PHILOSOPHY, PSYCHIATRY, AND NEUROSCIENCE: THREE APPROACHES TO THE MIND
Edward M. Hundert
Clarendon Press: Oxford, 1989
$19.95
313 page

Ghaemi, M.D., S. Nassir

Jefferson Digital Commons

Perspectives On The MindPHILOSOPHY, PSYCHIATRY, AND NEUROSCIENCE: THREE APPROACHES TOTHE MINDEdward ~1. HundertCl arendon Pr ess : Oxford , 1989$ 19.953 13 pag ess. Nassir Ghaemi, M.D.There is a Sufi ( I) tradit ion that forty wise men once were blindfolded , a nd th enpr esented with an elephant. One man only touch ed th e trunk a nd described a longcylind rical object. Another touch ed th e tai l, another a leg , a no t he r th e tu sk-theyeach described only a part of th e elepha nt. Only by consult ing together could th eydescribe th e whole ele pha n t. In a se nse, Hundert undert ak es a simila r pr oject alonein his attempt to describe th e interfaces among Philosophy, Psychi at ry a nd Neuro-science.H e op ens with a quot e from Lord Br ain: "T he br ain a nd th e mind const itu te aunity, and we may leave to th e phil osophers , who have se pa ra ted th em in th ought,th e task of putting th em together again (2)." The rest of th e book represen tsHundert's attempt to tak e up Br ain 's cha lle nge. As a psychiatrist with phil osop hicaltraining , Hundert demonstrat es familiarity with th e phil osophies of Desca rt es, Ka nt ,and Hegel, as well as a com pre he nsive understanding of clini cal psychi at ry a nd theproblems of neuroscien ce. This is a tall orde r for th e average read er, but if a nyoneca n follow him through this di scourse, I think it would be th e humani stica lly-ed uca te d psychiatrist. Thankfully, with his familiar and unpret entiou s writ ing sty le,Hundert avoids making an a lready difficult subject more obscure.Hundert begins with a description of th e philosophical analysis of th e mind fromDescart es to Hegel. With his "Cogito, ergo Sum" ("I think , th erefore I am ") ,Descartes divided th e world into physical obje cts and thoughts. Kant next mad e th ejump "from subjectivity to obj ectivity" by insisting that human thought is incon ceiv-ab le without something to th ink about, i.e., an expe rience of exte rnal obj ect s. Kan tth en makes his un iqu e discovery, th e ca te gories of thought. He hypothesized th a t ourcognit ion of ex te rn al obje cts is th e result of our interpret ation of th ose objects bymeans of faculties of th e mind, such as th e perception of space , time a nd se nsations .These ca te gories of thought produce human knowledge, whi ch requires th ou ghts andobj ect s. In Kant 's own words: "T houg hts without con te nt a re em pty, int uit ionswithout conce pts are blind" (2) . Kant cre a te d his own dil emma, however; th e passivedistortion of obj ects by th ought st ill does not guarantee th at we com pre hen d the-l950 JEFFERSO N JOURNAL OF PSYCHIATRYworld as it really is " in it self." Enter H egel. Hi s key contribu t ion is that th e mind isnot simply a passive interpret er of objects, but also an ac t ive agent in th e cre a t ion ofth e human world. The human mind, H egel's "Geis t ," helps cre a te th e objectsencoun te re d in human expe rie nce . H ence human kn owled ge is true, not becau sesubjective ideas correspond to ex te rn al obj ect s, but becau se subjective ideas a ndex te rn al obj ects together belong to a cohe re n t whol e, cre a te d in the course of humanhistory by mankind it self. Philosophy becomes historical , and, claims H egel , th erebybecomes scie nt ific.Kant 's definition of philosophy had been th e searc h for a priori knowledge, i.e.,knowled ge independent of particul ar fac ts. In con t rast, H egel inaugura ted th escientific notion th at knowledge was cha racte r istically a posteriori-it dep ended onexpe rience for confir mation or refutation. In Hundert 's te rms, Heg el proceed ed" from obj ecti vit y to ontolo gy," " a scie nce of th e ex iste nce of man," op ening th e wayfor th e end of metaphysics and th e beginning of ph enom enology, the study of livin gex pe rie nce. We live, said H egel. That is th e first truth, not "we think, " as Desca r tesasserted , and not "we interpret ," as Kan t implied . Kn owledge is not a straight linefrom man to th e world , or fro m th e world to man. It is a circle, embracing humanityand th e world.Usin g H egel 's conce p t of " knowing as livin g," Hunder t proceeds to exa minePiaget 's studies on how child re n cons t ruc t th eir ability to kn ow the world as part andparcel of their ro le as developing young members of t he human ra ce . He th enaddresses Freud 's di scovery that our th ou ghts are not mere ly objective and purelyintell ectual as th e philosophers had im agined , but rather, th ey are permeated withemo tions and, in many ways, con t ro lled by our instinct s a nd emotional lives. Feelingand thinking are not totally different and for that ma tt er, neither are " fee lings andthings." And, if " all objects a re sim ulta neous ly cog nit ive an d affective," do es notHundert mak e his point abou t th e need to unit e philosophy a nd psycho logy in someway?Perhaps th e mos t fascin ating psychi at ric chapter involves Hunder t 's inte rpreta-tion of psych osis. H e rej ect s th e tradition al descript ion of psychosis as defectivereality testing, a nd inst ead , bas ed on ph en om enological analysis, suggests that if th emind 's ca tegories fail to organize reality, th en th e psyc ho tic de lusion may be anat te m pt to recr eate some so r t of reali ty. Altho ug h d istorted , perhaps psych oti cdelusions too serve a fun cti on . As Elvin Se mrad once remarked, the onl y otheralte rn a tive may be suicide or mu rd er. Hundert th en summons up th e ghost of th eideali st wit hin us, Don Quixot e, whose crea to r, Cervan tes, once rema rked that a ttimes " fac ts get in th e way of truth.""Sanity must mean some thing," wri tes Hunder t (2), a proposition we psychi a-trist s often tak e for gra n te d whe n we conce n trate only on understa nding insanity.Hundert see ms to imply th at th e mistake of philosophy was that it tried to defin etruth by contrasting it with er ror in order to give meaning to huma n existe nce.Philosophy has trad itionally exam ine d th e th eory of kn owled ge as a means tounderst anding th e meaning of life. Perhaps we need to conne ct th a t philosophicalBOOK REVIEWS 5 1tradition with psychological perspectives on sanity in th e light of madness in orde r tobetter find th e path to the meaning of life.Hundert concludes his book by trying to link truth to biol ogy. H uman knowledgeis true for all humans, he argues, because it is derived from humani ty's biological andsocial history, as a result of the evolution of the species a nd of civilization . The br ainprovides th e key to this conclusion, for it has two functions: it is a " mechanism forexpe rie ncing" and as su ch, is a passive receptacl e, as in Kant 's mod el. Bu t Kant 'smistake was to eq ua te this psychological property of brain fun cti on with phi losophicaltruth. The brain is also a "tool for knowing" as H eg el noted ; as such, it is an ac t ivecreator of knowledge, and yet it is cre a ted by that whi ch it cr eates-Nature. Hence itpossesses an internal validity: cre a ted by nature, it com pre hends a nd shapes na turein return. That is th e basis of the validity of human knowled ge, a validi ty tha t isuniversal for humans but con tingen t on who we have becom e throu gh th e evolu tionof nature and human civilization."In reuniting subj ect and obj ect, thoughts and things . . . we also put an end toth e existence of any 'obj ective ne cessary' truth superior to ac tua l lived expe rience "(2) . The shadow of giant minds ca n get quite damp and dark. Hundert has taken anarduous journey through th e chilly regions of abstract thought a nd has re tu rned witha modern, unpresumptuous way of int egrating curre n t biol ogical and psychologicalknowledge with that core of philosophical issues whi ch , wh ether we recognize it ornot, constantly vexes us as human beings. We would do well to recogn ize thesignificance of this grand proj ect th e next time we wonder wh eth er some idea is tru eor not.NOTES1. Sufism re fers to th e Islamic mysti cal tradition.2. Hundert , EM : Philosophy, Psychi atry and Neuroscience. Ox ford: Clarendon Press, 1989

Perspectives on the Mind

Name not available

http://jdc.jefferson.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1312&context=jeffjpsychiatry

Perspectives on the Mind

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Jefferson Digital Commons

Name not available