An Interpretation of Rudolf Eucken's Philosophy by W. Tudor (William Tudor) Jones
page 61 of 186 (32%)
page 61 of 186 (32%)
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level of History.
But our question now is, Does the nature of man himself confirm such statements as have already been made? And it is to man's own nature and its content we now turn, as these are presented in Eucken's teaching. It is probable that Eucken has done less justice to psychology from the side of the [p.92] connection of consciousness with the external world. He is aware, and points out the fact in several of his books, of the close connection between mind and body; but seems to think that the fact is sufficiently brought out by text-books on psychology that some kind of dualism or parallelism is absolutely necessary to be held in order to account for the content of consciousness. What exact meaning and province should be assigned to psychology is to-day a matter of serious dispute. Textbooks of the nature of William James's _Principles of Psychology_ present a double aspect of the subject-matter as well as of its mode of treatment. It is often difficult to differentiate in James's works where one aspect ends and another begins. Psychology is presented by him as a natural science on one page, and on the opposite page we discover ourselves in the region of ethics and even of metaphysics and religion. On the one side, we find the _connection_ of consciousness and its mode of operation with the physical organism presented in terms which emphasise the mechanical and chemical sides. On the other side, the _content_ of consciousness itself, _after_ the connection has taken place, is presented as a psychology as well. So that several important writers on psychology have emphasised the need of differentiating one aspect from the other, and of confining the meaning of psychology to the description and explanation of the _connection_ [p.93] of mind and body.[26] But when we pass to the content of consciousness, something more than a mere connection of mind and body is discovered. The content |
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