This simple, cute children’s book is designed to help people understand youngsters on the Autism spectrum. Probably it is best for siblings and classmThis simple, cute children’s book is designed to help people understand youngsters on the Autism spectrum. Probably it is best for siblings and classmates who are struggling to understand the behavior of someone on the spectrum. The pictures of cats a very sweet, but I don’t know that it tells you much you don’t already know about cats. As I understand it, the use of “Asperger Syndrome” is now pretty dated and even seen as a bit offensive, so this may now be too old for schools and libraries. ...more
This book, which came out a few years after Albert Speer’s memoir became an international best-seller, reflects a period of public fascination with thThis book, which came out a few years after Albert Speer’s memoir became an international best-seller, reflects a period of public fascination with the leadership of the Third Reich. It has relatively little new to offer, but the promise of a psychological analysis of each of the Nuremberg defendants was enough to guarantee sales. Unfortunately, it hardly delivers on that promise.
The book is actually a new analysis of a set of Rorschach tests that were applied to the defendants prior to trial by psychologist G.M. Gibert, whose books Nuremberg Diary and The Psychology of Dictatorship Based on an Examination of the Leaders of Nazi Germany are more valuable first-hand accounts of the mental state of the Nazis after their defeat. At the time of the trials, the Rorschach test was a relatively new tool, and the authors admit that its application was not entirely correct. By the 1960s, it had become a widely-used and applied technique, although it has declined considerably since then, in part because the ink-blot patterns used in the test are now so widely familiar that spontaneous responses are relatively improbable. This book came out at a time when educated readers were likely to be familiar with the test and also to regard it as a solid scientific method.
Today, I’m somewhat skeptical of its validity, and this book does little to change that view. The lack of color in the photographs of the tests themselves makes I hard at times to understand the responses properly. The authors seem to be looking for indications of pathology in most cases, and will change their interpretations of the patients’ words to fit that expectation. In some cases, they seem to decide that the test is indicative of the intelligence of the subject, although it is not designed to measure that. And, typical of the psychiatry of that period, they are eager to find sexual perversion in the words of every answer. Certain leaders’ tests are not included (the only explanation is that they were “not available”), and this is disappointing, particularly in the case of Julius Streicher, the one Nazi whose sexual fixations were fairly open and unquestionable.
This book does offer some interesting character sketches of several of the Nuremberg defendants, but it is not the most useful book for anyone seeking deeper insight to their personalities....more
This book is less interesting for itself than for the three introductions (or rather, the preface, foreward, and introduction) that precede it. We’ll This book is less interesting for itself than for the three introductions (or rather, the preface, foreward, and introduction) that precede it. We’ll get to those in a minute. The contents of the book purport to be the memoir of a German psychiatrist who treated Adolf Hitler during the period of his rise to power, from 1919 to sometime around 1930. This is errant nonsense. Any historian of the Third Reich will instantly recognize this as a forgery – the personality he describes is not the real Adolf Hitler, but the caricature seen in media reports of Western countries. It is even more obvious than the books of Hermann Rauschning, which at least have a tint of plausibility about them. The book was printed at the height of the war, a time when English-speaking audiences were frantically reading about Hitler and Germany, and almost anything could (and did) get into print. Fortunately, so far as I can tell, no historian has ever relied on it for accurate information. The text is only amusing in its application of outdated Freudian stereotypes to that popular image of Hitler.
But, back to that prefatory matter, which is so interesting. The first brief “foreward” is written by Upton Sinclair, the famous novelist and social critic. I think he was fully aware of the dubious nature of the book, and he retains a sly distance from the text. He even goes so far as to suggest that “Kurt Krueger” may not really exist at all (“I assume he exists, because I have a letter from him”). For him, the book is merely evidence that Hitler “is one of the most interesting men who have ever lived,” and that interest in him will continue long after the war ends. He never really endorses the content in any way, but presumably he received a nice royalty check from it for a few years. This is followed by a “Preface” by one K. Arvid Enlind, who may or may not be the actual author of the text. His prose is certainly similar, although it’s possible that he was the uncredited editor of a work written in German or bad English by a German-speaker. His point is that the world has produced monsters like Hitler (and, presumably, Stalin) because it has abandoned God and Christianity. This, I suspect, was the reason for the book in general (that and cashing in on the interest in Hitler), and it is at its most obvious in this preface. Finally, Otto Strasser, the exiled ex-Nazi whose brother Julius was killed in the “Night of the Long Knives” action, provides the introduction. Strasser engages in schadenfreude and exalts in repeating old gossip about Hitler’s sex life. He sets the reader up to expect prurient revelations in the text to come, and he serves to legitimize those stories because “he was there” and he believes them (or claims to). Strasser, of course, is a notoriously untrustworthy witness, who was happy to endorse anything that might undermine Hitler’s regime, especially if he could get paid for it.
That’s about all that’s worth saying about this book. Read it for an insight to what people read and believed in the forties, not for any actual information about the Third Reich....more
This book, by the author of “Weimar Culture,” one of my go-to resources on European history, was something of an eye-opener for me. It turns out that This book, by the author of “Weimar Culture,” one of my go-to resources on European history, was something of an eye-opener for me. It turns out that Gay was a leading figure in “psychohistory” and an advocate of applying Freudian psychoanalytical technique to the study of history. In a way, it’s not surprising if the 1980s was the time of the rise of such an approach, it maps with the rising trend of applying psychoanalysis to fields other than psychology, such as art, literature, and film. Cynically, I suspect that this trend mirrors the decrease in Freud’s reputation among psychologists, but I accept that I don’t know enough about psychology to say for sure. This book, written in 1984, is ahead of the “Cultural Turn,” and thus is not deconstructionist, post-modernist, or post-structuralist; it is fairly typical intellectual history with a certain amount of delving into “subconscious” motivations on the part of its subjects. On the whole, it seems fairly balanced and reasonable, even if some conclusions better than others.
This methodology is applied to the study of the nineteenth-century bourgeoisie, a hard-enough entity to define, across essentially all of Europe and the United States, but with a definite preference for England, France, Germany, and the USA; other nations just put in cameo appearances. Gay is not blind to the problem of his very broad subject matter, and trying to nail down just what it is he’s studying takes up considerable space in this volume. Part of the problem is that “bourgeois” became as much an epithet as an identity partway through the century, and many of its most obvious members were in denial of their status. Another is that the class structure of different countries varied nationally; there was already considerable difference between being “middle class” in Germany and England in 1850, and this only became more stark as time went on.
Nevertheless, Gay’s analysis has a lot to offer. In some ways, this is the foundational study of “mainstream” heterosexuality during its formative period that Queer Studies critics have long been calling for (but didn’t realize it was already there). Gay has devoted this volume to the question of whether “Victorians” were really as uptight as everyone claims. His answer is both yes and no. In some areas – such as their demonization of the natural function of masturbation – they were shockingly repressed and repressive. But, looking deeply at diaries and letters between married couples and lovers, he comes to the conclusion that many people had fully satisfying, healthy sex lives. And, despite all the public outrage and concern about eroticism and “degeneracy,” they also produced some highly erotic expressions, primarily nudes, primarily female, in sculpted and painted forms, which he analyzes in detail. Gay comes out pretty sure that the 19th century was as horny as any other, and no more neurotic than most, for what that is worth.
As a pretty serious critic of Freud, it’s no surprise that I found several points of disagreement with Gay. Not least was his willingness to accept Freud’s about-face on the original Seduction Theory, which postulated that hysteria was widespread among middle class European women because so many of them were, in fact, sexually abused as children by their fathers. Given what we know today about child sexual abuse and its traumatic effects, this theory resounds even more strongly now and Freud’s odd notion that the women created their own trauma by fantasizing about sex with their fathers seems like classic victim-blaming. But the 1980s is starting to seem almost as distant as the 1880s now, and it seems easier to accept that “people just thought differently then” and not to be quite so dismissive of other insights based on one mistake. Folks who are interested in the historiography of sexuality would do well to see where it was coming from at this early point in history....more
This book was already an established canonical text of film theory when I read it as an undergraduate, over two decades ago. It remains influential, bThis book was already an established canonical text of film theory when I read it as an undergraduate, over two decades ago. It remains influential, because it is one of relatively few books that can serve as a basic text on film analysis, carefully defining terms as it goes so that new students can, albeit with effort, keep up.
I remember being somewhat fascinated by Nichols’ style when I read it the first time. The Preface and Introduction, for example, each begin with very general observations: “Contradictions reveal, among other things, the passing of time” (p.viii) and “Images surround us” (p.1). He continues to discuss these generalizations for the next page, slowly circling in on a more specific interest, so that the reader learns to expect that the specifics given are illustrations of a broader theoretical or philosophical concern. This isn’t particularly unusual in theoretical writing, but it was new to me at the time, and I notice it instantly when I return to the text now.
The other thing that has changed for me over time is that I’ve seen more of the movies he’s talking about. When I first read it, I’m not sure I had even seen “The Birds,” or at least not all of it, but since then I’ve become familiar with “Blonde Venus,” “Young Mr. Lincoln,” and other movies he works with. During that year, I worked on a paper (probably the longest I had written at that time) on Frederick Wiseman, no doubt based largely on Nichols’ discussion of “High School,” “Hospital,” and “Titticut Follies.” (I’m somewhat glad I no longer have that paper to remind me how bad a writer I was back then – although it might have the effect of making me more sympathetic to the struggles of modern-day undergraduates).
Nichols will turn a lot of people off, especially the sort of people who reject “film theory” as a category of analysis. Most filmmakers in America insist that theory just gets in the way of telling a story, that it is all mental masturbation, that it doesn’t have anything to do with practical considerations, and I’m sure that and far worse has been said about Nichols. His approach relies on Marx and especially on Freud, both of which are due for serious reconsideration by film theorists. He uses a lot of words which don’t appear in my dictionary, and demands a very attentive and careful reading to comprehend his arguments. I’d even go so far as to say that, while I enjoy the style and the writing, there are times when he gets caught up in his own discourse to the point he seems to lose sight of the subject of his analysis. But, maybe that’s the undergraduate inside me, speaking still.
All of which is to say that a 30-plus-year-old book won’t always seem cutting-edge and up-to-date, but it’s remarkable how much of Nichols still resonates in the twenty first century. I haven’t kept up with media studies, so I don’t know to what degree he is still being used or how far current film analysis has progressed past his position. But it seems to me that he serves as an excellent point of departure, even if we assume that film analysis can be better informed by current psychological understanding than by the theories formed 100 years ago in Vienna. If nothing else, Nichols provided a vocabulary and a syntax that film students will still benefit from learning....more
Toward the end of the 1960s, the concept of "Psycho-History," or psychological history, gained some currency in academic circles. The tools of psycholToward the end of the 1960s, the concept of "Psycho-History," or psychological history, gained some currency in academic circles. The tools of psychology and psychoanalysis, it was argued, could be brought to bear on historical subjects, bringing a unique insight to the motivations and actions of people of the past. Instead of simply understanding the past in terms of superficial actions and public statements, we would be able to get inside the minds of historical actors, and perhaps reach the holy grail of knowing “wie es wirklich war.”
It didn’t take long for academic historians to realize the serious problems in such a methodology. First, historians would need to go back to school and get training in psychology, spending years of their time gaining a new skill. That would be worth it if the rewards were high enough. But, then we reach the second problem – in order to properly psychoanalyze a subject, a psychologist must spend hours alone with that subject, studying his or her spontaneous reactions to stimuli and listening to the most intimate details of their mental life. Historians, even when studying living subjects, never have this opportunity. History is essentially the study, not of the mind, but of the documentary traces people and events leave; and, while historians have an array of methodologies for analyzing such documents, psychologists offer little or no useful insight into them.
The concept of psycho-history, however, did catch on strongly with the public, and remains a strong selling point even now. History buffs (as opposed to historians) like to feel that they are connecting with historical actors the way they do with their favorite fictional characters; they want to believe they are seeing inside of minds, not simply learning about facts. The more sensational historical figures offer themselves for the most thrilling such vivacious experiences, as readers have the opportunity to imagine they understand another’s bizarre or insane acts. Books like The Psychopathic God, by historian R.L. Waite, also confirmed what people then wanted to believe about the leader of the Third Reich: he was dangerously insane, and had to be stopped at any cost because of the destruction he would otherwise have wrought.
This book, published by a popular press in the early 1970s with an afterword by Waite, satisfied those same urges. The report which constitutes the bulk of its text, however, is not historical. Its author and his team prepared it for the Office of Strategic Services (or OSS, the forerunner of today’s CIA) at the very beginning of US involvement in World War II. As Langer explains in the introduction he, and OSS chief William Donovan, felt that psychological warfare methods needed to be updated to include the most cutting-edge insights into psychology at that time, and should be headed by actual psychologists, rather than military propagandists. Langer was such a psychologist, and he prepared the report based on interviews with people who had met Hitler in addition to media reports and such documents and intelligence studies as were available at the time (and there was quite a bit, as attested to in the bibliography of this volume). This is similar to, though not the same as a historian conducting interviews and reading documents, but it differs in the sense that Langer was a qualified psychologist, and that his subject was currently alive and active. The value of his work, from the OSS’s point of view, is that it offered some predictions regarding Hitler’s likely future behavior and what to do about it.
For the reader today, it is not an especially useful biography of Adolf Hitler, as so much new material has since come to light, so many of Langer’s sources have been called into question, and many of his conclusions seem irrelevant or questionable. Certainly questions of Hitler’s sexuality continue to titillate a popular audience, but provide little valuable insight into the crimes of the Third Reich. That is not to say that it is useless, however. I would recommend this book as a study of the history of US intelligence and psychological warfare. The kind of report we see here is a prototype for the kinds of reports intelligence agents prepare routinely today, employing some of the same methods as suggested by Langer, although in general vastly more refined versions thereof. Even questions such as Hitler’s sexuality or work habits would be interesting in that light, in regard to what the OSS was interested in knowing and why. In that sense, Langer probably tells us more about himself, and his boss, than he does about his subject, but that, after all, is the nature of psychology – it turns the focus from the subject of speech to its speaker....more
This book, by the wife of psychologist Carl Jung and one of her students, uses his concepts to explore one of the classic “archetypal” myths of the WeThis book, by the wife of psychologist Carl Jung and one of her students, uses his concepts to explore one of the classic “archetypal” myths of the Western world. It’s a pretty interesting read, although some parts will be more obscure depending on your familiarity with the Jungian approach and with the original legend. I personally found the beginning and end to be rough going, but there’s a good deal of interesting material in the middle of the book. I think it would have helped (me) to have started with a simplified narrative of the grail quest, synthesized from all of the major sources used, before breaking into an analysis of each part and each source separately. I can see why the authors might have deliberately avoided this, however: to prevent newcomers from thinking that there is a simple or “right” way to tell the story. The sources actually differ pretty widely, and this only becomes clear as you progress through the material in depth.
If you’re looking to be entertained by a classic “quest” piece of literature, then, this is not the book for you. If you already know something about the Grail, or if you’re excited by Jungian archetypes in general, I think you will find something of interest here. Within that, I had a few problems with the approach. One was that there is an implied “progressive” concept of social psychology at work. While the authors are sometimes careful enough to put “primitive” in quotation marks, the underlying analysis suggests that the idea of the self has gone through three stages – pagan, Christian, and modern – in that order, and that each is an improvement over the previous one. To make matters worse, certain aspects the concept of “paganism” as explained here appear to be taken from Christian propaganda against it.
Still, given the book’s age (now over fifty years old) this is largely to be expected, and does not really detract from the analysis provided. I don’t tend to take Jungian ideas as literal truths, but as fascinating thought-experiments that mix spiritual and psychological ideas in original ways. This approach to the grail did stimulate some very interesting ideas for me, some of which I hope I can explore further by greater exposure to classic “quest” literature. ...more
In this book, Robert Jay Lifton sought to understand how people trained to heal and protect life became involved as perpetrators of genocide and the dIn this book, Robert Jay Lifton sought to understand how people trained to heal and protect life became involved as perpetrators of genocide and the destruction of life. It remains significant as a book which ties together the early eugenics laws and operations to sterilize or euthanize undesirables with the ultimate development of mass killings on the Russian front and in the extermination camps. It also remains one of the most comprehensive analyses of the men who carried out the selections within the camps, and thus is an important historical contribution, which fortunately remains readily available more than twenty five years after its initial publication.
This is not to say that the book is without flaws, however, and history teachers considering it as a text will want to supplement it with more current research on perpetrators by historians, such as Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland. Lifton was not a historian, and in his introduction he confesses his own limited ability in German, Polish, and other relevant languages. Although the book is based on interviews, it appears that Lifton did not adhere to accepted standards of oral history, acting more as a journalist or psychologist might in approaching the subject. In some sense, this is logical, as he was a psychologist who had published several popular works, mostly about recent traumatic events and their effect on the participants and victims. As such, he gives insight into the inner workings of perpetrators, and finds (as Browning would) that their responses to the situation varied. I’m not qualified to assess his use of the psychological concept of “doubling” to explain how perpetrators found it possible to live with themselves, but I tend to concur with his estimation that the concept of “lebensunwertes Leben” served as a justification for doctors in deciding to see “healing” the Volk community as a higher priority than protecting the individual lives of marginalized victims of the regime.
I read this book many years ago, at the outset of my interest in German history and fascism, and it served as a good place to explore some complex issues, following upon some rather more sensationalist works on the Third Reich. It is accessible for people with little background in history or psychology, and that is probably one key to its success, but it does not oversimplify or overstate its case. At the time I read it, I was particularly interested in its coverage of Joseph Mengele, who had been presented as a kind of movie-style villain figure in other works, and this gave a more complex sense of him, without trivializing the evil he committed. As Lifton quotes one of the camp survivors saying in the introduction, “it is demonic that they were not demonic,” but rather human beings committing acts of evil that live as a potential in each of us. Books such as this may help us ultimately find ways to prevent that potential from being expressed in the future....more
This was recommended to me as a means to "aid my lifelong commitment" to Working on myself. It also seemed appropriate at a point in my life where I aThis was recommended to me as a means to "aid my lifelong commitment" to Working on myself. It also seemed appropriate at a point in my life where I am sorting out the death of one of my parents, a kind of turning point in which you can no longer think of yourself as young and immortal. Hillman argues that as a society we have become so focused on Youth that we fail to appreciate the value of becoming an Elder. He suggests that what makes us truly unique as we go through life is our "character," which comes through most forcefully as we leave behind the limitations of inexperience and truly become ourselves in old age. I would call this a fascinatingly subversive conservative concept, but not in the simplistic political sense of "conservative." Of course, conservatives of that breed have long fallen back on the argument that various kinds of hardship (which they generally do not suffer) build "character," but Hillman isn't glorifying unfairness in this way. Rather, he is conservative in the sense of arguing that what you already are is nothing to be ashamed of, is in fact the true "you," and that embracing it in the face of criticism is the highest form of self-change. On another level, however, he argues that the fear of growing old is based in an over-reaction to natural change - your role is different, your perceptions are different, your body is different than it used to be and that's part of character too. The book is written in a contemplative, poetic style, at times whimsical, at times deeply spiritual. I read it slowly and deliberately, as perhaps an older person would, and I think I got more out of it that way. ...more
This is one of those "seminal" books that shows you why so much of Western thought is totally screwed up. The premises and logic of Freud's argument aThis is one of those "seminal" books that shows you why so much of Western thought is totally screwed up. The premises and logic of Freud's argument are utter nonsense from beginning to end, yet he somehow taps into a vein of unconscious imagery within the contemporary Zeitgeist that still resonates 80 years later. Certainly, for anyone studying the early 20th century, the ideas in here will seem eerily familiar; Freud isn't so much creating a new argument here as speaking aloud what was in everyone's heads at the time.
So, the basis of this little thought-experiment was Freud's concept of the struggle between eros and thanatos: the drive for pleasure and the drive for death. That much still may apply, one way or another. As Freud saw it, the frustration of the id's natural desire for pleasure and love led to neurotic obsessions with death and destruction through aggressive behaviors. That part of the argument is sensible enough that the publishers see fit to include it on the back cover. What they don't tell you is that all of this began at some objective point in prehistory when a gang of brother cavemen killed and ate their father in order to possess and gang-rape their mother. For real. Freud says that this actually happened, and he "proves" it by pointing to various ancient myths in various cultures that can be seen as allegories for this objectively real event. I'm sure most Freudians would say that this is a metaphorical event, which took place in the imaginations of ancient peoples and that we still carry the legacy of this concept, but Freud's rejection of Jung's "collective unconscious" forces him into a position like unto fundamentalist Christians, insisting that his myths must be based upon actual fact.
Indeed, this text is largely intended as a refutation of Jung and other psycho-analysts of the time who were suggesting that something valuable might be found in spirituality. Freud used this horrific imagery to posit that all religious thought is based upon perversity and hatred. Certainly this resonated well enough with many of his contemporaries, and no doubt it still does. Underneath this is also an underlying argument that it is civilization itself which necessitates the death-drive and the existence of neuroses, again a common enough idea. Freud is not "anti-civilization," of course, and wants to believe that the eros-principle can be integrated into a healthy psyche without a complete return to nature, but this seems to contradict his own logic. Psychology has long-since abandoned Freud, but he remains an influential force in philosophy and social science, which needs to move on as well. I recommend this book primarily for its historical perspective, not for any actual insights....more
This book reminds me of Goldy Locks and the Three Bears, because the first part is too cold, the second part is too hot, while the third part is Just This book reminds me of Goldy Locks and the Three Bears, because the first part is too cold, the second part is too hot, while the third part is Just Right. Well, substituting "simplistic" for "cold" and "complex and technical" for "hot," it works, anyway.
The book is a series of essays written for general readers by a noted neurophysiologist, which is a somewhat bold move, and is perhaps understandably uneven. The first section is on “Ethology and Evolution” and includes the title essay. What is a throwing Madonna, you may well ask (at least two people asked me, when they saw the cover). Well, this is based on Calvin’s rather original speculative insight into brain specialization and human evolution, which he articulated in two papers for scientific journals prior to this book (they are included as appendices). Basically, he suggests that handedness could have developed because mothers tend to cradle their infants on the left side (nearer the heartbeat) and that mothers, developing the skill of throwing rocks to kill game, might have thrived or died based on their ability to throw with the right hand, which led to people with more complex and stratified brain function surviving and producing more such (mostly right-handed) offspring. Hence, his iconic image of a mother is a “throwing Madonna,” hurling a rock at a rabbit.
Now, I’ve included this, which may be Calvin’s signal effort in the “too cold” section of the book. Basically, in the essays in this section he dumbs things down more than he needed to (for me at least). The journal articles at the back of the book were better organized and more convincing, and included much clearer evidence. But this was far from the worst essay in the section. The next essay, on “The Lovable Cat” is probable the dumbest in the book (and even admits at the end that it is a cheap ploy to get the book to sell better. Here, he suggests that cats became pets for humans because they learned to “mimic” the behaviors of human infants. What behaviors, he doesn’t specify. I guess “cats are cute, babies are cute” was about as much as he expected people to understand.
The second section is titled “Neurophysiology,” which is Calvin’s specialty, and here he went all-out in presenting evidence and details. I’ll admit (and I’m a fairly smart guy with three Master’s degrees) that I didn’t understand even the basic argument of at least half of the essays in this section. I kind of get that he wants me to understand that the brain is more complex in its function than a computer, but don’t ask me to explain why. There’s also an essay on the year he spent researching in Israel, which reminded me from a political science perspective of how much better things were there in the 1980s, although we all thought things couldn’t get any worse. The final essay in this section is called “Left Brain, Right Brain, Science or the New Phrenology?” and is essentially a negative review of a book Calvin didn’t bother to read. For that reason, Calvin could not have understood why Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain would remain one of the most popular art instruction books more than forty years after its first publication, although he concedes that people have told him “it’s even a good drawing book.” He assumes that its success is because people are dumb about science, but actually it’s because the book has nothing to do with science and everything to do with seeing. We all know that the left/right brain divide is oversimplified, but from an artistic perspective, it’s a useful metaphor, not an example of some primitive lapse into superstition.
I was close to giving up on the book, but there were finally some much better pieces in “When Things Go Wrong,” and especially in “Neurolinguistics.” Here we started getting some interesting details about current research into the brain and some of the results of that research, boiled down to a much more readable level without being dumb. I think the big success for me was “Probing the Language Cortex” which went into specifics of studies of people with epiliepsy whose brains are stimulated while they try to solve various problems, to see which areas affect which motor or linguistic skills. In light of the President’s recent call to finalize the map of the brain, I’d like to believe that such research has proceeded apace since this book was written, and that we are coming reasonably close to a realistic assessment of the brains actual (not phrenological) division.
Because this is such an old book, I did a little research to see whether Calvin’s work was still being cited as relevant. To my surprise, I found a few scientific articles that actually cited this general-audience book, not just his research. Apparently his idea about throwing being the trigger that developed handedness and possibly linguistic skills is still being seriously researched today. At least one of his assertions, that humans are the only animals that throw one-handed has been discounted (as anyone who has seen monkeys in the zoo fling poo knows), but this just means that studies of chimpanzees throwing things has become a new area of neurological research. As recently as a few years ago, this was still being looked at seriously, and may remain one of Calvin’s great contributions to science....more
"Flow" is a book that discusses on a deeper, more academic level, the same essential subject as "Mastery" by George Leonard. Csikczentmihalyi is a psy"Flow" is a book that discusses on a deeper, more academic level, the same essential subject as "Mastery" by George Leonard. Csikczentmihalyi is a psychologist who asked the question, "why are we always studying people in crisis and trauma, why don't we try to learn about what it is to be happy?" This book is the result. He finds that sustained happiness results from "Flow:" "a state of consciousness so focused that it amounts to absolute absorption in an activity." He finds that people achieve this "optimal experience" (note that this is _not_ the same as "ecstasy" or "instant gratification") when they engage themselves with activities for their own sake, not with their minds on the future result. Activities should have rules that can be understood by the participants, require the learning of skills, set up goals, provide feedback, and make control possible. Ideal examples include rock climbing, sailing, playing music and chess, but in fact, everything, from doing the dishes to driving to work to writing a book review, has the capacity to be approached as a "flow" experience. It is a matter of the individual creating the meaning of their activities, and using that meaning to optimize enjoyment.
"Flow" is an easily-read and well organized book. Its basic message is simple, but the author provides many examples and details along the way. It can function as a self-help guide, a methodology for approaching life, or a unique approach to psychology. In any event, it is quite a rewarding read....more
A general note: as was typical at the time of writing, Fromm uses “man” as a generic term for humans and “he” as the generic pronoun for any human beiA general note: as was typical at the time of writing, Fromm uses “man” as a generic term for humans and “he” as the generic pronoun for any human being. Some will find this offensive or unappealing today, but it would have been standard in 1941. In general this review has attempted to avoid such usages.
Erich Fromm wrote this book as an attempt to answer the question of why, when Western Civilization had apparently advanced to the point where democracy was finally possible for all people of Europe, with the hope of its spreading to other continents and cultures, so many Europeans were choosing to ally themselves with Fascism, an ideology that explicitly promised to retract the freedoms which had been won. As a psychologist, Fromm takes a largely psychological approach to this question, but also includes economic, social, and historical forces in his explanation.
The first chapter simply sets out the “problem” of freedom in psychological terms, arguing that freedom is a drive in modern humans, but not one of the “basic” drives that is more or less physiological in nature. One part of this section which I find problematic is his assertion that human beings “must work” in order to fulfill their basic drives, and “work” is defined as “a specific kind of work in a specific economic system.” It appears ironic to me, in his discussion of freedom, that he ignores the fact that in all societies certain people choose to emphasize their drive for freedom over the need to work in the accepted ways, becoming criminals, vagabonds, or other outsiders.
In Chapter Two, “The Emergence of the Individual,” Fromm argues that children begin perceiving themselves as integrated from their environment, but that at some point they become fully self-aware individuals, a process he likens to the Fall from Paradise in its irreversability and consequences. He briefly talks about “instincts” which, he claims, give most other animals the skills they need to survive from birth, and the fact that humans lack such tools, and so must learn, as individuals, how to adapt and survive.
Chapter Three is a discussion of the Reformation, and how it transformed social expectations and attitudes toward freedom. Overall, he follows Weber’s theory of the “Protestant Work Ethic.” A lot of this narrative has come into question in recent years, but I’m going to focus on one thing in particular that disappoints me: Fromm’s tendency to analyze in terms of class. While there is demographic support for the argument that the lower middle classes tend to gravitate first to fascism, and to support it in the largest numbers, this has never told the whole story. Careful analysis, particularly of the more successful fascist movements, suggests that they are often the first true “mass parties” of a given country, recruiting from all classes, even if not entirely equally from all classes. The factors which drive nobles and factory workers to fascism cannot be summarized in a discussion of shopkeepers. Fromm’s discussion seems to draw largely from a priori class arguments, and not from careful analysis of psychological insecurities.
The fourth chapter essentially brings the same arguments up to Fromm’s contemporary world. He illustrates the dehumanizing effects of capitalism by contrasting the small shop-keeper with the department store. He also argues that the insidious effect of political propaganda and advertising is to make the individual feel as if he or she is making choices when in fact he or she is being manipulated. This is reasonably good, but nothing terribly new.
Chapter Five is “Mechanisms of Escape,” and for most of it Fromm seems on firmer ground. Here is where he can discuss psychology as he has practiced it on individuals in a clinical setting. He spends much of the chapter laying out the concept of the “authoritarian personality” or character, and in explaining the sado-masochistic elements of such persons. His authoritarian personality is fundamentally insecure, and is also rebellious against the authorities which he or she grew up with. As an insecure rebel, he or she insists that others believe as he or she does, and attempts to impose his or her will on the outer world. Fromm explains that sadistic and masochistic urges often exist side-by-side in the same individual, which probably isn’t as shocking today as it once might have been, and points to the fundamental destructiveness of such behaviors when repressed and expressed unconsciously. I thought his most interesting discussion was that of the dependency expressed through the “magic helper,” in which for example people who obsess over unavailable love-objects perceive the entire world in terms of gaining the approval or disapproval of that person. The final section discusses “automation conformity,” and begins with a very good explanation (using hypnosis as an example) of the ways in which “pseudo-thoughts” are mistaken for the original thoughts of their expressers. In that sense, he points out that much of the mental activity of individuals is beyond their own control and seems to be coming close to an Ouspenskian perspective. But, at the end of the chapter, he suddenly goes into several irrelevant case-studies using dreams as examples and fundamentally fails to “close the deal” by pointing out that even while “awake,” most people are Asleep and unaware of their own thoughts, feelings, and actions.
With Chapter Six, he finally ties this in to “Fascism,” as the premise of the book promised. Actually, the chapter is titled “Psychology of Nazism” and there is no attempt to theorize fascism as a generic category, and Mussolini is only mentioned once, in passing, to assert (wrongly) that he is pretty much the same as Hitler. In fact, most of the chapter is dedicated to analysis of Mein Kampf to confirm that Hitler is an “authoritarian personality” and exhibits sadistic and masochistic tendencies. On two occasions, he extends analysis of the “Nazi high command” to mention Joseph Goebbels’ pre-Nazi novel, Michael and one citation each of speeches by Ley and Goebbels. To put it bluntly, this is an extremely limited source-base from which to be making assertions about Germany’s rulers, much less the “masses” he claims to be able to analyze in terms of their relationship to National Socialism. He does have some interesting insights into Mein Kampf, but he ignores the fact that hardly anyone in Germany cited it as a reason for sympathizing with or believing in Nazism. In general, the thrust of his argument is that the lower-middle classes, in their flight from freedom and self-responsibility, gravitate towards an authoritarian personality who fulfills their desire to lose their individuality and the anxiety associated with it, and become masochistic servants of the regime while taking sadistic pleasure in whatever authority is granted them within the new hierarchy. All of this we could see coming, and it’s fine, for what it is, but it doesn’t give us anything new or very solid to hold on to.
The final (formal) chapter is “Freedom and Democracy,” and as it is an application of the conclusions of the rest of the book to a discussion of the future of Western and especially American society, it shares in the particular strengths and weaknesses of the previous chapters. Its strongest point by far is the discussion of the psychology and behavior of the “unique individual” in the section titled “Freedom and Spontaneity.” This hearkens to Stirner’s concept of the “the Unique One” and discusses to power of individuals to live as truly autonomous beings. Fromm seems not to be familiar with Stirner, however (he mentions him only once, in connection with Marx, in a much earlier chapter), and when it comes to the question of anarchy, he places it in the same category as disorder and neurotic compulsion. His ideal is “democratic socialism” and he even argues for a centralized economy, which somehow is supposed to function without suppressing the individual. This is the only point in the book at which he addresses soviet-style Communism (Stalinism, at the time he is writing), and he acknowledges that it shares some of the flaws of Fascism, but holds back from presenting a theory of Totalitarianism as such. In warning that the American system could suffer from the same psychological challenges as Germany, he fails to present any analysis of American fascists or even of American examples of authoritarian characters, so we must take his word that some of them resemble his analysis of Hitler.
At the end of the book is a short “appendix” placing the book within the context of contemporary psychological theory. He addressed the various points at which he breaks with Freud, without ever being overly harsh in his criticism of Freud. This section will be of most interest to historians of science and psychology, and possibly some current psychologists will appreciate it for putting psychology into perspective. It doesn’t add to the arguments of the book at all, but simply contextualizes them somewhat.
Overall, I found the book promised more than it delivered. It is interesting to see someone take a psychological approach to theorizing fascism, but Fromm’s familiarity with his subject seems limited to guesswork and source materials in publication. If he actually performed psychotherapy on Germans who sympathized with Nazism, no case studies or anecdotes are included here. Most of the analysis of fascism is based on Mein Kampf, which is a starting point, but not an adequate source to give a complete picture. Where he has the most interesting things to say about freedom, it is usually not in relation to fascism, but more in relation to contemporary society at large, but he holds back from going as far as other authors have in these areas, and so the end result is ultimately disappointing....more
I recommend reading this book simultaneously with _Synchronicity: Science, Myth, and the Trickster_ by Allan Combs and Mark Holland. Read my review ofI recommend reading this book simultaneously with _Synchronicity: Science, Myth, and the Trickster_ by Allan Combs and Mark Holland. Read my review of both books there....more
I recommend reading this book simultaneously with _Synchronicity: The Bridge Between Matter and Mind_ by F. David Peat. These books cover much of the I recommend reading this book simultaneously with _Synchronicity: The Bridge Between Matter and Mind_ by F. David Peat. These books cover much of the same ground from slightly different perspectives. Peat is a trained physicist, who seems to have gone over to pushing a spiritual agenda, based on the apparent unity of cosmic substance. Combs is a Psychologist, whose website claims he is a professor of "transformative studies" in California, while Holland is an English prof (maybe just there to clean up Combs's prose). It is safe to say that all (except maybe Holland) have traveled somewhat outside the conventions of their fields to explore interdisciplinary, unorthodox subject. That, however, is what is required to discuss synchronicity - the point where folklore, physics, and psychology meet.
One reason to read the books together is to keep the BS-detector on. Peat will raise a skeptical eyebrow at some of Combs/Holland's physical speculations, while the Psychologist-English pair avoid some of Peat's historical inaccuracies. But the subject does require some suspension of disbelief to consider. The world does contain a surprising amount of "meaningful coincidence" - and it seems to be generated not least by the action of observation itself, which we find is no longer physically "impossible" but just rather odd. The universe may not be so mechanical as was once imagined, but more organic and complex than that model allows. And it may be that Jung was onto something after all, given Freud's almost complete fall from favor in the academic Psychological world.
One aspect I found especially interesting was the suggestion that attempts at quantifying ESP/psi abilities are themselves destructive to those powers. The task becomes redundant and uninteresting to the psychic, and thus they stop demonstrating success. To suggest that something is "beyond science," is, of course, blasphemy in modern society, but it may be that science needs to start catching up to its own ramifications. The days when scientists believed nearly everything was already known are long since past, and wilder and wilder theories have been bearing fruit.
Most of us have had something occur "by chance" that seemed nearly impossible to explain. If it had meaning for us, it may reflect the ways in which consciousness brings meaning into the the universe, both passively (through analysis) and actively (through the generation of synchronicity). This may mean that we are more powerful beings than we had previously imagined - a discovery entirely worthy of a physicist and a psychologist....more
This, in fact, is the Platonic Ideal of a textbook. It is perfectly organized, clearly written, optimally internally referenced, and - best of all - iThis, in fact, is the Platonic Ideal of a textbook. It is perfectly organized, clearly written, optimally internally referenced, and - best of all - it explains, step-by-step /why/ its particular approach to teaching works. Indeed, this textbook would be ideal for all students to read in their first year of college, because much of its text is devoted to teaching them how to learn more effectively. Similarly, beginning teachers of any subject would be advised to consult this book before constructing a syllabus or preparing a lecture or test, because it will teach them how their students can best learn the material. Finally, it gives the beginning psychology student a surprisingly concise and interesting overview of the state of their field in relation to the internal working of the mind.
It even works well for students who are not traditionally text-oriented or lecture-oriented learners. The many "demonstrations" (which I would call "exercises," but perhaps that word has a stigma attached) serve as opportunities to step away from the text and reinforce the concepts given. Perhaps a particular student will not remember what "prospective memory" is from reading the definition, but will remember that crazy exercise where they tried tying string around their finger to see if it helped them remember to take out the garbage. Often I found the demonstrations helped me to understand the results of a given experiment better - because now I had had a chance to be a participant and to see what they were trying to do.
Cognition is increasingly popular in psychology, and the tools with which we attempt to understand it are increasingly sophisticated. Anyone who is interested in knowing how their mind works can benefit from this book....more
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