The Frontiers of Psychology

Abstract

THE need for re-examining and redefining the boundaries of these two fields of intellectual activity has been felt more arid more in recent years, and may be said to have become acute with Sir James Jeans's presidential address at the Aberdeen meeting of the British Association. The incursion of the physicist into metaphysics is a new and, to the psychologist no less than the philosopher, a most striking phenomenon. Time was, not so long ago, when the right of the psychologist to be regarded as a scientific worker was challenged on the ground that his pretended science was not science at all, but metaphysics, and no one challenged more loudly or more insistently than the physicist. There is doubt whether some physicists would concede the claims of the psychologist even yet, but it is certain that they must now formulate their challenge in different terms. Prof. W. McDougall's little book is certainly well-timed in view of the metaphysical tendencies of the new physics. Possibly the author shows a tendency to exaggerate the importance of the position of psychology. After all, psychology is a very young science. He cannot be said to exaggerate the importance of including in our scientific account of the ‘mysterious universe’ phenomena which fall within the field of study of the psychologist, and his deprecation of the gap that has been created between the world of the new physics and the world as experienced is at least thought-provoking. The tone of the book is controversial at some points pugnaciously so. Possibly also the author makes rather too much of inconsistencies in the writings of well-known physicists, which are due as much to the inadequacies of our language as to the doctrines of the new physics. None the less, the book is one which required to be written, and the author has presented clearly and cogently a case that required to be presented.

The Frontiers of Psychology

By William McDougall. (The Contemporary Library of Psychology.) Pp. xii + 235. (London: Nisbet and (Co., Ltd.; Cambridge: At the University Press, 1934.) 5s. net.