Re: Unsolved Problems in Psychology

Posted by Eric Charles on May 18, 2012; 1:30am
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/Unsolved-Problems-in-Psychology-tp7555188p7564785.html

Arlo, I agree completely about the process point.

I was a bit less certain when you said, "something difficult about psychology is that much of the data has to be collected through someone else - those [people] involved in the study"

I assume you would consider a person to be part of the physical world, treatable in most ways like any other type of object. Yes?  If so, how is your statement different than the following,

"something difficult about chemistry is that much of the data has to be collected through something else - those chemicals involved in the study"

Eric

On Thu, May 17, 2012 06:23 PM, Arlo Barnes <[hidden email]> wrote:

It seems so far science and tech have been regarded as thing, or adjectives to describe 'problem' - whereas I consider them processes (and to a much lesser extent philosophies in the) and not necessarily even ones with discrete ends, but more a recursive approach - I see a phenomena, I make a 'magic' explanation, I collect data on it, and see if the magic matches the data. If not, I revise the explanation. If so, I see if it predicts more data. Wash, rinse, and repeat. Really we are making rules (that are not perfect and have exceptions, and are therefore not 'done') and making more rules that govern the exceptions (and those rules also have exceptions). So we have something asymptotically approaching whatever objective Truth/reality there is by way of infinite regression. Then if we are doing tech, we makes things that take advantage of this set of rules and therefore work most of the time.
I think something difficult about psychology is that much of the data has to be collected through someone else - those involved in the study.
-Arlo James Barnes.

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Eric Charles

Professional Student and
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State University
Altoona, PA 16601

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