Philosophical Origins of Psychology

Rene Descartes: (1596 - 1650)
'I think, therefore I am'

This theory was that the mind and the body were separate and independent of each other.
The body - a complex machine,
The mind - the seat of the soul, both interacting through the brain.

This theory also continues on to the reason, how we are different from animals.
Descartes believed that animals operated blindly, as in that they didn't have a reason for doing things, they just produced action from instinct.

This thory was called Cartesian Dualism.


John Locke: (1632 - 1704)

had a different thory. He shared the theory, with several others on empiricism.

Empiricism, was the view that any external stimuli (or surrounding happenings) and the behaviour that arose from it, as a result, was what could be understood as valid findings to understand any human being.
This also went on as the people who believed in it, also believed that the human process of 'thinking' was unobservable and unimportant.
Thinking, they believed, was only a reaction to external stimulation and this was understood by the way that you could induce a behavioural reponse.
This they called behaviourism.

Locke thought that we dont respond to each stimulus as it occurs, but to alot of different stimuli all associated in some way or another. Which sounds alot like 'deja vu' but not so much an experience, as a relation. This comes under the name of associationism.

Charles Darwin (1809 - 1882)
'Survival of the fittest'

The theory of evolution, came from his study of the human body as the continuous need to develop and adapt to the surroundings. This came through his finding, that each and every animal, would genetically evolve in order to survive. Over generations, all types of that said species, would share that adaptation, as it were, to provide survival.

Darwin also found and singled out selective emotions that humans had in common with animals. These included: fear, rage and pleasure. He concluded, that through these various emotions, we shared the expressions of these said emotions with the animals.

iMMense