The psychology of suggestion : a research into the subconscious nature of man and society / by Boris Sidis with an introduction by William James.

  • Sidis, Boris, 1867-1923.
Date:
1898
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The psychology of suggestion : a research into the subconscious nature of man and society / by Boris Sidis with an introduction by William James. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.

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    phenomena that appear in the broad daylight of con- sciousness. The German school, with Wundt at its head, at first started out on similar lines, but they could not make any use of the subconscious, and their speculations ran wild in the fancies of Hartmann. The reason of this failure is due to the fact that the concept of the sub- conscious as conceived by the German school was extremely vague, and had rather the character of a mechanical than that of a psychical process. An un- conscious consciousness that was their concept of the subconscious. In such a form as this the subconscious was certainly meaningless—mere nonsense—and had to be given up. The German psychological investiga- tions are now confined to the content of consciousness in so far as the individual is immediately conscious of it. But as this form of consciousness is extremely nar- row and circumscribed, the results arrived at, though remarkable for their thoroughness, are after all of a rather trivial nature. It is what Prof. James aptly characterizes the elaboration of the obvious. We may therefore, with full right, assert that it was the French psychologists who made proper use of the sub- conscious and arrived at results that are of the utmost importance to psychology, although it were well if the French were to conduct their investigations with Ger- man thoroughness. It is not, however, the French alone who work along the lines of the subconscious, but the English and Americans, too, have a large share in the work. Gourney, James, Myers, and others, have done much toward the elucidation of the obscure phenomena of the subconscious. Psychology is especially indebted to the genius of Myers for his wide and comprehensive study