Psychologism
Psychologism is a teaching system according to which logic and / or epistemology can be reduced to empirical laws of psychology .
history
Towards the end of the 19th century , both psychologists and philosophers spoke out in favor of psychologism, on the one hand in the context of experimental psychology and on the other hand in the philosophy of life . As early as the 18th century , the empiricist David Hume had taken the idea of causality as a mere habit of thinking: Causality is not an objective law of nature, but only the human mind is forced to assume that every effect has a cause. According to Hume, this compulsion to accept arises from mere getting used to the fact that man repeatedly observes concurrent events. The similarly oriented utilitarianism , especially John Stuart Mills with his system of deductive and inductive logic , opened the controversy over the psychologistic position in 1843. In logic there were ways of looking at things , especially in the 19th century (e.g. Wilhelm Wundt , Ch. Sigwart, Theodor Lipps , B. Erdmann) that are also referred to as psychologism. The starting point of psychologism of this kind was the definition of logic as the science of thinking or of the forms of thinking, which was regarded exclusively as a psychological function and thus as an object of investigation in psychology. Logic would thus be reduced to a branch of psychology or at least as a branch from it.
Controversy over logic and thought psychology
The controversy over psychologism is often seen as a major theme in the history of the separation of philosophy and psychology. It is mainly associated with the names Edmund Husserl and Wilhelm Wundt and the Würzburg School . The main controversy has been about the relationship between thought psychology and logic . Husserl was of the opinion that logical concepts, probability, necessity, reason and consequence are independent and normative categories . He sharply criticized the psychologization of logic. What matters here is not how the mind is and how it thinks, but how it should proceed in thinking. The rules of logic should already be assumed when building a psychological theory. Wundt distinguished two perspectives here: logic is normative and universal, but the laws of logic must also be described psychologically, just as any psychological phenomenon linked to a brain could also be described physiologically. But describing does not mean that it can also be explained in this way. Husserl assumed an extreme form of psychologism, while Wundt tried to show that he rigorously rejects logical psychologism and considers logical thinking to be the universal bond of thought. A systematic overview and criticism of the positions that were considered psychologistic in the 1910s was provided by Willy Moog with his 1919 post- doctoral thesis.
The example of Viktor Frankl , who emerged as a sharp critic of psychologism , shows how complex the accusation of psychologism can be . Above all, he defended himself against Sigmund Freud and his atheism and the attempts to explain religious phenomena as illusionary ideal images due to the unattainable need for freedom from suffering and happiness. The psychoanalytic demand for consistent education of people about their psychological and unconscious nature could lead to a mania of unmasking and unmasking. Frankl rejected the unlimited psychologization of innermost convictions and demanded a stop before the "real", the meaning and values of people. Frankl spoke of Freud's devaluation of the human, which leads to nihilism and cynicism .
Philosophy of Psychology and Psychology of Philosophy
The relationship between philosophy and psychology often seems to be understood as a one-sided dependency, as it corresponds to the development of the history of science and the history of separation. The term philosophy of psychology is common, a psychology of philosophy is - under this name - unusual. Psychological problems of philosophizing and - even more - psychological comments on the person and the work of individual philosophers can provoke contradictions, accusations of misguided psychologizing and psychologism.
Philosophical ideas can undoubtedly also be analyzed psychologically as systems of belief and interpreted in the context of the author's psychosocial biography and religion . There will probably be a wide spectrum of opinions among philosophers and psychologists as to how fruitful these transgressions can be. - It is obvious that phenomenological thinkers such as Edmund Husserl and Max Scheler voiced the reproach of psychologism, because the phenomenological method in its process and in its results, in its alleged freedom from theories and prejudices, at least offers reasons for critical psychological comments. This can be in terms of knowledge psychology or thinking psychology, u. a. on cognitive styles, concept formation , judgment tendencies etc. happen or in terms of content, e.g. B. with regard to the often one-sided assumptions and images of people .
What should be objectionable to a not only systematic or historical, but also a psychological-biographical perspective on the work of philosophers and their controversies, provided that a merely destructive “nothing-but-then” interpretation is avoided? Even philosophers can be influenced by preconceived convictions and sustained attitudes that are only partially accessible to self-reflection , as is claimed for empirical research scientists . This does not only mean the tradition and one's own place in this tradition or the dependencies on the contemporary historical context, but also individual-biographical and cultural-ethnocentric assumptions about people.
criticism
Contemporary opponents of psychologism were above all the Neo-Kantians because of the apriorism they claimed . The counterargumentation by Gottlob Frege , who emphasized the difference between the subjective execution of thought and the objective content of thought, became even more violent - hence his logicism .
See also
literature
- Jacquette, Dale (Ed.): Philosophy, psychology, and psychologism , Kluwer Academic Publ .: Dordrecht, 2003; ISBN 1-4020-1337-X
- Viktor E. Frankl: The human being faced with the question of meaning. A selection from the complete works . Piper, Munich 1979/2002. (16th ed.). ISBN 3-492-20289-6
- Dieter Münch: The manifold relationships between philosophy and psychology. The relationship between Edmund Husserl and the Würzburg School from the perspective of philosophy, psychology and the history of institutions . In: Jürgen Jahnke, Jochen Fahrenberg, Reiner Stegie, Eberhard Bauer (eds.): History of psychology - relationships with philosophy and border areas . Profil, Munich 1998, pp. 319-345. ISBN 3-89019-461-3
- Nicole D. Schmidt: Philosophy and Psychology. Separation history, dogmas and perspectives . Rowohlt, Reinbek 1995. ISBN 3-499-55556-5
- Nicole C. Karafyllis : Willy Moog (1888-1935): A life of a philosopher . Freiburg, Karl Alber 2015 (especially Chapters 3.7 to 3.10). ISBN 978-3-495-48697-9
Web links
- Martin Kusch: Psychologism. In: Edward N. Zalta (Ed.): Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy .