Herbart in the history of philosophy: The relation of ideas. Perception and apperception

German philosopher Johann Friedrich Herbart (1776–1841) represents a realistic tradition in the history of philosophy. After studying philosophy in Jena under J. G. Fichte, Herbart started to work toward his own philosophical system. Following a period of a few years experience as a private tutor at Intelaken in Switzerland (where he made the acquaintance of J. H. Pestalozzi, as referred in le Huray & Day 1981: 452), Herbart defended his dissertation on philosophy in Göttingen (1802) and was thereafter appointed in 1809 to the chair at Königsberg formerly occupied by Kant (1724–1804). Herbart‖s main works include Allgemeine Praktische Philosophie (1808), Lehrbuch zur Psychologie (1816), Psychologie als Wissenschaft (1824–25) and Metaphysik (1828–29). Although Herbart‖s outline of philosophy psychology and metaphysics did not include distinct subject-matters, Herbart was an anti-idealist, unlike his predecessor Kant. Moreover, he is generally regarded as a follower of the line of British empirism and associationism (as represented by Locke, Berkeley and Hume). According to this epistemological approach, which was initiated by Thomas Hobbes, a contemporary of Descartes, there is no knowledge a priori.

All information on the world is empirically acquired through the senses in the processes of perception and sensation.

In the Introduction of his Psychologie als Wissenschaft (passage VI, Blicke auf die Geschichte der Psychologie seit Des-Cartes) Herbart reflects upon the different solutions offered in the philosophical tradition to the relationship of mind and world, or the perceptions of the former of the latter. He takes a stand in favour of Locke as compared to Kant or Descartes by quoting Locke in English:

Er hatte auch keinen kategorischen Imperativ; sondern der Satz: no innate practical principles!

gehörte wesentlich zu seiner ganzen Ansicht. Worin das Wesen des Geistes bestehe, wiefern unsre Gedanken von der Materie abhängen, sind ihm: speculations, which, however curious and entertaining, I shall decline, as lying out of my way. (Herbart 1890: 216.)

According to John Locke (1632–1704, principal work An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, 1690), the mind is an empty table, a tabula rasa,²¹⁹ which is gradually filled

219 Herbart wholeheartedly agrees with this view in his Psychologie als Wissenschaft (1890: 215).

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by the sensations that flow into it. Sensations also bring about reflections, which form a central concept in Locke‖s epistemology. Locke, who was educated as a physician, thought that knowledge is an empirical matter. The senses form the main avenue of contact between the mind and the external world (Boring 1950: 174). Ideas, that are units of mind, are not innate but derived from experience. In his doctrine of ideas Locke incorporated two kinds of ideas: sensations and reflections. Sensations, that are conveyed to the mind by the senses from external bodies, form the primary source of ideas and produce perceptions.

With the conception of reflections Locke attempts to answer the question of how the mind obtains knowledge of its own operations. Reflections as the operations of the mind form the second source of ideas—of ideas about ideas and the manner of their occurrence.

(Boring 1950: 170, 172–173).

Locke‖s immediate successor in British philosophy was George Berkeley (1685–1753, principal work A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge, 1710). Berkeley claimed that the act of consciousness, that is, perception, is the reality (esse est percipi), for the existence of an idea consists in being perceived (a claim which also includes ideas that can be perceived potentially). When in the empirism of Locke, matter generates mind, in the empirism of Berkeley, mind generates matter. (Boring 1950: 184.) For Berkeley, Bishop of Cloyne in County Cork, Ireland, God who creates and perceives ideas is their ultimate cause, a view characterized by Jones (1969: 295) as Christian Neoplatonism. (According to Jones Berkeley is an empiricist in spite of himself.) Perception as a process of consciousness presupposes the concept of the substance of the soul, which in Berkeley‖s philosophy equals consciousness. (Hartnack 1978: 112–114; Jones: 1969: 295.)

David Hume (1711–1776, principal work A Treatise of Human Nature, 1739), whose philosophical system can be discussed here only superficially, continued to scrutinize the concept of perception. His conception of perception included both impressions (sensations and reflections) and ideas, a distinction which according to Jones (1969: 299) did not involve Hume in metaphysics.²²⁰ Also for Hume impressions are the cause of ideas, every idea in turn being derived from a preceding perception. (Selby-Bigge 1928: 241.) Like Locke, Hume thought that every item (impressions or ideas) in consciousness is a distinct, separate, isolated unit. This assumption, called as “psychological atomism”, was to dominate psychology for more than a century to come. (Boring 1950: 190, 193; Jones 1969:

299, 301.)

Being in accordance with this line, Herbart‖s system of philosophy stems from the analysis of experience. The attributes added to the title of his major work Psychologie als Wissenschaft (1824–25)—neu gegründet auf Erfahrung, Metaphysik und Mathematik—clearly indicate the fundamental points of departure in Herbart‖s approach to science.

Accordingly, psychology as a science is empirical, for it is grounded upon experience.

Herbart emphasized the importance of observation as a method of scientific research, for new science (as it was understood after Galileo and Newton) could hardly fail when

220 In A Treatise of Human Nature (Book I, Of the Understanding, iv, 6) there is an illuminating passage in which Hume describes the connection between perceptions and mind. In an argument for the impossibility of perceiving the idea of self he states the following: . . . I may venture to affirm of the rest of mankind, that they are nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity, and are in a perpetual flux and movement. . . . nor is there any single power of the soul, which remains unalterably the same, . . . The mind is a kind of theater, where several perceptions successively make their appearance; pass, re-pass, glide away, and mingle in an infinite variety of postures and situations. (Selby-Bigge 1928: 252–253.)

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founded upon experience. However, Herbart did not imply that philosophy should be excluded from psychology (at that time all philosophy seemed to have acquired a psychological cast). Boring (1950: 252) remarks that by claiming that psychology has a metaphysical nature, Herbart specifically wanted to differentiate psychology from physical science: psychology was metaphysical, physics experimental. To Herbart psychology was also mathematical, for this provided him with another scientific method. Mental life was by Herbart still located under the general concept of soul, consisting of presentations, states, or impressions. Since mind (soul) is a unified whole it cannot be experimented or separated into pieces. Following the Cartesian dualism²²¹ Herbart disputed the idea that brain or physiological matters could equal the mind or that physiology could provide an approach to the problem of the mind.²²² (Boring 1950: 253–254.)

Herbart‖s conception of mind and matter has also certain affinity with the basic features of Leibniz‖s philosophy. Herbart greatly appreciated his German predecessor, and according to Boring (1950: 257), there are plenty of grounds for saying that Leibniz, and not Kant, was Herbart‖s tutor. Hilgenheger (2000: 1) remarks that in his metaphysic Herbart draws to a remarkable extent on Leibniz‖s theory on monads. As for Herbart the mind was indivisible, the ontology in Leibniz‖s thought is based on his concept of monads, which are metaphysical and indivisible singulars. The assemblage of monads forms a hierarchical system that is governed by the monad of monads, God, an infinite monad.

Consequently on the highest stages of this hierarchy also the grade of consciousness increases. Monads thus present a hierarchical epistemological capacity. Whereas human beings are capable of self-reflection, God has an absolute, universal consciousness.

Therefore, all existence is ultimately spiritual in essence. (Ibid.).

With his theory of pre-established harmony Leibniz explained the problem of psychophysical parallelism: the existence of mind and matter is taken for granted, but there is no interaction between the two. As characterized by Robinson (1982: 135–136), according to the view of pre-established harmony, mental life runs parallel to the cerebral, and mind and body are related to each other as two (by God) synchronously set clocks designed to tell the same time. They run their respective courses in parallel, displaying perfect correspondence but without ever interacting. Leibniz maintained that due to the principle of the pre-established harmony, the world in which we live is the best possible.

According to Boring however (1950: 254–255), in comparison with Leibniz Herbart did recognize the relation between mind and body. In his conception of ideas he included three principles of connection between these two realms: bodily conditions may hinder the arousal of an idea (for example in sleep), which Herbart names as repression (Druck). They may also facilitate the arousal of an idea (in intoxication or passion), identified as reinforcement (Resonanz). Furthermore, in cases where ideas cause movement, cooperation between soul and body is apparent.

221 According to Descartes, all interactions between mind and body are one way, with the mental realm standing as cause and the physical as effect. (Robinson 1982: 134.)

222 In his Lehrbuch zur Psychologie Herbart says: “Psychology cannot experiment with men, and there is no apparatus for this purpose. So much the more carefully must we make use of mathematics . . . All mental life, as we observe it in ourselves and others, is shown to be an occurrence in time, a constant change, . . .”

(Robinson 1982: 129.)

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As stated in Herbart‖s doctrine of Vorstellungen, ideas²²³ are distinguishable from one another in respect of quality, in which they are invariable and individual, thus making a different from b. However, ideas have two variables: time and intensity. Every idea may vary in intensity or force, an attribute equivalent to clearness. In relation to other ideas, each idea makes an effort to conserve itself. This makes ideas active, especially when there is opposition between them. If the ideas did not on account of their opposition inhibit one another, all ideas would compose only one act of the soul. In turn, those ideas which can constitute a single mental act collectively do not resist each other. Despite this, in Herbart‖s view inhibitions resulting from mutual opposition are seen to be the rule of consciousness (Boring 1950: 253, 255–256). As Boring (1950: 255) remarks, this kind of activity between the ideas represented for Herbart the fundamental principle of mental mechanics much in the same way as gravitation is the fundamental principle of physical mechanics. Thus permutations, interactions and combinations of ideas constitute the entire fibre of our mental life. This is also where Herbart could use his mathematical method. As noted by John G. Benjafield (2001: 92), consciousness was understood by Herbart to consist of a set of ideas that mutually facilitate each other. Because all mental life is the

“result of the action and interaction of elementary ideas”²²⁴ it was the relations between ideas that mattered in Herbart‖s philosophy rather than the intrinsic properties of ideas themselves, which he believed to be too evanescent to be part of a scientific psychology (ibid.). The attempt to use mathematics in establishing quantitative laws of the mutual interactions of ideas and presentations was later carried on by the experimental investigations of Fechner, Weber and Wundt.

As for the British empiricists who consider sensations and ideas as perceptions, Herbart extended his conception of idea further to cover the word apperception. As Boring (1950:

257) notes, this was a concept that Herbart adopted from the preceding German philosophy, especially from Leibniz. In Leibniz‖s view the concepts of perception and apperception are closely interlocked with the doctrine of monads, i.e., soul substances. In his essay Principles of Nature and Grace, Based on Reason (Principes de la nature et la grace, 1714) Leibniz defines the monad as follows:

A simple substance is that which has no parts. A composite substance is a collection of simple substances, or monads. Monas is a Greek word signifying unity, or what is one. Composites or bodies are multitudes; and simple substances—lives, souls, and minds—are unities.”²²⁵ (Ariew &

Garber 1989: 207.)

223 Herbart‖s concept of ―Vorstellung‖ as a kind of a psychological entity is quite difficult to translate. For example, Murray and Bandomir (2002: 2) use the equivalent ―idea‖ or ―presentation‖, but continue to use the original German term throughout their article. Boring (1950: 255) comments that it is possible to use the word ―idea‖ in Locke‖s sense, remembering that the German word includes both perceptions and ideas, as the modern English usage goes. Professor Dr. Josef Švancara reminded me in a personal discussion on Herbart at the Department of Psychology, Masaryk University, Brno on December 14th 2004, that the appropriate translation of ―Vorstellungen‖ should be images. I have at this point decided to keep to Boring‖s term idea.

224 Benjafield quotes J. Ward in his definition on Herbart‖s system in Encyclopaedia Britannica (1910, 11th ed., Vol. 13, p. 337).

225 In his Monadology, point 6, Leibniz states: “Thus, one can say that monads can only begin or end all at once, that is, they can only begin by creation and end by annihilation, whereas composites begin or end through their parts.” (Ariew & Garber 1989: 213.)

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Leibniz futher distinguished between perception and apperception of the monads:

. . . perception, which is the internal state of the monad representing external things, and apperception, which is consciousness, or the reflective knowledge of this internal state,²²⁶ something not given to all souls, . . . (Ariew & Garber 1989: 208.)²²⁷

Leibniz named the former type of perceptions as petites perceptions, which represent the lower degrees of consciousness. The conscious actualization of these perceptions is thus apperception. It involves also the act of recollecting as a part of consciousness. Leibniz illustrates the qualitative difference between these perceptions by a metaphor of the sea and its waves: the sound of the breakers on the beach is apperception, whereas the falling drops of water or the particular noises of each wave (petites perceptions), of which the whole noise is composed, are not distinguishable and cannot be conscious alone. (Ariew & Garber 1989:

211; Boring 1950: 167.)

As pointed out by Boring (1950: 257), Herbart derived his conception of inhibited ideas from Leibniz‖s concept of petites perceptions. The principal mental action that is going on all the while is inhibition. The activity of the combination of ideas is thus mostly negative.

However, Herbart introduced a concept that functioned as a unifying element between the ideas: the apperceptive mass of ideas selects new constituents by suppressing all but a few, which come up into consciousness of their own force, when not opposed. (Boring 1950:

257–258.) In Herbart‖s philosophy the apperception of an idea is thus more important than just the making of it conscious. The totality of compatible ideas in consciousness determines what new thoughts may enter consciousness and thus be assimilated into it.

This aspect of the apperceptive mass provided also a significant basis for Herbart‖s educational philosophy. Herbart‖s whole theory of education can be seen to be founded on his doctrines of apperception and interest. All progress in knowledge after the first percipient act is a process of apperception, and the character of each new perception is determined by those which have gone before. The facility and completeness with which new ideas are assimilated depends therefore on past perceptions. The kinds of ideas and the order in which they are presented are of utmost moment in Herbart‖s educational theory.

Ideas or objects are assimilable or apperceivable when they are partially familiar. Herbart was the first scientist to distinguish instructional process from subject matter and to combine the concepts of “education” and “teaching”. According to Herbart, interest develops when already strong and vivid ideas are hospitable towards new ones, thus past associations motivate apperception of current ones. This led him to stress the study of the psychological processes of learning as a means of devising educational programs based on the aptitudes, abilities, and interests of students. Herbartianism,²²⁸ in predicting that learning follows from building up sequences of ideas important to the individual, gave

226 L‖Apperception est la conscience, ou la connaissance réflexive de l‖état intérieur. (Cited in Herbart 1890:

218.)

227 According to Leibniz, all monads do present perceptions, but inanimate, inorganic monads belonging to nature show only perceptions that they are unable to become aware of. Accordingly the soul is the only monad capable of apperception. Every monad has its own perceptions and is thus unable to recognize the perceptions of other monads. As expressed by Leibniz, monads are closed worlds with no windows outward.

(Hartnack 1978: 100–101.)

228 In the connection of educational philosophy, the term “Herbartianism”, instead of “Herbartism”, has become an established term.

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teachers a semblance of a theory of motivation. The success of Herbart‖s methods led to their adoption in the teacher-training systems of numerous countries. (Clark 1999;

Hilgenherger 2000: 2–8.)

II.2.2 Herbart and the evolving of experimental psychology. Degrees and limen of