Hi TOK List,
So I continue to be obsessed with deconstructing the problem of psychology and crafting the proper solution. I have just finished reviewing
Watson’s 1913 Behavioral Manifesto. I am using it to show why psychology had a crisis with its subject matter. The answer is that Watson creates and ‘either or split’ between consciousness and behavior. To this day, this remains at the core of the problem
of psychology. That is, we can’t get a commensurate map of the concepts of behavior, consciousness, and science. This failure stems from what I call the Enlightenment Gap and its failure to produce an adequate synthetic philosophy that includes the proper
relations between matter and mind and social and scientific justification systems.
I am thinking of including the figure below. It tries to capture both the problem and the solution I offer. Consistent with my “metamodern sensibility”, it is a ‘sincere ironic’ representation. So, you get the top half, which communicates
the problem is that consciousness can’t equal behavior or be commensurate with it. Then you get my solution, whereby the unequal sign becomes the three layers of Mind (i.e., neurocognitive functionalism, subjective phenomenology, and self-conscious justification.
Per usual, I welcome thoughts.
Best,
Gregg