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Old 26-05-2017, 09:50 PM
Lorelyen
Posts: n/a
 
To me psychology is a pseudo-science based on observation and statistics
about social norms. It stereotypes people by classifying them in a cultural
context. It comes up with syndromes and disorders.

Psychologists can't get to individuals' raw data, the quality of their
experiences and how they affect individual lives. They're also often in the
unfortunate position of affecting the outcome by their presence (something
first noticed in the famous Hawthorn Experiment, probably the birth of
organisational psychology).

So I see no junction with spirituality beyond the anecdotal concerning types
of belief. Mental state is sometimes aberrant and can lead to harm (and thus
has to be constrained) but otherwise is the business of the individual. I'm not
even sure how psychologists regard the current splurge of spirituality - I
doubt they can sort out the snake-oil from genuine spiritual pursuit. If
someone wants to believe in an external god that does this and that, that's
up to them.

Spirituality is individual. People try to classify their practices/beliefs in a
broad sense to place themselves in a current but thereafter things
presumably diverge - they might not but as there's no experiential
vocabulary beyond the grossest terms - there's no way of proving anything
either way. (That's why this very forum can exist and be so fruitful.)
Like, psychologists use terms like "pleasant" and "unpleasant" to
refer to experiences but that's their limit. Words like "ecstatic", "beautiful",
"horrifying" are not in their vocabulary.

Even Wilhelm Wundt who sought to work with perceptions was eventually
pronounced a fraud.

This isn't to say that all psychology is useless. The behaviourists taught us
a lot and there's much to be learned from psychophisiology. There's also the
fact that marketers and advertising gurus capitalise on those social norms.
They seem to understand (most) people's minds more than psychologists.

These are just my views though.
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