Lecture 01 - A long past but a short history, sort of

Why is it said that "psychology has a long past, but only a short history”? Who said it?

Ebbinghaus'

• Psychology has a shorter history compared to physics, chem, etc.

• As a formal scientific area its started since the late 1800s but people have been thinking about psychology forever

  • To make sense of things

• People have been thinking about psychological issues for a millennia

What are burial rituals and what do they symbolize?

burial rituals: the fact that humans mourn and bury their dead (shows that we feel and care)

The point at which human burials involved reflection rather than just disposal is unclear but a very long time ago (at least 100,000 years ago)

evidence for early psychological thinking in humans

the dead were often buried with perfectly usable objects, maybe related to a future life

What is the difference between human vs. animal burials?

humans bury the death out of care vs. rats may bury their dead but only after they begin to smell

• emotional vs. practical

What are cave paintings and what do they suggest about early psychological thinking?

go back at least 50,000 years

many are reflections of daily life but suggest some form of self-awareness

they also display theme more psychological in nature (families, dreaming, good and bad luck, etc.)

What are indalos that were seen in cave paintings?

indalos - usually interpreted as someone protected from something bad like evil spirits or storms

painted in caves to ward off evil spirits, storms, and the evil eye.

What is trepanning?

a common early surgical procedure in Europe (5,000 BCE)

brain surgery where people would drill a hole in the skull

• it was a kind of spirit removal

medical reasons of removing pressure from the skull

Which major religion begins with a psychological observation?

Buddhism (this is outside EUROPE)

• life suffering is caused by the human mind

• life is suffering - interpreted in an existential sense as deep unfulfillment, not acute physical or psychological pain

• people practiced meditation among other things to deal with it

Who are often described as the originators of what led psychology?

Socrates et al.

How did Greek literature influence psychological ideas?

in the pre-Socratic era (1,000-500 BCE)

E.g. Oedipus Rex was a famous drama -> Freud used that term in one of his psychological stages

Tragedies involved serious stories and psychological themes (e.g. emotion overcoming reason, personality characteristics - arrogance, stubbornness)

What is the humoral theory of personality?

attributing personality traits to fluids; they stuck with you based on your make up

How did theatre and art in Greece contribute to psychology?

People in Greece went to very psychological, challenging, and thought provoking plays that were not simply light entertainment

• Assumes an educated audience with themes of fate vs. free will, the costs of arrogance, lack of knowledge, etc.

A lot of material in psychology for art (similar to religion)

Who were the Sophists?

a group of people who focused on teaching others to give a ‘stirring speech’ as well as logic, speaking, and argument

What is the Psyche? What was the development of the Psyche?

what makes people do what they do

this concept was a pre-Socratic notion

attributed to a spirit or soul then (now we realize not quite accurate, has more to do with life force)

associated with breathing and left the body once dead

What did thinking about the Psyche eventually lead thinking towards?

vague but interesting in early mind-body thinking