Harvard Psychological Studies Part 80

On the other hand, we have as the special concrete products of the laws, the objects themselves, and the most natural grouping of them may be from whole to part. In the physical world it means that we start from the concrete universe, turning then to the earth, then to the objects on the earth, inorganic and organic. There is here no logical difficulty. Each one of these objects can be considered in three aspects, firstly as to its structure, secondly as to its special laws, that is, the special function of the object as related to the general sciences of physics and chemistry, and thirdly as to its natural development. If we apply these three methods of study to the whole universe we have astronomy, astrophysics and cosmology, to the whole earth, geography, geophysics, geology, to animals, zoology, physiology, comparative anatomy, and so on.

The special phenomena in the framework of the psychological sciences group themselves in the same logical order, from the whole to the part. The psychological totality is empirical mankind, and as we select the earth as the one part of the universe which is the habitat of man, so our scientific interest must move from the whole psychical humanity to those phenomena of human life which are the vehicle of our civilization, from mankind to its most important function, the a.s.sociation of man; and as we moved from earth to the special objects on earth, so we may turn from a.s.sociation to the special phenomena which result from a.s.sociation. If we separated further the inorganic from the organic, we must here separate the products of undifferentiated and of differentiated a.s.sociation. The science of mankind is race psychology, the science of the a.s.sociation of man is sociology, the science of the results of undifferentiated a.s.sociation is Volkerpsychologie, folk psychology. The science of products of differentiated a.s.sociation has no special name; its subject matter is the whole of historical civilization considered as a psychological naturalistic phenomenon. As soon as we follow the ramification still further we have to do with the special kinds of these products, that is, with the volitions, thoughts, appreciations and beliefs. In the undifferentiated a.s.sociations they give us morals and habits, languages and enjoyments and mythological ideas, while the individually differentiated a.s.sociation gives political, legal and economic life, knowledge, art and religion: all of course merely as causal, not as teleological processes, and thus merely as psychological and not as historical material. Here, as with the physical phenomena, the structure, the special laws and the development must be everywhere separated, giving us three sciences in every case. For instance, the study of mankind deals with the differences of mental structure in psychical anthropology, with the special psychical laws in race psychology and with the development in comparative psychology. The chief point for us is that social psychology, race psychology, sociology, folk psychology, etc., are under this system sharply differentiated sciences and that they do not at all overlap the real historical sciences. There is no historical product of civilization which does not come under their method but it must be conceived as a causal phenomenon, not as related to the purposes of the real man, and thus even the development means merely a growing complication of naturalistic processes and not history in the teleological sense.

We turn to the normative sciences. The general theory of the overindividual purposes is metaphysics; the special overindividual acts are those which const.i.tute the normative volitions, connected in the philosophy of morals, the philosophy of state and the philosophy of law, those which const.i.tute the normative thoughts and finally those which const.i.tute the normative appreciations and beliefs, connected in aesthetics and the philosophy of religion. Especial interest belongs to the philosophy of thought. We have discussed the reasons why we group mathematics here and not among the phenomenalistic sciences. We have thus one science which deals critically with the presuppositions of thought, _i.e._ the theory of knowledge or epistemology, which can be divided into the philosophy of physical sciences, the philosophy of psychological sciences, the philosophy of normative sciences and the philosophy of historical sciences. We have secondly the science of the processes of thought dealing with concepts, judgments and reasoning, _i.e._, logic, and we have finally the science of those objects which the thought creates freely for its own purposes and which are independent from the content of the world, _i.e._, mathematics, which leads to the qualitative aspect of general mathematics and the quant.i.tative aspect of concrete mathematics. For our purposes it may be sufficient to separate externally algebra, arithmetic, a.n.a.lysis and geometry. In this way all the philosophical sciences find their natural and necessary place in the system, while it has been their usual lot to form an appendix to the system, incommensurable with the parts of the system itself, even in the case that the other scheme were not preferred, to make ethics, logic, aesthetics, epistemology and metaphysics merely special branches of positivistic sociology and thus ultimately of biology.

In the historical sciences the general theory which stands over against the special acts has a special claim on our attention. We may call it the philosophy of history. That is not identical with the philosophy of historical sciences which we mentioned as a part of epistemology. The philosophy of historical sciences deals with the presuppositions by which historical teleological knowledge becomes logically possible. The philosophy of history seeks a theory which connects the special historical acts into a unity. It has two branches. It is either a theory of the personality, creating a theory of real individual life as it enters as ideological factor into history, or it seeks the unity of entire humanity. The theory of personality shows the teleological interrelation of our purposes; the theory of humanity shows the teleological interrelation of all nations. The name philosophy of history has been used mostly for the theory of humanity only, abstracting from the fact that it has been often misused for sociology or for the psychology of history or for the philosophy of historical sciences--but the name belongs also to the theory of personality. This theory of personality is exactly that second kind of 'psychology' which does not describe and does not explain but which interprets the inner teleological connections of the real man. It is 'voluntaristic psychology' or, as others call it who see correctly the relation of this science to history, 'historical psychology.' It is practically 'apperceptionistic psychology.' The special activities of the historical man divide themselves again into volitions, thoughts, appreciations and beliefs, with their realization in the state, law, economical systems, knowledge, art and religion.

Each of these special realizations must allow the same manifoldness in treatment which we found with the special physical or psychical objects; we can ask as to structure, relation to the general view and development. But in accordance with the teleological material the study of the structure here means 'interpretation,' the study of the general relations here means study of the relation to civilization, and the study of the development here means the real history. We have, thus, for the state or law or economy or knowledge or art or religion always one science which interprets the historical systems of state, etc., in a systematic and philological way, one science which deals with its function in the historical world and one which studies biographically and nationally the history of state, law, economical life, science, art or religion.

In the sphere of the practical sciences the divisions of the theoretical sciences must repeat themselves. We have thus applied physical, applied psychological, applied normative and applied historical sciences, and it is again the ant.i.thesis of psychological and of historical sciences which is of utmost importance and yet too often neglected. The application of physical sciences, as in engineering, medicine, etc., or the application of normative knowledge in the sciences of criticism do not offer logical difficulty, but the application of psychological and historical knowledge does. Let us take the case of pedagogy or of penology, merely as ill.u.s.trations. Is the application of phenomenalistic psychology or the application of teleological voluntarism in question?

Considering the child, the criminal, any man, as psychophysical apparatus which must be objectively changed and treated, we have applied psychology; considering him as subject with purposes, as bearer of an historical civilization whose personalities must be interpreted and understood and appreciated, then we need applied historical knowledge. In the first case the science of pedagogy is a psycho-technical discipline which makes education mechanical and deprives the teacher of the teleological att.i.tude of inner understanding; in the second case it is a science of real education far removed from psychology. All the sciences which deal with service in the system of civilization, service as teacher, as judge, as social helper, as artist, as minister, are sciences which apply the teleological historical knowledge, and their meaning is lost if they are considered as psycho-technical sciences only.