How do we know?

How do we know?

1. Metaphysical Systems

   • Animism
     • The belief that natural phenomena are alive and influence behaviour
     • Plato
       • Belief that earth was literally alive and possessed a soul
     • Aristotle
       • Gravity reflects the desire of physical objects to return to "mother earth"
       • Physiogynomics - the idea that those who possess the physical attributes of certain animals possess the habits and dispositions of those same animals
   • Mythology & Religion
     • Assume that deities play an important role in human behaviour
     • Systems of understanding and explaining human behaviour
   • Astrology
     • Ancient Egyptians
     • Assumes that human behaviour is determined by the activity of celestial bodies

2. Philosophy

   • Aristotle & Plato
     • Focus on logic
   • Descartes
     • Transformed thinking about behaviour into a scientific enterprise; "nerves were hollow tubes through which 'animal spirits' flowed to the brain"
     • Placed value on making empirical observations
   • August Comte
     • Positivism
       • Based on observations made with absolute certainty
     • Empiricism
       • The idea that the best way to learn about the world is to make observations; became a core assumption of the scientific method

3. Physiology & Physical Sciences

   • Physiology
     • The study of functions and interrelations between different parts of the brain and body
   • William Harvey
     • 1628; made discoveries on the circulation of blood from the heart to other parts of the body
   • Luigi Galvani & Alessandro Volta
     • Used the experimental method to demonstrate that an electrical charge must be applied to produce muscle movements, in frogs
   • Marshall Hall
     • Experimented with decapitated animals in the 1800s
     • Discovered that reflex movements were controlled by the spinal cord not the brain

4. Experimental Psychology

   • Willhelm Wundt
     • Interested in higher-order mental processes
     • Studied perceptual and sensory processes and made use of experimental methods

5. The Four Canons of Science

   • Determinism
   • Empiricism
   • Parsimony
   • Testability

6. Four Ways of Knowing about the World