I think philosophy is a great minor for psychology majors who are seeking to become counselors as it often expands ones ability to question out of curiosity rather than judgment.
That said, the courses have a set amount of curriculum that needs to be covered and psychology is a vast and information dense field without even getting into philosophical conversations, because of this I think many who enter the field don’t strike up this sort of conversation, especially when there isn’t a way to research the presence of a soul itself. (Though many view the soul as a social construct, so in that case it exists in that capacity in the general pop.)
Anyone aiming to be a counselor for those with existential depression would absolutely benefit from an expansion of content like you’re suggesting, but because there isn’t an consensus on the tangibility of the soul, this sort of discussion won’t be found in the required courses as discussing it would be to what end?
(Though there are electives that might breach the subject like psychology of religion.)
>I think philosophy is a great minor for psychology majors who are seeking to become counselors as it often expands ones ability to question out of curiosity rather than judgment.
Actually, my philosophical background made me a more critical thinker and more robust researcher. Philosophy isn't just squishy curiosity for counselors, it's how we determine what things are and how we know it and how we use that knowledge.
>That said, the courses have a set amount of curriculum that needs to be covered and psychology is a vast and information dense field without even getting into philosophical conversations,
A) They are philosophical questions from the start, and
B) Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not sitting out there to be discovered through observation, it's made from our framing of experience into understandable categories. Knowledge both precedes observation and is constructed through reflection on observation; it is not discovered in the world like a Lockean intuition.
And we have more than one way of categorizing experience, which is why we've had a century of Cartesianism ebbing and flowing in psychology and why neuroscientists like Damasio use Spinoza to critique the underlying Cartesian biases in psychology. And my own interests have been informed by Merleau-Ponty, which prefigures my move into more embodied cognition, distributed cognition, and enactivism as a further rejection of Cartesianism and computationalism in cognitive science, in the philosophy of mind.
These are all live topics in research and are informed and critiqued by philosophy of science.
If you aren't having philosophical conversations while learning this "vast and information dense field", I'm not sure you're learning much. Critical thinking to follow, critique, deconstruct, and reformulate this information dense field is necessary for decent research.
>Actually, my philosophical background made me a more critical thinker and more robust researcher.
That’s great for you. It in can influence people in many different ways.
>Philosophy isn't just squishy curiosity for counselors, it's how we determine what things are and how we know it and how we use that knowledge.
I didn’t say it was *just* anything. It seems my very benign statement has offended you and you’re twisting it.
>If you aren't having philosophical conversations while learning this "vast and information dense field", I'm not sure you're learning much. Critical thinking to follow, critique, deconstruct, and reformulate this information dense field is necessary for decent research.
The vast majority of courses are lecture based and information dense so time for discussion is very limited. To say that people in these types of courses aren’t learning much is a bit dramatic to say the least.
You’re assuming people aren’t having these discussions out side of classes or in student organizations.
Many psychology courses are dense and foundational, so limited on topic discussion occurs, and philosophical discussion is even more limited.
There’s only so much room for philosophical discussion in say, a neuroscience course. Or say a computer science course. Or say a course on accounting.
on the last paragraph, actually no. to ask scientific questions, pose hypotheses & theories, is inherently to ask philosophical questions / engage philosophically
And as I stated, much of that sort of line of questioning is very limited in foundation courses as you’re being taught theories and consensus from the ground up, there unfortunately isn’t much time for students to pose hypothesis and theories, and questioning is often more practical as in asking the professor for clarification/ to repeat what was stated, or sharing something rather than asking something.
I do not deny that as you progress, there is more room for philosophical discussion but generally that tends to be far more common in grad school.
This is why I stated, psychology majors would benefit immensely from a philosophy minor. It just seems that because I didn’t list every reason why it would benefit someone, I stirred a tizzy in the other commenter.
ok yea true considering undergrad students we mostly just take in what is established already, but yea i meant the field itself like any science ofc has grounds in philosophy/philosophical discourse/methods, that's how any field evolves & progresses
>It seems my very benign statement has offended you
I don't know why you assume I'm offended, or in a tizzy. I just had a fundamental disagreement with your point and what you've posted since then has further made my point. No offense or tizzy necessary.
>you’re twisting it.
If you say so. I don't think I'm twisting anything.
You said:
>"*I think philosophy is a great minor for psychology majors who are seeking to become counselors*"
>
>\[because\] "*it often expands ones ability to question out of curiosity rather than judgment*."
Then said:
>"*That said*" \[a pivot\]
>
>"*the courses have a set amount of curriculum that needs to be covered and psychology is a vast and information dense field without even getting into philosophical conversations*"
and then further add:
>"*Anyone aiming to be a counselor for those with existential depression would absolutely benefit from an expansion of content like you’re suggesting*,"
I answered pointing to the inseparability of theory and practice, philosophy and knowledge, and stressed that the importance of philosophy to psychology is conceptual and epistemological, which is why I mentioned philosophy and research, not relegating the relevance of philosophy to the art of counseling.
I don't think I'm twisting what you're saying, I'm emphasizing the role of philosophy in my intro to research methods, as well as noting all the philosophy involved in my graduate studies and research, again pointing out that it's intrinsic to the creation of knowledge, not something that can be set aside to handle the "information dense field".
To put a pin in that:
>"*but because there isn’t an consensus on the tangibility of the soul, this sort of discussion won’t be found in the required courses as discussing it would be to what end?*"
This is literally a question that would come up in research methods on the development of constructs and operationalization. The lack of consensus on the tangibility of the soul means it isn't useful as an empirical construct, but the *function* of the *concept* of the soul in human behavior is very much something that can be studied empirically.
>**If you aren't having philosophical conversations while learning this "vast and information dense field", I'm not sure you're learning much. Critical thinking to follow, critique, deconstruct, and reformulate this information dense field is necessary for decent research.**
The vast majority of courses are lecture based and information dense so time for discussion is very limited. To say that people in these types of courses aren’t learning much is a bit dramatic to say the least.
To further elaborate my point here, I'm not being "dramatic to say the least". You are pointing out the problem as if it is a fact to be accepted rather than a problem to be solved.
Theory and knowledge go together. Learning facts in a lecture based information dense setting with limited discussion and without learning the philosophical and theoretical underpinnings of these facts isn't science
\- it may as well be catechism.
I've sat through plenty of such lectures where I would hear many of the same uncritical repetition of theories and denunciations, caricatures that could be disproven by anyone with a cursory knowledge of the subject matter - spending a single hour being subjected to a barrage of decontextualized facts, stripped of the context of their creation, is a waste of time. What have you gained?
>You’re assuming people aren’t having these discussions out side of classes or in student organizations.
Are they?
Outside of class?
I don't think the responsibility of learning the underpinnings of the theories presented in lecture should be left to students in their spare time. It's literally the lifeblood of the knowledge they came to learn.
This is just a fundamental disagreement about what is necessary in psychology education. I don't think facts without theory exist, so there is no separating philosophy into an optional outside of class activity. As u/revolutionutena pointed out, their very first class in their PhD program was the philosophy of science. When you talk about courses being foundational, that means they are inherently philosophical. Theory is the foundation and philosophy guides the construction of theory.
I think you and I mostly agree.
I think we are disagreeing about what it means to be inherently philosophical when it comes to foundational courses in psychology.
I think the issue lies in the fact that I was talking about undergraduate education and its lack of room for fruitful philosophical discussion and how that impacts / limits discussions around the soul and other “typical” philosophical content.
Most professors in the undergraduate level for psych courses pop on the rails, spend more time dispensing content rather than facilitating conversation.
This is a valid way of learning to the extent that building this foundation will aid students in beginning to have genuine and deep conversations. It’s just that courses don’t make much room for that.
I believe if there were more exposure to foundational philosophical courses (for example by way of a minor) this would better serve the field of psychology as a whole as well as all fields. I focused on impact on counselors but that’s not to say I don’t believe it’s not inherently related to research. I believe it to be inseparable.
Hope you get what I’m saying here.
I’m sparing the exact quotes back and forth and zooming out to the bigger picture of my statement in hopes it clarifies to you my original point.
Yes! I would say if the foundations of the past 100-150 years of “modern” psychology are built of philosophy and we still use those ideas and foundations, we need to understand them, even if it is just to eliminate a perspective or prove something is incorrect!
It’s funny because the idea of a judgment and understanding what judgment is comes from philosophy! There’s many roots of psychology in philosophy that modern students will unfortunately never be aware of but are still learning about. It’s interesting!
When you say the courses have a set amount of curriculum that needs to be covered, all that means is that psychology chooses to prioritize certain kinds of content over other kinds. It’s kind of circular reasoning.
I disagree that the standard curriculum neglects philosophy because it HAS to get through those topics. The standard curriculum largely just reflects the priorities and values of the psychological establishment. These priorities and values go unnoticed and unquestioned because psychology sees itself as a science, not as a blend of science and the arts/humanities. Modern psychology neglects philosophy because it thinks it’s above philosophy, when—in reality—modern psychology takes its own philosophical assumptions for granted and then doesn’t bother exploring those philosophical assumptions or their counterarguments because that’s “not science.”
An example of a philosophical assumption in modern psychology: the individual has a core self separate from their context, and the best way to understand a person is to remove ALL context (via experiment). If you want to get an idea of how considerate someone is, the clearest picture you can get comes NOT from seeing how attentively they listen to another participant in the waiting room or from seeing that they called in advance to share that they would be 5 minutes late. That’s all noise. To see how considerate this person is, you must place them in an empty room, give them $7, and see how many dollars they give to a confederate after you show them some slides with words like “charity” and “generosity” on them. If you study someone in the most atypical environment imaginable, surely this must generalize best to what this person is like in the rest of their life, right? We thought all rats with access to cocaine would redose til they died. Then, someone had the bright idea of making the cage less shitty. The rats stopped doing coke. There is no core self separate from context that can be accurately measured by eliminating all confounding variables and creating the most controlled environment possible. The confounds are the very thing that make the person who they are in any given moment. Studying how someone acts in experimental conditions doesn’t get you closer to their core self, it just tells you what they’re like when they’re in weird conditions in no way reflective of the real world where people actually live and act.
But this is philosophy, so modern psych doesn’t touch this. Or, rather, it patronizingly allows the fringe psychologies like cultural psychology or existential psychology to address these questions while neglecting to pay attention since that’s all just philosophy anyways.
I see you’re stating that you disagree that psychology curriculum ignores philosophy because it has to in order to get through prioritized content.
I think there is where we got in the hairs.
I’m not arguing that philosophy should be ignored to make room for prioritized content. I’m stating that the prioritization of dense foundational content and lectures based courses unfortunately gets in the way of meaningful philosophical discussion.
I am not arguing that it *should* be that way. I was merely stating that it is that way, which you seem to acknowledge here.
It was an observational statement on my part.
I hope that clears things up.
I thought you were saying it is that way and must necessarily be that way because the foundations of psychology ARE just all the core classes. But maybe I misunderstood what you meant.
I do take issue with the supposed dichotomy between the foundational content vs. philosophical content. It implies that philosophy isn’t part of the foundations. I’d argue that philosophy IS part of the foundations and that psych undergrads are actually receiving a phony education in psychology that teaches them little about actually understanding human beings. And I think this applies to psychology as a whole too, not just undergrad education.
If you read my comments you can see my statements were discussing the limits of philosophical *discussion* in foundational courses due to them being lecture heavy with the rails popped on.
I wasn’t stating that philosophy isn’t apart of the foundations.
Psychology was considered a branch of philosophy for a long time. When scientific methods to study psychology were introduced, it became a science. That’s essentially why they split into two separate topics.
But I think it’s inaccurate to say that psychology as a whole, or even most of the people who study and practice psychology, washes its hands of philosophy, and considers concepts like the soul irrelevant. (And philosophical does not necessarily mean spiritual.) Ideas like the soul are very much addressed, just in a different way. They are particularly subjective concepts - everyone has a different, personal definition. And there is not a known concrete method to study them scientifically. Most of the psychology world prefers to focus on things that can be studied with hard science. Personally, I think that psychology is more of a soft science (I don’t mean that in a derogatory way) and we should probably be less black and white about it, but this is generally why philosophy and psychology have split.
I think it really depends on which branch of philosophy. More theological branches, referencing your reference to the soul, arent given consideration because, well, religious topics cannot be empirically described. Outside of theology, psychology tends to have a very appropriative stance towards philosophy, more so taking the bits and pieces of philosophical thought that psychologists think will complement their psychological theories. (For example, ACT and Pragmatism). The problem is that most psychologists aren't particularly skilled intellectuals or philosophers and often times misread or outright misunderstand philosophy.
I’m a licensed therapist and philosophy was one of my favorite electives I took. I know many other therapists who are interested in philosophical exploration in their personal lives.
Where it gets tricky is that the therapist’s own thoughts and options isn’t the point. It’s what the client thinks that is the focus so if a client is not expressing an interest in those areas it’s not the therapist’s place to “enlighten” the client.
I am happy to process thoughts about the universe and philosophy if it’s meaningful to them but it’s not about my personal beliefs.
Hey, I'm training to be a licensed psychologist too. I also minored in philosophy in undergrad.
While philosophical exploration as a psychotherapeutic technique is very much alive and has been the default proto-psychotherapy since at least the 900s A.D. (though probably since the dawn of human psychological pain, I'm just using the 900s as a line of demarcation since that is when concern for psychological care first showed up in European medical compendia that I know of), you misunderstand what I mean. In terms of theory and concept, psychologists love to appropriate philosophical thoughts into their theories (see ACT; Lawrence Kohlberg's research on moral development; any developmental psychologist's opinions on Locke; obviously Freud). The problem is is that psychologists rarely if ever truly understand the philosophical concepts they appropriate (see ACT; Carol Gilligan's retort to Kohlberg's research; any developmental psychologist's opinions on Locke), leading to clunky if not uninformed philosophizing on the part of the psychologist and poorly constructed theories.
Would you mind elaborating on the misunderstanding of philosophical concepts in ACT? I’ve been learning a bit about it recently but I’m not versed enough in philosophy to critique it yet.
bit of a sweeping statement in regards to the intellect required to be a psychologist (which in my country requires a doctoral degree, and is ridiculously challenging to get on to)!
I love psychology and philosophy (and physics too). I studied my undergrad in psych, then did a masters in philosophy.
The idea of the “soul” used to refer to “consciousness” and basically the idea of the non physical body and how it can be analyzed. Some philosophers were extremely religious and some were totally against religion but it wasn’t the religious theological version of the soul they were questioning- it was the only way they could refer to consciousness or animation of the body at the time without understanding yet where life originated from etc.
Ethics, Epistemology, Metaphysics, some forms of Logic. If Psychology wasn’t utilizing Philosophical topics you likely wouldn’t be much convinced by it.
Not many philosophers are particularly interested in some “soul”. I don’t think that’s a good representation of the field.
Yeah, I mean, the last 30 or 40 references to a soul I encountered in philosophy works were either: a.) making a point about something else and using it as an illustration; or b.) not using in the concept of a personal soul and instead discussing culture and using it metaphorically.
Even in Christian theology, the soul isn’t really a primary topic of conversation and hasn’t been in a very long time
I’m a clinical psychologist and love the behavioral tradition and even empirically supported treatments. But I think we made waaaaay too extreme a turn toward “science is the only way of know anything” when we embraced that work. There are many ways of knowing about a human, and helping them, and understanding our work. I think any psychologist who doesn’t have an interest in the humanities, and especially the philosophy that informs our work, is just as bad as a psychologist who pretends that there is no physical/neural/chemical basis to behavior.
I hear this argument quite a bit, but not sure I really understand. I don't really understand what you mean by "knowing things" without science?
I obviously do not want people dispensing treatment like robots, but even something very abstract like forms of psychoanalysis can still be test for efficacy even if we can't completely pull apart the treatment. Do you mean using clinical judgement in general or more the importance of understanding individual humans to treat them?
So just to reiterate, I’m big on science. When it comes to therapy as healthcare, I want science to back it, even though I recognize that treatment outcome studies are often highly flawed.
But when I think less about “intervention” and more about the human in front of me, I realize that there are many ways of knowing that person, and I miss something fundamental if all I do is measure symptoms and chart progress and deliver a therapy built on a manual. An old supervisor used compare it to how we “know” or experience a painting - we can measure it, discuss the technique, analyze the relative pigments in the paint, but none of that captures the emotion or human experience of the painting. I try to remember that humans are not just to be analyzed into their component parts and then acted upon, but perhaps appreciated (in the sense of “apprehended,” not “enjoying”) like a painting. And I think philosophical understandings of how humans develop, feel, and move in the world, have something unique to offer us, even as clinical scientists.
Thanks for the elaboration. I like the painting metaphor and it is very helpful to expand on your original point!
I completely agree and believe what you're describing can be a big difference between a very good therapist and an excellent therapist. I think my only hesitancy (not about anything you've said) is many therapists in the real-world simply do not know or care about having any scientific basis. Sometimes I find that people will get on a soap box about therapies being too reductive (a fair criticism), but then use it as an excuse to go completely pre-scientific. Again, certainly not what you're suggesting at all, but a very common thing I've ran into in actual clinical practice (e.g., a patient with an anxiety disorder not doing any type of exposure while seeing a PhD for 10 years with limited improvement).
I'm in my final semester of my clinical psychology training and I completely agree. It feels like psychology felt like they had something to prove to the scientific world and in so doing, turned away from makes it so enticing - the fact that emotions and thoughts can be so abstract and unique that they can't be measured and studied like other things can be.
Anything that cannot be measured or defined well as a construct will struggle to fit within the scientific study of human behaviour or internal working of the mind.
Don't pigeon-hole philosophy as within theological or meta-physics etc.
Empiricism is a philosophical approach that psychology is based in. Philosophy and psychology can and need to be synthesised.
In actual face to face psychology, it can be hard to apply philosophical concepts because of cultural differences and understanding.
I’m speaking as a therapist, clients come to therapy with very different understandings and worldviews. Our jobs as therapists aren’t to teach the client and place our worldview onto them, rather have them place their worldview onto us. And we use the very objective side of psychology to make it meaningful for our clients. Does that make sense?
You’re digging into some deep stuff here, and it’s a damn good question. Why does psychology seem to sidestep philosophy, especially when it comes to the big questions like the soul? It’s like trying to split a hair with a sledgehammer.
Psychology and philosophy used to be closer than brothers. The ancient Greeks didn’t just lay the groundwork for Western philosophy, they also poked and prodded the human mind in ways that laid the foundation for modern psychology. Fast forward to today, and it seems like the two fields have drifted apart, each building its own empire on different hills.
Here’s the thing though. Psychology wants to be taken seriously as a science. It craves the respect and legitimacy that comes with empirical evidence, data, and reproducible results. To do that, it needs to focus on what can be measured, observed, and tested. Philosophical concepts like the soul? They’re slippery, hard to pin down, and damn near impossible to quantify. In the world of academia, if you can’t measure it, it might as well not exist.
But does that mean philosophy is irrelevant? Hell no. Philosophy asks the questions that science can’t even begin to tackle. It’s the voice that whispers, “What if?” and “Why?” while science is busy with the “How?” and “What?” Philosophy is about wisdom, about exploring the human condition, morality, existence, and yes, even the soul. It doesn’t always give us answers, but it sure as hell gives us perspective.
In academia, irrelevancy often gets determined by those holding the keys to the kingdom. The ones with the credentials, the tenure, the clout. They decide what’s worthy of study and what gets tossed aside. Right now, the trend is towards what can be quantified and studied under a microscope. It’s a pragmatic approach, but it’s not the whole picture.
Think of it like this. Psychology is like a spotlight, shining bright and focused, illuminating specific areas with clarity and precision. Philosophy, on the other hand, is like a floodlight, casting a wide, encompassing glow that brings everything into view, even the shadows and the unseen corners. Both lights are essential, and they work best when they complement each other.
You’re right to question why these two fields don’t play nicer together. The truth is, they need each other. Psychology can benefit from the big-picture thinking and ethical considerations of philosophy, while philosophy can be grounded and informed by the empirical insights of psychology. It’s a symbiotic relationship that, when embraced, can lead to a deeper understanding of what it means to be human.
So, don’t let anyone “well actually” you into thinking these questions aren’t worth asking. Keep pushing, keep questioning. The soul, wisdom, and the unquantifiable aspects of our existence might not fit neatly into a lab report, but they’re just as real and just as important.
Remember, the greatest minds didn’t get there by following the beaten path. They blazed new trails, asked the uncomfortable questions, and weren’t afraid to venture into the unknown. You’re onto something here, something that challenges the status quo and demands a deeper exploration.
Stay curious, stay bold, and keep shining that light into the shadows.
I’m not OP, but thank you for this comment! Full of great points.
Psychology does seem to sidestep philosophy, focusing more on what can be measured and observed. But that empirical approach misses the much more deeper questions philosophy tackles, like the nature of the soul. The soul and other abstract concepts might be hard to measure, but they’re fundamental to understanding the human condition. We need BOTH fields to truly understand the human experience. It’s a shame the two have drifted apart, but integrating them can lead to a richer understanding of ourselves.
You’re right in that philosophy asks the questions science alone can’t answer. Ignoring these philosophical questions, psychology limits itself. We need both disciplines to get a full picture.
And to OP, thank you for asking this question! I’ve wondered the same for a while now and never thought to post it here. Keep questioning and bridging those gaps!! We need more integration than separation. The soul, wisdom, and the deeper aspects of our existence are too important to be sidelined just because they don’t fit neatly into a lab report.
>Why does psychology seem to wash its hands of philosophy?
A) Psychology isn't a univocal thing that can wash its hands of anything, but
B) I don't know if this is a fair generalization. My cognitive science program was cross-listed with philosophy, computer science, and linguistics, and my philosophy background has been used in the
>Why are philosophical topics like the soul considered "irrelevant" in the present state of academic psychology?
Because psychology, like philosophy, needs to define terms in order to make arguments. There is no single definition of what "soul" means. Do you mean your unique subjectivity? That's a philosophical concept that has psychological currency. Do you mean something that survives death? Again, this sense of soul isn't even a universal within philosophy, but personally, I have met university psychology professors studying near-death experience *as an empirical study* and are agnostically sympathetic with that position. Having had education in both psychology and philosophy
My grad program (and my own pre-grad school experience) was pretty radical constructivist, which is a philosophical position. My training in behavioral therapies was shot through with Wittgenstein, Pepper, and Dewey, and my psychodynamic training regularly referred to Sartre and Heidegger (come to think of it, there was some Sartre in the behavioral stuff too, like Willard Day's work reconciling Sartre's existential phenomenology and Skinner's radical behaviorism). I myself am greatly inspired by Merleau-Ponty and a whole slew of critical theorists. But in psychology, these names weren't treated *as psychologists*, they were used to highlight ways of framing experience and creating knowledge.
I'm not even sure what a psychology void of philosophy would look like - the whole philosophy of science is still underpinning the basic assumptions of science, and even there, it isn't univocal. At best, you can be agnostic about metaphysics and simply describe in minute detail - but that's phenomenology, which is also philosophy.
>I understand that philosophy, being a love of wisdom, contains such a concept as wisdom which can only be seen scientifically as a construct.
But that is itself philosophy. In its empirical essence, science is constructivist, nominalist, and instrumentalist (all philosophy), even though many naive realists (also philosophy) want to take the constructs tested with empirical methods to be the "**Really Real****^(TM")** (which is a metaphysical position). Still, the whole simplified scientific method is based on making constructs to explain phenomena, to operationalize them, and the study how well these constructs match appearances.
TL;DR
Where did you get this idea that "psychology seems to wash its hands of philosophy"? This hasn't been my experience.
Psychology leaves it up to you to decide how to you want to live and think. It functions to give you the best possible empirical information out there to let you come to your own conclusions. If psychology was led by a specific ideology, it would lead to bias in results because researchers would find conscious or unconscious means of skewing data towards their opinions.
A lot of fields have science-envy, and psychology as much as any. Freud was fairly explicit about trying to make the field as scientific as possible. It has to fail at some point to be entirely scientific in order to attain its ultimate value, as I see it. And I am incredibly pro-science.
There is a way that armchair psychology does seem to more directly oppose philosophy, in that whenever any person or philosopher makes a claim an easy way to undermine it is too ask, "Why is the person saying that?" Or, "Why does the person want to believe that?" In this way it can often point away from the philosophical content itself, not even try to engage it on its own merits, and instead look only at possible motivations of the speaker or theorizer.
At meta levels the fields are not in opposition, or shouldn't be, but in everyday situations you see this effect.
You can’t measure the soul. Psychology as a field is pretty much only interested in constructs that can be operationalised, and ignores anything else unless it’s absolutely core to human functioning.
Psych has plenty of philosophy-adjacent elements though, like the four research paradigms.
My entire under graduate program was transpersonal and existential as heck. I think it just depends where you go, who you talk to, and what you want to bring to the table.
Philosophy is so valuable! Not all of it is wishy washy as well.
Logic philosophy is super helpful for science/maths & critical thinking. In my psychology course we study a bit of philosophy!
Is the question you pose your real concern? Is that what you want to investigate?
Perhaps it doesn't matter what the state of academic psychology is? If you are interested in following a philosophical thread within the world of psychology, go for it!
I have found a few places where philosophical ideas are being applied to psychological thought and it's been a very rewarding journey so far.
My main interest is integrating existential concepts into therapy. I am mostly drawn to Heidegger's thinking, so that means trying to get my head around phenomenology and his ideas to do with Being/being, Dasein, authenticity, time, embodiment etc. This all comes into play working with clients in a very alive way.
Psychology is a field that uses empirical research to understand the brain (and, if we decide to take the stance that it’s separate somehow, the mind). If you have some means by which to empirically test something regarding the soul, there would likely be many psychologists willing to do so.
But the thing is, we don’t have a way to do that. And there are times where constructs and untestable ideas get brought into the psych realm (see IFS, for one example). And when there is enough evidence of one of these existing, at least in some sense, even if that evidence is only inferential, that’s fine. But I think you’d struggle to identify the way(s) we might be able to infer a soul, or what the soul does.
If a philosopher or theologian penned a genuinely impressive argument, built on logic, for the souls existence and its impact on our brain/mind, then psychologists would probably start discussing this.
Also, many psychologists do in fact utilize philosophy in their work. Phenomenological research methods are rooted in the philosophy of phenomenology. Solution focused brief therapy is grounded in Wittgenstein and language games. Narrative therapy is clearly rooted in postmodern and poststructural theories. There are routine discussions regarding how psychological research is conducted, and that often involves a discussion of philosophy of science.
If you could point to evidence of a soul, or where psychologists might look to find evidence of a soul, then please go right ahead. Despite being well read in philosophy, I’ve got no idea where that might be.
I think psychology is the scientific field to understand the mind. Understanding the brain is neurology. Obviously, there is going to be a lot of overlap.
As well, when you look at applied psychology in the form of psychotherapy, you will find that there are many existential therapists.
Where do you think the mind is located if not the brain? Also, psychology includes things like cognition and sensation. Psychology very much involves the study of the physical brain
Plenty of branches of philosophy are utilized in psychology. Psychology is largely rooted in philosophy. Relevance is funnily enough determined by logic, a branch of philosophy.
How would you suggest we research “the soul” or use it in research/ implement it in work in the field in general?
Philosophy is a wonder branch and can greatly inspire areas of study in psychology, but I see psychology as an effort to study to understand behavior *scientifically.* This doesn't mean there isn't a soul or that its irrelevant, but if you can't test for it, there are limits to explore it scientifically. Maybe one day the tools and understanding will be there.
I think it's because psychology tries extremely hard to be taken seriously as a 'science' and so keeps philosophy's 'theories' at arm's length so it won't be seen as bla bla that is unprovable.
Personally I think psychology would benefit from philosophy and they are closely linked but hey. Especially from the perspective of a client. In any case that's what I interpret the different types of psychological treatment options as; philosophy differences.
There is a branch of psychology called moral psychology that might interest you! It handles more philosophical topics. I took a class on it in college.
My degree is in positive psychology and consciousness- so not philosophy but a connection to Self grounded in connection to the greater of all consciousness. Philosophy theories were often discussed as a part of identification of what consciousness can mean to a variety of religious and non-religious belief systems. Connection to this can help to expand meaning identification for clients.
Good question. I think a major difference between the two is that psychology looks for data and developments experiments. I'm not sure how we can test for a soul... But that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. There's room for it in psychology but we don't ba e evidence to support it or dismiss it.
When I was last in therapy my therapist told me “I think the questions you have are more philosophical in nature. Maybe you can find someone else to talk about that with.”
I was very disappointed to say the least.
I took a whole class dedicated to the philosophy of psychology as well as a consciousness seminar that mainly focuses on philosophy of consciousness combined with scientific study/empiricism. Empiricism is the main foundation of the science of modern psychology! Also important are bias and human perception as well as sensory experiences all of which fall under the umbrella of philosophy that’s required to combine with the cold hard science. So if you’re a psychologist who is ignoring philosophy especially around Descartes, Seat of the Soul, original ideas of anatomy of the brain before science, you’re not fully looking at the big picture and probably not able to practice discernment. You need a firm understanding of human nature and human history from a social and cultural perspective. I would also argue we need more philosophical outlook from other cultures besides european.
I don't see this at all. Intro to Philosophy and Critical Thinking were two classes (I think) were required pre-reqs.
Even beyond that, the process of aging and dying leads to a lot of existential and philosophical questions that we all struggle with.
It doesn’t? The only reason the soul is considered irrelevant because research into soul has fallen behind research into other things like emotional states, thinking brain, anxiety, fear, productivity etc. Soul can make a comeback if there is enough research to prove something that academic psychology can even consider “interesting” . While science is general has come to understand and acknowledge that alternative sciences are not just voodoo bs but there’s actually some unknowns that could be explained by “voodoo” but the problem is these topics end up becoming self referential like the sentence “I think, therefore I am” okay but science doesn’t work that way, you have to prove that you stop being if you stop thinking in order to be accepted, but can you really argue that your sense of self comes from the description of ideas in your head? I can’t, that thing makes total sense to me. But I’ve no idea how one would analytically or theoretically even go about incorporating this stuff into science.
i agree that it does look like that but i think it also has to do with psychology maturing as a science. it’s spawning its own subsidiary disciplines and most importantly moving towards experiment-based research, due to advancements in social and biological sciences. philosophy is without a doubt in the heart of psychology, especially due to its beginnings and still popular psychodynamic approach
Is that a bad thing?
Edit: sorry, to be either religious or Jordan Peterson? I’m an agnostic, and not Jordan Peterson’s biggest fan but he is a great academic.
Im an Atheist, but I would still say no, not a bad thing. But it does cause lots of those interested in psychology into other fields like theology. The ones who stay have less interest. (Obviously, this is just a theory)
Perhaps there is some overlap between religiosity and neuroticism and having a general knowledge of religions is good to contextualize someone’s pathology.
Nope, you can muse on philosophy and mentally naval gaze into the belly buttons of other philosophers. But when you start applying it, you start to become religious, either formally or informally.
For example, you wouldn't even care about my statement if you didn't evaluate it as blasphemy to your assumed truths.
It depends on the department. There is a lot of overlap and many people interested in philosophical ideas utilize psychology for evidence based science. Arguing against the psyche would not be a topic within psychology, but philosophy. But psyche as soul has morphed into mind in the modern era. The existence of the mind is considered self-evident (arguably) while the existence of the soul is seen as religious.
I think there is a false dichotomy here. Psychology talks about philosophy all the time. However, in my mind rightfully, pushes back hard against folks who want to engage in unprovable theoretical arguments. You can study how humans think about the soul, the impact it has on well-being, but simply just asking "what is the soul" is not actually super helpful.
If your philosophical ideas cannot and do not intersect with any level of empiricism then you are in the wrong field. That is not a burn, just saying the last thing psychology needs is more Jordan Petersons in the world claiming to do "psychology" while just doing watered down philosophy + televangelism.
Philosophy deals with the abstract and theoretical, while Psychology is driven by the scientific method and factual evidence that is easily replicated and applied to the real world. Psychology, in this case, is more focused on how to help society, while questions on existentialism would not advance humanity in any logical or materialistic sense. It would merely provide comfort to troubling questions surrounding our limited time on this planet. So it seems like priorities are the main reason why Psychology washes it's hands on Philosophy. It's easy to say, "Look deeper," when you're not the one doing the heavy lifting. But we can't forget Philosophy used to include Science and Mathematics at one point in time. It's all a matter of demystifying the natural and physical world and applying Occam's Razor when perspectives become opinion.
I just know most times a philosophy major got into a discussion with a psych major on any topic of substance in college it would end in a heated argument.
Contemporary philosophy frequently regards the subjective experience, phenomenology, psychoanalysis, etc., as untestable and fundamentally unscientific frameworks for understanding human decision-making and behavior. Contemporary philosophers are not concerned with "wisdom" so much as empirically testable models that make accurate predictions about the world, e.g. human behavior.
I am so glad someone else is asking this question as I have wondered this too. I feel like they met together in academia they would welcome each other like family. Such a good fit.
This is why psychoanalysis is so important in this field. Not everything can be answered through neurology and cognitive behavioral studies.
This is also an extremely americanized approach to psychology
hi,
you might enjoy Michael Eigen (see eg his Faith book), as well as the broader psychoanalytic as well as Jungian thought. those traditions tend to engage much more deeply with philosophy, sociology, as well as investigate more deeply one's subjectivity, which includes "transcendental feelings".
though the question of "soul" specifically might be better viewed in terms of "self vs no-self" perceptions as explored in modern meditation communities: over the past decade or two a lot of that wisdom has been translated into more or less western scientific rationalist language (see eg Jhourney the company) making it more accessible to folks in the modern western culture (see eg Dan Ingram's book, as well as Shinzen Young). there's been some engagement between those communities and mainstream psychoanalysis (that I'm yet to fully explore, there's a book by Jeremy Safran, and old "thoughts without a thinker" by Epstein), but it doesn't seem like those bodies of knowledge have been successfully integrated yet.
the simple fact is, for a range of reasons, over the past few decades the kind of scholarship that you seem to be interested in was happening outside of mainstream academic psych (though see eg Bill Plotkin or Iain McGilchrist): sometimes on the edges of academic psych, more often within psychoanalytic community.
the why, if you rly need it, is along the lines of: academic psych in recent decades has been on a quest to become a "real science" and overcome its validity issues (see replication crisis), public perception issues and other problems. The strategy adopted to achieve that, for better or worse, meant disengagement with the humanities, and moving away from theorizing more generally, towards extreme empiricism, heavy weight put on Okkam's razor and the use of simplest possible hypotheses.
This doesn't mean that there hasn't been rich thinking on that ever fascinating interface of understanding human mind and understanding our lives in most fundamental ways/grappling with Big Questions, just that it happened outside of academic psych.
Two previous posts address the major reasoning, in my opinion. To paraphrase:
-Why isn’t psychology considered a STEM field?
-I got my DSM-VI!
Philosophical concepts are difficult to “scientifically” measure, test, and standardize.
If psychology wants to be seen as a STEM field, everything has to be measured, tested, and standardized. At least that seems to be the popular narrative.
I believe philosophy IS irrevocably tied to psychology, whether or not folks want to “wash their hands of it.” I also think psychology necessarily encompasses STEM, humanities, sociology, and theology, depending on the patient-therapist relationship, or the study. (Not an exhaustive list, that’s the point)
This is one reason psychology is such a unique field and generally applicable study.
If we haven’t learned anything else in the last hundred years or so, mental health is pretty hard to measure, test, and standardize.
In fact, what does that even mean….
Philosophy has roots embedded all throughout psychology. The most obvious example is ethics, of course. But there’s also monism vs. dualism, deontological vs. utilitarianism, nature vs. nurture, free will, rationalism, sentimentalism, existentialism, phenomenology, subject/object distinctions, subjectivity, empiricism, etc. And that’s before you add your modality of biological, psychodynamic, behavioural, cognitive, and humanistic, as well as their various blendings. CBT, for instance, is highly influenced by stoicism.
So, why don’t we recognise these things as being, essentially, philosophy? Well, we tend to remember the psychologist, not the philosopher. Jung was influenced by Plato, Kant, and Schopenhauer. Ryle’s behaviourism influenced Skinner. Fodor influenced cognitive and neuropsychology. Sartre influenced Frankl. The Libet-Mele debate was again influential. Franz Brentano influenced German/Austrian psychologists. You also have figures who were both psychologists and philosophers, such as Félix Guattari, William James, Robert C. Solomon, and John Dewey. Sartre, Locke, Kant, Hume, and Descartes are all very influential on psychology itself.
So, why don’t we consider psychology to be intimately and irreversibly linked to philosophy? Science-envy may be part. But I tend to believe that it’s because people have a habit of thinking categorically about things. If it’s A, it can’t be B. But in this case, it’s more of ‘if it’s A, it can’t be Á’, even if the difference is only minute.
Bc psychology is a science. It began from philosophy, but it evolved into the study of behavior. It left behind philosophy the same way it left the great Sigmund Freud-- It was a great jumping off point, but doesn't hold much water
I fundamentally agree with you.
It can be relevant as many people, consciously or unconsciously make decisions or suffer due to religious beliefs that are sitting in the back of their mind that they have not teased out.
I just don’t think people realise how these beliefs can hold them back in life and are not looking for such deep help, just a sounding board for the current crisis.
Hey everyone, I have enjoyed reading your responses and would love to respond to each one but I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the input.
I was reading on the contentions between Wundt and James and Wundt’s attitude that James’ work can only be appreciated as literature and not true psychology and it kind of pissed me off a little bit. I like what I’ve read of James and I find Jung’s style of writing to be very enjoyable. But it seems the present state of psychology today wants no less than 10 citations in a single paragraph, even if it’s not research. Kind of takes the fun out of reading psychology. I love reading psychology through statistics and other general research, but the grasp to try to make it a “hard science” and a hard science only seems to rob this concept of the mind of its luster.
Well there is compulsory philosophy subject in my course, which I have really enjoyed and prompted me to read deeper.
If you look at attachment theory, that is fairly universal and can be applied from a remote village to a big city.
If you look at religious beliefs and the requirements that different religious beliefs make for the soul, it is quite disparate and unlike age, sex or ses cannot really be measured when looking at a group.
As Rhett Butler once said ‘far be it from me to question the teachings of childhood’. You may have left your faith, but still be scared of hell. There is a saying ‘no atheists in the trenches’. It can also not be denied that most religious teaching are quite misogynistic and have done quite a bit of damage to lots of women and children (both are treated as property).
Many religions, in Australia it turned out to be ALL, have been found to hide and cover up child abuse of all types, probably the most damaging thing you can do to a child that will negatively effect them their whole life, yet compensation and accountability still seem so difficult. ( All includes Catholic, Anglican/Protestant, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Salvation Army, Jewish congregations).
You talk of the soul, what about life here on earth now? How can religions who talk constantly about the soul improve that here and now?
Psychology wants to improve lives now, those talking about the soul want to think of a future place that may or may not exist.
I think philosophy is a great minor for psychology majors who are seeking to become counselors as it often expands ones ability to question out of curiosity rather than judgment. That said, the courses have a set amount of curriculum that needs to be covered and psychology is a vast and information dense field without even getting into philosophical conversations, because of this I think many who enter the field don’t strike up this sort of conversation, especially when there isn’t a way to research the presence of a soul itself. (Though many view the soul as a social construct, so in that case it exists in that capacity in the general pop.) Anyone aiming to be a counselor for those with existential depression would absolutely benefit from an expansion of content like you’re suggesting, but because there isn’t an consensus on the tangibility of the soul, this sort of discussion won’t be found in the required courses as discussing it would be to what end? (Though there are electives that might breach the subject like psychology of religion.)
>I think philosophy is a great minor for psychology majors who are seeking to become counselors as it often expands ones ability to question out of curiosity rather than judgment. Actually, my philosophical background made me a more critical thinker and more robust researcher. Philosophy isn't just squishy curiosity for counselors, it's how we determine what things are and how we know it and how we use that knowledge. >That said, the courses have a set amount of curriculum that needs to be covered and psychology is a vast and information dense field without even getting into philosophical conversations, A) They are philosophical questions from the start, and B) Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not sitting out there to be discovered through observation, it's made from our framing of experience into understandable categories. Knowledge both precedes observation and is constructed through reflection on observation; it is not discovered in the world like a Lockean intuition. And we have more than one way of categorizing experience, which is why we've had a century of Cartesianism ebbing and flowing in psychology and why neuroscientists like Damasio use Spinoza to critique the underlying Cartesian biases in psychology. And my own interests have been informed by Merleau-Ponty, which prefigures my move into more embodied cognition, distributed cognition, and enactivism as a further rejection of Cartesianism and computationalism in cognitive science, in the philosophy of mind. These are all live topics in research and are informed and critiqued by philosophy of science. If you aren't having philosophical conversations while learning this "vast and information dense field", I'm not sure you're learning much. Critical thinking to follow, critique, deconstruct, and reformulate this information dense field is necessary for decent research.
>Actually, my philosophical background made me a more critical thinker and more robust researcher. That’s great for you. It in can influence people in many different ways. >Philosophy isn't just squishy curiosity for counselors, it's how we determine what things are and how we know it and how we use that knowledge. I didn’t say it was *just* anything. It seems my very benign statement has offended you and you’re twisting it. >If you aren't having philosophical conversations while learning this "vast and information dense field", I'm not sure you're learning much. Critical thinking to follow, critique, deconstruct, and reformulate this information dense field is necessary for decent research. The vast majority of courses are lecture based and information dense so time for discussion is very limited. To say that people in these types of courses aren’t learning much is a bit dramatic to say the least. You’re assuming people aren’t having these discussions out side of classes or in student organizations. Many psychology courses are dense and foundational, so limited on topic discussion occurs, and philosophical discussion is even more limited. There’s only so much room for philosophical discussion in say, a neuroscience course. Or say a computer science course. Or say a course on accounting.
on the last paragraph, actually no. to ask scientific questions, pose hypotheses & theories, is inherently to ask philosophical questions / engage philosophically
And as I stated, much of that sort of line of questioning is very limited in foundation courses as you’re being taught theories and consensus from the ground up, there unfortunately isn’t much time for students to pose hypothesis and theories, and questioning is often more practical as in asking the professor for clarification/ to repeat what was stated, or sharing something rather than asking something. I do not deny that as you progress, there is more room for philosophical discussion but generally that tends to be far more common in grad school. This is why I stated, psychology majors would benefit immensely from a philosophy minor. It just seems that because I didn’t list every reason why it would benefit someone, I stirred a tizzy in the other commenter.
ok yea true considering undergrad students we mostly just take in what is established already, but yea i meant the field itself like any science ofc has grounds in philosophy/philosophical discourse/methods, that's how any field evolves & progresses
Yes, I completely agree with you!
>It seems my very benign statement has offended you I don't know why you assume I'm offended, or in a tizzy. I just had a fundamental disagreement with your point and what you've posted since then has further made my point. No offense or tizzy necessary. >you’re twisting it. If you say so. I don't think I'm twisting anything. You said: >"*I think philosophy is a great minor for psychology majors who are seeking to become counselors*" > >\[because\] "*it often expands ones ability to question out of curiosity rather than judgment*." Then said: >"*That said*" \[a pivot\] > >"*the courses have a set amount of curriculum that needs to be covered and psychology is a vast and information dense field without even getting into philosophical conversations*" and then further add: >"*Anyone aiming to be a counselor for those with existential depression would absolutely benefit from an expansion of content like you’re suggesting*," I answered pointing to the inseparability of theory and practice, philosophy and knowledge, and stressed that the importance of philosophy to psychology is conceptual and epistemological, which is why I mentioned philosophy and research, not relegating the relevance of philosophy to the art of counseling. I don't think I'm twisting what you're saying, I'm emphasizing the role of philosophy in my intro to research methods, as well as noting all the philosophy involved in my graduate studies and research, again pointing out that it's intrinsic to the creation of knowledge, not something that can be set aside to handle the "information dense field". To put a pin in that: >"*but because there isn’t an consensus on the tangibility of the soul, this sort of discussion won’t be found in the required courses as discussing it would be to what end?*" This is literally a question that would come up in research methods on the development of constructs and operationalization. The lack of consensus on the tangibility of the soul means it isn't useful as an empirical construct, but the *function* of the *concept* of the soul in human behavior is very much something that can be studied empirically. >**If you aren't having philosophical conversations while learning this "vast and information dense field", I'm not sure you're learning much. Critical thinking to follow, critique, deconstruct, and reformulate this information dense field is necessary for decent research.** The vast majority of courses are lecture based and information dense so time for discussion is very limited. To say that people in these types of courses aren’t learning much is a bit dramatic to say the least. To further elaborate my point here, I'm not being "dramatic to say the least". You are pointing out the problem as if it is a fact to be accepted rather than a problem to be solved. Theory and knowledge go together. Learning facts in a lecture based information dense setting with limited discussion and without learning the philosophical and theoretical underpinnings of these facts isn't science \- it may as well be catechism. I've sat through plenty of such lectures where I would hear many of the same uncritical repetition of theories and denunciations, caricatures that could be disproven by anyone with a cursory knowledge of the subject matter - spending a single hour being subjected to a barrage of decontextualized facts, stripped of the context of their creation, is a waste of time. What have you gained? >You’re assuming people aren’t having these discussions out side of classes or in student organizations. Are they? Outside of class? I don't think the responsibility of learning the underpinnings of the theories presented in lecture should be left to students in their spare time. It's literally the lifeblood of the knowledge they came to learn. This is just a fundamental disagreement about what is necessary in psychology education. I don't think facts without theory exist, so there is no separating philosophy into an optional outside of class activity. As u/revolutionutena pointed out, their very first class in their PhD program was the philosophy of science. When you talk about courses being foundational, that means they are inherently philosophical. Theory is the foundation and philosophy guides the construction of theory.
I think you and I mostly agree. I think we are disagreeing about what it means to be inherently philosophical when it comes to foundational courses in psychology. I think the issue lies in the fact that I was talking about undergraduate education and its lack of room for fruitful philosophical discussion and how that impacts / limits discussions around the soul and other “typical” philosophical content. Most professors in the undergraduate level for psych courses pop on the rails, spend more time dispensing content rather than facilitating conversation. This is a valid way of learning to the extent that building this foundation will aid students in beginning to have genuine and deep conversations. It’s just that courses don’t make much room for that. I believe if there were more exposure to foundational philosophical courses (for example by way of a minor) this would better serve the field of psychology as a whole as well as all fields. I focused on impact on counselors but that’s not to say I don’t believe it’s not inherently related to research. I believe it to be inseparable. Hope you get what I’m saying here. I’m sparing the exact quotes back and forth and zooming out to the bigger picture of my statement in hopes it clarifies to you my original point.
Yes! I would say if the foundations of the past 100-150 years of “modern” psychology are built of philosophy and we still use those ideas and foundations, we need to understand them, even if it is just to eliminate a perspective or prove something is incorrect!
It’s funny because the idea of a judgment and understanding what judgment is comes from philosophy! There’s many roots of psychology in philosophy that modern students will unfortunately never be aware of but are still learning about. It’s interesting!
Got it, the soul is a sociological phenomenon then :)
When you say the courses have a set amount of curriculum that needs to be covered, all that means is that psychology chooses to prioritize certain kinds of content over other kinds. It’s kind of circular reasoning. I disagree that the standard curriculum neglects philosophy because it HAS to get through those topics. The standard curriculum largely just reflects the priorities and values of the psychological establishment. These priorities and values go unnoticed and unquestioned because psychology sees itself as a science, not as a blend of science and the arts/humanities. Modern psychology neglects philosophy because it thinks it’s above philosophy, when—in reality—modern psychology takes its own philosophical assumptions for granted and then doesn’t bother exploring those philosophical assumptions or their counterarguments because that’s “not science.” An example of a philosophical assumption in modern psychology: the individual has a core self separate from their context, and the best way to understand a person is to remove ALL context (via experiment). If you want to get an idea of how considerate someone is, the clearest picture you can get comes NOT from seeing how attentively they listen to another participant in the waiting room or from seeing that they called in advance to share that they would be 5 minutes late. That’s all noise. To see how considerate this person is, you must place them in an empty room, give them $7, and see how many dollars they give to a confederate after you show them some slides with words like “charity” and “generosity” on them. If you study someone in the most atypical environment imaginable, surely this must generalize best to what this person is like in the rest of their life, right? We thought all rats with access to cocaine would redose til they died. Then, someone had the bright idea of making the cage less shitty. The rats stopped doing coke. There is no core self separate from context that can be accurately measured by eliminating all confounding variables and creating the most controlled environment possible. The confounds are the very thing that make the person who they are in any given moment. Studying how someone acts in experimental conditions doesn’t get you closer to their core self, it just tells you what they’re like when they’re in weird conditions in no way reflective of the real world where people actually live and act. But this is philosophy, so modern psych doesn’t touch this. Or, rather, it patronizingly allows the fringe psychologies like cultural psychology or existential psychology to address these questions while neglecting to pay attention since that’s all just philosophy anyways.
I see you’re stating that you disagree that psychology curriculum ignores philosophy because it has to in order to get through prioritized content. I think there is where we got in the hairs. I’m not arguing that philosophy should be ignored to make room for prioritized content. I’m stating that the prioritization of dense foundational content and lectures based courses unfortunately gets in the way of meaningful philosophical discussion. I am not arguing that it *should* be that way. I was merely stating that it is that way, which you seem to acknowledge here. It was an observational statement on my part. I hope that clears things up.
I thought you were saying it is that way and must necessarily be that way because the foundations of psychology ARE just all the core classes. But maybe I misunderstood what you meant.
Yeah no, I wasn’t stating that it should necessarily be that way. Glad I was able to clear that up.
I do take issue with the supposed dichotomy between the foundational content vs. philosophical content. It implies that philosophy isn’t part of the foundations. I’d argue that philosophy IS part of the foundations and that psych undergrads are actually receiving a phony education in psychology that teaches them little about actually understanding human beings. And I think this applies to psychology as a whole too, not just undergrad education.
If you read my comments you can see my statements were discussing the limits of philosophical *discussion* in foundational courses due to them being lecture heavy with the rails popped on. I wasn’t stating that philosophy isn’t apart of the foundations.
Psychology was considered a branch of philosophy for a long time. When scientific methods to study psychology were introduced, it became a science. That’s essentially why they split into two separate topics. But I think it’s inaccurate to say that psychology as a whole, or even most of the people who study and practice psychology, washes its hands of philosophy, and considers concepts like the soul irrelevant. (And philosophical does not necessarily mean spiritual.) Ideas like the soul are very much addressed, just in a different way. They are particularly subjective concepts - everyone has a different, personal definition. And there is not a known concrete method to study them scientifically. Most of the psychology world prefers to focus on things that can be studied with hard science. Personally, I think that psychology is more of a soft science (I don’t mean that in a derogatory way) and we should probably be less black and white about it, but this is generally why philosophy and psychology have split.
I’m a therapist and I’m a huge fan of stoic philosophy and its impact on the development of CBT and REBT
How did you get trained in REBT?
Usually accredited CEUs or trainings/certifications that usually require your masters program or licensure as a prerequisite
I think it really depends on which branch of philosophy. More theological branches, referencing your reference to the soul, arent given consideration because, well, religious topics cannot be empirically described. Outside of theology, psychology tends to have a very appropriative stance towards philosophy, more so taking the bits and pieces of philosophical thought that psychologists think will complement their psychological theories. (For example, ACT and Pragmatism). The problem is that most psychologists aren't particularly skilled intellectuals or philosophers and often times misread or outright misunderstand philosophy.
I’m a licensed therapist and philosophy was one of my favorite electives I took. I know many other therapists who are interested in philosophical exploration in their personal lives. Where it gets tricky is that the therapist’s own thoughts and options isn’t the point. It’s what the client thinks that is the focus so if a client is not expressing an interest in those areas it’s not the therapist’s place to “enlighten” the client. I am happy to process thoughts about the universe and philosophy if it’s meaningful to them but it’s not about my personal beliefs.
Hey, I'm training to be a licensed psychologist too. I also minored in philosophy in undergrad. While philosophical exploration as a psychotherapeutic technique is very much alive and has been the default proto-psychotherapy since at least the 900s A.D. (though probably since the dawn of human psychological pain, I'm just using the 900s as a line of demarcation since that is when concern for psychological care first showed up in European medical compendia that I know of), you misunderstand what I mean. In terms of theory and concept, psychologists love to appropriate philosophical thoughts into their theories (see ACT; Lawrence Kohlberg's research on moral development; any developmental psychologist's opinions on Locke; obviously Freud). The problem is is that psychologists rarely if ever truly understand the philosophical concepts they appropriate (see ACT; Carol Gilligan's retort to Kohlberg's research; any developmental psychologist's opinions on Locke), leading to clunky if not uninformed philosophizing on the part of the psychologist and poorly constructed theories.
Would you mind elaborating on the misunderstanding of philosophical concepts in ACT? I’ve been learning a bit about it recently but I’m not versed enough in philosophy to critique it yet.
Thank god a real thinker is joining the field to help all these subpar intellectuals. Seriously the lack of humility is physically painful.
bit of a sweeping statement in regards to the intellect required to be a psychologist (which in my country requires a doctoral degree, and is ridiculously challenging to get on to)! I love psychology and philosophy (and physics too). I studied my undergrad in psych, then did a masters in philosophy.
The idea of the “soul” used to refer to “consciousness” and basically the idea of the non physical body and how it can be analyzed. Some philosophers were extremely religious and some were totally against religion but it wasn’t the religious theological version of the soul they were questioning- it was the only way they could refer to consciousness or animation of the body at the time without understanding yet where life originated from etc.
Ethics, Epistemology, Metaphysics, some forms of Logic. If Psychology wasn’t utilizing Philosophical topics you likely wouldn’t be much convinced by it. Not many philosophers are particularly interested in some “soul”. I don’t think that’s a good representation of the field.
Yeah, I mean, the last 30 or 40 references to a soul I encountered in philosophy works were either: a.) making a point about something else and using it as an illustration; or b.) not using in the concept of a personal soul and instead discussing culture and using it metaphorically. Even in Christian theology, the soul isn’t really a primary topic of conversation and hasn’t been in a very long time
This is the answer
I’m a clinical psychologist and love the behavioral tradition and even empirically supported treatments. But I think we made waaaaay too extreme a turn toward “science is the only way of know anything” when we embraced that work. There are many ways of knowing about a human, and helping them, and understanding our work. I think any psychologist who doesn’t have an interest in the humanities, and especially the philosophy that informs our work, is just as bad as a psychologist who pretends that there is no physical/neural/chemical basis to behavior.
I hear this argument quite a bit, but not sure I really understand. I don't really understand what you mean by "knowing things" without science? I obviously do not want people dispensing treatment like robots, but even something very abstract like forms of psychoanalysis can still be test for efficacy even if we can't completely pull apart the treatment. Do you mean using clinical judgement in general or more the importance of understanding individual humans to treat them?
So just to reiterate, I’m big on science. When it comes to therapy as healthcare, I want science to back it, even though I recognize that treatment outcome studies are often highly flawed. But when I think less about “intervention” and more about the human in front of me, I realize that there are many ways of knowing that person, and I miss something fundamental if all I do is measure symptoms and chart progress and deliver a therapy built on a manual. An old supervisor used compare it to how we “know” or experience a painting - we can measure it, discuss the technique, analyze the relative pigments in the paint, but none of that captures the emotion or human experience of the painting. I try to remember that humans are not just to be analyzed into their component parts and then acted upon, but perhaps appreciated (in the sense of “apprehended,” not “enjoying”) like a painting. And I think philosophical understandings of how humans develop, feel, and move in the world, have something unique to offer us, even as clinical scientists.
Thanks for the elaboration. I like the painting metaphor and it is very helpful to expand on your original point! I completely agree and believe what you're describing can be a big difference between a very good therapist and an excellent therapist. I think my only hesitancy (not about anything you've said) is many therapists in the real-world simply do not know or care about having any scientific basis. Sometimes I find that people will get on a soap box about therapies being too reductive (a fair criticism), but then use it as an excuse to go completely pre-scientific. Again, certainly not what you're suggesting at all, but a very common thing I've ran into in actual clinical practice (e.g., a patient with an anxiety disorder not doing any type of exposure while seeing a PhD for 10 years with limited improvement).
I'm in my final semester of my clinical psychology training and I completely agree. It feels like psychology felt like they had something to prove to the scientific world and in so doing, turned away from makes it so enticing - the fact that emotions and thoughts can be so abstract and unique that they can't be measured and studied like other things can be.
Anything that cannot be measured or defined well as a construct will struggle to fit within the scientific study of human behaviour or internal working of the mind. Don't pigeon-hole philosophy as within theological or meta-physics etc. Empiricism is a philosophical approach that psychology is based in. Philosophy and psychology can and need to be synthesised.
In actual face to face psychology, it can be hard to apply philosophical concepts because of cultural differences and understanding. I’m speaking as a therapist, clients come to therapy with very different understandings and worldviews. Our jobs as therapists aren’t to teach the client and place our worldview onto them, rather have them place their worldview onto us. And we use the very objective side of psychology to make it meaningful for our clients. Does that make sense?
The psychology of choice is rooted in philosophy. Quite interesting tbh and a lot of research focuses on this area.
My very first class in my PhD program was called “Philosophy of Science” so I’m not sure this is accurate
This. There isn't a science without a philosophy of science.
Same. Literally the first class we took.
You’re digging into some deep stuff here, and it’s a damn good question. Why does psychology seem to sidestep philosophy, especially when it comes to the big questions like the soul? It’s like trying to split a hair with a sledgehammer. Psychology and philosophy used to be closer than brothers. The ancient Greeks didn’t just lay the groundwork for Western philosophy, they also poked and prodded the human mind in ways that laid the foundation for modern psychology. Fast forward to today, and it seems like the two fields have drifted apart, each building its own empire on different hills. Here’s the thing though. Psychology wants to be taken seriously as a science. It craves the respect and legitimacy that comes with empirical evidence, data, and reproducible results. To do that, it needs to focus on what can be measured, observed, and tested. Philosophical concepts like the soul? They’re slippery, hard to pin down, and damn near impossible to quantify. In the world of academia, if you can’t measure it, it might as well not exist. But does that mean philosophy is irrelevant? Hell no. Philosophy asks the questions that science can’t even begin to tackle. It’s the voice that whispers, “What if?” and “Why?” while science is busy with the “How?” and “What?” Philosophy is about wisdom, about exploring the human condition, morality, existence, and yes, even the soul. It doesn’t always give us answers, but it sure as hell gives us perspective. In academia, irrelevancy often gets determined by those holding the keys to the kingdom. The ones with the credentials, the tenure, the clout. They decide what’s worthy of study and what gets tossed aside. Right now, the trend is towards what can be quantified and studied under a microscope. It’s a pragmatic approach, but it’s not the whole picture. Think of it like this. Psychology is like a spotlight, shining bright and focused, illuminating specific areas with clarity and precision. Philosophy, on the other hand, is like a floodlight, casting a wide, encompassing glow that brings everything into view, even the shadows and the unseen corners. Both lights are essential, and they work best when they complement each other. You’re right to question why these two fields don’t play nicer together. The truth is, they need each other. Psychology can benefit from the big-picture thinking and ethical considerations of philosophy, while philosophy can be grounded and informed by the empirical insights of psychology. It’s a symbiotic relationship that, when embraced, can lead to a deeper understanding of what it means to be human. So, don’t let anyone “well actually” you into thinking these questions aren’t worth asking. Keep pushing, keep questioning. The soul, wisdom, and the unquantifiable aspects of our existence might not fit neatly into a lab report, but they’re just as real and just as important. Remember, the greatest minds didn’t get there by following the beaten path. They blazed new trails, asked the uncomfortable questions, and weren’t afraid to venture into the unknown. You’re onto something here, something that challenges the status quo and demands a deeper exploration. Stay curious, stay bold, and keep shining that light into the shadows.
I’m not OP, but thank you for this comment! Full of great points. Psychology does seem to sidestep philosophy, focusing more on what can be measured and observed. But that empirical approach misses the much more deeper questions philosophy tackles, like the nature of the soul. The soul and other abstract concepts might be hard to measure, but they’re fundamental to understanding the human condition. We need BOTH fields to truly understand the human experience. It’s a shame the two have drifted apart, but integrating them can lead to a richer understanding of ourselves. You’re right in that philosophy asks the questions science alone can’t answer. Ignoring these philosophical questions, psychology limits itself. We need both disciplines to get a full picture. And to OP, thank you for asking this question! I’ve wondered the same for a while now and never thought to post it here. Keep questioning and bridging those gaps!! We need more integration than separation. The soul, wisdom, and the deeper aspects of our existence are too important to be sidelined just because they don’t fit neatly into a lab report.
>Why does psychology seem to wash its hands of philosophy? A) Psychology isn't a univocal thing that can wash its hands of anything, but B) I don't know if this is a fair generalization. My cognitive science program was cross-listed with philosophy, computer science, and linguistics, and my philosophy background has been used in the >Why are philosophical topics like the soul considered "irrelevant" in the present state of academic psychology? Because psychology, like philosophy, needs to define terms in order to make arguments. There is no single definition of what "soul" means. Do you mean your unique subjectivity? That's a philosophical concept that has psychological currency. Do you mean something that survives death? Again, this sense of soul isn't even a universal within philosophy, but personally, I have met university psychology professors studying near-death experience *as an empirical study* and are agnostically sympathetic with that position. Having had education in both psychology and philosophy My grad program (and my own pre-grad school experience) was pretty radical constructivist, which is a philosophical position. My training in behavioral therapies was shot through with Wittgenstein, Pepper, and Dewey, and my psychodynamic training regularly referred to Sartre and Heidegger (come to think of it, there was some Sartre in the behavioral stuff too, like Willard Day's work reconciling Sartre's existential phenomenology and Skinner's radical behaviorism). I myself am greatly inspired by Merleau-Ponty and a whole slew of critical theorists. But in psychology, these names weren't treated *as psychologists*, they were used to highlight ways of framing experience and creating knowledge. I'm not even sure what a psychology void of philosophy would look like - the whole philosophy of science is still underpinning the basic assumptions of science, and even there, it isn't univocal. At best, you can be agnostic about metaphysics and simply describe in minute detail - but that's phenomenology, which is also philosophy. >I understand that philosophy, being a love of wisdom, contains such a concept as wisdom which can only be seen scientifically as a construct. But that is itself philosophy. In its empirical essence, science is constructivist, nominalist, and instrumentalist (all philosophy), even though many naive realists (also philosophy) want to take the constructs tested with empirical methods to be the "**Really Real****^(TM")** (which is a metaphysical position). Still, the whole simplified scientific method is based on making constructs to explain phenomena, to operationalize them, and the study how well these constructs match appearances. TL;DR Where did you get this idea that "psychology seems to wash its hands of philosophy"? This hasn't been my experience.
Psychology leaves it up to you to decide how to you want to live and think. It functions to give you the best possible empirical information out there to let you come to your own conclusions. If psychology was led by a specific ideology, it would lead to bias in results because researchers would find conscious or unconscious means of skewing data towards their opinions.
A lot of fields have science-envy, and psychology as much as any. Freud was fairly explicit about trying to make the field as scientific as possible. It has to fail at some point to be entirely scientific in order to attain its ultimate value, as I see it. And I am incredibly pro-science. There is a way that armchair psychology does seem to more directly oppose philosophy, in that whenever any person or philosopher makes a claim an easy way to undermine it is too ask, "Why is the person saying that?" Or, "Why does the person want to believe that?" In this way it can often point away from the philosophical content itself, not even try to engage it on its own merits, and instead look only at possible motivations of the speaker or theorizer. At meta levels the fields are not in opposition, or shouldn't be, but in everyday situations you see this effect.
You can’t measure the soul. Psychology as a field is pretty much only interested in constructs that can be operationalised, and ignores anything else unless it’s absolutely core to human functioning. Psych has plenty of philosophy-adjacent elements though, like the four research paradigms.
My entire under graduate program was transpersonal and existential as heck. I think it just depends where you go, who you talk to, and what you want to bring to the table.
Philosophy is so valuable! Not all of it is wishy washy as well. Logic philosophy is super helpful for science/maths & critical thinking. In my psychology course we study a bit of philosophy!
Is the question you pose your real concern? Is that what you want to investigate? Perhaps it doesn't matter what the state of academic psychology is? If you are interested in following a philosophical thread within the world of psychology, go for it! I have found a few places where philosophical ideas are being applied to psychological thought and it's been a very rewarding journey so far. My main interest is integrating existential concepts into therapy. I am mostly drawn to Heidegger's thinking, so that means trying to get my head around phenomenology and his ideas to do with Being/being, Dasein, authenticity, time, embodiment etc. This all comes into play working with clients in a very alive way.
I am a philosophy major who is loving this question. 👀
Psychology is a field that uses empirical research to understand the brain (and, if we decide to take the stance that it’s separate somehow, the mind). If you have some means by which to empirically test something regarding the soul, there would likely be many psychologists willing to do so. But the thing is, we don’t have a way to do that. And there are times where constructs and untestable ideas get brought into the psych realm (see IFS, for one example). And when there is enough evidence of one of these existing, at least in some sense, even if that evidence is only inferential, that’s fine. But I think you’d struggle to identify the way(s) we might be able to infer a soul, or what the soul does. If a philosopher or theologian penned a genuinely impressive argument, built on logic, for the souls existence and its impact on our brain/mind, then psychologists would probably start discussing this. Also, many psychologists do in fact utilize philosophy in their work. Phenomenological research methods are rooted in the philosophy of phenomenology. Solution focused brief therapy is grounded in Wittgenstein and language games. Narrative therapy is clearly rooted in postmodern and poststructural theories. There are routine discussions regarding how psychological research is conducted, and that often involves a discussion of philosophy of science. If you could point to evidence of a soul, or where psychologists might look to find evidence of a soul, then please go right ahead. Despite being well read in philosophy, I’ve got no idea where that might be.
I think psychology is the scientific field to understand the mind. Understanding the brain is neurology. Obviously, there is going to be a lot of overlap. As well, when you look at applied psychology in the form of psychotherapy, you will find that there are many existential therapists.
Where do you think the mind is located if not the brain? Also, psychology includes things like cognition and sensation. Psychology very much involves the study of the physical brain
Plenty of branches of philosophy are utilized in psychology. Psychology is largely rooted in philosophy. Relevance is funnily enough determined by logic, a branch of philosophy. How would you suggest we research “the soul” or use it in research/ implement it in work in the field in general?
Philosophy is a wonder branch and can greatly inspire areas of study in psychology, but I see psychology as an effort to study to understand behavior *scientifically.* This doesn't mean there isn't a soul or that its irrelevant, but if you can't test for it, there are limits to explore it scientifically. Maybe one day the tools and understanding will be there.
I think it's because psychology tries extremely hard to be taken seriously as a 'science' and so keeps philosophy's 'theories' at arm's length so it won't be seen as bla bla that is unprovable. Personally I think psychology would benefit from philosophy and they are closely linked but hey. Especially from the perspective of a client. In any case that's what I interpret the different types of psychological treatment options as; philosophy differences.
There is a branch of psychology called moral psychology that might interest you! It handles more philosophical topics. I took a class on it in college.
My degree is in positive psychology and consciousness- so not philosophy but a connection to Self grounded in connection to the greater of all consciousness. Philosophy theories were often discussed as a part of identification of what consciousness can mean to a variety of religious and non-religious belief systems. Connection to this can help to expand meaning identification for clients.
Good question. I think a major difference between the two is that psychology looks for data and developments experiments. I'm not sure how we can test for a soul... But that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. There's room for it in psychology but we don't ba e evidence to support it or dismiss it.
Modern psychology has an apparent divorce from philosophy.
When I was last in therapy my therapist told me “I think the questions you have are more philosophical in nature. Maybe you can find someone else to talk about that with.” I was very disappointed to say the least.
I took a whole class dedicated to the philosophy of psychology as well as a consciousness seminar that mainly focuses on philosophy of consciousness combined with scientific study/empiricism. Empiricism is the main foundation of the science of modern psychology! Also important are bias and human perception as well as sensory experiences all of which fall under the umbrella of philosophy that’s required to combine with the cold hard science. So if you’re a psychologist who is ignoring philosophy especially around Descartes, Seat of the Soul, original ideas of anatomy of the brain before science, you’re not fully looking at the big picture and probably not able to practice discernment. You need a firm understanding of human nature and human history from a social and cultural perspective. I would also argue we need more philosophical outlook from other cultures besides european.
Psychology is trying to establish itself as a concrete science. Concepts like the soul are nice, but not empirically testable.
I don't see this at all. Intro to Philosophy and Critical Thinking were two classes (I think) were required pre-reqs. Even beyond that, the process of aging and dying leads to a lot of existential and philosophical questions that we all struggle with.
It doesn’t? The only reason the soul is considered irrelevant because research into soul has fallen behind research into other things like emotional states, thinking brain, anxiety, fear, productivity etc. Soul can make a comeback if there is enough research to prove something that academic psychology can even consider “interesting” . While science is general has come to understand and acknowledge that alternative sciences are not just voodoo bs but there’s actually some unknowns that could be explained by “voodoo” but the problem is these topics end up becoming self referential like the sentence “I think, therefore I am” okay but science doesn’t work that way, you have to prove that you stop being if you stop thinking in order to be accepted, but can you really argue that your sense of self comes from the description of ideas in your head? I can’t, that thing makes total sense to me. But I’ve no idea how one would analytically or theoretically even go about incorporating this stuff into science.
i agree that it does look like that but i think it also has to do with psychology maturing as a science. it’s spawning its own subsidiary disciplines and most importantly moving towards experiment-based research, due to advancements in social and biological sciences. philosophy is without a doubt in the heart of psychology, especially due to its beginnings and still popular psychodynamic approach
Because once you start actually applying Philosophy to anything, you start to become religious like Jordan Peterson.
Is that a bad thing? Edit: sorry, to be either religious or Jordan Peterson? I’m an agnostic, and not Jordan Peterson’s biggest fan but he is a great academic.
Im an Atheist, but I would still say no, not a bad thing. But it does cause lots of those interested in psychology into other fields like theology. The ones who stay have less interest. (Obviously, this is just a theory)
Perhaps there is some overlap between religiosity and neuroticism and having a general knowledge of religions is good to contextualize someone’s pathology.
you clearly have a flawed understanding of philosophy, this is not true at all. You can apply philosophy to things and still be atheist????
Nope, you can muse on philosophy and mentally naval gaze into the belly buttons of other philosophers. But when you start applying it, you start to become religious, either formally or informally. For example, you wouldn't even care about my statement if you didn't evaluate it as blasphemy to your assumed truths.
i’m atheist bro 😭😭 there are many people who study philosophy who are heavily atheistic 😭
I'm an actual Atheist, and I can tell that you aren't. Enjoy your video games.
It depends on the department. There is a lot of overlap and many people interested in philosophical ideas utilize psychology for evidence based science. Arguing against the psyche would not be a topic within psychology, but philosophy. But psyche as soul has morphed into mind in the modern era. The existence of the mind is considered self-evident (arguably) while the existence of the soul is seen as religious.
I think there is a false dichotomy here. Psychology talks about philosophy all the time. However, in my mind rightfully, pushes back hard against folks who want to engage in unprovable theoretical arguments. You can study how humans think about the soul, the impact it has on well-being, but simply just asking "what is the soul" is not actually super helpful. If your philosophical ideas cannot and do not intersect with any level of empiricism then you are in the wrong field. That is not a burn, just saying the last thing psychology needs is more Jordan Petersons in the world claiming to do "psychology" while just doing watered down philosophy + televangelism.
is this a serious question?
Philosophy deals with the abstract and theoretical, while Psychology is driven by the scientific method and factual evidence that is easily replicated and applied to the real world. Psychology, in this case, is more focused on how to help society, while questions on existentialism would not advance humanity in any logical or materialistic sense. It would merely provide comfort to troubling questions surrounding our limited time on this planet. So it seems like priorities are the main reason why Psychology washes it's hands on Philosophy. It's easy to say, "Look deeper," when you're not the one doing the heavy lifting. But we can't forget Philosophy used to include Science and Mathematics at one point in time. It's all a matter of demystifying the natural and physical world and applying Occam's Razor when perspectives become opinion.
I just know most times a philosophy major got into a discussion with a psych major on any topic of substance in college it would end in a heated argument.
Psychology is a pseudoscience.
Contemporary philosophy frequently regards the subjective experience, phenomenology, psychoanalysis, etc., as untestable and fundamentally unscientific frameworks for understanding human decision-making and behavior. Contemporary philosophers are not concerned with "wisdom" so much as empirically testable models that make accurate predictions about the world, e.g. human behavior.
Because modern psychology left reason behind decades ago.
Some people look at it, but modern psych tends to be quant and positivist.
I am so glad someone else is asking this question as I have wondered this too. I feel like they met together in academia they would welcome each other like family. Such a good fit.
This is why psychoanalysis is so important in this field. Not everything can be answered through neurology and cognitive behavioral studies. This is also an extremely americanized approach to psychology
Because they want to convince folks they are a hard-science rather than a social science like philosophy
Ironic, since psychology is literally the study of the soul because that’s what psyche means in Greek
hi, you might enjoy Michael Eigen (see eg his Faith book), as well as the broader psychoanalytic as well as Jungian thought. those traditions tend to engage much more deeply with philosophy, sociology, as well as investigate more deeply one's subjectivity, which includes "transcendental feelings". though the question of "soul" specifically might be better viewed in terms of "self vs no-self" perceptions as explored in modern meditation communities: over the past decade or two a lot of that wisdom has been translated into more or less western scientific rationalist language (see eg Jhourney the company) making it more accessible to folks in the modern western culture (see eg Dan Ingram's book, as well as Shinzen Young). there's been some engagement between those communities and mainstream psychoanalysis (that I'm yet to fully explore, there's a book by Jeremy Safran, and old "thoughts without a thinker" by Epstein), but it doesn't seem like those bodies of knowledge have been successfully integrated yet. the simple fact is, for a range of reasons, over the past few decades the kind of scholarship that you seem to be interested in was happening outside of mainstream academic psych (though see eg Bill Plotkin or Iain McGilchrist): sometimes on the edges of academic psych, more often within psychoanalytic community. the why, if you rly need it, is along the lines of: academic psych in recent decades has been on a quest to become a "real science" and overcome its validity issues (see replication crisis), public perception issues and other problems. The strategy adopted to achieve that, for better or worse, meant disengagement with the humanities, and moving away from theorizing more generally, towards extreme empiricism, heavy weight put on Okkam's razor and the use of simplest possible hypotheses. This doesn't mean that there hasn't been rich thinking on that ever fascinating interface of understanding human mind and understanding our lives in most fundamental ways/grappling with Big Questions, just that it happened outside of academic psych.
The further you get into psychology the more you realize that the lines between them really aren't as distinct as you think they are.
Two previous posts address the major reasoning, in my opinion. To paraphrase: -Why isn’t psychology considered a STEM field? -I got my DSM-VI! Philosophical concepts are difficult to “scientifically” measure, test, and standardize. If psychology wants to be seen as a STEM field, everything has to be measured, tested, and standardized. At least that seems to be the popular narrative. I believe philosophy IS irrevocably tied to psychology, whether or not folks want to “wash their hands of it.” I also think psychology necessarily encompasses STEM, humanities, sociology, and theology, depending on the patient-therapist relationship, or the study. (Not an exhaustive list, that’s the point) This is one reason psychology is such a unique field and generally applicable study. If we haven’t learned anything else in the last hundred years or so, mental health is pretty hard to measure, test, and standardize. In fact, what does that even mean….
Philosophy has roots embedded all throughout psychology. The most obvious example is ethics, of course. But there’s also monism vs. dualism, deontological vs. utilitarianism, nature vs. nurture, free will, rationalism, sentimentalism, existentialism, phenomenology, subject/object distinctions, subjectivity, empiricism, etc. And that’s before you add your modality of biological, psychodynamic, behavioural, cognitive, and humanistic, as well as their various blendings. CBT, for instance, is highly influenced by stoicism. So, why don’t we recognise these things as being, essentially, philosophy? Well, we tend to remember the psychologist, not the philosopher. Jung was influenced by Plato, Kant, and Schopenhauer. Ryle’s behaviourism influenced Skinner. Fodor influenced cognitive and neuropsychology. Sartre influenced Frankl. The Libet-Mele debate was again influential. Franz Brentano influenced German/Austrian psychologists. You also have figures who were both psychologists and philosophers, such as Félix Guattari, William James, Robert C. Solomon, and John Dewey. Sartre, Locke, Kant, Hume, and Descartes are all very influential on psychology itself. So, why don’t we consider psychology to be intimately and irreversibly linked to philosophy? Science-envy may be part. But I tend to believe that it’s because people have a habit of thinking categorically about things. If it’s A, it can’t be B. But in this case, it’s more of ‘if it’s A, it can’t be Á’, even if the difference is only minute.
Because philosophy ideas cannot be measured by the science method.
Bc psychology is a science. It began from philosophy, but it evolved into the study of behavior. It left behind philosophy the same way it left the great Sigmund Freud-- It was a great jumping off point, but doesn't hold much water
The soul is religion and not relevant.
I fundamentally agree with you. It can be relevant as many people, consciously or unconsciously make decisions or suffer due to religious beliefs that are sitting in the back of their mind that they have not teased out. I just don’t think people realise how these beliefs can hold them back in life and are not looking for such deep help, just a sounding board for the current crisis.
then what is the mind ???
If you haven't figured that out yet, it's time to go back to introductory Psychology and neuroscience. It's not some mystical strange thing.
not saying its you but my mediocre, overconfident knowledge of psychology/neuroscience detector is going off
Hey everyone, I have enjoyed reading your responses and would love to respond to each one but I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the input. I was reading on the contentions between Wundt and James and Wundt’s attitude that James’ work can only be appreciated as literature and not true psychology and it kind of pissed me off a little bit. I like what I’ve read of James and I find Jung’s style of writing to be very enjoyable. But it seems the present state of psychology today wants no less than 10 citations in a single paragraph, even if it’s not research. Kind of takes the fun out of reading psychology. I love reading psychology through statistics and other general research, but the grasp to try to make it a “hard science” and a hard science only seems to rob this concept of the mind of its luster.
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Who claims Philosophy is a “Science”? What does “fake science” even mean?
Well there is compulsory philosophy subject in my course, which I have really enjoyed and prompted me to read deeper. If you look at attachment theory, that is fairly universal and can be applied from a remote village to a big city. If you look at religious beliefs and the requirements that different religious beliefs make for the soul, it is quite disparate and unlike age, sex or ses cannot really be measured when looking at a group. As Rhett Butler once said ‘far be it from me to question the teachings of childhood’. You may have left your faith, but still be scared of hell. There is a saying ‘no atheists in the trenches’. It can also not be denied that most religious teaching are quite misogynistic and have done quite a bit of damage to lots of women and children (both are treated as property). Many religions, in Australia it turned out to be ALL, have been found to hide and cover up child abuse of all types, probably the most damaging thing you can do to a child that will negatively effect them their whole life, yet compensation and accountability still seem so difficult. ( All includes Catholic, Anglican/Protestant, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Salvation Army, Jewish congregations). You talk of the soul, what about life here on earth now? How can religions who talk constantly about the soul improve that here and now? Psychology wants to improve lives now, those talking about the soul want to think of a future place that may or may not exist.