Abstract
THIS short course of lectures is designed to give an account of the distinctive character of the modern movement in psychology. It provides a sketch of the historical development of the science, and shows the revolution it has undergone, as essentially a part of, and determined by the general revolution, in the whole conception of modern science which has followed the abandonment of the geocentric point of view. Psychology is the youngest of the empirical sciences, but in none has the revolution been more marked and rapid. This is due to the fact that only in very recent times have we come to recognise that psychology is something more and other than a chapter in general philosophy, that it has for its subject-matter a class of empirical facts as distinct, as obstinate, and as capable of being abstracted for the purposes of special study as the facts with which physics and biology deal. Prof. Wood-worth sees the real beginning of modern psychology in John Locke and the English empiricist philosophers. Its notable advance in recent times, and the complete change it has undergone, are mainly due to the discernment of the significance of the facts revealed in abnormal psychology, and also to the study of the instinctive basis of human nature. The “drive” and the “mechanism” are the two factors which mutually condition one another, and it is the object of the modern psychologist to discover their true nature and relation in order to lay the foundations of a practical or applied science. Although the lectures make no pretension to add anything to our theoretical or practical knowledge, they are very valuable as indicating the new conception of the much-debated scope and method of psychology.
Dynamic Psychology.
Prof.
R. S.
Woodworth
By. (Columbia University Lectures.) Pp. 210. (New York: Columbia University Press; London: Humphrey Milford, 1918.) Price 6s. 6d. net.
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C., H. Dynamic Psychology . Nature 101, 503 (1918). https://doi.org/10.1038/101503a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/101503a0
