PSY 375 Chapter 3 Lecture Notes PDF

lOMoARcPSD|37523509 PSY 375 Chapter 3 - lecture notes History of Psychology (Athabasca University) Scan to open on Studocu Studocu is not sponsored or endorsed by any college or university Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509 Chapter 3: Rome and the Middle Ages Th...

lOMoARcPSD|37523509 PSY 375 Chapter 3 - lecture notes History of Psychology (Athabasca University) Scan to open on Studocu Studocu is not sponsored or endorsed by any college or university Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509 Chapter 3: Rome and the Middle Ages The Middle Ages      The Dark Ages were a period of several hundred years during which Greek and Roman works were all but lost and little, if any, progress was made in science, philosophy, and literature o In general, Roman law had collapsed and was replaced by a variety of local or Germanic customs o Villages armed themselves against attack from neighbours and far away invaders o The most basic education was limited to priests, monks and nobility o The Christian church wielded tremendous power; most of those able to produce new writings had been trained by the Church and to pursue matters outside of the Church’s interest was suspect; the question of what was true had already been answered - people were either believers or heretics, and heretics were often dealt with harshly; priests controlled behaviour, feelings, and thoughts of the citizens Some historians mark the beginning of the Dark Ages in 410 with the sack of Rome by the Visigoths, others in 430 with the death of Augustine, others in 476 with the abdication of the last Roman emperor, and some even later The eight Crusades (1095-1291) against the Muslims showed Christianity’s power to organize its followers to stop the Islamic influence that had been spreading so rapidly The Muslim armies moved west, and the Christian armies moved east; the clash between the resulted in the bloody holy wars, but it also brought the West back into contact with Greek philosophy (it was during these holy wars that Aristotle’s writings were rediscovered) o Many centuries earlier, because of the conquests of Alexander the Great, Greek influence had been spread over a large areas; Greek philosophy, science, and art continued to flourish in territories later conquered by the Muslims and, as such, Aristotle’s works were preserved in the great Islamic universities and mosques and were used to develop Islamic philosophy, religion, science, mathematics, and medicine Long before Aristotle's writing were rediscovered by the west, Muslim philosphers busied themselves attempting to make it compatible with Islam o Thus, in re-welcoming Aristotle’s writings into the West, Christian church authorities attempted to Christianize them in order for Aristotle’s thoughts to be accepted Islamic and Jewish Influences  During the Dark Ages, Islam became a powerful force  According to believers, in middle age, Muhammad (who was born in Mecca in 570) received a revelation from God instructing him to preach Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509 He called his religion Islam and his followers were called Muslims His teachings are contained in the Koran Islam spread with incredible speed, and within 30 years of Muhammad’s death (632), the Muslims had conquered Arabia, Syria, Egypt, Persia, Sicily, and Spain Within 100 years after the prophet’s death, the Islamic empire extended over an area larger than that of the Roman empire at its peak Islamic philosophers translated, studied, and expanded on the ancient wisdom of Greece and Rome, and, in doing so, the Muslims made huge strides in medicine, science, and mathematics o These subjects were of great importance during the expansion of the Islamic empire because of their practical value However, when conditions stabilized, there was greater interest in making the ancient wisdom compatible with Islam o o     Avicenna  Avicenna was a child prodigy who had memorized the Koran by the age of 10  He became a physician before the age of 20 and was considered the best of the Muslim physicians  He wrote books on many topics, including; medicine, mathematics, logic, metaphysics, Islamic theology, astronomy, politics, and linguistics o His book on medicine, The Canon, was used in European universities for more than five centuries  He made modifications in Aristotle’s philosophy that persisted for hundreds of years  In his analysis of human thinking, Avicenna started with the five external senses o He then postulated seven “interior senses” which were arranged in a hierarchy;  1. Common sense: synthesizes the information provided by the external senses  2. Retentive imagination: the ability to remember the synthesized information from the common sense  3. Compositive animal imagination  4. Compositive human imagination  Compositive imagination allows animals and humans to learn what to approach or avoid in the environment  For animals, this is a strictly associative process; those objects or events associated with pain are avoided, and those associated with pleasure are approached  Human compositive imagination allows the creative combination of information from the common sense and from the retentive imagination; ex. The ability to imagine an object without ever having experienced one  5. Estimative power: the innate ability to make judgements about environmental objects Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509 6. The ability to remember the outcomes of all the information processing that occurs lower in the hierarchy  7. The ability to rationally use that information Aristotle only postulated three internal sense; common sense, imagination, and memory  o  Avicenna’s major departure from Aristotle’s philosophy concerns the active intellect o For Aristotle; active intellect was used in understanding the universal principles that could not be gained by simply observing empirical events o For Avicenna; active intellect took on theological qualities - it was the aspect of humans that allowed them to understand the cosmic plan and to enter into a relationship with God  An understanding of God represented the highest level of intellectual functioning  As a physician, Avicenna employed a wide range of treatments for physical and mental illnesses o He attempted to treat melancholic patients by reading to them or by using music as therapy o At times he tried to frighten patients out of their ailments Averroës  Averroës disagreed with Avicenna about the arrangement of human intelligences; he believed that all human experiences reflect God’s influence  His writings are mainly commentaries on Aristotle’s philosophy with special emphasis on senses, memory, and sleep  Like Aristotle, Averroës believed that only the active intellect aspect of the soul survives death - because the active intellect is the same for everyone, therefore nothing personal survives death o This interpretation of Aristotle (Averroism) was contrary to Christian thought and was severely attacked by later Christian philosophers  Averroes also made a number of scientific contributions o Credited with discovering that the retina, not the lens, is the light sensitive part of the eye o Also among the first to observe that those who got smallpox and survived were thereafter immune to the disease, thus suggesting inoculation as a way of preventing disease Maimonides  In addition to being a biblical and talmudic scholar, Maimonides was a physician who anticipated the modern concern with psychosomatic disorders by showing the relationship between ethical living and mental health Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509  He wrote The Guide for the Perplexed for scholars who were puzzled by the conflict between religion and the scientific and philosophical thought of the day o He specifically sought a reconciliation between Judaism (he was a Jew) and Aristotelian philosophy (i.e. between faith and reason); he attempted to show that many passages from the Old Testament and the Talmud could be understood rationally, and that other passages were to be understood only as allegory and not taken as literally true o He even stated that is something is demonstrably false, it should be rejected, even if it is stated as true in the Bible or the Talmud Toward a Reconciliation of Christian Faith and Reason  St. Anslem invented the ontological argument for the existence of God: essentially, it says that if we can think of something, something must be causing the thought; when we think of things, there must exist real things corresponding to those thoughts (reification) o St. Anselm beckoned us to continue thinking of a being until we could think of no better or greater a being - ultimately, we will conjure up God, and because we can think of him, he therefore exists  St. Anselm was one of the first Christian theologians to attempt to use logic to support religious beliefs, however, faith preceded his efforts to understand (he was attempting to support what he already believed to be true)  Peter Lombard insisted that God could be known by studying his works; there is no need to escape from the empirical world to understand God, one could learn about God by studying the empirical world o For Lombard, there were 3 ways to learn about God;  Faith  Reason  The study of God’s works (the empirical world)  St. Anselm and Peter Lombard helped create a receptive atmosphere for the works of Aristotle in Western philosophy Scholasticism  Scholasticism: the synthesis of Aristotle’s philosophy and Christian theology o After the holy wars has brought the Western world into contact with the works of Aristotle and other Greeks, the reaction of the Christian church from the recovered works occurred in 3 stages;  1. The works were welcomed  2. Inconsistencies between the works and church dogma were realized, and the works were condemned as pagan Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509  3. Efforts were made to modify the works and, in modified form, they were incorporated into church dogma (scholasticism) Peter Abelard  In addition to translating Aristotle’s writings, Abeldard introduced a method of study that would characterize the Scholastic period o Dialectic method: examining arguments and counterarguments as a way of clarifying issues and arriving at valid conclusions  Specifically, he contrasted the contradictory way in which some 158 theological questions were answered by scripture and by various Christian theologians (he pitted conflicting authorities against each other with the expectation that the authority of the Bible would prevail)  Abelard believed that God existed and thus all method of inquiry would prove it  Realism versus Nominalism o Realism: the belief that essences (called universals) exist in pure form independent of individual instances of such things, and individual members of such classes differ only by accident o Nominalism: the belief that what we call universals are nothing more than verbal labels allowing the grouping of objects or events that resemble one another  Abeldard decided to debate William of Champeaux (the most famous teacher at the most famous school in Christendom at the time (the cathedral school of Notre Dame), and a devout realist) on the matter of realism versus nominalism o Abeldard argued that we should not confuse words with things, meaning that just because we use words to describe and understand universals, it does not necessarily follow that they actually exist (the conclusions reached when logic is applied to words do not necessarily generalize to the physical world); thus, Abeldard argued that logic and physics were two different disciplines and should be kept sharply separate o Abeldard accused William of confusing the two disciplines in his position and therefore committing the fallacy of reification (believing that if you can name something, there must necessarily be something real that corresponds to the name)  As a compromise between realism and nominalism, Abeldard proposed conceptualism: the claim that universal essences do not exist, but Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509   similarities among categories of experiences do, and, based on these commonalities, we form concepts o Thus, concepts summarize individual experiences (nominalism) but, once formed, concepts in a sense exist apart from the individual experiences upon which they were formed (realism) Abeldard opened his own school and became so famous a teacher that the classrooms of older professors were nearly empty Abelard’s Relationship with Heloise o At the age of 42, Abelard met 17 year old Heloise, the niece of another canon of Notre Dame named Fulbert o Fulbert was interested in continuing Heloise’s education, and thus struck a deal with Abelard; in exchange for room and board in his and Heloise’s home, Abelard would tutor Heloise o During their lessons, Abelard and Heloise began a romantic and sexual relationship which continued for several months before Fulbert found out and threw Abelard out of the house o When Heloise announced her pregnancy, Abelard took her to his sister’s home where she gave birth to their son, Astralabe o Abelard offered to marry Heloise, but she initially refused as she believed marriage would ruin his chances of advancement within the church, as well as due to both of their low opinions on marriage o However, they did eventually marry; Abelard wanted to keep the marriage a secret, while Fulbert wanted it known to save Heloise’s reputation o Finally, Abelard could no longer take the strain and took Heloise to live under the pretext of a nun without actually taking the vows - Abelard would continue to visit her at the convent from time to time in secret o Fulbert believed that Abelard has forced Heloise to become a nun to cover his own sins, and he and his aides exacted revenge on Abelard by castrating him o As a result, Abelard became a monk, Heloise became a nun, and their future interaction was limited to exchanging love letters o After recovering from his ordeal, Abelard resumed his studies and teachings using the dialectic method, however this controversial method led to trouble with church authorities, and in 1140, Pope Innocent II order Abelard to stop teaching and writing o Within a few years, Abelard died a lonely and bitter man St. Albert Magnus  One of the first Western philosophers to make a comprehensive review of both Aristotle’s works and the Islamic and Jewish scholars’ interpretations of them  Magnus performed detailed observations of nature following Aristotle, and himself made significant contributions to science Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509  Magnus presented Aristotle’s views on sensation, intelligence, and memory to the church scholars and attempted to show how human beings’ rational powers could be used to achieve salvation St. Thomas Aquinas  Also continued the synthesis of Aristotle’s philosophical works and the Christian tradition  One negative aspect of this was that once Aristotle’s ideas were assimilated into church dogma, they were no longer challengeable o Aristotle’s ideas that were not compatible with church doctrine were either changed or ignored  The reconciliation of faith and reason was Aquinas’ greatest task and achievement o This task came about, as the Aritotelian emphasis on empirical observation guided by reason was so great that it could not be ignored by the church  This was difficult for the church, as, from its inception, it had emphasized revelation, faith, and spiritual experience while minimizing empirical observation and rationality o For Aquinas and other Scholastics, all paths (reason and faith) led to the same truth - God and his glory  Thus, God could be known through revelation, scripture, examination of inner experience, or through logic, reason, and the examination of nature  The philosopher uses logical proof and demonstration to verify God’s existence, whereas the theologian takes the existence of God on faith (thus, faith and reason cannot conflict) o Aquinas’ synthesis of Aristotelian and Christian thought prevails as a philosophical cornerstone of Catholicism to this day    Aquinas also accepted sensory information as a viable source of knowledge, but following Aristotle, claimed that the senses could only provide information about particulars and not about universals (which must be abstracted from sensory information by reason) Aquinas also spent considerable time discussing the differences between humans and lower animals - he recognized the biggest difference as being that non-human animals do not possess rational souls, and therefore he concluded that salvation is not possible for them Aquinas’ work has several effects; o It divided reason and faith which allowed them to be studied separately o It made the study of nature (empirical observation) respectable o It showed the world that argument over church dogma was possible Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509  Although Aquinas’ goal was to strengthen the position of the church by admitting reason as a means of understanding God, several philosophers used Aquinas’ work to argue that faith and reason could be studies separately and that reason could be studied without considering its theological implications o Thus, philosophy without religious overtones was becoming was once again becoming a possibility after hundreds of years o This shift had to take place before the Renaissance could take place William Occam: A Turning Point  Occam accepted Aquinas’ division of faith and reason, and pursued the study of reason  He believed that in explaining things, no unnecessary assumptions should be made; explanations should always be kept as parsimonious (simple) as possible o Occam’s razor: the belief that extraneous assumptions should be “shaved” from explanations or arguments o Occam’s razor was applied to his debate concerning the existence of universals; he saw the assumption that universals had an independent existence as unnecessary, and therefore sided with the nominalists on this argument, arguing that universals were nothing more than verbal labels o According to Occam, the fact that experiences have features in common allows us to use general labels to describe those experiences, but the use of such labels does not mean that there is a pure idea, essence, or form that exists independent of our experiences o Occam believed that we can trust our senses to tell us what the world is really like; we can know the world directly without needing to worry about what lurks beyond our experience  Occam changed the question concerning the nature of knowledge from a metaphysical problem to a psychological problem o He was not concerned with the existence of a transcendent reality that could only be understood by abstract reasoning or introspection - rather, the question for Occam was how the mind classifies experience; his answer was that we habitually respond to similar objects in a similar way  We apply the term female to a person because that person has enough in common with others we have called female  Occam went beyond Aristotle in his empiricism; o Aristotle believed that sensory experience was the basis of knowledge (viable source of information) but that reason needed to be applied to extract knowledge of universals and essences from individual experiences o Occam believed that sensory experiences alone provided information about the world Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected]) lOMoARcPSD|37523509    Occam’s philosophy is considered a turning point, as it essentially marks the end of the Scholastic period The church made great efforts to suppress Occam’s views (he said that God’s existence must be accepted on faith, as it could never be confirmed by studying nature), yet they were ultimately widely taught and can be viewed as the beginning of modern empirical philosophy We see in Occam a strong hint of the coming Renaissance Downloaded by JENESAH HANKE ([email protected])