Januaey 20, 1899.] 



SCIENCE. 



93 



and certaiulj' never seeing an instrument 

 in the lecture room. The advanced course 

 is a theoretical discussion of the funda- 

 mental conceptions in psycholgy. The 

 course is verj^ difficult, but the fact that 

 about one hundred advanced students take 

 the course this year shows sufficiently how 

 earnestly thej' feel the need, in our time— in 

 which a thoughtless playing with psy- 

 chology has become the fad of society — of 

 discussing the principles of that science 

 from a higher standpoint, and not only as 

 a superficial introduction into expei'imental 

 psychology. 



Those who are interested in the details 

 of the experimental work and want to fol- 

 low it beyond the first elements which the 

 lectures offered enter the training course in 

 the laboratory, performing a prescribed set 

 of individual experiments, working in 

 groups of two. The question how far this 

 training course ought to lead offers again 

 methodological difficulties. We tried dif- 

 ferent schemes. My assistants gave last 

 year two courses, the first training merely 

 in well-known experiments, the second 

 training in the scholarly attitude of the 

 psj'chological investigator by carrying out' 

 some small investigations from which no 

 gain for science was expected. This year 

 we have dropped the second course and 

 welcome every one, already after a-half 

 year's elementary training course, to the 

 regular original research work of the lab- 

 oratorj', in which, of course, everything is 

 adapted to the effort to work towards the 

 progress of science. We have come to this 

 shorter circuit because with regard to the 

 pedagogical value of original research work 

 psychology has again quite an exceptional 

 position ; the self-observation factor, which 

 stands in the way of the experimental work 

 in the lecture room, becomes the greatest 

 advantage for the psychological education 

 in the research work. In physics or 

 physiology you take the part of the in- 



vestigator or you are outside ; in psychology 

 you can take a different part — you may be the 

 investigator or the self-observing subject. 

 And this subject part is, as every experi- 

 ment is self-observation, in no way a less 

 important and less scientific factor of the 

 research, and yet it is still free fi-om the 

 administrative responsibilities of the in- 

 vestigator who carries on the experiment. 

 To work for a time as subject in different 

 investigations — every student of my labora- 

 tory takes part in at least three different 

 investigations of different fields — is thus 

 the very best bridge between the simple 

 training course and the work which points 

 towards publication and the Ph. D. My ad- 

 vice is thus to open the doors of the research 

 laboratory rather earlier than the other ex- 

 act sciences would wish to do ; to work un- 

 der constant supervision some time as sub- 

 ject seems to me even a better preparation 

 than any special training course. The 

 psychological seminary finally has to ac- 

 company this highest stage by advanced 

 debates and papers ; this work, in Professor 

 James' hand, alternates in Harvard be- 

 tween more general questions and problems 

 of abnormal psychology. The only defect 

 which I must regret in this scheme is that 

 we have so far no specialists for animal, 

 child and social psychologj\ Child psy- 

 chology finds a refuge in the department of 

 pedagogy, social psychology in the depart- 

 ment of sociology. They find in many uni- 

 versities to-day a very large amount of 

 good will in both departments, but — and 

 tliat is the last methodological principle 

 which I wish to lay down — good will alone 

 is also for psj'chological studies not always 

 sufficient. ' 



Hugo Mxjnsteebeeg. 

 Haevabd University. 



antheopology. 

 Antheopology is one of the subjects that 

 have been added to the universitj' curricu- 



