THE TRANSFORMATION OF PSYCHOLOGY INTO AN OPEN SYSTEM OF IDEAS
New ideas come up in every age. The problem with such new ideas is that it is very easy for
many to say what somebody said to Freud when he first described his theory: that he says a lot
of things that hold true, but others have said them before him, and a lot of new things, which,
however, are of no importance and are nonsense
. After so many years, nobody now remembers this person; but everybody remembers Freud.
It is in such conditions that the progress of ideas takes place. Even Freud himself could have
said of others what was said about himself and which we have just described above. [i]
This is the problem of consciousness, with its tendency towards stagnation. The problem of the
limited mobility of the interpretative consciousness as regards the truly complex and dizzying
happening in nature and the functional aspect of life is an anthropological one. To this is added
that of the level of self-referentiality of the consciousness, of its self-awareness and
self-knowledge.
No system which seeks to be closed is complete. The pivotal issue is whether the material
universe is open to actions, in the sense that we give to set theory and to mathematical theory
and meaning. In this case, physico-chemical operations have within them the potential for, in
the broader sense, psychological and biological actions. Thus, psychological and biological
laws of material causal connections, of physical and biochemical processes and affinities have
a broader field of application than that which has been attributed to them up to now.
A closed system of concepts which does not have a reference to ontology and consciousness is
not sustainable. According to Gödel's propositions, [ii] any closed mathematical system of
propositions was rejected as deceptive. The same applies,
a fortiori
, when we speak of concepts in their universality by and large which have reference to the
consciousness.
The consciousness has a phasmatic nature and a multiplicity which has also been developed in
man and in his civilisation. This multiplicity and its freedom cannot be restrained, because
freedom lies in the spiritual nature of the thing which is innate in a bipolar manner and
isomorphically related to its material nature.
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There is in the consciousness a dual dynamic of reasoning and dream which cannot become,
one-dimensionally, monopolar. In the universe of the few perceptible dimensions, as we
apprehend it today, the present-day cosmology of physical science adds dimensions which
make much more difficult the simulatability of the consciousness. The Shakespearean
observation addressed to Horatio is something more than actual truth. [iii]
On a psychology inspired by the holistic structure of the phenomenon of life
We are in a new phase of apprehension of our traumatic and defective relation both with nature
and the ecosystem, and with our self. This is because of the possibility of access to knowledge,
but also by reason of accumulated historical experience and its maturation which allows us to
draw conclusions. Easy access, through the Internet, to specialist and alternative data banks,
the host of educational and historical documentaries, accessible at minimal or no cost, the vast
number of students of human civilisation who lodge their own enhanced or revisionist
approaches to the past and the future militate in favour of the fact that we are going through a
new period which characterises not a very small portion of humanity, but the greater part of the
population of the Western world - at least.
In parallel with the new psychological developments and the evolution of psychological theory,
we must also deal, in a constructive way, with the semantic reading of information, speaking in
terms of the microcosm and taking into consideration the biological example. From the point of
view of the life of the cell, for example, there is a primeval threefold dynamic in its functioning;
this is the dynamic:
(a) of identity;
(b) of reconnaisance, of co-operation, of rejection;
(c) of energy and of stamina.
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This dynamic is revealed to us when we study the immune and haematological cycle of
coherence of the systems. We see it also in the dynamic of specialisation in systems of the
homoeostasis of consciousness, energy, and irregular response. In a similar way, we can
advance to greater functional specialisations by observing systematically the dynamic of
functioning of the core of the cells.
As we draw these conclusions from the observation of biological life, we could say that it would
be normal to expect the same conclusions about the characteristics of life and sustainability
from the human sciences and theories. Consequently, it is natural for us also to expect from
psychology, in parallel with the phasmatic natural process of evolution of the phenomenon of
life, a phasmatic approach to consciousness and life which would bring to light the blastocellular
dynamic of the human hypostasis. We can expect from the new psychology an isomorphic
dynamic of reading of the biopsychological phenomenon on all the scales.
Philosophical origins of psychology
Today's knowledge of psychology owes much to various currents in philosophy. One of these is
that of Existentialism. [iv]
Thus, the philosophical movement of Existentialism, which started out with Søren Kierkegaard
and spread with Karl Jaspers, Gabriel Marcel, Martin Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, Jean-Paul
Sartre, and other philosophers, inspired the creation of the school of psychology of the
existentialist psychologists, such as Abraham Maslow and Rolo May.
We can also see the affinity of psychoanalysis with the fundamental problématique of
Schopenhauer, in connection, moreover, with the primeval myths of the tragic cycle.
The phenomenological school of psychology of Laing is descended from the philosophical trend
of 'phenomenology' of Edmund Husserl, [v] and attempts to throw light both on what appears
and on the way in which it
does. It studies the
angles of vision of the subjects in looking on their world. It tries to describe in detail the content
and the structure of the subjects' consciousness, and to take the qualitative multifariousness of
experiences in and to analyse their substantive meanings. One of its basic characteristics is the
emphasis which it gives to the self-referentiality of consciousness and to the quest for the
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consciousness as an entity.
We can also see the organic theory of the lifespan, or, expressed in another way, the organic
theory of time
, from Bergson to Whitehead, also raising issues interdependent with time, life, and
consciousness as phenomenological or philosophical psychology.
We could say, in conclusion, that all the main schools and the psychological evolutionary
process have as their starting-point either philosophical developments of the thought of Kant, or
the dualist perception of 'self and non-self' of Fichte, or the transition through the various
phases involving the 'titanic' in the cultural element, in Schelling. At the same time, there is also
a current of fundamental psychophysics which has its initial reference to Fechner and Goethe.
Ioannis Zisis, Writer
Photo from Wikimedia
[i] Thompson, Clara, Psychoanalysis: Evolution and Development [Greek edition], publ.
Epikouros, 1992.
[ii] Gödel's First Incompleteness Theorem states that: Any effectively generated theory capable
of expressing elementary arithmetic cannot be both
consistent
and complete
.
In particular, for any consistent, effectively generated formal
theory
that proves certain basic arithmetic truths, there is an arithmetical statement that is true,
but not provable in the theory (Kleene 1967, p. 250)
.
Gödel's incompleteness theorems
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[iii] Shakespeare, William, Hamlet [Greek edition], publ. Pontiki, 2010, p. 61.
"HAMLET: There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your
philosophy."
[iv] Existentialism - Wikipedia.
[v] Phenomenology - Wikipedia.
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