Summary of Timothy D. Wilson's Strangers to Ourselves

Everest Media

Description

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.
Sample Book Insights:
#1 What are more important than matters of the heart. Or more difficult to decipher. Some people know exactly what they want, but are unable to achieve it because of their own pride, stubbornness, or lack of self-insight.
#2 The idea that a large portion of the human mind is unconscious is not new, and was Freud's greatest insight. Modern psychology owes him a large debt for his willingness to look beyond the narrow corridor of consciousness.
#3 The first experimental psychologists to jump off the behaviorism bandwagon said little about whether those aspects of the mind they were studying were conscious or unconscious. But as cognitive and social psychology flourished, it became clear that people could not verbalize many of the cognitive processes that psychologists assumed were occurring inside their heads.
#4 The modern, adaptive unconscious is not the same as the psychoanalytic one. The gap between research psychologists and psychoanalysts has narrowed considerably as scientific psychology has turned its attention to the unconscious.

Sujets

• Sociologie, société et politique
• General officer
• Psychotherapy
• Psychology
• General

Informations

• Publié par: Everest Media LLC
• Date de parution: 17 mai 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9798822512870
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Insights on Timothy D. Wilson's Strangers to Ourselves
Contents Insights from Chapter 1 Insights from Chapter 2 Insights from Chapter 3 Insights from Chapter 4 Insights from Chapter 5 Insights from Chapter 6 Insights from Chapter 7 Insights from Chapter 8 Insights from Chapter 9 Insights from Chapter 10
Insights from Chapter 1

#1

What are more important than matters of the heart. Or more difficult to decipher. Some people know exactly what they want, but are unable to achieve it because of their own pride, stubbornness, or lack of self-insight.

#2

The idea that a large portion of the human mind is unconscious is not new, and was Freud's greatest insight. Modern psychology owes him a large debt for his willingness to look beyond the narrow corridor of consciousness.

#3

The first experimental psychologists to jump off the behaviorism bandwagon said little about whether those aspects of the mind they were studying were conscious or unconscious. But as cognitive and social psychology flourished, it became clear that people could not verbalize many of the cognitive processes that psychologists assumed were occurring inside their heads.

#4

The modern, adaptive unconscious is not the same as the psychoanalytic one. The gap between research psychologists and psychoanalysts has narrowed considerably as scientific psychology has turned its attention to the unconscious.

#5

The modern perspective on the unconscious is that it is a collection of primitive, infantile thought that is kept out of consciousness because it is a source of psychic pain. This type of thought is repressed for a purpose, not simply because our attention is drawn elsewhere.

#6

The modern view is that people cannot directly examine how their minds work, such as basic processes of perception, memory, and language comprehension, because these parts of the mind are inaccessible to conscious awareness. People have developed myriad defenses to avoid knowing what their unconscious motives and feelings are.

#7

The modern view of the adaptive unconscious is that a lot of the interesting stuff about the human mind occurs outside of awareness for reasons of efficiency. The mind is a well-designed system that is able to accomplish a great deal in parallel by analyzing and thinking about the world outside of awareness while consciously thinking about something else.

#8

The 19th century saw the development of the idea that there is nonconscious perception and thought. The British physicians and philosophers William Hamilton, Thomas Laycock, and William Carpenter noted that a good deal of human perception, memory, and action occurs outside of conscious deliberation or will.

#9

The Freudian legacy was a rejection of the scientific method as a means of studying the mind. The complex nature of unconscious processes could not be examined in controlled experiments, and they could only be studied by careful clinical observation.

#10

The narrative of the adaptive unconscious is not just about the small stuff, but also plays a major role in all facets of life. It is not just about the pervasiveness of psychoanalytic thinking, but also about the importance of the adaptive unconscious.

#11

The modern view of the unconscious is not anti- Freudian. It believes that we have a sophisticated and efficient nonconscious system that is indispensable for navigating our way through the world. However, it also believes that there are dynamic forces keeping unpleasant thoughts out of awareness.

#12

The adaptive unconscious is difficult to access and understand, as it is non-conscious processing that makes up the majority of the brain's architecture. It is best to understand ourselves by looking outward at our behavior and how others react to us, and coming up with a good narrative.
Insights from Chapter 2

#1

The unconscious parts of our minds are difficult to describe because we cannot observe them directly. We can only describe what it is like to lose our nonconscious minds.

#2

We are completely unaware of our nonconscious sensory systems. We can stand and close our eyes, and keep our balance, with no awareness of how much mental work is involved. It is only the loss of these systems that demonstrates how important they are.

#3

The human mind is like a federal government, with lower-level employees who gather information and follow orders, but it is the high-level employees, such as the president and cabinet officers, who ponder information, make decisions, and set policy.

#4

The term unconscious is used to describe anything that is in your mind that you are not consciously aware of at a particular point in time. However, we quickly run into problems when we try to equate consciousness with attention or short-term memory.

#5

The term adaptive unconscious is meant to convey that nonconscious thinking is an evolutionary adaptation.