March 12, 1915] 



SCIENCE 



375 



find itself on a proerustean bed. Advance 

 would be impossible. If the science is to 

 determine the definition, the statement can 

 be at best a short-hand description of it, it 

 can do no more than approximate either 

 completeness or accuracy. A definition is 

 no more than a choice of evils. All that is 

 incumbent upon us is that of all evils we 

 choose the least. 



Even more the subject of conflict at the 

 present moment than the definition of the 

 science is the question of the methods that 

 may be employed in developing it. On 

 this point psychologists have been even 

 more divided and each more strenuous in 

 insisting upon his own attitudes. Whether 

 a new science attracts the more aggressive 

 and in consequence more intolerant men in 

 the scientific community, or the very uncer- 

 tainty of the subject of method leads to an 

 over-emphasis of assurance, a whistling to 

 keep up courage, or what the psychoanalyst 

 would call an emotion that arises from the 

 constant repression of a complex of doubt 

 that must be kept below the threshold be- 

 cause of its unpleasantness, it is undoubt- 

 edly true that psychologists have spent 

 more time than most scientists in insisting 

 upon their own method or the methods that 

 they have adopted. Ex cathedra state- 

 ments, and assertions that all who do not 

 follow their own method are not psychol- 

 ogists and that all who do follow it and 

 reach results that do not conform with 

 their own are not psychologists, have been 

 relatively very frequent. Several instances 

 may be mentioned. Wundt, as you all 

 know, early in the history of the science 

 asserted that no man who could not obtain 

 the sensory and motor differences in reac- 

 tion times was to be included among psy- 

 chologists, and only recently after a con- 

 troversy with Biihler on the Ausfrage 

 method he announced that he would read 

 no more reports on work done by that 



method. At present Miiller and Meumann, 

 both respected leaders in the science, are 

 indulging in a controversy in which each 

 seems to fall back upon similar personal 

 criteria as a justification for their impa- 

 tience with the standpoint of the other. 

 No psychology without introspection has 

 been a motto frequently implied if not ex- 

 plicitly asserted, and, ironically enough, an 

 advocate of the newest method to claim a 

 monopoly turns upon the former tyrant 

 among methods with the assertion that it 

 has been dealing with an illusory material, 

 that the method is worthless, and that its 

 followers have retarded the development of 

 the science and are in general cumberers 

 of the earth. Turn about is fair play, but 

 to meet intolerance with intolerance is 

 usually more interesting and picturesque 

 than helpful to the science. 



To my mind the great difficulty on both 

 sides lies in the same tendency that makes 

 trouble with the definition, the method 

 rather than the science is given priority. 

 The method should be the servant of the 

 science, not the science the slave of the 

 method. The only test of a method is its 

 accomplishment. Just as with definition 

 no authority exists that can once and for 

 all say this is the method, follow it or cease 

 to be a psychologist. Attempts on the part 

 of any one to take that tack are quite cer- 

 tain to be a means of covering the uncer- 

 tainties or the mistakes of the author; they 

 are certain not to be fruitful for the sci- 

 ence. These must have their origin in prej- 

 udice rather than in any universal law 

 revealed to that individual alone. Any 

 method that gives results must be kept, 

 and the more we have the better. What are 

 to be called results offers room for differ- 

 ence of opinion, but the gradually devel- 

 oped judgment of the recognized members 

 of the science and of related sciences will 

 be the final arbiter of that question. With 



