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Although much has been written about the history of the concept of mind as unconscious, the present volume attempts a critical review
and ranges widely over many interlocking and related concepts. That the author is admirably qualified for such a project is evident from the wealth of information at his command, already demonstrated in his earlier work, A History of Scientific Psychology. Its Origins and Philosophical Backgrounds.1
The present work contains a sophisticated discussion of the historical antecedents and subsequent evolution of numerous conceptualizations of mental functioning, ranging from the conscious to the dissociated. There is valuable information on such topics as the origins of the concept of empathy; the philosophical background of an unconscious mind in the contributions of Kant, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Leibniz, Hume, Fichte, Herbart, Fechner, Wundt, and others; William James's cogent reasoning regarding compartmentalized or dissociated thinking, the basis of posthypnotic behavior in determining tendencies and delayed reactions, the fallacies of division and of sensationalism, and much more; Herbart's concept of apperceptive mass and Helmholtz's of unconscious inference (with comments on his later recantation); the concept of subliminal consciousness as elaborated by C. S. Myers, James, and others; various theories of motivation and of emotions, including the shift from instincts to drives (with references to R. S. Woodworth and W. MacDougall on functional autonomy); the distinction between determinism of means versus determinism of ends (deriving from Spinoza's thinking on desires and causes); comments on endogenous versus exogenous motives; and, in an attempt at a synthesis, the views of the Würzburg group on nonsensory ideation.
Yet, despite the author's erudition, his apparent intention to be fair and to consider all viewpoints and arguments, and his careful attention to detail, this book i