Summary of Main points Last Class

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Summary of Main points- Last Class

• Plato Being
• Forms/ideas are innate perceptions misleading
• Personality Conflict between rational and
  passionate souls (psychoanalytic idea)
• Aristotle- Becoming
• 4 causes Teleology (movement towards final
  cause( Humanistic idea) Body Mind intertwined
  Vegetative, efficient, Rational soul Rational
  Passive/active mind, common sense Memory
  Organization based on associations, laws
  (similarity, etc.,) (Gestalt)
• Descartes- Out of scholasticism and into
  scientific inquiry
• Mechanistic model animal spirits parsimonious
  theory Animal experimentation Cartesian
  Dualism- Interactions between sensory input and
  rational soul Pineal gland

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• He performed animal experiments. His mechanistic
  view of behavior is evident in his description of
  these experiments
• Animals are mechanical beings with no feelings.
• As Descartes and his friend operated on wakeful
  animals they describe themselves as amused at
  their cries and yelps since there were
  nothing but the hydraulic hisses and vibrations
  of machines.
• In humans Because of the rational soul the
  story is different.

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Cartesian Dualism Body and Mind

• Back to the model of human behavior
• What makes the animal spirits move the hand?
• Back to Aristotle The rational soul which
  contains innate ideas of the soul- inherited
  axioms (e.g., justice, unity, infinity).
• Innate ideas as distinct from derived ideas
  That arise from direct application of external
  stimuli (the idea of a bell derived from repeated
  experiences of hearing a bell).
• The model
• A stimulus falls on the retina
• Through hollow pipes it moves with animal spirits
  to the brain
• In the brain in the Pineal gland- an
  interaction between the stimulus and innate
  ideas.
• Motivation/emotions are created, will and
  behavior ensue
• An interaction between what we have inside and
  what comes from the outside creates motivation
  and behavior
• A movement of the animal spirits impresses the
  pineal gland and produces a sensation
• Why in the Pineal Gland? An area full of fluids,
  single organ in the brain where others are
  duplicated in the two hemispheres.

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• Research Strategy
• Do not accept anything as true- Doubt everything
• How will I know when to stop doubting? What can
  not be doubted?
• Its the same perceptions that we have when
  awake that may come to us when asleep without
  their being true
• I decided to suppose that nothing that ever
  entered my mind was more real than the illusions
  of the dream
• What's REAL???
• but I soon noticed that while I wish to thing
  everything false it was necessarily true that I
  who thought was something COGITO ERGO SUM.
• Divide a problem to smaller parts
• How do you know that you have arrived at the
  basic level of the problem?
• The concept is clear and distinct (can not be
  divided further) .
• The example of stick in water.
• Stick in water is clear, but not distinct
• Solve the easier parts first
• Create theories that are general- Parsimonious.
  With a minimal set of assumptions and rules
  explain a lot.
• Descartes proposes the basic attitude of
  scientific inquiry Questioning everything.

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• Cartesian dualism In other models of dualism
  The body is like a puppet on a string. Here
  behavior is determined by an interaction between
  two equally important entities BODY and MIND.
• Without soul like animals A pool of reflexes.
  Without body No behavior but a pool of abstract
  primary constructs.

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• The major contributions of Descartes to modern
  psychology
• Brain as a major organ to understand behavior
• The idea of S-R
• The idea of processing of physical energy into a
  psychological experience
• The interaction between body and mind to
  understand behavior.
• Creating an attitude of openness towards the
  study of human behavior.
• Specifying the strategy of research

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The British Empiricists

• No point in discussion of innate ideas, soul and
  similar concepts
• The emphasis is on How do we transform sensory
  experiences into all that we are and know.
• We are born tabula rasa.
• 3 basic attitudes
• Materialism
• Positivism (Comte- the only valid information is
  observables)
• Empiricism All that we are and know is a result
  of our interaction with reality

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• John Locke (1632-1704)
• The personal secretary of the Duke of Shaftsbury
• Exiled to Holland with his employer where he
  published An essay concerning human
  understanding (1690)
• SENSATION-------- Reflection------- Idea
• let us suppose the mind to be as we said a
  white paper void of all characters without any
  ideas, How comes it to the vast store of ideas
  that man painted on it? To this I answer in one
  word From experience is that all our knowledge
  is found and from it ultimately derives its self

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• The distinction between single atoms and a
  structure of atoms together paralleled in the
  psychological world in Simple and Complex ideas.
• Complex ideas are made of simple ideas that are
  held together by associations
• Each object has primary and secondary property.
  The secondary is dependent on the perceiver
  (Sharpness of knife, and pain of cut)
• An experiment Hand immersed in hot/cold water
  and then put in regular water.
• Secondary property is always subjective.

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Other empiricists

• Berkeley (1695-1753)
• All subjective ad absurdum (story about his
  death)
• Maybe everything is secondary quality? Tree in
  dream and tree in reality- which is true?
• Answer Reality exists because the great
  perceiver (god) looks at us.
• Knowledge gained through association
• Sitting in my study I hear a coach drive along
  the street, I look through the window and see it,
  I walk out and enter it I heard, I saw I
  touched the same thing, and the same thing is the
  coach and because of contiguity I derive the
  concept a coach . (Gestalt idea)
• Depth perception? Because of disparity in the
  images that fall on two eyes.
• David Hume (1711-1776)
• The central place of empirical research in
  psychology As the science of man is the only
  solid foundation for the other sciences, so the
  only solid foundation we can give to this science
  itself must be based on experience and
  observation
• Causality A habit of the mind (Gestalt,
  Cognitive processes shape reality).

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Behaviorism and Cognitive Behaviorism James
Mill (1773-1836) and J.S. Mill (1806-1873)

• James Mill (the father) John Lockes idea of
  tabula rasa as a way of life.
• The mind A mechanistic process of accumulation
  of associations.
• Applied the ideas to his son J.S. Mill who read
  Plato in Greek at the age of 3, wrote his first
  scientific article at the age of 11, and finished
  his academic degree at the age of 12.
• J.S. Mill views the mind as a creative process.
  He places an emphasis on cognitive processes and
  not only on mechanistic discussion of chains of
  associations.
• Behaviorism and Cognitive Behaviorism (Watson vs.
  modern behaviorism).
• His book On the subjugation of women.
• Years later Freud, who translated the book to
  German, writes to his fiancee (Martha Bernays)
  The position of women can not be other than what
  it is To be adored sweetheart in youth and a
  beloved wife in maturity.

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Leibniz (1646-1718) Away from the emphasis on
empiricism The unconscious, temperament theory

• On his personal life
• Born in Leipzig, finished his Ph.D. at 19, became
  the secretary of the Nuremberg society of
  alchemy, and decided that science he wants
  diplomacy and politics and not science.
• Began to work with the duke of Mainz.
• Was sent to Paris to convince Louis 14th to
  conquer Egypt. His plan similar to Napoleons
  conquest.
• A Da-Vinci type person Built a working
  submarine, invented Binary system in Algebra,
  etc.,
• Met Anton Van Levenhook, and was captivated by
  the microscope. This was the basis of his theory
  of man
• Was the first non-British elected to the British
  Royal Society.
• A well known and eccentric figure in Europe. The
  Philosopher in Walters Candid.

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• His theoretical ideas
• As is the case with a drop of water under the
  microscope, the world is made of smaller
  invisible parts MONADS Organic units of
  existence. These monads are not inanimate. They
  have independent energy
• The Eternal Monad Supreme Monad- God The
  everything develops from it.
• The Finite Monads
• Simple The units from which non-organic matter
  is made
• Subtinent More complex, animals are made of
  them. They are capable of perception and simple
  feelings (e.g., pain, happiness).
• Rational Monads The building blocks of human
  existence- they have all the capabilities of
  Simple and Subtinent, but also enable
  Apperception (processing of perception) and
  Reflection (the quality of self awareness). These
  two qualities make people different than
  animals.
• Later in Psychology- the question of
  apperception, and self awareness.

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• Psychophysical parallelism the three types of
  monads that make up human psychology are like
  parallel clocks that operate together. They run
  in parallel.
• This is a very different from the tabula rasa
  empiricism of John Locke.
• Empiricism vs. Nativism Locke is Empiricist
  Leibniz is a Nativist.
• The contrast summarizes much of what we said
  before. Being vs. Becoming revisited
• In Leibniz words there is a question of
  whether the soul itself is completely blank like
  a writing tablet on which nothing has yet been
  written as Aristotle and John Locke maintain, or
  whether the soul inherently contains the sources
  of various notions and doctrines which external
  objects merely rouse up on suitable occasions as
  I and Plato believe.
• We have necessary truths (tendencies,
  doctrines) within us which is like a mathematical
  axiom and our interaction with reality just
  exemplifies it.
• If we replace inherent truths with genes, and
  tabula rasa with S-R we are facing the same
  dilemma that we wont solve. We enlarge the
  circles of knowledge around the questions. We do
  not provide a definitive and exclusive answer.
• Leibniz Lockes psychology is apt to describe
  animal behavior people have within them the
  monads that enable cognitive processes and
  introspections. It is not that we need to replace
  Locke, but develop our knowledge where he
  stopped- Cognitive processes.

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• The mind is like a block of marble. It has lines
  of potential fracture, strength, softer, harder.
• The sculptor will later make it into a sculpture.
  But the image is already in the block.
• So is the mind The potential is there, it
  includes all the inclinations and tendencies, and
  reality is the sculptor. It sculpts the final
  image of the mind in light of the potential.
• (Temperament theory- Buss, e.g., the temperament
  of active-passive and reality determines the
  persons becoming an angle or Satan).
• Perception (raw input), Apperception (meaning)
  there are basic laws of understanding that we are
  born with (e.g., a thing can not be and not be
  at the same time), Minute Perceptions (things
  that we perceived but are not conscious of).
• Minute perceptions occur in the unconscious and
  they form the basis for our sense of continuous
  self. Without the unconscious (no sense of
  continuity of self).
• (Psychoanalytic view of personality and the
  importance of unconscious life).
• Contributions Emphasis on cognitive processes,
  laws of perceiving and understanding (e.g.,
  cognitive, gestalt), Inherited tendencies that
  are shaped by reality, the unconscious and its
  importance.

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The Physiological Path to Psychology

• The place of the brain
• Aristotle Can not be a central organ in
  behavior.
• No blood
• Non sensitive to touch
• Fairly unimpressive
• The place is the heart. The brain a cooler for
  the blood
• Descartes Centrality of brain
• A link between physiological events in the brain
  (e.g., stroke and behavior change).
• Hales (early 18th) Pinches a frogs nerve and
  leg moves
• Later electricity is discovered and Galvani
  produces a movement in frogs leg by electrical
  current (the myth of electricity
  Frankenstein-).
• Schwann (early 19th) discovered the nerve cell

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The Question of localization of psychological
functions in the brain- The story begins with
Franz Gal

• Franz Gal (1758-1828)
• Among contributions (1) The link between the 2
  hemispheres, (2) a link between complexity of
  psychological functions an organism can perform
  and the surface of cortex.
• Phrenology
• The basic idea
• 27 areas in the brain for faculties such as
  memory, honesty, passion, etc.,
• When highly developed affects structure of skull
• Craniometry
• His memory of his bright class mates (front of
  eyes)
• Gals passionate widow (back of skull)
• But not always
• Messenger boys should be thieves, but when not-
  Honesty region developed and compensates for
  acquisitiveness area.

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• Localization? YES. Not only for simple behaviors
  (leg movements) but also for complex human
  qualities/behaviors
• A good scientific theory? On the one hand Yes-
  parsimonious.
• Yet
• Why only 27? Why not 2700? Why not 7?
• The assumption that skull reflects brain is
  erroneous
• Circular. You can explain anything by referring
  to an interaction between regions. Can refute.
• Very influential in 19th century Europe.
  Phrenological clinics a sort of first
  psychotherapy (talk about skull structure and its
  implications/consequences for ones life, etc.,)

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Localization? NO- Pierre Flourens (1794-1867)

• Among his major physiological contributions
  Discovery of respiratory center in brain
  (medulla) and function of cerebellum in
  coordinated behavior
• Methodology Franz Gal- Craniometry, Flourens in
  Ablation.
• His conclusion NO localization.
• Performed an ablation on what Gal described as
  the area of passion (cerebellum) and sees
• The animal lost gradually the faculty of orderly
  and regular movement soon he could walk only by
  staggering in zig-zag he fell each time he
  wanted to advance when he wanted to turn to the
  right, he turned to the left.
• What I did was to destroy the ability for an
  overall orderly behavior. Therefore No
  localization The brain as one unit works to
  produce an orderly behavior.
• Distinguishes between action propre and action
  commune. The first refers to simple actions
  which may be localized and the second to more
  complex functions that involve the whole brain.

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