From Soul to Mind: The Emergence of Psychology, from Erasmus Darwin to William James

by Edward S. Reed

Early in the nineteenth century, psychology was considered a science of the soul; by the end of the century, it had abandoned the soul to become a science of the mind, says Edward Reed. In this lively and original account of psychology's formative years, Reed tells the story of the failures and successes of the attempts of nineteenth-century thinkers and practitioners―including philosophers, theologians, medical workers, mesmerists, and even poets―to make psychology into a science. He also situates psychological developments within the social, religious, and literary contexts of the times, taking into account the effects of such significant historical changes as rising nationalism, industrialization, urbanization, and changes in communication.

From Soul to Mind introduces a cast that includes not only well-known psychologists and philosophers (Kant, Reid, Darwin, James) but also figures important in their time who are largely forgotten today (R. H. Lotze in Germany, G. H. Lewes in Britain) and literary notables (Mary Shelley, E. T. A. Hoffman, Edgar Allan Poe). Countering the widespread belief that psychology is the offspring of philosophy, Reed contends that modern philosophy arose when academic philosophers sought to distinguish themselves from psychologists. He places the histories of philosophy and psychology within a broad intellectual and social framework and offers a new perspective on the roots of the New Psychology.

Genres: Psychology, Philosophy, History

302 pages, Paperback

First published May 29, 1997

Reviews

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Remarkable to me how little read this suggestive book appears to be. Reed died shortly before it was published, so it did not receive the appreciation subsequent scholarship by Reed might have conferred upon it. I quote from its sensible conclusion: "Once the science of psychology arrogates the right to reject out of hand the content of a person's experience -- because it is too inchoate, mystical, or whatever -- it can no longer pronounce on the meaning of the experience."

But our current psychology, beholden to applied research (pharmaceuticals), academic study of the brain, clinical study of behavior, and the repudiation of the unconscious, commits all sorts of these arrogations, each a reductive science. Reed's history of 19th Century psychology is an effort to recuperate the richness of that period's "serious intellectual journalism." Reed uses no foot/end notes -- he explains these traditions that culminate in his hero, the American physiologist, William James. One suggestive question, of course, is whether Jamesian humanism hasn't always been an Erkenntnistheorie, or science of science. That's how it appears on Reed's account.

[Aileen Yee]

About the emergence of psychology in literature, how in the past people were persecuted if they spoke or acted out against the church; and so, people expressed their beliefs (along with their frustrations) in the form of art, including literature.

[David Auerbach · Rating 4 out of 5]

Concise and evidently very well-informed history of "psychology" in the modern world. Lots of obscure names I'd never even heard of, sort of the "Secret History of Psychology."