is more, psychologists seem to prefer to idly stand by and let it happen.
*aww*
The confidence with which they speak suggests otherwise.
Not when you're on the other side -- when you're the one in position of less power.
What are you, as a psychologist, willing to sacrifice in order to reduce the stigma of a psychiatric diagnosis?
Answer this, and you'll have a context for the above.
Quoting Isaac
There is a stereotype about psychologists that says that psychologists have a poor grasp of human nature. Psychologists seem to be really eager to prove this, as often as humanly possible ...
The negative reactions you often see to psychologists is when people resent the legal power that psychologists have.
Oh yes. That's why people vote for Trump.
Science is what science does not what you say.
Psychologists and philosophers are equally subject to stupid stereotyping because people don't care enough to try to understand. This is also true of almost all academic disciplines and professions.
Oh? It's people who don't care? Or is it that almost no academic disciplines and professions care about people?
People should care about psychologists, but psychologists should not have to care about people, right.
Professionals are part of a system. If they don't do their jobs according to their system then it's up to the system to correct that. If you disagree then go complain, but don't just throw shee at everyone in site.
Mental health workers don't have the means or time to treat more than the symptoms with medications. Sad, but true.
That's alright by me but I'm only toeing the official line here.
I have absolutely no idea what any of that means, but I'm delighted by the complete absurdity of it all. I sincerely hope it has no connection to the OP at all and it's a masterful stroke of Dadaism, but I suspect there'll be some more tralatitious meaning...?
The existence of the experimental method makes us think we have the means of solving the problems which trouble us; though problem and method pass one another by.”
If you clicked the first link, what did you hear?
Perhaps the stimulus was too noisy, literally.
Anyway, just sharing some lovely (perhaps inauthentic) social history.
No aspersions or barbs.
Carry on.
I'm really not sure what you think I could do. I was a researcher for most of my career. Now I mainly help organisations include human factors in their long-term risk analysis. What would you have me do differently to effect a change in the stigma associated with psychiatric diagnosis? I really would be glad to help, but I haven't a clue how.
Quoting baker
Is there? And..?
Quoting baker
Really? Do we see the same with judges, barristers, solicitors, policemen, doctors, forensic lab technicians, and graphologists?
Something about ketchup?
Quoting bongo fury
Cool.
:rofl:
"... an' they catch 'im... an' they say e's mental!!"
I think that final gem is the culmination of the speech by the boy pictured (used earlier in the track).
Hopefully you can see the passing relevance.
Ah.
'Ketchup' was better...
Quoting bongo fury
I do now, yes.
There you go.
Is it not the case that you hold a vested interest in the proliferation of the stigma associated with psychiatric diagnosis?
The stigma is, after all, what makes the psychiatric diagnosis so powerful and so relevant. Without the stigma, psychiatric diagnosis would be triflesome.
Yes. From what I've seen, psychologists tend to try really hard to live up to that stereotype. Maybe it's a professional deformation. Maybe it's something deeper than that.
We can see it with anyone who is in some important way more powerful than we are.
But psychologists are in a rare position to have the insight into this, due to the nature of their field of study.
*sigh*
If they persist in that system, they become complicit in whatever said system does.
Besides, that film is a cautionary tale about what one should expect if one tries to play the system.
Did you even read what I wrote? I don't have anything whatsoever to do with the diagnosis of mental disorders. Nothing.
Quoting baker
Or maybe it's because you're forming your judgment about an entire international field of research, teaching and practice based on the six people you happen to have met...?
Sometimes, you can be really narrow and petty.
Sure, you, in particular, might not be in the business of diagnosing some other people, but you have worked in a field for which as a whole, diagnosing people is an important activity, both theoretically and practically. You belong to that field. What applies to that field, directly or indirectly applies to you.
That, and you were the one bringing up the issue of wanting to reduce the stigma of psychiatric diagnosis, and asked for suggestions on how to do this.
*sigh*
No, my not so favorable opinion about psychologists is based primarily on knowing the laws of the land that give psychologists the power they have, and on their interpretation of psychological experiments and psychological phenomena.
For example, take the standard interpretation of the Milgram Experiment, namely, that people will go to great lengths because they obey authority. To me, this is an interpretation entirely foreign to life. I'd need a paragraph or so to sketch out in brief why I think so. Or some "scientific" ideas on why people procrastinate and how to cure that ...
How so? I have no more influence over the way diagnosing psychologists do their work than you do. It's like saying that engineers are at least partly responsible for the arms trade because some of their number design weapons. It's ridiculous. The whole tone of this thread has been "yeah, but psychology is basically about diagnosing people" despite me posting quite a clear set of links to exactly what places like Cambridge University and the Royal Society consider to be covered by Psychology. It's sadly typical of the responses here that they fall so lazily into "yeah, but...".
Quoting baker
It was a rhetorical question, as in "how on earth am I supposed to do anything about that!", but more conciliatory. Should have stuck with the cantankerous version.
Quoting baker
We're responsible for the law now? The sheer number of things psychologists are responsible for is mounting rapidly, I can't keep track. I'd better keep a weather eye on the situation in Syria lest it transpire that's my fault too.
Quoting baker
Okaaay... so because you've had a little think of your own about Milgram's experiments, and have decided he's wrong that means the...
Quoting baker
...is mistaken globally? Should we be consulting you directly from now on?
The dawn of philosophy is much earlier than Socrates. A lot of great and well known philosophers, called "Pre-Socratic", existed before him, and their philosophy is classified as "pre-Socratic philosophy"
- Thales of Miletus – l. c. 585 BC
- Anaximander – l. c. 610 - c. 546 BC
- Anaximenes – l. c. 546 BC
- Pythagoras – l. c. 571 - c. 497 BC
- Xenophanes of Colophon – l. c. 570 - c. 478 BC
- Heraclitus of Ephesus – l. c. 500 BC
- Parmenides – l. c. 485 BC
- Zeno of Elea – l. c. 465 BC
(https://www.worldhistory.org/Pre-Socratic_Philosophers/)
Quoting Shawn
It is quite ironic that the words Psychology and Psychiatry are based on the ancient Greek word "psyche", which means "soul". Yet, Psychology nor Psychiatry do not even believe in the existence of soul (spirit)! There's only a brain for them. All material. Nothing spiritual, religious or philosophical. So mind, soul and spirit are all still in the hands of other fields (philosophy and religion).
Read again what I said.