Carrol Cox wrote:
>What is a theory of psychology a theory *of*?
>
>Off hand, I can't see any reason for having one.
So why are you clinically depressive? Even if you give a biologically
based answer, you've got a theory of psychology.
One can reduce depression *in the abstract* to chemical activity in the brain. But in every person that chemical activity is a constituent in a unique history (an ensemble of social relations), which is so extraordinarily complex that neither now nor in the future can one elaborate a "science" that will apply to particular people. One can have a theory of neuroscience and one can have a theory of social relations. One cannot have a theory of the individual. So what can a psychological theory be *of*.
Qualification: Learning theory is perhaps possible and needed -- and I believe some progress in learning theory (separable from either neurology or social relations) has been made. But it also probably ought to have its own name. Theory of Consciousness is in wild disarray but is perhaps possible. But neither theory would tell us / does tell us anything in respect to the many pseudo questions "psychology" seems to revel in.
Carrol
P.S. I put this in a postscript because I'm not sure of the vocabulary appropriate to it. Thinking of course always in a sense *is* chemical activity. I.e., thinking about this sentence I'm writing generates different chemical activity than would thinking about the book I'm reading to review. Probably the difference in chemical activity is not significant enough (what would be significant enough, and will we ever know?) to make any more or less prolonged changes in brain chemical activity. But clearly some kinds of thinking (say daily fear of expected sexual molestation that night by one's father) could / probably does make changes in the brain's ongoing chemical activity. (One label for one kind, or perhaps a genus of kinds, of changes of this sort is PTSD.) Then there develops defects in the flow and re-uptake of serotonin by the neurons in the brain. One is clinically depressed. But no two people with that kind of chemical activity express it in the same way. For that one needs to search for social causes, which are probably undiscoverable. There are some general empirical observations possible. Somewhere over half, perhaps considerably more than half, of depressed people are afraid of the phone. For us, the answering machine is one of the beauties of the 20th century. But not all are. All are in some sense "afraid" of a lot of things, but it would be foolish to try to explain these fears. They are simply part of that unique history to which we give the label of "an individual person." I take it that what you and Zizek think of as psychology tries to explain these phenomena. I think that is silly.
P.S. 2 My therapist tells me (in response to some questions I asked) she always tries to get her clients not to ask "Why?" (I of course have never asked why.) She said she has one client who is really insistent on knowing "why," so she speculates with him to keep him happy. Most of her clients, however, can be weaned away from this sort of wildgoose chase. The question "Why?" (Why am I afraid of telephones when in a deep depression but not when in a mild depression?) presupposes what (I assume) does not exist -- an answer to the question "What is psychology a theory *of*?. Geology is the study of the earth, its internal structure, etc. Political economy is the study of the social relations and culture of the capitalist mode of production. What is psychology the study of?