Outlines of psychology : with special reference to the theory of education / by James Sully.

  • James Sully
Date:
1889
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Outlines of psychology : with special reference to the theory of education / by James Sully. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    its occurrence, or afterwards.1 We have tlie power of turning the attention inwards on the phenomena of mind. Thus I can attend to a particular feeling, say admiration for a beautiful object, in order to see what its nature is, of what elementary parts it con- sists, how it is affected by the circumstances of the moment, and so on. This method of interna] or sub- jective observation is known as introspection (e looking within ’). Objective Method. In the second place we may study mental phenomena not only in our own indi- vidual mind but as they present themselves externally in other minds. This is the indirect, external, or ob- jective way of studying mental phenomena. Thus we note the manifestations of others’ feelings in looks, gestures, &c. We arrive at a knowledge of their thoughts by their speech, and observe their inclina- tions and motives by noting their actions. This objective observation embraces not only the mental phenomena of the individuals who are per- sonally known to us, old and young, but those of others of whom we hear or read in biography, &c. Also it includes the study of minds in masses or aggregates, as they present themselves in national sentiments and actions, and in the events of history. It includes too a comparative study of mind by ob- serving its agreements and differences among different races, and even among different grades of animal life. 1 Strictly speaking, we never observe a mental phenomenon at the exact instant of its occurrence. All introspection is retrospection. But we distin- guish broadly between studying an immediately antecedent mental state, and one which occurred some time before. (See my work on Illusions, Chap VIII., p. 190 n.)
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