Is Psychology Possible?

Abstract

To ask such a question, when we consider the publicity and importance which is accorded nowadays to psychology, may appear rather startling, if not absurd. Yet, as the late Professor Miinsterberg observes, “to reach a clear understanding as to the true meaning of psychology is a more difficult task than the solution of any special psychological problem.” Of late years there has arisen a great deal of criticism not only concerning the foundations on which this science rests, but also in regard to its very aims and scope. The student of psychology is at the outset confronted by a perplexing variety of “schools,” each claiming right of way to the general exclusion of all others. Quite recently this discordance was voiced in no measured terms by Professor Spearman. “It is generally agreed,” he writes, “that nowadays psychology has arrived at a very undesirable degree of disunitedness. Each school, if not each individual, seeks to establish the science independently both of his predecessors and even of his colleagues. The result is that all alike have come into general discredit. Psychology is a byword of reproach among other sciences.” Even Professor McDougall, whose writings on Psychology are so widely known, seems infected with this feeling of discontent; for in a recent publication he remarks: “Even now after some forty-five years of sustained effort I am not sure that I have made any progress, have learned anything of human nature.” He further adds that he inclines to the view current among the Oxford philosophers of his day that such a knowledge is impossible.