Examtests with History of Psychology by Van der Velde - 1st edition - Exclusive

How has psychology as a science developed? - ExamTests 1

Open questions with chapter 1

Open question 1

What features of mechanicism resound in Bacon's view of science? Can political and moral problems be solved through science?

Open question 2

What do the terms monism and dualism mean?

Answers Open questions with chapter 1

Open question 1

Characteristics of the mechanism that resound in Bacon's view of science are that everything can be traced back to matter and atoms, and the use of mechanistic explanations. Knowledge could be acquired through observations made by the method of induction. The results should be presented in an organized manner, after which certain patterns or laws become visible. These patterns can be of practical use and help in understanding how the world works. By understanding how the world works, what the causes of certain phenomena are, political and moral problems could be solved.

Open question 2

Monism is a philosophical position that holds that there is only one of something. There are different types of monistic visions. Many philosophers and scientists are materialists and their view is that matter is the only substance in existence. That is an example of a monistic point of view called realism. Another example is idealism, as followed by Plato, who believed that the world of ideas or the mind is more real than the physical world we think we perceive. Dualism is a philosophical view that holds that there are two different forms of substances in the universe. The first is matter, as studied in physics, biology, and chemistry. The second is the basis of the human mind. Examples of dualism can be seen in Descartes' view that defines the substance of mind as thinking, and the causality that Wundt describes that would drive thought and creativity.

Who were Descartes and Hobbes? - ExamTests 2

Open questions with chapter 2

Open question 1

What is cartesian doubt and ´the doubt experiment´?

Open questions 2

According to Descartes, how can true knowledge be acquired?

Open question 3

How does Descartes define the human soul and what did that mean for psychology?

Open question 4

Which view of Descartes was responsible for the fact that for a long time consciousness was the main object of research in psychology?

Open question 5

What is freedom and free will according to Hobbes?

Open question 6

To what extent does individualism play a role in the views of Descartes and Hobbes?

Open question 7

How does the mechanistic influence show in the thinking of Descartes and Hobbes?

Open question 8

What does Descartes consider to be the criterion of real truth?

Open question 9

Explain the difference between Descartes' rationalist philosophy/psychology and Locke's empiricist psychology. Also explain the connection with the nature-nurture debate.

Answers Open questions with chapter 2

Open question 1

In Descartes' philosophy, the cartesian doubt is a way of seeking certainty by systematically doubting everything. It is also known as the 'doubt experiment'. If you reject all knowledge that can be doubted, there remains only knowledge that is necessarily true. Every doubt brings with it a certainty, namely the awareness of doubting, which means that you know that you are thinking, which in turn means that you know that you exist. In other words, what you are thinking is not true in most cases, but the fact that you are thinking, is.

Open question 2

Descartes is a rationalist and true knowledge can, according to him, only be acquired by using our ratio. He reasons on the basis of axioms and identifies two groups of unquestionable knowledge: 1) innate unquestionable knowledge and 2) reasoned unquestionable knowledge (theorems reasoned from axioms by deduction).

Open question 3

Descartes was a dualist and according to him there were two substances in the universe. The first substance is matter, which is characterized by spatial expansion. The second substance is the human soul, which is characterized by thought. The human soul is the only entity on Earth that consists of this and humans are said to possess it from birth. He believed that only things made of matter and with spatial expansion could be analyzed by science. According to him, if you can't dissect something, and can't quantify and analyze its parts, you can't study it scientifically.

Open question 4

Descartes was a dualist and claimed that the soul consists of a separate substance that cannot be scientifically examined. As a result, for a long time psychology was only concerned with cognition (consciousness and thinking). Other aspects such as emotions and behavior were not seen as part of psychology because they were thought to belong to the body.

Open question 5

Hobbes regarded man entirely as a machine. All psychic phenomena could be reduced to physical phenomena and have a preceding cause. In that sense, a machine cannot have free will. According to Hobbes, man is free when his actions (a chain of cause-effect relationships) are not blocked by anything. Human freedom would then refer to the unrestricted circulation of blood in the body that allows the body to act based on the decisions a person makes, which in turn are based on that person's appetites and aversions.

Open question 6

Descartes considers each person as an individual, because he is autonomous in his thinking. In addition, man himself is responsible for acquiring knowledge if he wants to. Hobbes sees a very high degree of individualism in people. This is apparent from his vision of the state of nature, in which people only think of themselves and are in constant conflict with each other. That individualism could be curbed by means of a social contract that must be supervised by an absolute monarch.

Open question 7

Descartes relied on man's ability to understand and explain nature. Complex matters could only be understood by observing them closely. He also considered the human body to be a machine, made up of matter, that would operate on mechanistic principles. However, he did not consider the human soul to be a machine or composed of matter. Hobbes, on the other hand, did. Hobbes did not believe in the existence of a soul and regarded higher psychological functions as material processes with material causes. Hobbes was mainly interested in applying mechanicism to society, and less to the individual as Descartes did.

Open question 8

According to Descartes, the first statement that can be considered true is "I think, therefore I am". Other truths he discovers all have one thing in common with this statement, which is that they appear clearly and distinctly in the mind. Descartes then takes this quality as a measure of the real truth, which is that any statement that is clear and distinctive to the mind is true.

Open question 9

Descartes believed that by using your mind you could arrive at unquestionable knowledge. This real knowledge would consist partly of innate knowledge and partly of deductively reasoned knowledge. This puts him on the nature side of the nature-nurture debate. Locke did not believe in innate knowledge. He believed knowledge came from experience. He believed in generally accepted principles and logical laws. He is therefore on the nurture side of the nature-nurture debate.

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