The Psychology of Aristotle, The Philosopher: A Psychoanalytic Therapists Perspective

The Psychology of Aristotle, The Philosopher: A by Charalambos Ierodiakonou

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Here, Aristotle's thought created a paradigm that remained unchallenged for centuries and one that still underpins the work of modern psychology and philosophy, where desire is renamed as emotion and reason as rationality. Uniquely, Aristotle also understood the importance of time on the actions driving a person, with desire concerned with the present and reason more concerned with the future and long-term consequences. As an aside and a slight divergence into sociology, this short-termism and quest for immediate results is one of the driving forces behind economic collapses, environmental degradation and political popularism.

Perhaps more people should study Aristotle and his ideas of what drives human behavior. Aristotle can, quite legitimately, be called the first behaviorist and the basis of work by B. Skinner and Pavlov , two of the most famous names in the history of psychology.

Aristotle's psychology included a study into the formation of the human mind, as one of the first salvos in the debate between nature and nurture that influences many academic disciplines, including psychology, sociology, education, politics and human geography. Aristotle, unlike Plato, was a believer in nurture, stating that the human mind was blank at birth and that educating the individual and exposing them to experiences would define the formation of the mind and build a store of knowledge.

Plato and Aristotle adopted a philosophical and abstract approach to defining human behavior and the structure of the mind, but that was not the only contribution of the Hellenistic philosophers. The development of Ancient Greek medicine introduced the study of physiology into the history of psychology, proposing that there were physical reasons underlying many mental ailments.

Chief amongst these was the Father of Medicine, Hippocrates, who proposed that epilepsy had a physical cause and was not some curse sent by the fickle Greek Gods.

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Unlike Aristotle, who saw the heart as the seat of thought and reason, Hippocrates understood the importance of the brain. This debate continued, with physicians such as Praxagoras still maintaining that the heart and arteries linked thought, through a mysterious fluid called pneuma. In a gruesome experiment, Herophilus and Erasistratus were given permission, by the ruler of Alexandria, Egypt, to perform vivisection on criminals and they determined that the nervous system and brain controlled the body and were therefore the seat of reason. However, they still believed that the heart sent pneuma throughout the body, but that it controlled unconscious processes, such as metabolism.

By contrast, the nerves sent 'psychic' pneuma throughout the body. These experiments revealed a lot of information but introduced medical ethics into the history of psychology, a debate that rages today.

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Whilst their studies were abhorrent when looked at through the lens of history, the Twentieth Century history of psychology includes some infamous and unwanted landmarks. Following on from Hippocrates was the physician, Galen, who provided the link between the Greeks and Islamic psychology.

Of Greek extraction, this brilliant physician and researcher earned the respect of successive Roman emperors for his skill and ability, and he went on to produce volumes of work covering many aspects of the human condition, from psychology to eye surgery. He proposed the idea of four 'humours' within the human body, each responsible for a different aspect of the human condition, and believed that an imbalance between the four would affect physical and mental wellbeing.

This holistic approach to medicine inextricably linked mind and body, a factor only recently readopted by modern medicine, which tends to treat physical conditions and symptoms without paying much regard to mental health, and vice-versa. Galen believed that the balance of these four humours would be influenced by location, diet, occupation, geography and a range of other factors. Whilst this idea of humours was incorrect, it influenced medical and psychological thought for centuries, and it was developed further by the great Islamic scholar, Ibn-Sina Avicenna.

This idea of looking at the entire body and mind, rather than blaming witchcraft and spirits, certainly influenced medicine and the history of psychology for the better although some of the cures used to alleviate the build-up of a humour, such as blood-letting, were harmful. Of course, to modern commentators, the idea of the humors seems a little primitive and is based upon a limited knowledge of psychology.

However, the importance of Galen is not the exact nature of the theory but the fact that his ideas saw the first paradigm shift away from the idea of mental conditions having a supernatural source and towards finding answers in physiology. It is no surprises that his work upon psychology and the mind, as well as other disciplines, became the backbone of the Islamic rediscovery of the Greeks; his ideas were copied and added to by Islamic scholars.

Certainly, his empirical and pragmatic approach earns him a place in the history of psychology. There is little doubt that the Ancient Greeks laid out the course of modern psychology, although due respect has to be given to the Chinese, Indian and Persian scholars who made contributions outside the scope of this history of psychology, but which influenced modern thought in many disparate ways. The Islamic expansion saw a culmination of this process and an integration of Greek thought allied to the wisdom of the Middle-Eastern and Eastern scholars as they drew knowledge from around the known world.

The roots of the history of psychology certainly began here and the beliefs of the Greeks would also influence sociology, geography and economic theory. Check out our quiz-page with tests about:. Martyn Shuttleworth Jun 19, Retrieved Sep 11, from Explorable. The text in this article is licensed under the Creative Commons-License Attribution 4. You can use it freely with some kind of link , and we're also okay with people reprinting in publications like books, blogs, newsletters, course-material, papers, wikipedia and presentations with clear attribution.

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