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The invitation to deliver the William James Lectures in 1938–1939 at Harvard University prompted the author to survey anew the much scattered data upon the subject of the fundamentals of social relationships, which is the problem of human nature. In his previous book, The Organism, Goldstein endeavored to develop the basic methodolgy for studying organismic behavior, using facts drawn from his experience chiefly as illustrations of the method proposed. In this publication, however, Goldstein is striving for a systematic interpretation of all those facts with reference to a conception of the nature of man.
Starting with a review of William James' works, the holistic approach is described, illustrated by the concept of 'isolation' and the problem of cognition in biology. The chapters about 'the abstract attitude in patients with lesions of the brain cortex' and 'amnesicaphasia and the problem of the meaning of words' form the basis and the transition to more general remarks about ordered and catastrophic behavior. In protection against castastrophic situations, the world of the abnormal person begins to shrink.
The discussion of psychoanalysis is not very impressive and may be summarized in a quotation from page 164. The 'overestimation of the genetic factor, on the one hand, and the misinterpretation of the ideas presented in free association as being repressed conscious phenomena, on the other, have had a fateful consequence in both a theoretical and a practical respect … as a result many theoretical statements of psychoanalysis have arisen which lead only to the hopeless struggle of the neurotic patient with psychoanalytic terms, a situation that suggests the vain labor of Sisyphus.' The