Jacob Lowe's Archive

Personally, I enjoy the respect that third-force psychologists and humanists give to people. Many schools of psychological thought seem to focus on what is wrong with mankind, rather than on anything that is good about humans. In fact, this is one of the criticisms that third-force psychologists have against psychoanalysis, the focus on the abnormal. Third-force thinkers believe that humans are more than just messy, selfish individuals who have issues. They believe that there is something altogether unique about people, and that that uniqueness should be respected. Traditional science is rejected, a human science is needed. Growing up, I learned from many churches the filthiness of man. I have been well educated in the fact that people are sinners. In Christianity, I believe it is necessary to have a full understanding of our desperate need for the grace of the cross of Jesus. However, sometimes it seems to be forgotten that people are beautiful. If God made people, people must be beautiful. The Humanists seem to have grasped this truth.

One concept that I found while studying behaviorism was the concept of modeling. Our textbook gives us the example of what Watson and Jones did to try and help a young child named Peter. Peter was very frightened by certain objects. Watson and Jones used modeling to try and eliminate his fear of these objects. Peter watched other children play fearlessly with the objects that he was so afraid of. Modeling can be found in everyday life. It can also be found in The Lion King. I have uploaded a picture of Mufasa and Simba. In this spectacular film we see quite a bit of modeling. In this specific picture Simba is modeling his father in overlooking his kingdom. Another example is the scene when the hyenas attack Simba and Nala, and Simba tries to roar in the bravery of his father to scare away the enemies. Simba had seen how effective the roaring had been for his father, and he tried to model the same behavior.

People like to talk about dreams. Many people that I hear talking about dreams are trying to interpret them, searching for hidden signs and meaning behind every facet of their dreams. Freud said that dreams were people’s wishes and desires that could not be expressed or fulfilled without anxiety. I hear many people today becoming anxious about their dreams. If a young woman has a dream about some obscure man in her life, she may begin to worry that she has unconscious feelings for him. This is an example of everyday psychoanalytical thinking.
A Freudian slip is a relatively well known concept to adults, at-least in America. When people accidentally say something that they do not mean, many believe it is a Freudian slip, some unexpressed emotion from the unconscious.
Freud is also relatively possible in media. We see examples of his thinking and theories in entertainment such as the sitcom Frasier and the movie Inception. Freud being found in entertainment only seems to widen the spread of his influence over many people’s daily lives.

I do not know about anybody else, but evolutionary psychology challenges me. It used to be easy for me to ignore other ideas of how the world came to be, and just be content with, God did it. Do not misunderstand me, I still believe with all of my heart that God is responsible for creation. However, it seems the more I know, the more questions I have. My faith has not grown weaker, but it has been challenged as I have been given all of these questions. Evolutionary psychology, in a lot of ways, makes sense. I have often sinned and called myself selfish, where evolutionary psychologists would just say that I was doing what I am genetically made up to do, look out for myself. Friday’s class was intriguing. It seems that, according to evolutionary psychology, most human behavior, and most behavior in general, is due to a search for a mate, so that one can pass along one’s genes. Perhaps I am hearing incorrectly, but it also seems, according to evolutionary psychology, that pretty much anything humans do, is at-least in some way due to the desire to mate, and hence, pass along genes. Call me ignorant, but I am not so sure that I buy it. My arguments on the matter are shallow, for I am still a new student on the matter, but, I believe there is something more to humans than the desire to have sex. After all, people do choose, everyday, not to engage in sexual activity, and it is not always simply to show a potential mate one’s sensitivity. The fact that humans have such an incredible desire to have sex, and choose not to, seems to point to something more. Whether that is just the ability to be rational, or much more, I cannot say. I believe this. There is a Creator God who has given man the ability to choose. And the only real and lasting satisfaction we will have, is in the pursuit of Him. I do not negate or condemn any other ideas, indeed, one cannot simply condemn or ignore them justly. But I do believe that people can make decisions outside of just making them to find a mate, or continue one’s gene pool.

I must apologize and be honest all at once. I will do so by the confession that I was not as attentive to the podcast on Monday of Rene Descartes as I could have, and should have been. So, I apologize, this blog is not based upon information I have learned from the blog, but information I have learned from the textbook. Nevertheless, I truthfully did enjoy reading of Descartes in the textbook, I truthfully enjoy reading the textbook. I find specifically intriguing a similarity between Descartes and Augustine, the use of doubt to validate experiences that were subjective. Descartes was in turmoil over the lack of certainties amongst contemporary and previous philosophers, so he decided to learn on his own, come to his own conclusions. What he found was that the only thing he could conclude, was that he struggled with coming to any conclusions. In other words, as the textbook states, he was only certain that he was doubting. Of course, this certainty of his doubt led to his certainty that he thought, which eventually led to his well known, “I think, therefore I am” (Descartes). Descartes is somewhat encouraging to me. I have found myself frustrated with all of the brilliant minds we have studied who so passionately disagreed. If these brilliant people cannot agree, then what should one believe? Descartes sought his own answers. I find this to be wise. I also find it wise to always ask questions. This does not mean, however, that I have not found contentment in my certainty of Jesus Christ. That He has resurrected from the dead and lives, I am certain. Many philosophers may have a lot to say about that, good. I know it to be true.

The Renaissance time period included, as we have been taught, a significant amount of interest in humans. The changes in art from the medieval ages to the Renaissance point to a greater interest in humans. During the medieval ages much of the art portraying humans were one dimensional, with a lot of the emphasis on the Heavens in the art rather than the human. Renaissance art depicts a shift from one dimensional characters to much more specific images of humans. Examples of this are Da Vinci and Michelangelo.Both of these artists spent a good deal of time on the details of the human body. Humanism interests me. I too find people to be beautiful, not just physically, just in general. I believe in a Creator God who has made people beautiful, and I think He enjoys it when we recognize His handiwork.

I thoroughly enjoyed Dr. McAnulty’s class on Tuesday. I have had many psychology classes, and many bible classes, but I rarely have the opportunity to listen to powerful servants of Jesus speak of personal experiences serving God in the field of psychology. Honestly, I struggle with this quite a bit. My deepest desire is to pursue Jesus in everything I do; that would obviously include my profession, which could be in the field of psychology. It blessed my heart to see Dr. McAnulty teach about his experiences, and to see his compassion for people. I know that one can serve the Lord in absolutely everything, and I know that being a counselor can be a very powerful place to help people, it was just encouraging to hear the professor’s testimonies about how Jesus has moved in his practices. I appreciate how he was willing to share how he had grown and struggled as a psychologist. It was interesting to hear of how some clients, upon hearing of his faith, completely hid behind a facade of purity and a mask of all is well. Dr. McAnulty’s stories of clients especially interested me. The client of the pastor who doubted his own salvation, of the man who was super spiritual and uptight about sin to a very unhealthy degree, the woman who lost her child, these have taught me. One man asked if it was best to pray for clients; it seems that, for Dr. McAnulty, that depended on the season of life and specific situation. All of these things relate in that it is a psychologist’s story in our nation of growth and learning of how to combine psychological thought and techniques to faith in Christ Jesus. I wish I had more opportunities like this one, these are the things I most eagerly desire to learn. I suppose, though, like Dr. McAnulty, I will need time to grow and learn, to experience and adapt. Nonetheless, I truthfully appreciated the professor’s openness and testimonies.

I find the Sophists to be particularly intriguing. They considered truth to be relative, and, as the textbook says, this marked a philosophical shift. The Sophists wondered what people could truly know, and how they could know it. Furthermore, they believed that there was no one absolute truth, but rather, that there were many truths. If you could convince someone that something was true, then it was true. Now, I suppose many Sophists had common ground on what was true. But, how could any people create a kingdom, a government, or even an intimate community based on the beliefs that what each one thinks is true? I suppose this was not their ultimate goal, to create a kingdom or government or community, but nonetheless, I feel that living amongst Sophists could become confusing, frustrating, and possibly even dangerous. I enjoyed reading about Xenophanes, who, although a Sophist, and therefore thought truth was relative, still believed in a god that has many similarities with the Christian God. The god he believed in had characteristics that were superior to mens, that this god saw and knew all, and that this god remains forever. Xenophanes also believed this god to be motionless; I suppose here we would differ. I believe that God is everywhere always, acting and doing for good. However, as the Sophist he was, he would have no problem with me thinking that, and he would not say that it was not true, for to him, truth was relative. Still, this is interesting to me, would even Xenophanes say that the murder of the innocent is moral if another claimed it to be true? Perhaps he would say it was not true for him. Perhaps my understanding of Sophism is still shallow, but, I am always willing to learn more.
I am going to attach a link to a youtube clip of a Christian rap artist, Lecrae, who tells of His Christian beliefs as it pertains to Sophism and absolute truth, in a song called: “Truth.” I find that I agree with him concerning truth. Jesus is. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIQR9OuJ388

I have been interested in existentialism ever since I have heard of it. To be honest, I have not studied it much and I know very little about it. When I read about some of the forerunners of existentialism, my confusion only increased. Granted, to acquire a greater understanding I realize more study is necessary. However, I would love to learn more about existentialism in this class. I am particularly interested in how different the beliefs in God can be amongst existentialists. Nietzsche and Kierkegaard, for example, seem to have completely different ideas concerning God. I understand that existentialism does not point to one particular view of God, but I would be interested in finding where and how the differences lie. Furthermore, the ideas of existentialists have influenced many minds and ideas since. Due to the influence of existentialism on the field and science of psychology, I would enjoy pursuing a greater understanding of its principles and ideas.