Re: [xmca] Subject and Self

Eric, my interest in this was stimulated by the opening sentence of Hegel's
1802 "System of Ethical Life":

                "Knowledge of the Idea of the absolute ethical order
depends entirely on the establishment of perfect
                adequacy between intuition and concept, because the Idea
itself is nothing other than the identity of
                the two. But if this identity is to be actually known, it
must be thought as a made adequacy."
                http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/se/introduction.htm

In this sentence read for "intuition" Sensation or ideography and for
"concept" read Reason or nomology. The Idea is human life, but it's unity
(in the 1802 system) is the outcome of history, not its starting point. The
institutions and products of the world and how they ought to be, have to be
in tune with one another. In the world to begin with, before it can be in
thought as such.

Andy
At 09:26 AM 20/12/2007 -0600, you wrote:

>Steve:
>
>Thank you for the question. Initially I was drawn to the
>idiographic/nomothetic distinction because of reading Vygotsky's crisis and
>discussing the article on xmca. As always my best thinking (in my mind?)
>is done when I discuss articles. Valsiner references Vygotsky's crisis in
>his introduction. Going further in history ( one of the reasons I
>appreciate Valsiner so much is his emphasis on history when he writes)
>Valsiner describes the Erklaren-Verstehen dichotomy that was introduced by
>Droyson in 1858 and later elaborated on by Dilthey (a researcher referenced
>by Vygotsky in Crisis). This distinction was that Verstehen
>(understanding) was the goal for the science of the mind and that Erklaren
>(expalining) was the goal for the physical sciences.
>
>A quote from page 10 of his introduction to the volume:
>
>" The study of individual cases has always been the major (albeit often
>unrecognized) strategy in the advancement of knowledge about other human
>beings. Medical science. . .everyday life. . .the handling of such unique
>problems in everyday life is of utmost importance for the problem-solving
>individuals, who have to adopt a case-study approach to them. However,
>case studies in the social sciences have often been labeled "soft" science
>because they are indeed aspects to them that do not satisfy the
>requirements of the so-called "hard" sciences: existence of controls,
>replicability of measurement, separation of independent and dependant
>variable and so on. "
>
>Isaac Frank's chapter 1, "Psychology as a science: resolving the
>idiographic-nomothetic controversy" relies greatly on Allport's quest for a
>proper method for studying psychology. Frank quotes Allport, 1961, p.10:
>"we do not need to understand every life in order to discover the lawful
>regularities in one life. If you have intimate friend, you may know very
>well why he behaves as he does. . because you know the lawful regularities
>in his life."
>
>I could go on if interested but for now I'll ask,
>
>"what do you think?"
>
>eric
>
>
>
>
> Steve
> Gabosch
>
> <sgabosch@comcas To: "eXtended Mind,
> Culture, Activity" <xmca@weber.ucsd.edu>
> t.net> cc:
>
> Sent by: Subject: Re: [xmca]
> Subject and Self
> xmca-bounces@web
>
> er.ucsd.edu
>
>
>
>
>
> 12/19/2007
> 08:20
>
> PM
>
> Please
> respond
>
> to
> "eXtended
>
> Mind,
> Culture,
>
> Activity"
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>Eric, what passages/ideas from Valsiner or others in this volume most
>interest you on this topic? I would be pleased to hear your
>thoughts, favorite quotes, etc.
>- Steve
>
>
>
>On Dec 19, 2007, at 9:21 AM, ERIC.RAMBERG@spps.org wrote:
>
> >
> > For those interested in the Nomothetic/Idiographic distinction please
> > reference Valsiner's The individual subject and scientific psychology.
> > 1986, Plenum Press
> >
> >
> >
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  Andy Blunden : http://home.mira.net/~andy/ tel (H) +61 3 9380 9435,
mobile 0409 358 651

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Received on Thu Dec 20 16:14 PST 2007