Critique And Reconstruction Of The Idea Of Psychology As A Science

In more than a hundred years of the history of psychology as a natural science,the schools change frequently and new theories emerge continually. Each school hasdifferent opinions of its research methods and objects, and what makes them as anintegrated discipline is a common belief hold by its researchers that psychology is anatural science. However, if we try to further examine this idea, we will find that inthe scientific psychology which constitutes the mainstream of psychology, the ideahas never been systematically and seriously studied, which means that the idea ofpsychology as a natural science isn’t built on a basis of full rationality. But since theblind pursuit of its scientific status, psychology of the scientism tradition has nevertaken this question into their theoretical horizon, which has led to the division andcrisises that accompany with psychology since its natal day as a natural science.Meanwhile if we could expand our horizon beyond the mainstream of psychology, wewill find that in the same era of Wundt’s experimental psychology which forms themainstream of scientific psychology there has been another approach of psychologywhich holds an opposite idea of science to Wundt’s. This is the psychology of thephenomenological tradition. This psychology has been realized by two thinkers,James and Husserl, in their distinctive ways, and the works of them are identical bothin the attitudes and the contents. Phenomenological psychology provides us withprovides us with a necessery and truthful understanding of the idea of psychology as ascience, which serves as a reliable base and a wider space to critically understand theidea of science of the mainstream of psychology.Based on the above discussions, the thesis in the negative sense criticize therationality of the idea of science of the mainstream psychology both on its backgroundand its theoretical base from a phenomenological perspective on the one side, and inthe positive sense provides a direction and possibility of thinking to thereconstruction of the idea of psychology as a science by the grasp and discussion ofthe identical phenomenological trend of the psychological thoughts of James andHusserl on the other side in the background of the opposition of natural scientifictradition and phenomenological tradition of psychology. The thesis is consisted by the following five parts. Chapter onepreliminarily investigated the historical background, theoretical premise and therationality of its motivation of the idea of psychology as a natural science. A generalbackground of this idea is the development of positive science and the scientism ledby it, the general point of which is that everything including the consciousness as suchcan be illustrated by the method of natural science. But taking dualism as its premise,natural science is a research style aiming at material entity which is unrelated, if notopposite, to the psychology whose object is consciousness. That means for the realaim of psychology, the rationality of taking the method of natural science is unproved,while taking the instrumental rationality as its own aim, scientific psychology mustlead to the alienation of itself.Chapter two specifically and critically analyzes the idea of psychology as anatural science from a phenomenological perspective. We give a phenomenologicalstudy of the premise and specific paths of the naturalization of consciousness aspsychology’s research object on the one side, and a discussion of the methodcentralism and its results on the other side, to reveal the fallacy of the idea ofpsychology as a natural science.Chapter three specifically studies William James’ psychological thoughts andtheir phenomenological implication. James has definitely taken psychology as anatural science as the starting point of his thoughts, but it has met several difficultiesduring its concrete expansion, which means a negation of psychology as a naturalscience and its dualism premise. As a result, James finally went beyond the idea anddeveloped his metaphysics named radical empiricism. Many studies show that thismonism metaphysics is internally identical with Husserl’s phenomenology both in itsattitude and its contents, both of which provide a completely new way to understandpsychology as a science and a hope for psychology to become a real science. Thischapter study in detail the starting point of his psychological thought and the reasonand clues of its turnabout, and discuss its similarities to Husserl’s phenomenology andits meaning for the reconstruction of the idea of psychology as a science.Chapter four mainly discusses Husserl’s phenomenological psychology as arealization of the idea of psychology as a science. It starts from the analysis ofHusserl’s idea of science and illustrates its three characteristics, namely the strictness,the evidence and the radicalness. Then Husserl’s critique to the idea of psychology asa natural science based on his idea of “strict science” is discussed, including his critique to the psychologism of its aim which perceive psychology as the basis of anyother science and the naturalism in its premise which blindly imitates the naturalscience. At last the research methods and basic contents of phenomenologicalpsychology are studied and its status in Husserl’s thoughts and its role in thereconstruction of the idea of psychology as a science are evaluated.Chapter five gives concluding comments on the impact and enlightenment ofJames and Husserl to the modern psychology.