Abstract
Traditionally, Wolff has been conceived as the champion of rationalism. The aim of this chapter is to propose an alternative reading of Wolff’s philosophy and empirical psychology, starting from one of his most interesting intuitions: the concept of psychometria (psychometrics). On the one hand, I will undertake an analysis of Wolff’s interest in the measurement of psychological acts during the first half of the Eighteenth Century. On the other hand, I will develop an analysis of psychometrics through the main work of Robert Greene, The Principles of Philosophy of the Expansive and Contractive Forces or an Inquiry into the Principles of the Modern Philosophy (1727), which Wolff reviewed in the Acta Eruditorum in 1728. Greene’s intuition of psychometrics played a considerable role in the development of Wolff’s conceptions of empirical psychology. And that found a setback after Wolff, until the foundation of Wundt’s laboratory of experimental psychology in Leipzig.
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Notes
- 1.
Jean École does not share the same view. According to him the terminological distinction between empirical and rational psychology appears for the first time in Thümmig’s Institutiones in 1725 (École, 1990). Even so, “One must assume … that much of what is new in the ‘Institutiones’ goes back to Wolff’s oral explanations, not to Thümmig’s own elaborations” (Albrecht, 2010, p. 1178).
- 2.
For example, the degree of speed cannot be divided into parts of which one exists outside the other; for this reason, the notion that we have of it is imaginary (Wolff, 1736/1962, §.752). Moreover, the notion of substance is also imaginary. Wolff also cites Robert Greene, who, in his work The Principles of Philosophy of Expansive and Contractive Forces or an Inquiry into the Principles of Modern Philosophy, defines the notion of substance as the result of imagination (Wolff, 1736/1962, §.773). Among imaginary notions, Wolff also mentions, for example, the notion of substance (Wolff, 1736/1962, §.773).
- 3.
Wolff uses the following arguments. We compare two composite entities: a visible object—consisting of several parts, to which several partial perceptions correspond, such as a tree (arborem)—and the corresponding word—the word arborem, consisting of several syllables arranged in a specific sequence. We can more easily imagine a tree and, in general, objects that are visible, than we can smells, tastes, and tactile qualities, much as we can more easily imagine words than we can confused qualities. The reason for this is that we can have confused perceptions of qualities but distinct perceptions of visible objects and words (Wolff, 1740/1972, §.289). The example of words used by Wolff is even more significant because words are given to us by dual material ideas that are perceived through sight in a successive (successive) manner and through hearing in a simultaneous (simul) manner. However, we have to learn how to read written words, and we must develop a habit that reduces the amount of time it takes to perceive the written word, in the same way as happens with a musical instrument or with the educational process, in contrast to the conditions in which savages live, for example (Wolff, 1740/1972, §.290).
- 4.
Wolff also points out that partial perceptions are not only perceptions of the parts of which the perceived thing is composed but also of the determinations or quantity and quality of the same thing (Wolff, 1738/1968, §.40).
- 5.
Above all, it would be difficult to establish an exact relationship between the perfection or willingness on one side and the imperfection or tedium on the other (Wolff, 1738/1968, §.522).
- 6.
For example, the relationship between the Sun and the Moon: “[T]he Sun has an Expansive and Dissipating Force, as is Evident in Fact, the Earth has a Contractive, as is Evident from Gravitation, and the Moon has a Contractive, but which acts in a quite contrary Direction to that of the Earth, as is manifest from the Tides produc’d by their Contranitent Forces” (Greene, 1727, p. 106). Another example is the animal system: “[T]he Animal System has a Contractive, as well as an Expansive Force belonging to it, as is Evident from the Systole and Diastole of the Earth, from the Pulse or Contraction and Dilatation of the Arteries, and from the Expansion and Contraction of the Muscles” (Greene, 1727, p. 108).
- 7.
In this regard he states, “As to the Doctrine of the Expansive and Contractive Forces, Perception seems to Participate of both; It has the Greatest Expansive Force, when it Exerts it’s [sic] self into Business and Action, and the Greatest Contractive, when it Retires from it, and Resigns it’s [sic] self to Study and Contemplation” (Greene, 1727, p. 638).
- 8.
This aspect is strongly affirmed by Greene when he states that all the cases analyzed above “Furnish abundant Matter for Mathematicians to Employ their Speculations about; and which would as much Answer the Purposes of a True Knowledge and a much more Important one, as the Proceeding (which is at Present done) in the Inquiry only into the Relations and Proportions of Abstracted Quantities in Extension” (Greene, 1727, p. 629).
- 9.
In fact, there had been attempts at mathematical calculation in the moral field by, for example, Christian Thomasius (1655–1728) and Francis Hutcheson (1694–1746) (see Aalto, 1981, pp. 343–56; Wood, 2003, p. 815). However, these attempts are not regarded as an integral part of the scientific conception of psychology, in contrast to Wolff’s.
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Mei, M. (2021). Wolff’s Idea of Psychometria. In: Araujo, S.d.F., Pereira, T.C.R., Sturm, T. (eds) The Force of an Idea. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, vol 50. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-74435-9_6
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