Here are some excerpts from Jung's
Psychological Types:
There are in nature two fundamentally different modes of adaptation which ensure the continued existence of the living organism. The one consists in a high rate of fertility, with low powers of defence and short duration of life for the single individual; the other consists in equipping the individual with numerous means of self-preservation plus a low fertility rate. This biological difference, it seems to me, is not merely analogous to, but the actual foundation of, our two psychological modes of adaptation. I must content myself with this broad hint. It is sufficient to note that the peculiar nature of the extravert constantly urges him to expend and propagate himself in every way, while the tendency of the introvert is to defend himself against all demands from outside, to conserve his energy by withdrawing it from objects, thereby consolidating his own position. Blake’s intuition did not err when he described the two classes of men as “prolific” and “devouring.” Just as, biologically, the two modes of adaptation work equally well and are successful in their own way, so too with the typical attitudes. The one achieves its end by a multiplicity of relationships, the other by monopoly.
The fact that it is cold outside prompts one man to put on his overcoat, while another, who wants to get hardened, finds this superfluous. One man admires the latest tenor because everybody else does, another refuses to do so, not because he dislikes him, but because in his view the subject of universal admiration is far from having been proved admirable. One man resigns himself to circumstances because experience has shown him that nothing else is possible, another is convinced that though things have gone the same way a thousand times before, the thousand and first time will be different. The one allows himself to be oriented by the given facts, the other holds in reserve a view which interposes itself between him and the objective data.
Rational judgment is based not merely on objective but also on subjective data. The predominance of one or the other factor, however, as a result of a psychic disposition often existing from early youth, will give the judgment a corresponding bias. A judgment that is truly rational will appeal to the objective and the subjective factor equally and do justice to both. But that would be an ideal case and would presuppose an equal development of both extraversion and introversion. In practice, however, either movement excludes the other, and, so long as this dilemma remains, they cannot exist side by side but at best successively. Under ordinary conditions, therefore, an ideal rationality is impossible. The rationality of a rational type always has a typical bias.
19. EXTRAVERSION is an outward-turning of libido (q.v.). I use this concept to denote a manifest relation of subject to object, a positive movement of subjective interest towards the object. Everyone in the extraverted state thinks, feels, and acts in relation to the object, and moreover in a direct and clearly observable fashion, so that no doubt can remain about his positive dependence on the object. In a sense, therefore, extraversion is a transfer of interest from subject to object. If it is an extraversion of thinking, the subject thinks himself into the object; if an extraversion of feeling, he feels himself into it. In extraversion there is a strong, if not exclusive, determination by the object. Extraversion is active when it is intentional, and passive when the object compels it, i.e., when the object attracts the subject’s interest of its own accord, even against his will. When extraversion is habitual, we speak of the extraverted type (q.v.).
34. INTROVERSION means an inward-turning of libido (q.v.), in the sense of a negative relation of subject to object. Interest does not move towards the object but withdraws from it into the subject. Everyone whose attitude is introverted thinks, feels, and acts in a way that clearly demonstrates that the subject is the prime motivating factor and that the object is of secondary importance. Introversion may be intellectual or emotional, just as it can be characterized by sensation or intuition (qq.v.). It is active when the subject voluntarily shuts himself off from the object, passive when he is unable to restore to the object the libido streaming back from it. When introversion is habitual, we speak of an introverted type (q.v.).
22. FUNCTION (v. also INFERIOR FUNCTION ). By a psychological function I mean a particular form of psychic activity that remains the same in principle under varying conditions. From the energic standpoint a function is a manifestation of libido (q.v.), which likewise remains constant in principle, in much the same way as a physical force can be considered a specific form or manifestation of physical energy. I distinguish four basic functions in all, two rational and two irrational (qq.v.): thinking and feeling, sensation and intuition (qq.v.). I can give no a priori reason for selecting these four as basic functions, and can only point out that this conception has shaped itself out of many years’ experience. I distinguish these functions from one another because they cannot be related or reduced to one another. The principle of thinking, for instance, is absolutely different from the principle of feeling, and so forth. I make a cardinal distinction between these functions and fantasies (q.v.), because fantasy is a characteristic form of activity that can manifest itself in all four functions. Volition or will (q.v.) seems to me an entirely secondary phenomenon, and so does attention.
30. INFERIOR FUNCTION . This term is used to denote the function that lags behind in the process of differentiation (q.v.). Experience shows that it is practically impossible, owing to adverse circumstances in general, for anyone to develop all his psychological functions simultaneously. The demands of society compel a man to apply himself first and foremost to the differentiation of the function with which he is best equipped by nature, or which will secure him the greatest social success. Very frequently, indeed as a general rule, a man identifies more or less completely with the most favoured and hence the most developed function. It is this that gives rise to the various psychological types (q.v.). As a consequence of this one-sided development, one or more functions are necessarily retarded. These functions may properly be called inferior in a psychological but not psychopathological sense, since they are in no way morbid but merely backward as compared with the favoured function. Although the inferior function may be conscious as a phenomenon, its true significance nevertheless remains unrecognized. It behaves like many repressed or insufficiently appreciated contents, which are partly conscious and partly unconscious, just as, very often, one knows a certain person from his outward appearance but does not know him as he really is. Thus in normal cases the inferior function remains conscious, at least in its effects; but in a neurosis it sinks wholly or in part into the unconscious. For, to the degree that the greater share of libido (q.v.) is taken up by the favoured function, the inferior function undergoes a regressive development; it reverts to the archaic (q.v.) stage and becomes incompatible with the conscious, favoured function. When a function that should normally be conscious lapses into the unconscious, its specific energy passes into the unconscious too. A function such as feeling possesses the energy with which it is endowed by nature; it is a well-organized living system that cannot under any circumstances be wholly deprived of its energy. So with the inferior function: the energy left to it passes into the unconscious and activates it in an unnatural way, giving rise to fantasies (q.v.) on a level with the archaicized function. In order to extricate the inferior function from the unconscious by analysis, the unconscious fantasy formations that have now been activated must be brought to the surface. The conscious realization of these fantasies brings the inferior function to consciousness and makes further development possible.
36. IRRATIONAL. I use this term not as denoting something contrary to reason, but something beyond reason, something, therefore, not grounded on reason. Elementary facts come into this category; the fact, for example, that the earth has a moon, that chlorine is an element, that water reaches its greatest density at four degrees centigrade, etc. Another irrational fact is chance, even though it may be possible to demonstrate a rational causation after the event.69
The irrational is an existential factor which, though it may be pushed further and further out of sight by an increasingly elaborate rational explanation, finally makes the explanation so complicated that it passes our powers of comprehension, the limits of rational thought being reached long before the whole of the world could be encompassed by the laws of reason. A completely rational explanation of an object that actually exists (not one that is merely posited) is a Utopian ideal. Only an object that is posited can be completely explained on rational grounds, since it does not contain anything beyond what has been posited by rational thinking. Empirical science, too, posits objects that are confined within rational bounds, because by deliberately excluding the accidental it does not consider the actual object as a whole, but only that part of it which has been singled out for rational observation.
In this sense thinking is a directed function, and so is feeling (qq.v.). When these functions are concerned not with a rational choice of objects, or with the qualities and interrelations of objects, but with the perception of accidentals which the actual object never lacks, they at once lose the attribute of directedness and, with it, something of their rational character, because they then accept the accidental. They begin to be irrational. The kind of thinking or feeling that is directed to the perception of accidentals, and is therefore irrational, is either intuitive or sensational. Both intuition and sensation (qq.v.) are functions that find fulfilment in the absolute perception of the flux of events. Hence, by their very nature, they will react to every possible occurrence and be attuned to the absolutely contingent, and must therefore lack all rational direction. For this reason I call them irrational functions, as opposed to thinking and feeling, which find fulfilment only when they are in complete harmony with the laws of reason.
Although the irrational as such can never become the object of science, it is of the greatest importance for a practical psychology that the irrational factor should be correctly appraised. Practical psychology stirs up many problems that are not susceptible of a rational solution, but can only be settled irrationally, in a way not in accord with the laws of reason. The expectation or exclusive conviction that there must be a rational way of settling every conflict can be an insurmountable obstacle to finding a solution of an irrational nature.
44. RATIONAL. The rational is the reasonable, that which accords with reason. I conceive reason as an attitude (q.v.) whose principle it is to conform thought, feeling, and action to objective values. Objective values are established by the everyday experience of external facts on the one hand, and of inner, psychological facts on the other. Such experiences, however, could not represent objective “values” if they were “valued” as such by the subject, for that would already amount to an act of reason. The rational attitude which permits us to declare objective values as valid at all is not the work of the individual subject, but the product of human history. Most objective values—and reason itself—are firmly established complexes of ideas handed down through the ages. Countless generations have laboured at their organization with the same necessity with which the living organism reacts to the average, constantly recurring environmental conditions, confronting them with corresponding functional complexes, as the eye, for instance, perfectly corresponds to the nature of light. One might, therefore, speak of a pre-existent, metaphysical, universal “Reason” were it not that the adapted reaction of the living organism to average environmental influences is the necessary condition of its existence—a thought already expressed by Schopenhauer. Human reason, accordingly, is nothing other than the expression of man’s adaptability to average occurrences, which have gradually become deposited in firmly established complexes of ideas that constitute our objective values. Thus the laws of reason are the laws that designate and govern the average, “correct,” adapted attitude (q.v.). Everything is “rational” that accords with these laws, everything that contravenes them is “irrational” (q.v.). Thinking and feeling (qq.v.) are rational functions in so far as they are decisively influenced by reflection. They function most perfectly when they are in the fullest possible accord with the laws of reason. The irrational functions, sensation and intuition (qq.v.), are those whose aim is pure perception; for, as far as possible, they are forced to dispense with the rational (which presupposes the exclusion of everything that is outside reason) in order to attain the most complete perception of the general flux of events.
47. SENSATION. I regard sensation as one of the basic psychological functions (q.v.). Wundt likewise reckons it among the elementary psychic phenomena.77 Sensation is the psychological function that mediates the perception of a physical stimulus. It is, therefore, identical with perception. Sensation must be strictly distinguished from feeling (q.v.), since the latter is an entirely different process, although it may associate itself with sensation as “feelingtone.” Sensation is related not only to external stimuli but to inner ones, i.e., to changes in the internal organic processes.
Primarily, therefore, sensation is sense perception—perception mediated by the sense organs and “body-senses” (kinaesthetic, vasomotor sensation, etc.). It is, on the one hand, an element of ideation, since it conveys to the mind the perceptual image of the external object; and on the other hand, it is an element of feeling, since through the perception of bodily changes it gives feeling the character of an affect (q.v.). Because sensation conveys bodily changes to consciousness, it is also a representative of physiological impulses. It is not identical with them, being merely a perceptive function.
A distinction must be made between sensuous or concrete (q.v.) sensation and abstract (q.v.) sensation. The first includes all the above-mentioned forms of sensation, whereas the second is a sensation that is abstracted or separated from the other psychic elements. Concrete sensation never appears in “pure” form, but is always mixed up with ideas, feelings, thoughts. Abstract sensation is a differentiated kind of perception, which might be termed “aesthetic” in so far as, obeying its own principle, it detaches itself from all contamination with the different elements in the perceived object and from all admixtures of thought and feeling, and thus attains a degree of purity beyond the reach of concrete sensation. The concrete sensation of a flower, on the other hand, conveys a perception not only of the flower as such, but also of the stem, leaves, habitat, and so on. It is also instantly mingled with feelings of pleasure or dislike which the sight of the flower evokes, or with simultaneous olfactory perceptions, or with thoughts about its botanical classification, etc. But abstract sensation immediately picks out the most salient sensuous attribute of the flower, its brilliant redness, for instance, and makes this the sole or at least the principal content of consciousness, entirely detached from all other admixtures. Abstract sensation is found chiefly among artists. Like every abstraction, it is a product of functional differentiation (q.v.), and there is nothing primitive about it. The primitive form of a function is always concrete, i.e., contaminated (v. Archaism; Concretism). Concrete sensation is a reactive phenomenon, while abstract sensation, like every abstraction, is always associated with the will (q.v.), i.e., with a sense of direction. The will that is directed to abstract sensation is an expression and application of the aesthetic sensation attitude.
Sensation is strongly developed in children and primitives, since in both cases it predominates over thinking and feeling, though not necessarily over intuition (q.v.). I regard sensation as conscious, and intuition as unconscious, perception. For me sensation and intuition represent a pair of opposites, or two mutually compensating functions, like thinking and feeling. Thinking and feeling as independent functions are developed, both ontogenetically and phylogenetically, from sensation (and equally, of course, from intuition as the necessary counterpart of sensation). A person whose whole attitude (q.v.) is oriented by sensation belongs to the sensation type (q.v.).
Since sensation is an elementary phenomenon, it is given a priori, and, unlike thinking and feeling, is not subject to rational laws. I therefore call it an irrational (q.v.) function, although reason contrives to assimilate a great many sensations into a rational context. Normal sensations are proportionate, i.e., they correspond approximately to the intensity of the physical stimulus. Pathological sensations are disproportionate, i.e., either abnormally weak or abnormally strong. In the former case they are inhibited, in the latter exaggerated. The inhibition is due to the predominance of another function; the exaggeration is the result of an abnormal fusion with another function, for instance with undifferentiated thinking or feeling. It ceases as soon as the function with which sensation is fused is differentiated in its own right. The psychology of the neuroses affords instructive examples of this, since we often find a strong sexualization (Freud) of other functions, i.e., their fusion with sexual sensations.
35. INTUITION (L. intueri, ‘to look at or into’). I regard intuition as a basic psychological function (q.v.). It is the function that mediates perceptions in an unconscious way. Everything, whether outer or inner objects or their relationships, can be the focus of this perception. The peculiarity of intuition is that it is neither sense perception, nor feeling, nor intellectual inference, although it may also appear in these forms. In intuition a content presents itself whole and complete, without our being able to explain or discover how this content came into existence. Intuition is a kind of instinctive apprehension, no matter of what contents. Like sensation (q.v.), it is an irrational (q.v.) function of perception. As with sensation, its contents have the character of being “given,” in contrast to the “derived” or “produced” character of thinking and feeling (qq.v.) contents. Intuitive knowledge possesses an intrinsic certainty and conviction, which enabled Spinoza (and Bergson) to uphold the scientia intuitiva as the highest form of knowledge. Intuition shares this quality with sensation (q.v.), whose certainty rests on its physical foundation. The certainty of intuition rests equally on a definite state of psychic “alertness” of whose origin the subject is unconscious.
Intuition may be subjective or objective: the first is a perception of unconscious psychic data originating in the subject, the second is a perception of data dependent on subliminal perceptions of the object and on the feelings and thoughts they evoke. We may also distinguish concrete and abstract forms of intuition, according to the degree of participation on the part of sensation. Concrete intuition mediates perceptions concerned with the actuality of things, abstract intuition mediates perceptions of ideational connections. Concrete intuition is a reactive process, since it responds directly to the given facts; abstract intuition, like abstract sensation, needs a certain element of direction, an act of the will, or an aim.
Like sensation, intuition is a characteristic of infantile and primitive psychology. It counterbalances the powerful sense impressions of the child and the primitive by mediating perceptions of mythological images, the precursors of ideas (q.v.). It stands in a compensatory relationship to sensation and, like it, is the matrix out of which thinking and feeling develop as rational functions. Although intuition is an irrational function, many intuitions can afterwards be broken down into their component elements and their origin thus brought into harmony with the laws of reason.
Everyone whose general attitude (q.v.) is oriented by intuition belongs to the intuitive type (q.v.).68 Introverted and extraverted intuitives may be distinguished according to whether intuition is directed inwards, to the inner vision, or outwards, to action and achievement. In abnormal cases intuition is in large measure fused together with the contents of the collective unconscious (q.v.) and determined by them, and this may make the intuitive type appear extremely irrational and beyond comprehension.
21. FEELING. 46 I count feeling among the four basic psychological functions (q.v.). I am unable to support the psychological school that considers feeling a secondary phenomenon dependent on “representations” or sensations, but in company with Höffding, Wundt, Lehmann, Külpe, Baldwin, and others, I regard it as an independent function sui generis. 47
Feeling is primarily a process that takes place between the ego (q.v.) and a given content, a process, moreover, that imparts to the content a definite value in the sense of acceptance or rejection (“like” or “dislike”). The process can also appear isolated, as it were, in the form of a “mood,” regardless of the momentary contents of consciousness or momentary sensations. The mood may be causally related to earlier conscious contents, though not necessarily so, since, as psychopathology amply proves, it may equally well arise from unconscious contents. But even a mood, whether it be a general or only a partial feeling, implies a valuation; not of one definite, individual conscious content, but of the whole conscious situation at the moment, and, once again, with special reference to the question of acceptance or rejection.
Feeling, therefore, is an entirely subjective process, which may be in every respect independent of external stimuli, though it allies itself with every sensation.48 Even an “indifferent” sensation possesses a feeling-tone, namely that of indifference, which again expresses some sort of valuation. Hence feeling is a kind of judgment, differing from intellectual judgment in that its aim is not to establish conceptual relations but to set up a subjective criterion of acceptance or rejection. Valuation by feeling extends to every content of
consciousness, of whatever kind it may be. When the intensity of feeling increases, it turns into an affect (q.v.), i.e., a feeling-state accompanied by marked physical innervations. Feeling is distinguished from affect by the fact that it produces no perceptible physical innervations, i.e., neither more nor less than an ordinary thinking process.
Ordinary, “simple” feeling is concrete (q.v.), that is, it is mixed up with other functional elements, more particularly with sensations. In this case we can call it affective or, as I have done in this book, feeling-sensation, by which I mean an almost inseparable amalgam of feeling and sensation elements. This characteristic amalgamation is found wherever feeling is still an undifferentiated function, and is most evident in the psyche of a neurotic with differentiated thinking. Although feeling is, in itself, an independent function, it can easily become dependent on another function—thinking, for instance; it is then a mere concomitant of thinking, and is not repressed only in so far as it accommodates itself to the thinking processes.
It is important to distinguish abstract feeling from ordinary concrete feeling. Just as the abstract concept (v. Thinking) abolishes the differences between things it apprehends, abstract feeling rises above the differences of the individual contents it evaluates, and produces a “mood” or feeling-state which embraces the different individual valuations and thereby abolishes them. In the same way that thinking organizes the contents of consciousness under concepts, feeling arranges them according to their value. The more concrete it is, the more subjective and personal is the value conferred upon them; but the more abstract it is, the more universal and objective the value will be. Just as a completely abstract concept no longer coincides with the singularity and discreteness of things, but only with their universality and non-differentiation, so completely abstract feeling no longer coincides with a particular content and its feeling-value, but with the undifferentiated totality of all contents. Feeling, like thinking, is a rational (q.v.) function, since values in general are assigned according to the laws of reason, just as concepts in general are formed according to these laws.
Naturally the above definitions do not give the essence of feeling—they only describe it from outside. The intellect proves incapable of formulating the real nature of feeling in conceptual terms, since thinking belongs to a category incommensurable with feeling; in fact, no basic psychological function can ever be completely expressed by another. That being so, it is impossible for an intellectual definition to reproduce the specific character of feeling at all adequately. The mere classification of feelings adds nothing to an understanding of their nature, because even the most exact classification will be able to indicate only the content of feeling which the intellect can apprehend, without grasping its specific nature. Only as many classes of feelings can be discriminated as there are classes of contents that can be intellectually apprehended, but feeling per se can never be exhaustively classified because, beyond every possible class of contents accessible to the intellect, there still exist feelings which resist intellectual classification. The very notion of classification is intellectual and therefore incompatible with the nature of feeling. We must therefore be content to indicate the limits of the concept.
The nature of valuation by feeling may be compared with intellectual apperception (q.v.) as an apperception of value. We can distinguish active and passive apperception by feeling. Passive feeling allows itself to be attracted or excited by a particular content, which then forces the feelings of the subject to participate. Active feeling is a transfer of value from the subject; it is an intentional valuation of the content in accordance with feeling and not in accordance with the intellect. Hence active feeling is a directed function, an act of the will (q.v.), as for instance loving as opposed to being in love. The latter would be undirected, passive feeling, as these expressions themselves show: the one is an activity, the other a passive state. Undirected feeling is feeling-intuition. Strictly speaking, therefore, only active, directed feeling should be termed rational, whereas passive feeling is irrational (q.v.) in so far as it confers values without the participation or even against the intentions of the subject. When the subject’s attitude as a whole is oriented by the feeling function, we speak of a feeling type (v. Type).
53. THINKING. This I regard as one of the four basic psychological functions (q.v.). Thinking is the psychological function which, following its own laws, brings the contents of ideation into conceptual connection with one another. It is an apperceptive (q.v.) activity, and as such may be divided into active and passive thinking. Active thinking is an act of the will (q.v.), passive thinking is a mere occurrence. In the former case, I submit the contents of ideation to a voluntary act of judgment; in the latter, conceptual connections establish themselves of their own accord, and judgments are formed that may even contradict my intention. They are not consonant with my aim and therefore, for me, lack any sense of direction, although I may afterwards recognize their directedness through an act of active apperception. Active thinking, accordingly, would correspond to my concept of directed thinking. 85 Passive thinking was inadequately described in my previous work as “fantasy thinking.”86 Today I would call it intuitive thinking.
To my mind, a mere stringing together of ideas, such as is described by certain psychologists as associative thinking, 87 is not thinking at all, but mere ideation. The term “thinking” should, in my view, be confined to the linking up of ideas by means of a concept, in other words, to an act of judgment, no matter whether this act is intentional or not.
The capacity for directed thinking I call intellect; the capacity for passive or undirected thinking I call intellectual intuition. Further, I call directed thinking a rational (q.v.) function, because it arranges the contents of ideation under concepts in accordance with a rational norm of which I am conscious. Undirected thinking is in my view an irrational (q.v.) function, because it arranges and judges the contents of ideation by norms of which I am not conscious and therefore cannot recognize as being in accord with reason. Subsequently I may be able to recognize that the intuitive act of judgment accorded with reason, although it came about in a way that appears to me irrational.
Thinking that is governed by feeling (q.v.) I do not regard as intuitive thinking, but as a thinking dependent on feeling; it does not follow its own logical principle but is subordinated to the principle of feeling. In such thinking the laws of logic are only ostensibly present; in reality they are suspended in favour of the aims of feeling.
55. TYPE. A type is a specimen or example which reproduces in a characteristic way the character of a species or class. In the narrower sense used in this particular work, a type is a characteristic specimen of a general attitude (q.v.) occurring in many individual forms. From a great number of existing or possible attitudes I have singled out four; those, namely, that are primarily oriented by the four basic psychological functions (q.v.): thinking, feeling, sensation, intuition (qq.v.). When any of these attitudes is habitual, thus setting a definite stamp on the character of an individual (q.v.), I speak of a psychol - ogical type. These function-types, which one can call the thinking, feeling, sensation, and intuitive types, may be divided into two classes according to the quality of the basic function, i.e., into the rational and the irrational (qq.v.). The thinking and feeling types belong to the former class, the sensation and intuitive types to the latter. A further division into two classes is permitted by the predominant trend of the movement of libido (q.v.), namely introversion and extraversion (qq.v.). All the basic types can belong equally well to one or the other of these classes, according to the predominance of the introverted or extraverted attitude.88 A thinking type may belong either to the introverted or to the extraverted class, and the same holds good for the other types. The distinction between rational and irrational types is simply another point of view and has nothing to do with introversion and extraversion.
In my previous contributions to typology89 I did not differentiate the thinking and feeling types from the introverted and extraverted types, but identified the thinking type with the introverted, and the feeling type with the extraverted. But a more thorough investigation of the material has shown me that we must treat the introverted and extraverted types as categories over and above the function-types. This differentiation, moreover, fully accords with experience, since, for example, there are undoubtedly two kinds of feeling types, the attitude of the one being oriented more by his feeling-experience [= introverted feeling type], the other more by the
object [= extraverted feeling type].
It may perhaps seem superfluous that I should add to my text a chapter dealing solely with definitions. But ample experience has taught me that, in psychological works particularly, one cannot proceed too cautiously in regard to the concepts and terms one uses: for nowhere do such wide divergences of meaning occur as in the domain of psychology, creating only too frequently the most obstinate misunderstandings. This drawback is due not only to the fact that the science of psychology is still in its infancy; there is the further difficulty that the empirical material, the object of scientific investigation, cannot be displayed in concrete form, as it were, before the eyes of the reader. The psychological investigator is always finding himself obliged to make extensive use of an indirect method of description in order to present the reality he has observed. Only in so far as elementary facts are communicated which are amenable to quantitative measurement can there be any question of a direct presentation. But how much of the actual psychology of man can be experienced and observed as quantitatively measurable facts? Such facts do exist, and I believe I have shown in my association studies1 that extremely complicated psychological facts are accessible to quantitative measurement. But anyone who has probed more deeply into the nature of psychology, demanding something more of it as a science than that it should confine itself within the narrow limits of the scientific method, will also have realized that an experimental method will never succeed in doing justice to the nature of the human psyche, nor will it ever project anything like a true picture of the more complex psychic phenomena.
But once we leave the domain of measurable facts we are dependent on concepts, which have now to take over the role of measure and number. The precision which measure and number lend to the observed fact can be replaced only by the precision of the concept. Unfortunately, as every investigator and worker in this field knows only too well, current psychological concepts are so imprecise and so ambiguous that mutual understanding is practically impossible. One has only to take the concept “feeling,” for instance, and try to visualize everything this concept comprises, to get some sort of notion of the variability and ambiguity of psychological concepts in general. And yet the concept of feeling does express something characteristic that, though not susceptible of quantitative measurement, nevertheless palpably exists. One simply cannot resign oneself, as Wundt does in his physiological psychology, to a mere denial of such essential and fundamental phenomena, and seek to replace them by elementary facts or to resolve them into such. In this way an essential part of psychology is thrown overboard.
In order to escape the ill consequences of this overvaluation of the scientific method, one is obliged to have recourse to well-defined concepts. But in order to arrive at such concepts, the collaboration of many workers would be needed, a sort of consensus gentium. Since this is not within the bounds of possibility at present, the individual investigator must at least try to give his concepts some fixity and precision, and this can best be done by discussing the meaning of the concepts he employs so that everyone is in a position to see what in fact he means by them.
