1. Causes of the flourishing of ancient psychology
2. The first psychological theories of antiquity (VI - IV centuries BC)
3. Leading psychological theories of the classical period of antiquity (IV - II centuries BC)
4. Psychological ideas of the Hellenistic period
5. Results of the development of psychology in antiquity
1. Reasons for the rise of ancient psychology
Among the main reasons for the emergence and systematization of the first scientific concepts that explore the essence of the mental, the following are noted:
1) For the flourishing of Greek culture as a whole, the successful geographical position(at the intersection of trade routes, which simultaneously served as information flows, bringing information and knowledge from different countries of the world);
2) The Greeks were able to create an excellent education system for those times - they received knowledge in various fields of culture and art. At the heart of ideas about a person was the harmony of body and spirit, best school considered life itself. After receiving an education, parents sent their children to travel, which was considered the best way gaining life experience, as well as consolidating knowledge in practice;
3) In Athens, respect for the individual reigned, and a person was evaluated primarily by intelligence and abilities, and not by wealth and origin. Any free Greek could make a political career, if he were smart, educated and eloquent. Even a slave, if he had talents, could be granted freedom, and the state allocated him land and funds;
4) In Greece, the democratic structure of state life flourished. There was private ownership of land, fixed by law, and everyone who owned at least a piece of land had the right to vote: he could participate in solving political issues, in the election of statesmen;
5) Although the consciousness of the Greeks was more religious, religion did not play the same role in the life of Greek society as in the East. Its influence on the development of ideas about the world, about man was almost not felt.
Conclusion: The first psychological teachings appeared at the turn of the 7th-6th centuries. BC. Their appearance is connected with the need for the formation of scientific ideas about a person, about his soul, not on the basis of myths, legends and fairy tales, but on the basis of objective knowledge from the field of medicine, mathematics, philosophy. Psychological knowledge became an important area of science that studied the laws of society, nature and man, that is, natural philosophy.
Allocate three important periods in the development of ancient psychology:
1) VII (VI) - IV centuries. BC. - the time of the emergence of the first psychological theories within the framework of natural philosophy;
2) IV - II centuries. BC. - the classical period, associated with the creation of the classical theories of antiquity by Plato and Aristotle;
3) II century. BC. - IV century. - the period of Hellenism, when Greek culture and science spread throughout the world with the campaigns of Alexander the Great. The period was distinguished by the predominance of practical interests, with the desire to understand and identify the ways of moral self-improvement of a person.
2. The first psychological theories of antiquity (VI - IV centuries BC)
The first psychological ideas about the soul were based on the functions of the soul identified in the mythological and religious-philosophical ideas of the Ancient East:
Energy (motivation of a person to activity);
Regulatory
· cognitive.
It is worth noting that the appearance of the first psychological ideas of antiquity, as well as in the Ancient East, was associated with animism, that is, the belief in their invisible essences hidden behind visible things - souls that leave the body with their last breath.
One of the first to speak about the various properties of the soul and its purpose Pythagoras(VI century BC), who was not only a famous mathematician, but also a philosopher and psychologist. According to his ideas, the soul of a person cannot die with his body, it develops and lives according to its own laws in accordance with its own goal - purification, enlightenment, liberation from carnal desires. The ideas of Buddhism about karma (posthumous retribution), samsara (reincarnation of the soul) left an imprint on his views - he also believed that after death the soul moves to another body depending on the moral assessment of its existence in this body - metempsychosis.
Exploring the functions of the soul, Pythagoras did not yet ask himself the question of how a person cognizes the world, how the regulation of behavior occurs, i.e. he considered the soul mainly as a source of human vital energy. He believed that initially some souls are more active and capable, while others are less capable and more inclined to obedience, and this determines the class inequality of people. However, the abilities of the soul during life can be changed using special training. Therefore, Pythagoras considered it necessary to create an education system that would involve the search for the most inclined to learn people in all strata of society. He spoke about the need to form a ruling class - aristocrats - from the most enlightened and intelligent people of his time.
The transition from animism to hylozoism (gilo- substance, matter; zoa- a life). According to hylozoism, the whole world, that is, the macrocosm, the universe, is thought to be originally alive, and the soul develops according to the general laws of the universe.
This view developed in natural philosophy (the first philosophical school, the Miletus school), in the 7th - 6th centuries. BC. Its representatives are Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes. They believed that all things and phenomena of the surrounding world are characterized by the unity of their origin, and the diversity of phenomena and objects of reality are just different states of a single material principle (primary principle, primary matter). This position was extended by them to the area of the mental, i.e. the material and the spiritual, the corporeal and the psychic in their fundamental principle are one. The difference between the views of philosophers was what kind of concrete matter each of them took as the basis of the universe.
Hyloism for the first time put the soul (i.e. mental) under the general laws of nature, arguing about the initial involvement of mental phenomena in the cycle of nature, i.e. believing that the mental is a natural moment of the universe as a whole.
Thales(624 - 547 BC) indicated water as the fundamental principle of the world, referring to the fact that "the Earth floats in water." He considered the soul as a special state of water, main characteristic which is the ability to give bodies movement, i.e. the soul is that which makes one move.
Thales put the mental state (soul) in dependence on the physical health of the body. He believed that “only a person who strives to live according to the law of justice can be happy, and it consists in not doing for himself what a person blames other people for.”
Anaximander(610 - 547 BC) believed that the basis of the world is the first matter - apeiron, which does not have a qualitative originality, but can take the form of fire, water, earth or air - any substance known to man.
Anaximander was the first to try to explain the origin of man and all living beings, he expressed the idea of the origin of the living from the inanimate.
Anaximenes(588 - 522 BC) - an ancient Greek philosopher, a student of Anaximander, a representative of the Miletus school. He considered air to be the basis of the universe, said that the world arises from "infinite" air, and all the variety of things is air in its various states. Cooling, the air condenses and, solidifying, forms clouds, earth, stones; rarefied air gives rise to heavenly bodies with a fiery nature. The latter arise from earthly vapors. claimed that aerial nature the soul also has, and the existence of a soul in a person can be judged by his breathing.
In the first natural-philosophical theories that pointed to the material nature of the mental, a detailed picture of a person’s mental life was not yet given, this merit belongs to the famous philosopher Heraclitus of Ephesus(530 - 470 BC).
For the fundamental principle of the universe, he took fire, which is in perpetual motion, change caused by the struggle of opposites. It is fire that gives rise to all things material and spiritual world, and the whole world develops, changes, everything in it passes from one state to another according to some universal law - logos , the law of the universe as a whole, the macrocosm. But the microcosm of an individual soul is identical to the macrocosm of the entire world order, therefore, the human soul is Psyche - this is a particle of the fiery element, which also develops according to the law of the logos. Heraclitus first introduced the term for the human soul - psyche, which became the first psychological term.
He considered the goal of human life to be knowledge of oneself, but to know oneself, “to comprehend one’s psyche” means to understand the law, logos, which underlies the universe, is the basis for the harmonious development of the whole world, where everything is woven from contradictions, but develops harmoniously.
Moral behavior excludes the abuse of bodily desires and lower needs, this weakens the psyche, moves it away from the logos, and moderation in satisfying needs contributes to the development and improvement of a person’s mental and intellectual abilities.
The best state of the soul is its "dryness" or "fieryness", and the development of the human psyche is associated with the attainment of the soul of a pure fiery substance. Those. the soul of the child is still “wet”, immature, it grows together with the person, improves and becomes more “fiery”, mature, capable of clear and precise thinking. And in old age, the soul is gradually saturated with moisture, "damp", and the person begins to think badly and slowly. Thus, Heraclitus first expressed the idea of the development of the soul and connected this development with thinking.
Much attention was paid to the process of cognition, Heraclitus singled out the stages of cognitive activity. He associated the first stage with the activity of the sense organs, but he considered the mind to be the leading one, because. the sense organs of a person allow only the external laws of nature to be established, and the mind, relying on feelings, discovers its internal laws, is able to comprehend the logos. The purpose of knowledge is to discover the truths of the universe, listen to the voice of nature and act in accordance with its laws.
Thus, the most important provisions of the teachings of Heraclitus are as follows:
1) Heraclitus developed the idea of the material ("fiery") nature of the soul and the dependence of the mental on the general laws of nature - the logos;
2) Introduced the first term to refer to mental phenomena - "psyche";
3) Emphasized the variability of not only the world as a whole, but also the human psyche, the dependence of mental health on a person’s lifestyle and the physical state of the body;
4) Formulated the principle of the natural development of the world in general and the psyche in particular.
The most important ideas about the nature of the soul, its bodily foundations were expressed not only by philosophers, but also by representatives of medicine, among whom a prominent physician and philosopher of antiquity stands out. Alcmaeon(VI - V centuries BC). He was the first to connect the psyche with the work of the brain and the nervous system as a whole, introduced nervism principle . Gave the first systematic description of the general structure of the body and the alleged functions of the body. Empirically revealed the presence of "conductors" going from the brain to all systems and sense organs. He believed that the psyche is inherent in both humans and animals as creatures with a nervous system and a brain. This view is called neuropsychism.
He believed that, unlike animals, a person has a mind, and animals have only the ability to sense and perceive. Feelings considered the original form of cognitive activity. I noticed that there is a “similarity” of a sense organ and an external stimulus for the emergence of a qualitatively unique sensation (sounds - the ear, color - the eye, etc.). Alcmeon associated human activity with the special dynamics of blood movement in the body: when blood rushes - awakening, ebb - sleep, complete outflow - death. The general condition of the body, its health depends on the “elemental harmony” in the body: air, water (liquid), earth, fire, and the “elemental harmony”, in turn, depends on the person’s lifestyle, food, climatic and geographical conditions, and also on the conditions of human life in general.
Thus, the most important provisions of the teachings of Alcmaeon are as follows:
1) The connection of the psyche with the brain and the nervous system as a whole as the basis of the mental ( brain-centric concept of the psyche );
2) Neuropsychism - the psyche is associated with the presence of the brain;
3) The vital activity of the organism is determined both by the internal harmony of all the elements, and by the external one.
Democritus(460 - 370 BC) - the founder of the atomistic theory of the world, according to which material things consist of the smallest particles - atoms, which differ from each other in shape, sequence and rotation. Man, like all the surrounding nature, consists of atoms and emptiness. The soul is material, it consists of small, round, smooth, most mobile atoms, which must communicate activity to the body.
The infinite variety of things has determined the infinite variety of atoms and their combinations. The next life is not a continuation of a divine act, it is generated by the cohesion of wet and warm atoms, in particular, animals arose from water and silt, and man came from an animal. Both man and animal have a soul, something that makes them move. The atoms of the soul are related to the atoms of fire, they penetrate into the body through breathing, with the help of which replenishment occurs in the body. Penetrating into the body, the atoms are scattered throughout the body.
Penetrating into the body through breathing, the atoms of the soul are localized in three points:
· in my head- a reasonable point, the most mobile atoms that are associated with cognitive functions:
· in the chest- a courageous point, the atoms of the heart are less mobile, associated with emotional states, experiences, feelings;
· in the liver- a lusty point where inclinations, desires, aspirations, material needs are concentrated.
Eidol- a copy of a material object. When they come into contact with the atoms of the soul, a sensation occurs, thus, all sensations are contact. Summarizing the data of several sense organs, a person discovers the world, moving to the next stage of knowledge, i.e. on the basis of sensations arise perceptions, and then consciousness.
In the theory of knowledge, Democritus was a sensualist, he singled out two stages of knowledge: sensory knowledge (sensation and perception) and consciousness (thinking) as the highest level of knowledge. He emphasized that thinking gives us more knowledge than sensations.
He was the first to introduce the concept of primary and secondary qualities of an object. Primary - those qualities that exist in objects objectively (weight, surface, density, shape, etc.). Secondary - those qualities that depend on the properties of not only the object, but also the sense organs (color, taste, temperature, etc.). Thus, Democritus came to the conclusion that knowledge is subjective.
He argued that there are no accidents in the world, and everything happens for a predetermined reason. People invented randomness to cover up their ignorance and inability to control any phenomena. In fact, there are no accidents, everything is causal - principle of determinism . This principle extends to the fate of man, therefore, there is no free will of man. This assertion led to fatalistic view to the fate of man. In this case, a person cannot control his behavior and evaluate the actions of people, because. they depend not on the moral principles of man, but on fate. This is the most controversial place in the theory of Democritus. Nevertheless, he believed that moral principles are not given from birth, but are the result of upbringing, which is supposed to give a person three gifts: to think well, speak well and do wonderful things.
The soul is a material substance, which consists of atoms of fire, spherical, light and very mobile. Democritus tried to explain all the phenomena of mental life by physical and even mechanical causes. The soul receives sensations from the external world due to the fact that its atoms are set in motion by atoms of air or atoms directly “flowing” from objects.
Democritus attributed the function of regulating behavior to emotions, i.e. atoms concentrated in the heart. He believed that both humans and animals have a soul, and the differences between them are not qualitative, but quantitative. Much that man has learned comes from imitating animals and nature in general.
One thing for the soul and for the cosmos as a whole is the presence of a law (logos), which determines the course of things, and according to which there are no causeless phenomena. All of them are inevitable results of the impact of atoms. Subsequently, this principle was called universal determinism.
Hippocrates(460 - 370 BC) considered life as a changing process, among its explanatory principles he singled out air as a force that maintains the inseparable connection of the body with the world, brings intelligence from the outside, and performs mental functions in the brain. A single material principle as the basis of mental life was rejected.
Hippocrates replaced the doctrine of a single element underlying the diversity of things with the doctrine of four liquids (humor): blood (sanguis), mucus (plegma), yellow bile (chole) and black bile (melaine chole). This theory is called the humoral theory of temperaments.
Thus, Hippocrates laid the foundation for the scientific typology of personality, fitting all types of human behavior into four general patterns of behavior associated with four types of temperament. Thus, he is considered the "father" of differential psychology, which studies individual differences between people and their causes (the sources of these differences). Hippocrates searched for the reasons for the differences inside the body, making mental qualities dependent on bodily ones. An important concept in his theory was the concept of measure, proportionality, proportion, harmonious ratio, which he denoted by the concept of "temperamentum". This harmony in the body and soul of a person is influenced by both external conditions and the way of life of a person.
Anaxagoras(V century BC) - a scientist who was one of the first to connect the rationality of a person with his bodily organization. Man is the most intelligent of animals because he has hands, and such an organization of corporality determines his advantages, i.e. the level of mental development also depends on the level of bodily organization - the principle of consistency (organization) .
Conclusion: Thus, in the VII-V centuries. BC. the first scientific concepts of the psyche appear, in which it is considered, first of all, as a source of body activity, but they also began to analyze both the cognitive and regulatory functions of the soul. At the same time, it was believed that the soul of a person and the soul of other living beings have only quantitative differences, since a person and all animals, and everything in nature is subject to the same laws. During the period, the first theories of knowledge appear, which emphasize the role of sensory cognition as the first stage of cognitive activity (sensualism). Emotions were considered to be the regulator of behavior.
Also during this period, the key problems of psychology were formulated, which became the subject of analysis in subsequent centuries:
the ratio of material and spiritual, soul and body;
The functions of the soul
How does knowledge of the world take place?
What is the regulator of behavior, and whether a person has the freedom of this regulation.
Three most important principles were formulated, which throughout the development of psychology were the basis of the scientific knowledge of mental phenomena. This is the principle of regular development formulated by Heraclitus; the principle of causality (universal determinism), formulated by Democritus; the principle of consistency (organization), formulated by Anaxagoras.
3. Leading psychological theories of the classical period of antiquity (IV - II centuries BC)
During the period of classical ancient psychology, the first detailed psychological concepts formulated by Plato and Aristotle. An intermediate position between the first psychological theories and the ideas of antiquity is occupied by Socrates and the sophists.
Sophists (“teachers of wisdom”) were not interested in nature, with its laws independent of man, but in man himself. The most prominent representatives of this school were Gorgias and Protagoras.
The study of speech and mental activity came to the fore among the sophists from the point of view of its use to manipulate people. Behavior was not made dependent on the inevitable laws of nature, they associated mental phenomena and the content of the soul with thoughts that were reflected in the language. Language and thoughts are devoid of such inevitability, they are full of conventions and depend on human interests and passions, thus the actions of the soul acquire unsteadiness and uncertainty.
The activities of the sophists marked the beginning of paid education in the sciences. The goal of educational influence was considered not the improvement of a person, but the search for optimal ways of adapting to the social conditions in which a person lives. Thus, the sophists sought to form an adapted, socially active personality capable of achieving success in life. The means of this can be oratory and other methods of influencing and manipulating others. The ability to eloquence made it possible to participate more actively in public life and achieve a higher position.
A kind of opponent of the sophists was Socrates(469 - 399 BC). One of the most important provisions of his theory was the idea that there are absolute knowledge and absolute truth that a person can realize in his thinking and transfer to another. Truth is fixed in speech, general concepts, words, and in this form is passed on from generation to generation.
Thus, Socrates for the first time connected the thought process with the word, speech. Subsequently, this idea was developed by Plato, who identified thinking and speech. Truths are present in a person as knowledge, but are not realized by the mind until they are updated in the learning process or the perception of some kind of speech.
Socrates was the first to raise the issue of developing a method for updating knowledge in the human soul. This method is based on a dialogue between the teacher and the student, in which the teacher directs the student's thoughts with leading questions and gradually leads him to the necessary conclusions - suggestive method or socratic method . This method began to be considered as the basis of problem-based learning. Socrates believed that universal absolute knowledge is in the mind and only from it should be derived.
Socrates for the first time considered the soul as a source of reason and morality of a person, and not as a source of body activity. Consequently, the soul is the mental quality of the individual, characteristic of him as a rational being, acting in accordance with moral ideals. Because such an approach to the soul could not proceed from the idea of its materiality, then, simultaneously with the emergence of a view on the connection of the soul with the moral, a new one appears - an idealistic understanding of the essence of the soul.
“Know thyself” - Socrates did not focus on turning “inward”, to one’s own experiences and states of consciousness, but an analysis of actions and attitudes towards them, moral assessments and norms human behavior in various life situations.
Plato(428 - 348 BC) founded the Academy in 388 BC. near Athens, in the gardens dedicated to the mythical hero Akadem. A wide range of disciplines was developed at the Academy: philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, natural science. There was a division into seniors and juniors, the main method of teaching was dialectics (dialogue).
The main part of Plato's philosophy, which gave the name to a whole trend in philosophy, is the doctrine of ideas (eidos). Ideas - truly existing being, unchanging, eternal; an objectively existing world of ideal entities (things) that exist independently of sensible things.
Matter- the potential being of really existing things, becomes a thing when combined with an idea, which at the same time changes or hides its essence.
Soul acts as a beginning mediating between the world of ideas and sensible things. It exists before it enters into connection with any body. By its nature, it is infinitely higher than the perishable body, therefore, it can rule over it, it is eternal and immortal.
Plato distinguished three principles of the human soul:
1) the first and lower, common to man, animals and plants, lustful, unreasonable principle, occupies a large part of the human soul;
2) rational, opposes or opposes the aspirations of the lustful beginning;
3) a furious spirit, an affective principle, emotions, feelings, ideas about justice, honor, dignity, courage, for the sake of these higher ideas one can even go to death. A furious spirit is concentrated in the heart of man.
Plato's teaching about the fate of the soul after the death of the body is clothed in the form of a myth that pursues ethical and state-pedagogical goals. While living, people must believe that after death the soul is responsible for all the actions of the body, and this belief will make everyone fear retribution in the future life, so as not to fall into the denial of all morality and duty.
Plato's theory of cognition is rationalistic, the leading role in cognition is assigned to the mind, but in man there is a power that is higher and more beautiful than human properties, it is a divine gift (inspiration, the ability to be creative).
He distinguished two ways of learning:
It is based on sensations (perception), memory and thinking. He especially emphasized the role of memory, which allows you to correlate sensory images with those ideas that exist in the soul from the very beginning. In this sense, knowledge is the "remembering" of what the soul already knew in its past, ideal life, but forgot when moving into the body.
· The second way is connected with the comprehension of the ideal essence of things on the basis of intuitive thinking, like an act of insight.
Plato was the first to characterize memory as an independent cognitive process and singled out different types of thinking: the inductive method of cognition and intuitive thinking.
An integral part of Plato's doctrine of the soul is the doctrine of feelings. Refutes the notion that the highest good lies in pleasure. Plato gives a list of feelings: anger, fear, desire, sadness, love, jealousy, envy.
About the state, Plato wrote the following: in the state, people should occupy a place in accordance with their natural inclinations. But, at the same time, he attached great importance to upbringing: “proper upbringing and training awaken good natural inclinations in a person, and those who already had them become even better thanks to such upbringing.”
He wrote about the need for professional selection and "testing" of children in order to determine both the intellectual level and inclinations of the child already in childhood, and educate him according to these inclinations and his destiny.
So Plato:
Identified the stages of cognition;
Substantiated the role in the formation personal experience a man of memory;
Emphasized the activity of human thinking;
Presented the process of thinking in the form of inner speech;
· Formulated a position on the internal conflict of the soul (later - Freud's psychoanalysis).
Plato's most famous student was Aristotle(384 - 322 BC) (Fig. 10). He revised Plato's approach to the soul as a kind of entity opposed to the body, and came to the conclusion that the soul and body are inseparable. The soul is a form of existence and realization of a body capable of life, cannot exist without a body, but is not a body. Also, the soul is a way of organizing a living body, the actions of which are expedient.
Aristotle believed that the soul is inherent in all living organisms, including plants. In the process of life, “not the soul itself, but the body, thanks to it, learns, reflects, experiences, feels.”
He believed that there are three levels of the soul: plant, animal and rational. The vegetable soul is capable of reproduction and nutrition, the animal, in addition to these functions, also has the ability to move, feel, sense and remember, and the rational soul, in addition to everything, has the ability to think.
Thus, Aristotle has the idea genesis - that is, the origin and development of mental forms (soul) from lower to higher. Moreover, in an individual person, from the moment of his conception to development into a mature being, the same steps are manifested that the entire organic world has passed from the plant soul to the rational one. This idea is called biogenetic law .
Since the functions of the plant and animal soul cannot be carried out without a body, the plant and animal souls are mortal, that is, they appear and disappear with the body, while the rational soul is immortal. It is the concentration of innate knowledge accumulated by previous generations of people. After death, the rational soul is stored in a certain universal mind ( nous ), and at the birth of a child, a part of the mind, forming a new rational part of the soul, moves into the body of the newborn, uniting with plant and animal parts.
Speaking about the theory of knowledge of Aristotle, it should be noted that he considered the first stage of cognition to be sensations that accumulate in a certain general sensory (memory), where comparison takes place, correlation among themselves on the basis of association mechanism . There are three types of associations: by similarity, by contrast, by contiguity in space and time.
Connecting on the basis of the mechanism of associations, sensations form integral images of perception, and then, on the basis of mental logical operations, a person forms general concepts that capture the essence of things.
Aristotle distinguished two types of thinking: logical and intuitive. Logical thinking- completes the sensualistic path of cognition from sensations to general concepts, and intuitive thinking helps to actualize knowledge from the innate rational part of the soul. Obtaining fundamentally new knowledge and experience is the task of logical thinking.
In addition, Aristotle shared the theoretical and practical reason, which is aimed at guiding behavior. He came to the conclusion that a double regulation of behavior is possible: on the basis of both emotions and reason. But when behavior is regulated by emotions and affects, it becomes spontaneous, impulsive, unfree. Freedom is possible only with reasonable regulation of behavior. It is possible to reduce the negative impact of emotions, affects that deprive behavior of rationality, using mechanism of catharsis (purification of the soul from affects through their experience, living with the perception of art); thereby highlighted the therapeutic role of art, which can lead to relaxation.
Aristotle emphasized that a person's character is formed on the basis of real moral deeds, in which a person's moral attitude towards other people is realized (work "Character").
Conclusion: During the period of classical ancient psychology, the first detailed concepts formulated by Plato and Aristotle appear. An intermediate position between the first psychological theories and the ideas of antiquity is occupied by Socrates and the sophists.
During this period, the study of qualitative differences begins, which are inherent only in the human soul, and which other living beings do not have. The ideas are affirmed that the psyche (human soul) is the carrier of not only activity, but also reason and morality, and culture has the most direct influence on its development.
The idea is affirmed that behavior is regulated not only by emotions, but also by reason, which is also considered as a source of objective, true knowledge that cannot be obtained through sensations.
4. Psychological ideas of the Hellenistic period
The psychological thought of the Hellenistic era is due to the crisis of the Greek Polis, with the emergence and then the collapse of the world's largest monarchy, the Macedonian king Alexander. The period lasted from the II century. BC. according to III-VI centuries. AD
The campaigns of A.Macedonsky stimulated the synthesis of elements of the cultures of Greece and the countries of the Ancient East. The most important thing that changed the worldview during this period was that a person was losing strong ties with his hometown, its stable social environment, and political structure. As a result, a person found himself in the face of unpredictable changes, internal contradictions, bestowed by freedom of choice, and with increasing acuteness, a person felt the fragility of his existence in a changed and “free” world.
Thus, it is no coincidence that the psychology of the Hellenistic era is focused on the study of practical problems. Belief in the power of reason is questioned. That is why philosophers considered the main task not to study the essence of things, not to comprehend objective truths and laws, but to work out the rules of life for moral self-improvement and the achievement of happiness. The most important problem of this period is the development of morality, moral self-improvement.
The period is coming to an end when Christianity becomes a world religion (325) and begins to dominate scientific concepts, becomes the basis of the world outlook in general.
Arises skepticism(from the Greek skepticos - examining, investigating) - a philosophical direction that puts forward doubt as a principle of thinking, especially doubt about the reliability of truth.
In the ordinary sense, skepticism is seen as a psychological state of uncertainty, doubt about something, which forces one to refrain from making categorical judgments regarding the world around because of their understatement, relativity, changeability, etc.
The founder of skepticism is Pyrrho(IV century BC). the ideas of Indian philosophy had a certain influence on him, first of all, on his idea of happiness, which was considered as ataraxia - lack of unrest, complete detachment from the outside world, indifference, indifference to events.
The most famous representative of skepticism in the Hellenistic era is Sextus Empiricus(II century BC).
Skepticism denied the truth of any knowledge, refrain from judgments - its main thesis.
The ideal of a person - a philosopher who strives for happiness, can consist in imperturbable calmness and the absence of suffering. Whoever wants to achieve happiness must answer three questions: What are things made of? How should we treat them? How will we benefit from our relationship with them?
A skeptic, refraining from judgment, will follow the laws of the state in which he lives and observe all the rites, not taking anything for granted. He will keep peace of mind without adhering to any of the possible dogmatic judgments.
School of cynics (cynics) proceeded from the fact that each person is self-sufficient, i.e. has everything necessary for spiritual life in itself.
Founder - Antisthenes of Athens. He claimed that best life is not just in naturalness, but in getting rid of conventions and artificialities, freedom from the possession of superfluous and useless. To achieve good, one should live “like a dog”, i.e. live with:
Simplicity of life, following one's own nature, contempt for conventions;
The ability to firmly defend their way of life, to stand up for themselves;
Loyalty, courage, gratitude.
Diogenes of Sinop (400 - 325 BC) believed that the only way for moral self-improvement is the way to oneself, limiting contacts and dependence on the outside world.
The path to moral perfection includes three steps:
1. One of the key ideas - ascesis (austerity) - the ability to self-denial and endure difficulties. Cynic ascesis - the ultimate simplification, limitation of one's needs, "strength of spirit, character." Thus, from the point of view of the Cynics, dependence on society was overcome, which, in exchange for comfort, demanded that a person leave “from himself”.
2. Apedeusia (apadeikia) - the ability to liberate from the dogmas of religion and culture. A person was inspired with the idea of the need to ignore the knowledge accumulated by society. Cynics believed that ignorance and bad manners, illiteracy - a virtue.
3. Autarky - the ability to independent existence and self-restraint. Independence was equal to the rejection of the family, the state, a person was taught to ignore public opinion, praise and blame.
Thus, the ethical ideal of cynicism was formed as:
1) extreme simplicity, bordering on a pre-cultural state;
2) contempt for all needs, except for the basic ones, without which life itself would be impossible;
3) a mockery of all conventions;
4) demonstrative naturalness and unconditionality of personal freedom.
But in fact, striving for independence, the cynics demonstrated not so much self-sufficiency as disdain and negativism towards society and the people around them, shocking public opinion. Thus, the main moral goal that they set for themselves - gaining freedom and peace - was not achieved.
One of the most influential philosophical currents of the Hellenistic era was epicureanism- a kind of atomistic philosophy. As a philosophical doctrine, it is characterized by a mechanical view of the world, materialistic atomism, the denial of theology and the immortality of the soul, and ethical individualism. The mission of philosophy is to heal the soul from fears and suffering caused by false opinions and absurd desires, to teach a person a blissful life, the beginning and end of which is pleasure. The founder of this scientific school is epicurus, who improved the teachings of Democritus about atoms.
True epicureanism is when a person conquered passions in himself, became independent of them, acquired a state of ataraxia - freedom from affects and passions. Spiritual pleasures are eternal and imperishable, while bodily pleasures are temporary and can turn into their opposite. greatest pleasure a person is brought by friendship and spiritual fellowship, which Epicurus considered the highest good.
The only source of good and evil is the person himself, he is also the source of activity, morality and the main judge of his actions. Unlike Democritus, Epicurus asserted the freedom of the will of a person - by an effort of will, by moral self-improvement, a person can change his fate.
Morality distinguishes a person from other living beings, not only behavior based on reason is moral, but everything that causes pleasant feelings in a person, and it is feelings that control human behavior, causing the desire to do what causes a feeling of pleasure and avoid what causes feeling of displeasure.
The main problem of human life is overcoming fear, suffering, mainly fear of death, the afterlife. Analyzing the cause of the fear of death, Epicurus argued that it was not the fear of punishment, but the fear of uncertainty, the unknown. Fear cannot lead to morality, because it is based on suffering.
Happiness consists in ataraxia - a state of spiritual equanimity, which is achieved by education and reflection. A person should not participate in politics, fruitless disputes with unlearned people, should avoid participation in public life. Only solitude and reflection with close friends give real pleasure and lead to the discovery of truth.
Epicurus proved the ethical validity of alienation from society by the fact that social life is a source of anxiety, envy, cruelty, conformism. In contrast to it, the moral life is a personal life, in the circle of books and close friends, aimed at self-improvement and knowledge.
The approach preached by Epicurus was acceptable mainly for a determined and self-confident person - an individualist. A vulnerability is the lack of clear criteria for good and evil, moral and immoral behavior.
Ideas of Epicurus developed Lucretius Kar(I century BC), but they were not widely used.
Stoicism- a philosophical school that arose during early Hellenism and retained influence until the end of the ancient world. Founders - Zeno and Chrysippus(IV - II centuries BC), who had conversations, walking along the portico called "standing", hence - their ideas were called stoicism.
The history of Stoicism includes three stages:
Ancient (older standing) - the end of the 4th - the middle of the 2nd centuries. BC.
Middle - II - I centuries. BC.
Late (new) - I - III centuries.
The periods are united by the ideas of universal inevitability of events, fatal inevitability, predestination both in relation to natural phenomena and in relation to the fate and life of each person.
The key issue was the question of freedom, which was divided into internal and external (Seneca, Brutus, Cicero, Marcus Aurelius). At the center of the concept is the idea that a person cannot be absolutely free, because. lives according to the laws of the world it enters, i.e. external freedom, freedom of human action is impossible.
The Stoics first raised the question of inner freedom, freedom of the spirit. External freedom was considered by them as a “choice of a play and a role”, which is not available to a person, and internal freedom is a “way of playing” this role, which is entirely in the will of a person. The only restriction for inner freedom and moral self-improvement of a person are affects.
The Stoics first drew attention to ways to deal with affects:
External expression reinforces the effect;
• It is necessary to teach people exercises that help relieve bodily tension;
Delay the last stage of the growth of affect;
Get distracted by memories of a different kind;
Expose the actions to which the affect pushes.
The mind aggravates the affective state and its consequences if it is weak and burdened with ordinary prejudices. The affect is based on an incorrect judgment, on the error of the mind, therefore, to be or not to be an affect depends on the mind.
In addition to affects, there are also good passions: joy, caution, will, which allow a person to achieve moral self-improvement.
The most prominent representatives Alexandrian School of Physicians are Herophilus and Arasistratus(IV century BC).
They identified differences between sensory nerves, which run from the sense organs to the brain, and motor fibers, which run from the brain to the muscles. The nervous system and the brain are the actual organs of the soul. They established a certain localization of the mental functions of certain parts of the brain. They were the first to express the idea that the physiological basis of mental activity is not the activity of the brain.
This idea was developed over several centuries Claudius Galen(130 - 200 years): the mental is a product of organic life, while he took blood as the initial basis for the activity of all manifestations of the soul, which he considered as vitality the whole organism. "Blood on the way to the brain, through the liver and heart, evaporating and purifying, turns into psychic pneuma." The state of blood dynamics determines emotions, general activity and temperament of a person. Temperature depends on arterial blood. The mental does not disappear with the death of the body, the mind and soul are immortal.
5. The results of the development of psychology in antiquity
Antiquity marked a new stage in the history of mankind, a cultural flourishing, the emergence of numerous philosophical schools, the emergence of outstanding researchers and the first attempts to bring a philosophical, and often scientific basis, to the phenomena of the surrounding world. It was during the heyday ancient culture The first attempts were made to understand and describe the human psyche.
The development of ancient psychology is divided into 3 important periods:
1) VI-IV centuries BC - the time of the emergence of the first psychological theories within the framework of natural philosophy.
Personalities: Pythagoras, Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Heraclitus, Alcmaeon, Democritus, Hippocrates, Anaxagoras.
During this period, the first scientific concepts of the psyche appear, in which it is considered, first of all, as a source of body activity, but also began to analyze the cognitive and regulatory functions of the soul. At the same time, it was believed that the soul of a person and the soul of other living beings have only a quantitative difference, since a person, and all animals, and everything in nature, and the psyche, are subject to the same laws. The first theories of cognition appeared, which emphasized the role of sensory cognition as the first stage of cognitive activity (sensualism). Regulatory function was associated with emotions.
During this period, many key problems of psychology were formulated, which became the subject of analysis in subsequent centuries, such as:
Correlation between material and spiritual, soul and body
The functions of the soul
The process of knowing the world
Regulation of behavior
Three most important principles were formed, which throughout the development of psychology were the basis of the scientific knowledge of mental phenomena:
Regular development (Heraclitus)
· Causality / universal determinism (Democritus)
Systematics / organizations (Anaksagoras)
2) IV - II centuries BC - the classical period, associated with the creation of classical theories of antiquity
Personalities: Socrates, Gorgias, Protagoras (sophists), Plato, Aristotle.
During the period of classical ancient psychology, the first detailed psychological concepts formulated by Plato and Aristotle appeared. An intermediate position between the first psychological theories and the ideas of antiquity is occupied by Socrates and the sophists.
During this period, the study of qualitative differences begins, which are inherent only in the human soul, and which other living beings do not have. The ideas are affirmed that the psyche (human soul) is the carrier of not only activity, but also reason and morality, and culture has the most direct influence on its development. There are ideas that behavior is regulated not only by emotions, but also by reason, which was also considered as a source of objective true knowledge that cannot be obtained through sensations.
3) II century BC - IV century AD - the period of Hellenism, the predominance of practical interests, the desire to understand and identify the ways of moral self-improvement of man.
Directions: skepticism, cynicism, epicureanism, stoicism.
The psychology of the Hellenistic era is focused on the study of practical problems. The main problem this period is the development of morality and moral self-improvement. Belief in the power of reason is increasingly being questioned, and the main task of philosophy was considered not to study the essence of things, not to comprehend objective truths and laws, but to work out the rules of life to achieve happiness and moral self-improvement.
Ancient scholars posed problems that have guided the development of human sciences for centuries. It was they who first tried to answer the questions of how the corporeal and spiritual, thinking and communication, personal and sociocultural, motivational and intellectual, rational and irrational, and many other things inherent in human existence are related in a person. The ancient sages and nature testers raised the culture of theoretical thought to an unprecedented height, which, transforming the data of experience, tore the veils from the appearances of common sense and religious mythological images.
Behind the evolution of ideas about the essence of the soul, the work of research thought, full of dramatic collisions, is hidden, and only the history of science can reveal various levels of comprehension of this mental reality, indistinguishable behind the very term “soul”, which gave the name to the new science.
2.2. The main stages in the development of ancient psychological thought
In the development of ancient psychological thought, a number of stages are distinguished, determined by the dominant approaches in understanding and explaining a person and his soul.
2.2.1. "Proto-philosophical" stage in the development of ancient psychology
The process of separating philosophical rational thinking from mythology was slow and at the first stage one can speak of "protophilosophy", which is characterized by "the presence of many images of mythology, significant elements of anthropomorphism, pantheism, the absence of philosophical terminology, allegoricalness" (Chanyshev A.N., 1981. S. 125).
Antique protophilosophy dates back to the 6th century. BC. and includes:
1) Ionian philosophy (Miletian school of Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Heraclitus);
2) Italian philosophy (Pythagorean Union and the school of Elates - Xenophanes, Parmenides, Zeno);
3) the philosophy of Empedocles, which combines the Ionian and Italian traditions.
The first philosophical and psychological school of antiquity is considered the Miletus school, the founder of which was Thales(624-547 BC), one of the semi-legendary "7 Wise Men of Greece", who for the first time named the number of days in a year, inscribed a triangle in a circle, predicted a solar eclipse of 585 BC. e. (according to Herodotus). The name Thales has become a household name, denoting a sage in general. Thales was the first to formulate the scientific problem: "What is everything?", aiming at the search for a universal substratum of the universe. And he answers that the basis of everything is water. From it all things and all cosmic phenomena arise, including man and his soul. Thus, man is seen as part of the natural world. This means the emergence of a nature-centric approach to its understanding. The mythology of Thales's views is manifested in hylozoism and animism in describing the world: the cosmos is an animated whole, full of divine powers; all phenomena of the world (both living and non-living) are endowed with mental abilities. Thales recognizes the existence of a deity, but gives him not an anthropomorphic, but a rational explanation: God is that mind "which created everything from water."
The soul is a special state of water. That is, the soul is endowed with a substrate common to the whole world, it is considered as a natural phenomenon. The soul is immortal. The function of the soul is determined - the ability to give movement to everything. This rational idea is combined with the animistic assertion that souls are inherent in all phenomena of the world, including inanimate matter: "A stone (magnet) has a soul, because it moves iron." The soul is connected with the body, depends on its health: those who have a healthy body have the best mental abilities.
The sayings expressed by Thales contain important ethical provisions ("Remember about friends present and absent"; "Do not show off in appearance, but be beautiful in deeds"; "Do not enrich yourself dishonestly"; "What services you render to parents, you yourself expect in old age from children" and etc.). They also record accurate psychological observations (“What is difficult? - To know oneself”; “What is the most pleasant? - To achieve what you want”; “What is the sweetest thing - success”; “What is harmful? - intemperance”; “What is unbearable ? - bad manners"; "Teach and learn the best"; "Observe the measure"; "Being in power, manage yourself"; "What is the easiest way to endure misfortune? - If you see that the enemies have it even worse"). The words of Thales sound extremely relevant: "How to live the most righteous life? - If we ourselves do not do what we reproach others for." Thales draws an ideal person, saying that he is "healthy in body, rich in kind, well-educated in soul."
Representative of the Milesian school - Anaximander(610-547) believed that the universal substrate is apeiron (a harbinger of the atom) - the eternal infinite divine principle, which does not have a specific material form, qualitative characteristics (a mixture of all elements) and controls everything. The driving force behind the development of the world is the struggle and isolation of opposites (first of all, heat and cold). He stood at the origins of the evolutionary idea, arguing that the living comes from the inanimate, and man - from animals. He proved the impossibility of the existence of the "first man" as the predecessor of all living beings: "... Initially, man descended from animals of a different species, because other animals soon begin to independently obtain food; man alone only needs prolonged breastfeeding. As a result, the first man, being like that, he couldn't have survived."
Disciple of Anaximander - Anaximenes(died presumably in 528-525 BC) believed that the substrate of all things, the primary matter is air, which is infinite, capable of discharging and condensing, thereby giving rise to all things. Earth, stones - frozen air. He did not deny the existence of the gods, but argued that they did not create the air, but themselves came from it (testimony of Augustine). When describing cosmic phenomena, he used the method of analogies with everyday phenomena: he compared the formation of earth from air with felting wool for felt; said that the stars enter the sky like nails; compared the movement of the sky around the Earth with a cap turning around the head.
The soul, according to Anaximenes, consists of air and performs an integral function: "Just as our soul ... existing as air holds us together, so breath and air embrace the entire cosmos." Subsequently, the ideas about air as a component of the soul were developed in the teachings of Epicurus.
The pinnacle of the Milesian school was the teaching Heraclitus(530 / 540-470 / 480 BC), whose views, according to the famous researcher of antiquity A.F. Losev, are extremely controversial and metaphorical; mythologisms are widely used in his works. Indeed, the ideas of Heraclitus are difficult to understand. It is no coincidence that his contemporaries dubbed him the "dark philosopher". Heraclitus is the founder of the idea of development, according to which everything that exists is in a state of eternal and constant change.
Heraclitus went down in history as one of the first researchers of mental activity proper. He introduced the concept of "psyche", on the basis of which the concepts of "psyche" and "psychology" were subsequently born.
In the works of Heraclitus, a number of important psychological ideas were put forward: 1) the materiality (fiery) of the soul; 2) the dependence of the laws of the soul on the Logos; 3) external and bodily conditioning of the psyche; differentiation of levels of vital activity (sleep, wakefulness); 4) the ratio of cognitive and motivating forces.
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The word "psychology" appeared in the 16th century in Western European texts. Then the language of learning was Latin. It was composed of two ancient Greek words: "psyche" (soul) and "logia" (understanding, knowledge). In these ancient Greek terms, meanings have settled, transformed by two thousand years of work of a great many minds. Gradually, the word "psychologist" entered the circulation of everyday life. In Pushkin's "Scene from Faust" Mephistopheles says: "I am a psychologist ... oh, here is science!"
But in those days, psychology as a separate science did not yet exist. Psychologists were called connoisseurs of the soul, human passions and characters. Scientific knowledge differs from everyday knowledge in that, relying on the power of abstraction and universal human experience, it reveals the laws that govern the world. For the natural sciences, this is obvious. Relying on the laws they have studied allows them to anticipate future events - from miraculous solar eclipses to the effects of human-controlled nuclear explosions.
Of course, psychology, in terms of its theoretical achievements and practice of changing life, is far, for example, from physics. Its phenomena are immeasurably superior to physical ones in complexity and possibility of cognition. The great physicist Einstein, getting acquainted with the experiments of the great psychologist Piaget, noticed that the study of physical problems is a child's game compared to the riddles of a child's game.
Only by the middle of the 19th century did psychology become an independent science from disparate knowledge. This does not mean at all that in previous eras, ideas about the psyche (soul, consciousness, behavior) were devoid of signs of scientific character. They erupted in the depths of natural science and philosophy, pedagogy and medicine, in various phenomena of social practice.
For centuries, problems were recognized, hypotheses were invented, concepts were built that prepared the ground for modern science of the human mental organization. In this eternal search, scientific and psychological thought outlined the boundaries of its subject.
1. ANTIQUE
Once upon a time, students joked, advising at the psychology exam in any subject to the question of who first studied it, boldly answer: "Aristotle"(384-322 BC). This ancient Greek philosopher and naturalist laid the foundation stones for many disciplines. He should also rightly be considered the father of psychology as a science. They wrote the first course general psychology"About the soul." First, he outlined the history of the issue, the opinions of his predecessors and explained the attitude towards them, and then, using their achievements and miscalculations, he proposed his own solutions. Let us note that, concerning the subject of psychology, we follow Aristotle in our approach to this issue.
No matter how high the thought of Aristotle rises, immortalizing his name, it is impossible to discount the generations of ancient Greek sages, and not only theoretical philosophers, but also naturalists, naturalists, and doctors. Their works are the foothills of a peak rising through the ages: Aristotle's teachings about the soul, which was preceded by revolutionary events in the history of ideas about the surrounding world.
Animism. The appearance of ancient ideas about the world around us is associated with animism (from the Latin "anima" - soul, spirit) - the belief in a host of spirits (souls) hidden behind visible things as special "agents" or "ghosts" that leave human body with the last breath, and according to some teachings (for example, famous philosopher and the mathematics of Pythagoras), being immortal, forever wandering through the bodies of animals and plants. The ancient Greeks called the soul the word "psyche". It gave the name to our science.
The name retains traces of the original understanding of the connection between life and its physical and organic basis (compare the Russian words: “soul, spirit” and “breathe”, “air”). It is interesting that already in that ancient era, speaking of the soul (“psyche”), people, as it were, combined into a single complex inherent in external nature (air), the body (breath) and the psyche (in its subsequent understanding). Of course, in their everyday practice, they all distinguished this perfectly. Getting acquainted with their myths, one cannot help but admire the subtlety of understanding the behavioral style of their gods, distinguished by cunning, wisdom, vindictiveness, envy and other qualities that the creator of myths endowed the celestials with - a people who knew psychology in the earthly practice of their communication with their neighbors.
The mythological picture of the world, where bodies are inhabited by souls (their "doubles" or ghosts), and life depends on the arbitrariness of the gods, has reigned in the public consciousness for centuries.
Hylozoism. The revolution in the minds was the transition from animism to hylozoism (from the Greek word "hyle", meaning substance, matter, and "zoe" - life). The whole world is the universum, the cosmos was thought from now on to be originally alive. The boundaries between the living, the inanimate and the psychic were not drawn. All this was considered as a product of a single primary matter (pra-matter), and, nevertheless, a new philosophy was a great step towards the knowledge of the nature of the psychic. It did away with animism (although even after that, over the centuries, up to the present day, it has found many adherents who consider the soul to be an entity external to the body). Hylozoism for the first time placed the soul (psyche) under the general laws of nature. A postulate, immutable even for modern science, about the initial involvement of mental phenomena in the cycle of nature was affirmed.
Heraclitus and the idea of development as a law (logos). To the hylozoist Heraclitus, the cosmos appeared in the form of "eternally living fire", and the soul ("Psyche") - in the form of its spark. Everything that exists is subject to eternal change: "Our bodies and souls flow like streams." Another aphorism of Heraclitus read: "Know yourself". But in the lips of a philosopher, this did not mean at all that to know oneself means to go deep into one's own thoughts and experiences, abstracting oneself from everything external. “No matter what roads you go, you will not find the boundaries of the soul, so deep is its Logos,” Heraclitus taught.
This term "logo s", introduced by Heraclitus, but still used today, has acquired a great variety of meanings. But for himself, it meant the law according to which "everything flows", according to which phenomena pass into each other. The small world (microcosm) of an individual soul is similar to the macrocosm of the entire world order. Therefore, to comprehend oneself (one's psyche) means to delve into the law (Logos), which gives the universal course of things dynamic harmony woven from contradictions and cataclysm.
After Heraclitus (he was called "dark" because of the difficulty of understanding, and "weeping", since he considered the future of mankind even more terrible than the present), the idea of the natural development of all things.
Democritus and the idea of causality. The teaching of Heraclitus that the course of things depends on the law (and not on the arbitrariness of the gods - the rulers of heaven and earth) passed to Democritus. The gods themselves, in his image, are nothing but spherical accumulations of fiery atoms. Man is also made up of different sorts of atoms. The most mobile of them are the atoms of fire. They form the soul.
He recognized the law as one for the soul and for the cosmos, according to which there are no causeless phenomena, but all of them are the inevitable result of the collision of continuously moving atoms. Random events seem to be the causes of which we do not know.
Democritus said that at least one causal explanation of things would prefer royal power over the Persians. (Persia was then a fabulously wealthy country.) Subsequently, the principle of causality was called determinism. And we will see exactly how, thanks to him, scientific knowledge about the psyche was obtained bit by bit.
Hippocrates and the doctrine of temperaments. Democritus was friends with the famous physician Hippocrates. For a physician, it was important to know the structure of a living organism, the causes on which health and disease depend. Hippocrates considered such a reason to be the proportion in which various “juices” (blood, bile, mucus) are mixed in the body. The proportion in the mixture was called temperament. The names of four temperaments that have survived to this day are associated with the name of Hippocrates: sanguine(blood predominates) choleric(yellow bile), melancholic(black bile) phlegmatic(slime). For future psychology, this explanatory principle, for all its naivete, had importance. No wonder the names of temperaments have survived to this day. First, the hypothesis was brought to the fore, according to which all the countless differences between people can be contained in a few general patterns of behavior. Thus, Hippocrates laid the foundation for scientific typology, without which modern teachings about individual differences between people would not have arisen. Secondly, Hippocrates looked for the source and cause of differences within the organism. Mental qualities were made dependent on bodily ones.
The role of the nervous system in that era was not yet known. Therefore, the typology was, in today's language, humoral (from the Latin "humor" - liquid). It should be noted, however, that the latest theories recognize the closest connection between nervous processes and body fluids, its hormones (a Greek word meaning that which excites). From now on, both doctors and psychologists talk about unified neurogu of moral regulation of behavior.
Anaxagoras and the idea of organization. The Athenian philosopher Anaxagoras did not accept either the Heraclitean view of the world as a fiery stream, or the Democritus picture of atomic whirlwinds. Considering nature to be made up of many tiny particles, he I searched in it for the beginning, thanks to which integral things arise from the random accumulation and movement of these particles. From chaos - organized space. He recognized as such a beginning the “finest thing”, to which he gave the name “nus” (mind). From the extent to which it is represented in various bodies, their perfection depends. However, “man,” Anaxagoras said, “is the most intelligent of animals due to the fact that he has hands.” It turned out that not the mind, but the bodily organization of a person determines his advantages.
Thus, all three principles approved by Heraclitus, Democritus, Anaxagoras created the main vital nerve of the future scientific way of understanding the world, including the scientific knowledge of mental phenomena. No matter how tortuous paths this knowledge took in subsequent centuries, it had its regulators. three ideas: regular development, causality and organization (systemic). The explanatory principles discovered by the ancient Greek mind two and a half thousand years ago have become for all time the basis for explaining mental phenomena.
Sophists: a turn from nature to man. A new feature of these phenomena was discovered by the activities of philosophers called sophists (“teachers of wisdom”). They were not interested in nature with its laws independent of man, but man himself, whom the sophist Protagoras called "the measure of all things." Subsequently, false sages began to be called sophists, who, with the help of various tricks, pass out imaginary evidence as true. But in the history of psychological knowledge, the activity of the sophists discovered a new object: relations between people, which were explained with the help of means designed to prove and inspire any position, regardless of its reliability.
In this regard, the methods of logical reasoning, the structure of speech, the nature of the relationship between the word, thought and perceived objects were subjected to a detailed discussion. How can one convey anything through language, asked the sophist Gorgias, if its sounds have nothing in common with the things they denote? And this is not a sophism in the sense of a logical trick, but a real problem. She, like other issues discussed by the sophists, prepared the development of a new direction in the understanding of the soul. The search for its natural "matter" (fiery, atomic, etc.) was abandoned. Came to the fore speech and thinking as a means of manipulating people.
Signs of its subordination to strict laws and inevitable causes that operate in physical nature disappeared from the ideas about the soul. Language and thought lack this inevitability. They are full of conventions and dependence on human interests and passions. Thus, the actions of the soul acquired unsteadiness and uncertainty. Socrates strove to restore their strength and reliability, but rooted not in the eternal laws of the universe, but in its own internal structure.
Socrates and the new concept of the soul. We know about this philosopher, who has become for all ages the ideal of disinterestedness, honesty and independence of thought, from the words of his students. He himself never wrote anything and considered himself not a teacher of wisdom, but a person who awakens in others the desire for truth through a special technique of dialogue, the originality of which was later called the Socratic method. Selecting certain questions, Socrates helped the interlocutor to "give birth" to clear and distinct knowledge. He liked to say that he continued the work of his mother, a midwife, in the field of logic and morality.
The already familiar formula of Heraclitus “know thyself” in Socrates meant addressing not to the universal law (Logos), “but to the inner world of the subject, his beliefs and values, his ability to act as a rational being according to the understanding of the best.
Socrates was a master of oral communication. With every person he met, he started a conversation with the aim of making him think about his carelessly applied concepts. Subsequently, they began to say that by doing so he became pioneer of psychotherapy the purpose of which, with the help of the word, is to reveal what is hidden behind the cover of consciousness. In his methodology lurked ideas that, many centuries later, played a key role in the psychological study of thinking. First, the work of thought was made dependent on the task that created an obstacle in its usual course. It was precisely this task that confronted the questions that Socrates brought down on his interlocutor, thereby forcing him to think in search of an answer. Secondly, the work of the mind initially had the character of a dialogue. Both signs: a) the determining tendency created by the task, and b) dialogism, which assumes that cognition is initially social, since it is rooted in the communication of subjects, became the main guidelines for the experimental psychology of thinking in the 20th century.
After Socrates, whose interests were centered on the mental activity of the individual subject (its products and values), the concept of the soul was filled with a new substantive content. It was made up of very special realities that physical nature does not know. The world of these realities became the core of the philosophy of the main student of Socrates Plato.
Plato: the soul as a contemplator of ideas. He created his own scientific and educational center in Athens, called the Academy, at the entrance to which was written: "He who does not know geometry, let him not enter here."
Geometric figures, general concepts, mathematical formulas, logical constructions were intelligible objects, endowed, in contrast to the kaleidoscope of sensory impressions, with inviolability and obligation for any individual mind. Raising these objects into a special reality, Plato saw in them the sphere of eternal ideal forms, hidden behind the firmament in the form of the realm of ideas.
Everything perceptible to the senses, from fixed stars to directly perceptible objects, is only obscured ideas, their imperfect, weak copies. Affirming the principle of the primacy of super-strong general ideas in relation to everything that happens in the perishable corporeal world, Plato became the founder of the philosophy of idealism.
How, then, settled in the mortal flesh of the soul joins the eternal ideas? All knowledge, according to Plato, is memory. The soul remembers (this requires special efforts) what it happened to contemplate before its earthly birth.
Discovery of inner speech as a dialogue. Based on the experience of Socrates, who proved the inseparability of thinking and communication (dialogue), Plato took the next step. He assessed the process of thinking from a new angle, which does not receive expression in the Socratic external dialogue. In this case, according to Plato, it is replaced by an internal dialogue. “The soul, when thinking, does nothing else than talk, ask itself, answer, affirm and deny.”
The phenomenon described by Plato is known to modern psychology as inner speech, and the process of its generation from external (social) speech was called "interiorization" (from the Latin "interior" - internal).
Plato himself does not have these terms. Nevertheless, we have before us a phenomenon that has firmly become part of the current scientific knowledge about the human mental structure.
Personality as a conflicting structure. The further development of the concept of the soul proceeded by singling out various "parts" and functions in it. In Plato, their distinction took on an ethical meaning. This was explained by the Platonic myth of a charioteer driving a chariot to which two horses are harnessed: a wild one, eager to go its own way at any cost, and a thoroughbred, noble, manageable. The driver symbolized the rational part of the soul, the horses - two types of motives: lower and higher motives. Reason, called upon to reconcile these two motives, experiences, according to Plato, great difficulties due to the incompatibility of base and noble desires.
Such important aspects as conflict of motives having different moral value, and the role of reason in overcoming it. After many centuries version of the interaction of three components, constituting the personality as a dynamic, conflict-torn and contradictory organization, come to life in Freud's psychoanalysis.
Nature, culture and organism. Knowledge about the soul - from its first rudiments on ancient soil to modern systems- grew depending on the level of knowledge about external nature, on the one hand, and on communication with cultural values, on the other.
Philosophers before Socrates, reflecting on mental phenomena, focused on nature. They were looking for, as an equivalent of these phenomena, one of its elements, which form a single world, which is ruled by natural laws. The great explosive power of this line of thought is that it dealt a crushing blow to the ancient belief in the soul as a special double of the body.
After the Sophists and Socrates, in the explanations of the soul, there has been a turn towards understanding its activity as a cultural phenomenon. For the abstract concepts and moral ideals that make up the soul cannot be derived from the substance of nature. They are products of spiritual culture.
For both orientations - both on nature and culture - the soul acted as an external reality in relation to the organism, either material (fire, air, etc.) or incorporeal (the focus of concepts, generally valid norms, etc.). Whether it was about atoms (Democritus) or about ideal forms (Plato), it was assumed that both one and the other were introduced into the body from the outside, from the outside.
Aristotle: the soul as the form of the body. Aristotle overcame this way of thinking, opening up a new era in understanding of the soul as a subject of psychological knowledge. Not physical bodies and not incorporeal ideas became for him the source of this knowledge, but the organism, where the corporeal and the spiritual form an inseparable integrity. This did away with both the naive animistic dualism and the sophisticated dualism of Plato. Soul, according to Aristotle, - it is not an independent entity, but a form, a way of organizing a living body.
Aristotle was the son of a physician under the Macedonian king and was himself preparing for the medical profession. As a youth of seventeen, he came to Athens to the sixty-year-old Plato and studied for a number of years at his Academy, with which he later broke. The famous fresco of Raphael "The School of Athens" depicts Plato pointing his hand to the sky, Aristotle - to the earth. These images capture the difference in the orientations of the two great thinkers. According to Aristotle, the ideological richness of the world is hidden in sensually perceived earthly things and is revealed in direct communication with them based on experience.
Aristotle created his school on the outskirts of Athens, called the Lyceum (by this name, the privileged schools). It was an indoor gallery where Aristotle, usually walking, taught classes. “Those think right,” Aristotle told his students, “who think that the soul cannot exist without a body and is not a body.”
Who was meant by those who "think right"? Obviously, not natural philosophers, for whom the soul is subtle body. But not Plato, who considered the soul a pilgrim, wandering through bodies and other worlds. A decisive summary of Aristotle's reflections: "The soul cannot be separated from the body" immediately made meaningless all the questions that stood at the center of Plato's teachings about the past and future of the soul.
It turns out that when referring to those who “think right”, Aristotle had in mind his own understanding, according to which it is not the soul that experiences, thinks, learns, but the whole organism. “To say that the soul is angry,” he wrote, “is tantamount to saying that the soul is engaged in weaving or building a house.”
Biological experience and change in the explanatory principles of psychology. Aristotle was both a philosopher and an explorer of nature. At one time he * taught the sciences to the young man Alexander the Great, who subsequently ordered samples of plants and animals from the conquered countries to be sent to his old teacher. A huge amount of facts was accumulated - comparative anatomical, zoological, embryological and others, the richness of which became the experimental basis for observing and analyzing the behavior of living beings.
The psychological teaching of Aristotle was based on a generalization of biological facts. However, this generalization led to the transformation of the main explanatory principles of psychology: organization (systemicity), development and causality.
Organization of the living (system-functional approach). The very term "organism" requires considering it from the point of view of organization, that is, the orderliness of the whole, which subordinates its parts to itself in the name of solving any problems. The device of this whole and its work (function) are inseparable. “If the eye were a living being, its soul would be sight,” said Aristotle.
The soul of an organism is its function, work. Treating the organism as a system, Aristotle singled out in it various levels of activity abilities.
The concept of ability, introduced by Aristotle, was an important innovation, forever included in the main fund of psychological knowledge. It separated the capabilities of the organism (the psychological resource inherent in it) and its implementation in practice. At the same time, a scheme was outlined for the hierarchy of abilities as functions of the soul: a) vegetative(it is also found in plants); b) sensory-motor(in animals and humans); v) reasonable(inherent only in man). The functions of the soul became the levels of its development.
Pattern of development. Thus, it was introduced into psychology as the most important explanatory principle development idea. The functions of the soul were located in the form of a "ladder of forms", where a function of a higher level arises from the lower and on its basis. (After the vegetative (vegetative) one, the ability to feel is formed, from which the ability to think develops.)
At the same time, each person, during his transformation from an infant into a mature being, goes through those steps that the entire organic world has overcome in its history. (This was later called the biogenetic law.)
The distinction between sense perception and thought was one of the first psychological truths discovered by the ancients. Aristotle, following the principle of development, sought to find the links leading from one stage to another. In these searches, he discovered a special area of mental images that arise without the direct impact of things on the senses.
Now they are called representations of memory and imagination.(Aristotle spoke of fantasy.) These images are again subordinate to the association mechanism- View links. Explaining the development of character, he argued that a person becomes what he is by performing certain actions.
The doctrine of the formation of character in real actions, which in people as “political” beings always presuppose a moral attitude towards others, put mental development a person into a causal, natural dependence on his activity.
The concept of the final cause. The study of the organic world prompted Aristotle to give a new impetus to the main nerve of the apparatus of scientific explanation - the principle of causality (determinism). Recall that Democritus considered at least one causal explanation worthy of the entire Persian kingdom. But for him the model was the collision, the collision of material particles - atoms. Aristotle, along with this type of causality, distinguishes others. Among them - the target cause or "what the action is for."
The end result of the process (goal) affects its course in advance. Mental life at the moment depends not only on the past, but also on the required future. This was a new word in understanding its causes (determination). So, Aristotle transformed the key explanatory principles of psychology: consistency, development, determinism.
Aristotle discovered and studied many specific mental phenomena. But there are no so-called "pure facts" in science. Any fact of it is seen differently depending on the theoretical angle of view, on those categories and explanatory schemes with which the research mind is armed. Enriching these principles, Aristotle presented a completely new, in comparison with his predecessors, picture of the structure, functions and development of the soul as a form of the body.
The world of culture has created three "organs" for understanding a person and his soul: religion, art and science. Religion is built on myth, art is built on an artistic image, science is built on experience organized and controlled by logical thought. The people of the ancient era, enriched by the centuries-old experience of human knowledge, in which they drew both ideas about the character and behavior of the gods, and the images of the heroes of their epic and tragedies, mastered this experience through the “magic crystal” of a rational explanation of the nature of things - earthly and heavenly. From these seeds grew the branched tree of psychology as a science.
The value of science is judged by its discoveries. At first glance, the chronicle of discoveries that ancient psychology can be proud of is laconic.
One of the first was Alcmaeon's discovery that the organ of the soul is the brain. If we ignore the historical context, this looks like little wisdom. It is worth recalling, however, that two hundred years after this, the great Aristotle considered the brain to be a kind of “refrigerator” for blood, and placed the soul with all its abilities to perceive the world and think in the heart in order to appreciate the non-triviality of Alcmaeon’s conclusion. Especially when you consider that it was not a speculative conjecture, but arose from medical observations and experiments.
Of course, in those days the opportunities to experiment on the human body in the sense that is now accepted were negligible. Information has been preserved that experiments were carried out on those sentenced to death, on gladiators, etc. However, one must not lose sight of the fact that ancient physicians, while treating people and involuntarily changing their mental states, passed on from generation to generation information about the results of their actions, about individual differences. It is no coincidence that the doctrine of temperaments came to scientific psychology from the medical schools of Hippocrates and Galen.
No less important than the experience of medicine were other forms of practice - political, legal, pedagogical. The study of methods of persuasion, suggestion, victory in a verbal duel, which became the main concern of the sophists, turned the logical and grammatical structure of speech into an object of experimentation. In the practice of communication, Socrates discovered (ignored by the experimental psychology of thinking that arose in the 20th century) its original dialogism, and the Socratic student Plato discovered inner speech as an internalized dialogue. He also owns the model of personality, so close to the heart of the modern psychotherapist, as a dynamic system of motives that tear it apart in an inescapable conflict.
The discovery of many psychological phenomena is associated with the name of Aristotle (the mechanism of associations by contiguity, similarity and contrast, the discovery of images of memory and imagination, the differences between theoretical and practical intelligence, etc.).
Consequently, no matter how meager the empirical fabric of the psychological thought of antiquity was, without it this thought could not "conceive" the tradition that led to modern science. But no wealth of real facts can acquire the dignity of the scientific, regardless of the intelligible logic of their analysis and explanation. This logic is built according to the problem situation, given by the development of theoretical thought. In the field of psychology, antiquity is glorified by great theoretical successes. These include not only the discovery of facts, the construction of innovative models and explanatory schemes. Problems have been identified that have guided the development of the human sciences for centuries.
How are the bodily and spiritual, thinking and communication, personal and socio-cultural, motivational and intellectual, rational and irrational, and many other things inherent in his being in the world integrated in him? The minds of the ancient sages and nature explorers fought over these riddles, who raised the culture of theoretical thought to hitherto unknown heights, which, transforming the data of experience, tore the veil of truth from the appearances of common sense and religious and mythological images.
In the well-known Pushkin verse "Movement", describing the dispute between the sophist Zeno, who denied the movement, and the cynic Diogenes, the great poet took the side of the first. “There is no movement,” said the bearded sage. The other was silent and began to walk before him. He could not have objected more strongly; All praised the convoluted answer. But, gentlemen, an amusing incident brings me to mind this other example: after all, every day the Sun walks before us. However, the stubborn Galileo is right.”
What is it about? The sophist Zeno, in his well-known aporia "stage", pointed out the problem concerning the contradictions between the self-evident fact of movement and the theoretical difficulty that arises in this case (before passing a stage (a measure of length) one must pass half of it, but before that one must pass half a half, etc. .), i.e. it is impossible to touch J an infinite number of points in a finite time).
Refuting this aporia empirically and silently (i.e., refusing to explain), Diogenes ignored Zenon's request for its logical solution. Pushkin, on the other hand, took the side of Zeno, recalling the "stubborn Galileo", thanks to whom the real, true picture of the world was revealed behind the visible, deceptive picture of the world.
These lessons are also illustrative for the construction of a scientific “picture of the soul”. Its reliability grew with the ability of theoretical thought to comprehend, studying the self-evidence of psychological facts, their hidden connections and causes. The change in ideas about the soul reflects the work of this thought, full of dramatic collisions. Only the history of her work reveals different levels of comprehension of psychic reality, indistinguishable behind the same term "soul", which gave the name to our science.
WITH collapse of the ancient world Western Europe Religion becomes the dominant ideology of feudal society. She cultivated contempt for any knowledge based on experience and rational analysis, inspired faith in the infallibility of church dogmas and the sinfulness of an independent understanding of the structure and purpose of the human soul, which is different from that prescribed by church books.
Aristotle's teaching was dangerous for the dictatorship of the church. His main formula, according to which “the soul cannot be separated from the body,” immediately made all questions about resurrection, retribution, mortification of the flesh, etc. senseless. Catholic Church banned Aristotle, and then began to "master" his ideas, turning him into a pillar of theology.
This task was most successfully solved by the theologian of the thirteenth century, Thomas Aquinas, whose teaching was canonized as a truly Catholic philosophy and psychology, called Thomism (now modernized under the name of neo-Thomism).
“Aristotle with tonsure” was born, in whose books all the concepts developed by him (soul, abilities, images, associations, affects, etc.), as well as all his explanations of mental facts (their organization, development, determination), were introduced into a completely another system of ideas. Thus, the subject of psychology turned out to be non-Aristotelian.
It was this trend that killed everything living in Aristotle, including his life-filled doctrine of the soul.
Philosophy arose in the era of the replacement of the primitive communal system by a class slave-owning society almost simultaneously both in the East - in Ancient India, Ancient China, and in the West - in Ancient Greece and ancient Rome. Already during this period, the main problems of psychology were formulated: what are the functions of the soul, what is its content, how the world happens, what is the regulator of behavior, whether a person has the freedom of this regulation.
In the psychology of antiquity, three stages can be conventionally distinguished- the origin and formation of psychology (7-4 centuries BC), the period of classical Greek science (3-2 centuries BC) and the period of Hellenism (2 centuries BC -3-4 centuries .n.e.).
The first psychological theories of antiquity
Pythagoras (6th century BC) denied the equality of souls, there is no equality in nature at all. All people have different abilities. He considered it necessary to search for capable people and their special needs. The ideas of Pythagoras left their mark on Plato's theory of an ideal society. Pythagoras came to the conclusion that the soul does not die with the body, it develops according to its own laws, its goal is purification (an imprint of the idea of karma and reincarnations of the soul).
Heraclitus (6-5 centuries BC) believed that the formation and development of the world, nature and man is carried out according to immutable laws that no one, neither people nor gods, can change. This law is the logos, expressed primarily in the word, and is the force that man calls fate. Heraclitus introduced into psychology the idea of constant development and change, the saying: "Everything flows." For the first time he suggested that there are two stages in the processing of knowledge - and the mind. Mind above. Heraclitus believed that the human soul is born, grows and improves, then gradually grows old and finally dies.
Sophists - teachers of wisdom, taught not only philosophy, but also psychology, rhetoric, common culture. Protagoras. Saying: "there is a measure of all things." He talked about relativity and subjectivity human knowledge, about the blurring of the concepts of good and evil. He attached great importance to oratory.
Democritus (470-370 BC). The book "Great Worldbuilding". Man, like all surrounding nature, consists of atoms that form his body and soul. Breathing is one of the most important processes for life, the atoms of the soul are constantly updated in it, which provides mental and somatic. The soul is mortal. After the death of the body, the soul dissipates in the air. The soul resides in several parts of the body. Theory of outflows: theory of knowledge. The contact of 8YD0LY (copies of surrounding objects invisible to the eye) with the atoms of the soul is the basis of sensation, in this way a person learns the properties of surrounding objects. All our sensations are contact. The theory of outflows explained the phenomena of perception. In the theory of Democritus, there are two stages in the cognitive process - and which arise simultaneously and develop in parallel. Moreover, thinking will give us more knowledge than sensations. Democritus introduced the concept of primary and secondary qualities of objects. Primary - these are the qualities that really exist in objects: mass, surface texture, shape. Secondary qualities are color, smell, taste, they were invented by people for their convenience. Democritus argued that there are no accidents in the world, everything happens for a predetermined reason. considered it difficult.
Hippocrates (460-370 BC) Developed a well-known doctrine of, based on a combination of four types of fluid and the body: mucus, black bile and yellow bile. He was the first to speak of a man.
Classical period of ancient psychology
Aristotle (384-322 BC) Greek scientist. Work "About the Soul". Born into a family of doctors and himself received a medical education. In Athens he studied philosophy at the school of Plato. He was a mentor to the son of Alexander the Great. He created his own school-lyceum, which existed for 6 centuries. He believed that the separation of soul and body is an impossible and senseless act. The soul is a form of realization of a body capable of life, cannot exist without a body and is not a body.
There are three types of soul: plant (capable of reproduction and nutrition), animal (has four more functions: aspiration, movement, sensation and memory), rational (only in humans, has the ability to think). For the first time he proposed the idea of genesis, development - the transition from one form of life to another, namely from the plant to the animal world and to man. Conclusion: plant and animal souls are mortal, i.e. appears and disappears simultaneously with the body. The rational soul is not material and immortal. Introduced the concept of nous - the universal mind. Mus serves as a repository of the rational part of a person's soul after his death. In a newborn, knowledge is not realized, but is actualized in the process of learning or reasoning (Plato, Socrates). The new generation of people adds something of their own, i.e. it is forever changing. Introduced the concept of common sensibility and association. At the stage of knowledge processing in a common sensory area, modal sensations (color, taste, smell, etc.) are isolated, and then they are stored and the images of objects are combined into their primary systems. He singled out two types of thinking: logical and intuitive. Intuitive - actualization of the knowledge that a person has (Plato). He made a distinction between reason - practical (aimed at guiding behavior) and theoretical (accumulation of knowledge). Regulation of behavior can be carried out emotionally and by reason.
Psychological concepts of Hellenism
The school of cynics proceeded from the fact that each person is self-sufficient, i.e. has the essentials for spiritual life in itself. The only path for moral self-improvement is the path to oneself, the path that limits contacts and dependence on the outside world. Therefore, they refused comfort, the benefits that society gives, wandered.
School of Epicurus ("Garden of Epicurus"). An inscription was placed on its gate: "Wanderer, you will feel good here, here pleasure is the highest good." The Epicurians believed that everything that causes pleasant feelings is moral. They lacked the criteria of good and evil. A follower of Epicurus, Lucretius, believed that all our delusions are from incorrect generalizations, from the mind, while the senses give us absolutely correct information, which we cannot always dispose of correctly. Not mind, but control behavior.
Stoics. They talked about internal independence, autonomy, obedience to laws, fulfillment of role duties (Seneca, Cato, Cicero, Brutus, Emperor Marcus Aurelius). We studied the process of cognition, which was reflected in the understanding of the soul. The Stoics identified 8 parts of the soul, of which only one is not associated with the process of cognition, but is responsible for the continuation of the family. One of the main postulates of this school was that a person cannot be absolutely free, since he lives according to the laws of the world he enters. They argued that man is only an actor in the play that fate has given him. The concept of the Stoics was based on man, on the power of his mind. The only limitation for freedom and moral self-improvement of a person are affects.
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