New Pathways in Psychology: Maslow and the Post-Freudian Revolution by Colin Wilson

After writing my recent appreciation (and critique) of Colin Wilson, I found that one of my favorites books of his was available on Kindle, so I bought it and re-read it. I’m glad I did. It reminded me of what I find so valuable in Wilson (and it reminded me of some annoyances as well). This is Wilson at his best. He started the book as a biography of Abraham Maslow, with whom he met and corresponded, but it turned into more than that. In addition to it's appreciation of Maslow, it’s a history and appraisal of how psychology developed from the early moderns through the publication of the book in 1972. 

Wilson reports that when he first came upon Maslow’s work he ignored it, only to have it come back to his attention at a later time. We should be happy for that second look. Wilson’s first book, The Outsider, and continuing through a cycle of books that bore the imprint of the first, explored the contemporary human dilemma. How do we successfully engage in life? In the Outsider cycle, Wilson examined the dilemmas of modern life through extraordinary individuals, many of whom failed to find a satisfactory resolution to their problem of existence, such as Van Gogh, Nietzsche, and T.E. Lawrence, to name but three. Wilson explored the European existentialists such as Sartre, Camus, and Heidegger, but he found their responses unsatisfactory. Wilson went on the construct a “new existentialism” that gloried in choice and will. When Wilson got around to looking at Maslow’s work, he found a kindred spirit. Maslow’s most well-known contributions to psychology, his hierarchy of needs and the reality of peak experiences, fit with Wilson’s growing belief that we ignore opportunities and abilities to summon peak experiences at will.

After some initial reflections touching on many of Wilson’s favorite themes and examples, as well as a brief introduction to Maslow’s work, Wilson begins a summary of modern psychology and philosophy starting with Hobbes and Descartes. I found this brief history valuable and instructive. Descartes, Hobbes, Locke, and Hume, despite their rationalist-empiricist differences, all premised their understanding of humans as essentially mechanistic with little (if any) room for free will. But there is another current of thought that blossoms later in the 19th century. It manifests in the work of Brentano and Husserl on the Continent and in America through the work of William James. Wilson quotes James a lot, and rightly so. Wilson finds James, especially in his essays, pointing in the right direction, although James doesn’t connect all the dots for Wilson. But while James was pointing in the right direction, Sigmund Freud was taking a different perspective in Vienna. 

Freud gave us depth psychology, but his “depth”, with its reference to hidden sexuality and Greek myths, overlays a deterministic and mechanistic outlook. While prying deeply into psychic injuries, Freud's theories reflected a rigid idea of how our psyche works. Freud, who had a deep personal rigidity about him, dismissed various disciples who tried to take the master’s work in different directions, like Adler, Jung, and Rank. Wilson does an excellent job of mixing biography and ideas in this section (something that he tends to do well). Each of the three apostates (Adler, Jung, and Rank) pointed psychoanalysis in new and promising directions, identifying different sources of psychic disturbance and motivation. But still, Wilson concludes, this viewpoint focused on the disturbed, unhealthy individual. 

After this informative and entertaining history of psychology and philosophy, Wilson turns to Maslow’s biography and work. I was surprised to learn that Maslow started in the rat and monkey business. Stimulus-response theory was all the rage at the time (1930’s), and Maslow worked that angle. He also came to terms with Freud and considered himself a Freudian. However, Maslow realized that Freud and his cohort focused on the sick individual, and Maslow decided to explore the psychology of the healthy. Maslow follows a path similar to Wilson’s in turning his focus from the sick to the healthy. Wilson explores and appreciates Maslow’s insights and how Maslow developed his theories. The down side of the tale is that Maslow died relatively young (bad heart) and wasn’t able to further develop his perspectives. 

In the final chapter, we get Wilson’s synthesis of his own insights, Maslow’s, and a host of others, especially those connected with “existentialist psychology”. Existential psychologists, such as Victor Frankel and Rollo May, draw upon Husserl’s intentionality and its concern with will to help put a patient back in control of his or her destiny. Meaning, intentionality, and will once again become important aspects of psychology. As Wilson does, he dances between psychology, literature, and anecdote to make his points. This trait is both delightful and frustrating, as Wilson can be. But Wilson is a man of ideas, not a scientist or academic who does the necessary grunt work of the lab or field, necessary as that is. Sometimes Wilson seems dated, as in his adherence to the right brain-left brain dichotomy or his understanding of schizophrenia, but I don’t think that these dated conceptions have much affect on his arguments. (I am interested to learn if Leah Greenfeld’s work Mind, Modernity, Madness: The Experience of Culture on Human Experience about mental illness or Ian McGilchrist’s work on the different brain functions in The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Modern World provide any vindication of Wilson’s larger perspective.) 

I’ve read about six or eight Wilson books, and other than perhaps the first two works in the Outsider cycle (The Outsider and Religion and the Outsider), this might be the best book to jump into. Wilson’s speculations—his strength and his weakness—are tempered by his commitment to Maslow’s project and by his exposition of the history of modern psychology. Thus, we get the best of Colin Wilson’s enterprise here in a balanced, informative, and thought-provoking work.

Stand by Me: Movie Review

I didn't see Stand by Me in the theater, and while I've seen the gist of it on television, as I mentioned it in my recent Stephen King On Writing book review, I decided I should see the film in full. Also, knowing the setting, I expected that King would capture the milieu of late 50's America as few can, as I'd read do so in 11.22.63 and On Writing. 

In doing a bit of research, I read that King claimed that this was the first satisfactory translation of one of his books into a film. Hats off to the screenwriter who remained loyal to a strong story well told. The film really captures the goofiness of adolescent boys and of the era. Boys are weird creatures, given to bizarre beliefs, strange rites, and volatile emotions. The film captures this sense. The film works because the boys range from smart-ass know-it-alls to tearful little pups in the course of one scene to the next, as boys that age would. The strange fascinations of seeing a dead body (one of their peers), gaining fame, and claiming turf are all captured. Also captured is the adolescent boy infatuation with girls and grossness (the barf scene). This isn't adolescence seen through a gauze lens, it's adolescence as a rite of passage in 1959, as the boys get ready to go into junior high. 

The end is touching because the boys know that they will be split apart by the segregation to come. Three of them see themselves as headed into endless shop class, while the young writer (the King character you could posit) will go into the college track. In our junior high they tried to hide the tracking by not putting the "A" students in section 7A, but in section 7B instead. We were fooled for about two seconds. The "F Troop" (the title of a popular TV series at the time) knew who they were. But as the narrator reflects, it meant the end of friendships and bonds that had been forged across social boundaries, of oaths and secrets that each held dear. I had friends like that, and I share that sense of loss that you don't know quite what to do with. It's awkward at a time when everything in your life can seem awkward and unwieldy.

The young actors have the look and feel of the time and their age. Credit goes to director Rob Reiner as well as the actors for those outstanding performances. It's a fine film, well deserving of the praise it received. It's not all fun and games, although that abounds with little parental supervision. It was wilder time, in some ways more innocent, and in other ways more foolish. King and these film-makers have explored it well.

Harvest by Jim Crace

Jaipur Literature Festival author Jim Crace’s Harvest fascinated me. The book never specifies its setting of time and place, but we can discern an English village around the time of the enclosure movement. (The enclosure movement in Tudor England divided lands held in common into privately owned plots and brought sheep to replace row crops and other livestock raised on the commons.) “Walter Thirsk” tells the story of what happens in his adopted village during the course of one week during harvest time. Walter is an astute and intelligent observer of village life, his insight enhanced by the fact that he’s an outsider, having come to the village as an adult. He’s known and served the local grandee for many years, but he lives in the village with the local folk. The narrator portrays a sense of a stable equilibrium of life in the village when the book opens, although not without a sense of foreboding. Then strangers appear on the edge of the village, someone sets the grandee’s dovecot on fire, and a new claimant to the land arrives who wants to bring sheep. This cluster of events begins to eat away at the ties that bind the village into a community. 

This book might have been a novel of detection: crimes are committed, but Walther Thirsk is no William of Baskerville (The Name of the Rose). He is an intelligent but plain, common man. Walter’s narrative is that of a keen observer who attempts—sometimes successfully, sometimes not—to untangle mysteries and reduce wrongs, but his efforts have only limited success. Events and intentions are too great for him to manage. He’s forced into the role of observer even as he hopes to shape events as a participant. 

I heard Crace speak a couple of times at JLF, and I recall that during the panel on the “historical novel” he said that Harvest doesn’t merit that that designation. He’s both right and wrong. Right in the sense that he never specifies the time and place nor does he reference any historical figures. But he nevertheless suggests a sense of village life that compels us back into a hazy past. Part of his success in doing so comes from his well-wrought prose, rich yet not pandering. He provides a sense of the sinews of village life and how they might be cut asunder, how a village reacts to loss, blame, and change. It’s quite a treat. I might also say it’s relevant. 

The contemporary world continues to experience accelerated change, especially for smaller, agricultural communities. In many nations, such villages still exist (I think here especially of Ethiopia), but of course also in India. These villagers will experience sudden and dramatic change—economic, cultural, social, and (therefore) political—and change does not occur easily. Many of the problems become visible in the cities. We see slums and crime. We know about the culture of unattached males that roam the streets. In India, we’re especially aware of the culture of rape, the thuggery, and susceptibility to demagoguery that have arisen among these unattached village males transplanted into cities like Delhi. But even Iowa has experienced dramatic changes with economic decline. Although separated by centuries from Crace’s imaginary village, one can appreciate the sense of disorder and loss that must occur. These ongoing events and processes make me think that Crace’s book is more than a journey into the past. It also serves as an appreciation of what still happens in the world around us.

Why Read Moby Dick? by Nathaniel Philbrick

Why indeed? How about because it’s the best piece of literature written by an American? The Great Gatsby and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn might claim the title (from me anyway), but Moby-Dick stands out. This novel, which started out as just another novel about a sea-faring voyage, morphed into something much more: a meditation on the great world. 

Nathaniel Philbrick, author of the award winning In the Heart of the Sea about the whaling ship Essex tragedy that affected Melville’s work, writes a brief and perceptive appreciation of this great book. Philbrick’s book works well because his brief chapters reference scenes and characters from Moby-Dick that serve as a gateway to a deeper understanding of Melville, its time (America headed unknowingly into the crucible of the Civil War), and its characters. Each character plays a role in the drama of a ship’s crew, the great oceans, and the Universe. Philbrick reminds us that Melville has packed so much into this book some think is  "about a whale". Moby-Dick, for all its profundity, is in parts quite humorous, informational, didactic, and deeply insightful about human relations and our relation to world. Philbrick’s book reminds us of this. If, like me, you’ve only listened to it once (I’ve never read it), Philbrick’s book reminds you of why you can read it again (and again) with great profit and growing appreciation. 

If you’re wondering about why people make such a fuss about Moby-Dick, or if you read it as a youth and found it a bore, then pick-up Philbrick’s book and read it to gain insights into Melville and his great book and to motivate you to go read Melville’s masterpiece.

Postscript: I’ve listened to two of the (what I consider) three of the greatest American novels. (I also listened to Gatsby. I read Huck Finn in high school.) While I intend to go back and read Moby-Dick and The Great Gatsby, I value and recommend the listening experience. The performance (more than just a reading) of Moby-Dick by Frank Muller is outstanding. It got me into a book that I had started a couple of times but that I'd become bogged down in. Now I know where I’m going. For a fine appreciation of audio books, enjoy this NYT piece by Stanford anthropologist T.M. Luhrmann. By the way, I, too, have memories of passages from books that I heard associated with places. My favorite venue for listening was driving my car (not so much lately), but planes and trains work. Walking serves as a fine occasion for listening, too.

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King

I owe Stephen King a big, fat apology. For many years, I thought him a horror hack, someone who only writes creepy stuff for the more gullible among us. Of course, doubts crept in over the years. Several movies based on his work, The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile (which I saw only about a year and half ago), and Stand by Me were all movies with compelling stories. Some, like The Green Mile, incorporate a fantastic element, but all tell compelling stories about interesting people even without a fantastic element. I was intrigued when I saw that King had written 11.22.63, and I saw that it received good reviews. As you may have read, I gave it a good review, too. So, Stephen King, I’m sorry for typecasting you, which reflects poorly on me and not at all on you. (If you, reader, retain some prejudice against the fantastic in literature, then you won't count Homer, Sophocles, Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare, Milton, or say, Italo Calvino or Garcia Marquez, among your favorite authors. Well, so be it if you insist. Just know that don’t need to go the Fantasy/SF section of the bookstore to find the fantastic.)

So how is this nonfiction book of King’s? Excellent. It’s divided into three parts. The first part is a memoir of his youth and his beginnings as a writer. As someone who, like King, grew up in America in the 50’s and 60’s, I share many of his experiences and cultural references. But King had a tougher start than I did. He was raised by a single mother (dad hit to road when Stephen was about age three), and they never had much money. But Stephen and his brother were bright and inventive. Stephen got into comic books and Tom Swift (“Junior” by Victor Appleton II, like me, or the older ones? He doesn’t say). Like many a writer, illness kept him at home one year (requiring him to repeat a grade) so he read to pass the time. Later Stephen got into horror books and movies. I’m certain he would have watched the ones that I liked to watch on late Saturday nights, like Rodan, the giant Pteranodon that comes out of the mountain and blows down miniature Japanese cities. And I’m sure he’d know the one about the giant Gila monster in the American southwest created by atomic testing. The giant lizard creeps up on teenagers parked in the desert making out, when, just as they getting intimate, the monster strikes. (“That’ll teach ’em!”) Yes, I understand much of the background of Stephen’s cultural upbringing. Now I appreciate some of the sources of his inspiration.

The second section of the book deals with “The Toolbox”: vocabulary, grammar, adverbs (he hates ‘em), and so on. The third part deals with the practicalities of writing and publishing fiction. While not quite as personal or entertaining as the first part, King never loses his sense of humor (which I quite like) or his sense of perspective. King has sold about a gazillion books, but it hasn’t seemed to have gone to his head. He did develop a drug and alcohol addiction, but he made it to the other side. He married his college sweetheart, and they raised a family and now have grandkids. King knows of his good fortune and shares his wisdom freely.

If you have any inclination to read a book about writing that’s also entertaining and personal—the not Strunk and White or F.L. Lucas type of book—this is a superb choice. Educational and edifying with some great tips that most any writer can use: cut the adverbs and cut 10% of your initial draft are my two favorite take-aways.

"Thank you, John Ralston Saul": The End of History and the Last Man by Francis Fukuyama

At the Jaipur Literature Festival, I looked forward to hearing a program on “History Strikes Back and the End of Globalism.” It was a dialogue between John Ralston Saul and Hubert Vedrine (a former French foreign minister). I hadn’t read either author, although Saul’s Voltaire’s Bastards is packed with my other books back in Iowa City). I wasn’t sure what to expect. The Glamorous Nomad and C joined me. We were in for a surprise. 

Saul opened the session by singling out “some guy called Francis Fukuyama” for writing one of the “stupidest books in the last 25 years”. In this book, Saul claimed, Fukuyama declared the end of history. Saul continued that Fukuyama then wrote another “stupid” book (unnamed) and yet Fukuyama still makes money. I was flabbergasted, while C and the Glamorous Nomad (who’s read Fukuyama’s The Origins of Political Order) simply walked out. I was shocked and puzzled. Also angry, but this bit of intellectual character assassination intrigued me enough to stay. I’d read The End of History and the Last Man about 15 years ago or so, and I’d thought it brilliant. Had I missed something?  

The good news from this is that it’s led me to re-read The End of History and the Last Man (1992; with a New Afterward, 2006). (I’d purchased a copy here in India last October because I thought it worth a re-read; perhaps a bit of intuition here). To start with the conclusion: the book is brilliant. It’s one of the best books about politics that I’ve read. It is also one of the most discussed and criticized books about politics since its publication. Saul’s low blows aren’t new or novel. Why so? I suspect because few people have read it carefully or have grasped its real significance. 

What Fukuyama wrote, shortly after the fall of Communism in 1989, was that History (may have) come to an end. (I know: China, North Korea, Viet Nam, and Cuba—these regimes survived, but Communism as a living ideology was dead, a few zombies notwithstanding.) Fukuyama, building on the work of Hegel and Hegel’s 20th-century interpreter, Alexandre Kojeve, argues that liberal democracy may have answered as thoroughly as possible the “struggle for recognition” that has driven History. By the way, there is history, and then there is History. “History” with the capital “H” is not a Teutonic affectation on my part, but it’s the term for the Hegelian understanding of the fundamental pattern of change in human history. (With a small “h”, history is the story of the stuff that happens.) Hegel believed that History came to an end in 1805 at the Battle of Jena, when the ideas of the French Revolution, imposed by the military might of Napoleon, defeated the forces of reaction. 

Fukuyama’s intellectual project and lineage are not familiar to most readers. Few have any direct knowledge of Hegel. Most, like me, only learned about Hegel as the precursor to Marx. I expect only a handful of persons know of Kojeve. (I didn’t.) Thus, History is a new concept to most readers, and many seemed to have confused the End of History with the end of stuff happening, which isn’t what Fukuyama argued. 

But History isn’t the most important subject of the book for me. The most intriguing part comes from Fukuyama’s project of reinstating thymos into our understanding of human motivation. If you've read Plato’s Republic (or about it), you know of Plato’s tripartite division of the soul into Reason (logos) on top (for the Philosopher-Kings) and desire (appetite) at the bottom for the masses. In the middle, he places thymos, often translated as “spiritedness” for lack of a better English equivalent. This attribute manifests in the Guardians, the warriors who protect the polis. Fukuyama notes that thymos dominates in aristocratic warrior societies. Thymos receives a new and unique treatment in the Anglo-American liberal tradition starting with Hobbes and Locke. To deal with “vainglory” or “pride” (as manifestations of thymos), these authors and their successors—including Madison and Hamilton—work to sublimate thymos under the devices of desire. Bourgeois man becomes interested only in fulfilling desires and living rationally. So the Anglo-American tradition argues and hopes. But fortunately for the U.S., Madison, Hamilton, and their peers knew that strong men will still strive, and they put in place many checks on power. In the German tradition, Hegel puts thymos front and center as a part of the “struggle for recognition” that drives the dialectic of master and slave (or lordship and bondage, if you prefer). This struggle for recognition drives History. With the French Revolution, the Christian project of equality before God now translates into equality between individuals in the social and political realm. Work becomes dignified as a replacement for the thymotic urge to prove one’s worth on the field of battle, the warrior-aristocrat ideal. 

Fukuyama also discusses whether contemporary liberal societies will see an actual End of History by granting recognition to all and by channeling thymotic urges into more productive pursuits than war. Fukuyama points out that among all the factors leading to the outbreak of WWI, we shouldn’t ignore the popular expression of thymos that led millions to greet the coming of the war with glee. Many greeted the war as an outlet for pent-up desires. This is an astute observation. Now, perhaps, war has become too terrible for its use as such a popular outlet for thymos. Fukuyama also explores whether the twin ideals of liberty (which fosters outlets for thymos in individuals) and equality (our urge to see each acknowledged as equals) can co-exist over a long period as often antagonistic goals. 

Fukuyama levels a sharp critique of realism in international relations, especially in its academic guise typified by Kenneth Waltz and John Mearsheimer. Fukuyama argues that academic realism posits that nothing has changed since Thucydides and that nations are motivated only by the desire for greater power vis a vis any potential rivals. Changes (history) in the motivations of actors or the system of international relations count for nothing in the purer forms of realist theory. Fukuyama is undoubtedly correct in his critique. Legitimacy has become a significant touchstone of action in the international realm as well as in the domestic sphere. 

I highly recommend this book. Fukuyama isn’t as naïve or brazen as his detractors would like to portray him. Like Thucydides and Machiavelli, Fukuyama examines the world today to gain deeper insight into the most significant issues in political thinking. 

Postscript: If you want to see and hear John Ralston Saul’s attack on Fukuyama (and Hubert Vedrine’s more measured comments, go here, starting about 3:40 minutes. My question in defense of Fukuyama and challenging Saul comes at 49:45. I didn't speak as artfully as I would have liked, but I think that I get my point across. The answer is vague. In fact, I believe I have a good deal of sympathy for Saul’s perspective, but his modus operandi in attacking Fukuyama and Huntington was disgraceful. He should—as should we all—at least accurately and honestly state our adversaries’ positions if we are to attack them in absentia.

Hacks, Climate Change, Science & Decisions

Charles Krauthammer, hack writer

I don't often read Charles Kruthammer. I perceive him to be a hack, a tool, a shill--in a word, predictable. I say that with some hesitation because I stopped reading him years ago. I now only glance. I don't want to call people with whom I disagree hacks or other demeaning terms because we disagree. After all, I could be wrong. I can fail to learn by ignoring new information and perspectives. But some writers on both the right and the left are too predictable. They bend the facts to fit their perspectives. We all do that do some degree, but at some point, you just have to stop reading. So why did I read Kruthammer today? 

For reasons that sometimes escape me, our local paper of choice, The Hindu, carries columnists from the NYT & WaPo. Do Indians really get Maureen Dowd? In any event, today I read Krauthammer because I suspected he was full of baloney when I read his title: "The myth of settled science". Here's his opening: 

I repeat: I'm not a global warming believer. I'm not a global warming denier. I've long believed that it cannot be good for humanity to be spewing tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. I also believe those scientists who pretend to know exactly what this will cause in 20, 30 or 50 years are white coat propagandists.

Let's unpack this. Healthy skepticism, open-mindedness, continuing inquiry: all are hallmarks of good science. However, this scientific agnosticism, like patriotism, if often the last refuge of scoundrals. Flat-earthers and creationists love to spout it, along with climate change deniers. There is a huge body of science upon which we can have no rational disagreement. Science lives in a double-world: both agreed and open to revision. We have to use sound judgment to distinguish the two. 

In matters concerning global climate change and human carbon-loading of the environment, we have to maintain both attitudes. However, we do have to choose on the basis of the best evidence. We have to make decisions on what we believe to be the truth based on empirical evidence. From this we have to discern  the hypothesis most likely to approximate the truth (facts) that will arise in the future. When it's the future we're considering--and it certainly is in this case--we have to constantly revise our theories and understanding. Double that thought when we're talking about the uber-complex world of the biosphere, perhaps the ultimate complex system that evolves over eons and that fluctuates moment-to-moment. 

Krauthammer unleashes a shotgun spray of arguments in an attempt to hit Obama on this issue. We can't know for sure, so we can't say that "The debate is settled. Climate change is a fact."

Yes, we can. 

It's true to say that we're not sure of how fast change will continue to come, how it will affect weather patterns, and so on. We don't know these things with a high degree of certainty. So does this prevent us from acting? No, we act, regardless. We only can choose whether to act in ignorance or by informed and educated science. We are now acting, only foolishly. What Obama and a decisive majority of the science community are recommending is that we act rationally based on the strong consensus of the scientific community. (I know about Freeman Dyson, but isn't there one in every crowd? Einstein didn't accept quantum theory, either. Even geniuses make mistakes.) Climate change is undoubtedly occurring, even though we don't know with certainty its parameters or trajectory.

We need to act according common law standards for torts (harm to others with whom we don't have a contractual relationship). In other words, we need to gaudge the liklihood of harm, the magnitude of the possible harm, the cost of avoiding the harm, and act accordingly. Climate change-deniers (yes, an apt name for them) ignore the context that we should apply to this type of issue and attempt to make it an all-or-nothing proposition. Nice work if you can get it, but don't expect it in serious issues about the future.

We should recall that we on planet earth are running an N=1 experiment. In doing so, we need to remember that we can't run it again, at least not in this iteration of the universe. Therefore, we ought to be pretty damn careful. I don't like the thought of using less energy--energy is eternal delight. But I don't want to mess up the planet permanently. Especially if we do so by paying attention to hacks like Charles Kruthammer.