<p>See this <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R1HCBOZM66IGEM/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_viewpnt?ie=UTF8&amp;ASIN=B008TVFCXC#R1HCBOZM66IGEM" rel="nofollow noreferrer">review</a> 
Reference "Joseph C. Hager, Ph.D." Amazon Review -</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Why would anyone want to read a book about psychology that was first
  published 113 years ago? One answer is the rationale for reading any
  psychology book: that it provides insights into psychological issues
  not available elsewhere. Although many psychologists of the late 19th
  and early 20th century probably started their career by reading this
  book, it is not appropriate today as an introduction to psychology.
  Too many of James's viewpoints are antiquated, and his facts, outdated
  or incorrect. Neither is it the book to read if you are looking for
  contemporary psychological views or a compilation of psychological
  knowledge. Recent textbooks are better for these purposes. Yet, the
  word most frequently used to describe James's Principles of Psychology
  is probably 'monumental' and rightly so because not only is this a
  lengthy work (~1400pgs), but it also is the culmination of a long line
  of philosophical thinking about the Soul, Self, Mind, Matter, and
  related topics that began with the pre-Socratic Greeks and continued
  through the 19th century, when positivist philosophers and
  experimentalists began to explore psychologically relevant
  philosophical questions in more concrete terms, invoking a scientific
  method and rejecting metaphysics. At the end of the 19th century, a
  seeming riot of discussion about the meaning of life, the nature of
  consciousness, mind, ego, evolution, and related subjects dominated
  the scientific and popular culture. At this point in history, William
  James, an American trained as a physician and employed as a Harvard
  professor, examines the various philosophies of the previous two
  millenia, picking out those aspects relevant to psychology, comparing
  and sorting them to reveal their value as unambiguous theories that
  might be tested by research, and reflecting on how the evidence stacks
  up in their favor. He also advances his own, original conceptions on
  various issues. His work is not the first to collect speculation and
  evidence into a coherent psychology, and there are many previous works
  with "Psychology" in their titles, but James's efforts would galvanize
  an American discipline of psychological science that would eventually
  become a dominant intellectual force. James defines psychology as the
  "Science of Mental Life" and describes the stream of consciousness as
  "the ultimate fact for psychology." Out of his viewpoint, the school
  of functionalism in psychology developed, where the mind is conceived
  as a useful organ that evolves according to natural selection and
  grows according to discoverable rules. His orientation towards
  physiological and behavioral data eventually diminished the then
  dominant psychological method of introspection that James himself uses
  so frequently with great effect. Subsequent viewpoints in psychology,
  such as behaviorism, though taking part of their inspiration from
  functionalism, reject James's definition of psychology, so that by the
  end of the 20th century, most psychologists with an empirical
  orientation may call themselves "behavioral scientists," but certainly
  not "mental scientists." Reading this book can be disconcerting,
  perhaps because of his period style or Victorian sensibilities, or the
  frequent, unglossed short quotes and phrases in German, French, and
  Latin because he assumes the reader has at least these minimal
  language skills. Perhaps also, it is because James is not only
  conversant with the giants of philosophy and experimental technique
  who preceeded him, but seemingly, with virtually every published
  sentence to date bearing on the subjects of concern, and in veritable
  fractal detail, producing a tour de force in erudition. His is not the
  style of current psychology journals and textbooks, but fortunately he
  does translate into English many long passages he quotes from their
  original sources. Yet possibly the most disconcerting aspects are the
  subjects that James raises in this book. The new mainstream psychology
  after James rejects many topics as unsuitable - even for discussion -
  that figure prominently in the intellectual history of philosophy and
  psychology. James's view that the concept of Soul should be eliminated
  in scientific works is one point on which later psychologists heartily
  agree, but they also, to a large extent, throw out other concepts of
  central concern to James, such as mind, emotion, will, and feeling.
  Rare pleas by scholars with varying backgrounds (e.g., Ornstein,
  Tomkins) urge students of psychology to revisit issues discussed by
  James and address the larger questions contained therein, but such
  exhorations echo mostly in halls of learning emptied by Vita
  enhancement pressures. Renewal of interest reappears lately for some
  of the suppressed topics, cast into such areas as cognitive psychology
  or emotion theory, but James's idea that the mind is a core concept
  remains foreign to virtually all contemporary psychologists, and much
  of his emphasis seems uncomfortable from today's viewpoint. The
  reluctance among psychologists to embrace such philosophical and
  scientific issues concerning the mind is remarkably not shared by some
  physicists, mathematicians, biologists, computer scientists, and other
  scientists who in recent works have implied that psychologists may be
  irrelevant to elucidating such issues, if not muddle-headed,
  scientific dwarfs. This twist is ironic because psychologists restrict
  their vocabulary and investigations partly to ape their conception of
  these "hard-core" sciences. It is not clear whether psychology will
  survive the choices that psychologists have made about their subject
  matter, or whether psychology departments will inevitably be diced and
  parsed into their appropriate slots in departments of computer
  science, biology, medicine, statistics, and physics, but certainly,
  the end of psychology is nearer if tomorrow's students of psychology
  fail to study James's Principles of Psychology. James's work is the
  jumping off point for much of what forms 20th century psychology:
  habit, association, attention, memory, imagination, object and space
  perception, etc. His thoughts about emotion, feelings, the self,
  consciousness, and other topics remain important for today's
  theoretical views. On the other hand, this work predates
  psychoanalysis and does not include an organized account of abnormal
  psychology, human communication, and other topics raised in most
  elementary surveys of psychology. The context in which James puts
  scientific psychology is probably the most important lesson of this
  book. The Dover edition is unabridged, the only form of this work that
  should be considered by the serious reader.</p>
</blockquote>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-12-13T10:20:03.217Z
2016-12-16T11:49:08.247Z
2016-12-16T11:49:08.247Z
Billy Boyo
<p>I was reading about eminent psychologists and I came across William James and a book that he has written: <em>The Principles of Psychology</em>. However, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Principles_of_Psychology" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Wikipedia states this book is outdated</a>:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Philosopher Helmut R. Wagner writes that most of the book's contents
  are now outdated, but that it still contains insights of interest.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>The article referenced is the following:</p>

<p>Wagner, Helmut R. (1983). Phenomenology of Consciousness and Sociology of the Life-world: An Introductory Study. Edmonton: The University of Alberta Press. p. 218. ISBN 0-88864-032-3.</p>

<p>Is this true or is it still worth reading?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-12-15T18:14:37.680Z
Now that you have incorporated the context you are basing yourself on (the Wikipedia reference), it becomes even more clear your question is primarily opinion-based, or at a minimum, unclear. Wikipedia does not even state it is not worth reading ... Why does the opinion stated on wikipedia not answer your question? _**"but that it still contains insights of interest."**_ Have you looked up the referenced paper, which might in fact answer your question? In case you are interested in something more specific, you need to make your question more specific as well.
Steven Jeuris
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-12-15T19:06:10.170Z
I didn't mean to make this question complicated.simply I asked about your opinions about this book. It is opinion-based.  I wanted to read this book but as soon as I saw It's 1400 pages I decided to have your opinion about whether this book is outdated or this is a good introductory book to read.
Masih K
CC BY-SA 3.0
2016-12-15T19:52:15.730Z
That is understandable. :) However, that is the reason this question was put on hold. I recommend you to read [the faq](http://cogsci.stackexchange.com/tour) to find out more about why such questions are discouraged on Stack Exchange sites.
Steven Jeuris
<psychology><history-of-psychology>
Is ''The principles of psychology'' by ''William James'' outdated?
Masih K
# Is ''The principles of psychology'' by ''William James'' outdated?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2016-12-10)

I was reading about eminent psychologists and I came across William James and a book that he has written: *The Principles of Psychology*. However, [Wikipedia states this book is outdated](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Principles_of_Psychology):

> Philosopher Helmut R. Wagner writes that most of the book's contents
> are now outdated, but that it still contains insights of interest.

The article referenced is the following:

Wagner, Helmut R. (1983). Phenomenology of Consciousness and Sociology of the Life-world: An Introductory Study. Edmonton: The University of Alberta Press. p. 218. ISBN 0-88864-032-3.

Is this true or is it still worth reading?

**Tags:** psychology, history-of-psychology

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Now that you have incorporated the context you are basing yourself on (the Wikipedia reference), it becomes even more clear your question is primarily opinion-based, or at a minimum, unclear. Wikipedia does not even state it is not worth reading ... Why does the opinion stated on wikipedia not answer your question? _**"but that it still contains insights of interest."**_ Have you looked up the referenced paper, which might in fact answer your question? In case you are interested in something more specific, you need to make your question more specific as well.  
> **username_0**: I didn't mean to make this question complicated.simply I asked about your opinions about this book. It is opinion-based.  I wanted to read this book but as soon as I saw It's 1400 pages I decided to have your opinion about whether this book is outdated or this is a good introductory book to read.  
> **username_1**: That is understandable. :) However, that is the reason this question was put on hold. I recommend you to read [the faq](http://cogsci.stackexchange.com/tour) to find out more about why such questions are discouraged on Stack Exchange sites.  

---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_2 on 2016-12-13. Score: 0 | Accepted answer

See this [review](https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R1HCBOZM66IGEM/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_viewpnt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B008TVFCXC#R1HCBOZM66IGEM)
Reference "Joseph C. Hager, Ph.D." Amazon Review -

> Why would anyone want to read a book about psychology that was first
> published 113 years ago? One answer is the rationale for reading any
> psychology book: that it provides insights into psychological issues
> not available elsewhere. Although many psychologists of the late 19th
> and early 20th century probably started their career by reading this
> book, it is not appropriate today as an introduction to psychology.
> Too many of James's viewpoints are antiquated, and his facts, outdated
> or incorrect. Neither is it the book to read if you are looking for
> contemporary psychological views or a compilation of psychological
> knowledge. Recent textbooks are better for these purposes. Yet, the
> word most frequently used to describe James's Principles of Psychology
> is probably 'monumental' and rightly so because not only is this a
> lengthy work (~1400pgs), but it also is the culmination of a long line
> of philosophical thinking about the Soul, Self, Mind, Matter, and
> related topics that began with the pre-Socratic Greeks and continued
> through the 19th century, when positivist philosophers and
> experimentalists began to explore psychologically relevant
> philosophical questions in more concrete terms, invoking a scientific
> method and rejecting metaphysics. At the end of the 19th century, a
> seeming riot of discussion about the meaning of life, the nature of
> consciousness, mind, ego, evolution, and related subjects dominated
> the scientific and popular culture. At this point in history, William
> James, an American trained as a physician and employed as a Harvard
> professor, examines the various philosophies of the previous two
> millenia, picking out those aspects relevant to psychology, comparing
> and sorting them to reveal their value as unambiguous theories that
> might be tested by research, and reflecting on how the evidence stacks
> up in their favor. He also advances his own, original conceptions on
> various issues. His work is not the first to collect speculation and
> evidence into a coherent psychology, and there are many previous works
> with "Psychology" in their titles, but James's efforts would galvanize
> an American discipline of psychological science that would eventually
> become a dominant intellectual force. James defines psychology as the
> "Science of Mental Life" and describes the stream of consciousness as
> "the ultimate fact for psychology." Out of his viewpoint, the school
> of functionalism in psychology developed, where the mind is conceived
> as a useful organ that evolves according to natural selection and
> grows according to discoverable rules. His orientation towards
> physiological and behavioral data eventually diminished the then
> dominant psychological method of introspection that James himself uses
> so frequently with great effect. Subsequent viewpoints in psychology,
> such as behaviorism, though taking part of their inspiration from
> functionalism, reject James's definition of psychology, so that by the
> end of the 20th century, most psychologists with an empirical
> orientation may call themselves "behavioral scientists," but certainly
> not "mental scientists." Reading this book can be disconcerting,
> perhaps because of his period style or Victorian sensibilities, or the
> frequent, unglossed short quotes and phrases in German, French, and
> Latin because he assumes the reader has at least these minimal
> language skills. Perhaps also, it is because James is not only
> conversant with the giants of philosophy and experimental technique
> who preceeded him, but seemingly, with virtually every published
> sentence to date bearing on the subjects of concern, and in veritable
> fractal detail, producing a tour de force in erudition. His is not the
> style of current psychology journals and textbooks, but fortunately he
> does translate into English many long passages he quotes from their
> original sources. Yet possibly the most disconcerting aspects are the
> subjects that James raises in this book. The new mainstream psychology
> after James rejects many topics as unsuitable - even for discussion -
> that figure prominently in the intellectual history of philosophy and
> psychology. James's view that the concept of Soul should be eliminated
> in scientific works is one point on which later psychologists heartily
> agree, but they also, to a large extent, throw out other concepts of
> central concern to James, such as mind, emotion, will, and feeling.
> Rare pleas by scholars with varying backgrounds (e.g., Ornstein,
> Tomkins) urge students of psychology to revisit issues discussed by
> James and address the larger questions contained therein, but such
> exhorations echo mostly in halls of learning emptied by Vita
> enhancement pressures. Renewal of interest reappears lately for some
> of the suppressed topics, cast into such areas as cognitive psychology
> or emotion theory, but James's idea that the mind is a core concept
> remains foreign to virtually all contemporary psychologists, and much
> of his emphasis seems uncomfortable from today's viewpoint. The
> reluctance among psychologists to embrace such philosophical and
> scientific issues concerning the mind is remarkably not shared by some
> physicists, mathematicians, biologists, computer scientists, and other
> scientists who in recent works have implied that psychologists may be
> irrelevant to elucidating such issues, if not muddle-headed,
> scientific dwarfs. This twist is ironic because psychologists restrict
> their vocabulary and investigations partly to ape their conception of
> these "hard-core" sciences. It is not clear whether psychology will
> survive the choices that psychologists have made about their subject
> matter, or whether psychology departments will inevitably be diced and
> parsed into their appropriate slots in departments of computer
> science, biology, medicine, statistics, and physics, but certainly,
> the end of psychology is nearer if tomorrow's students of psychology
> fail to study James's Principles of Psychology. James's work is the
> jumping off point for much of what forms 20th century psychology:
> habit, association, attention, memory, imagination, object and space
> perception, etc. His thoughts about emotion, feelings, the self,
> consciousness, and other topics remain important for today's
> theoretical views. On the other hand, this work predates
> psychoanalysis and does not include an organized account of abnormal
> psychology, human communication, and other topics raised in most
> elementary surveys of psychology. The context in which James puts
> scientific psychology is probably the most important lesson of this
> book. The Dover edition is unabridged, the only form of this work that
> should be considered by the serious reader.


---

