CHAPTER VIII
THE “I” PROBLEM AND GENIUS
"In the beginning the world was nothing but the Âtman, in the form of a man. It looked around and saw nothing different to itself. Then it cried out once, 'It is I.' That is how the word 'I' came to be. That is why even at the present day, if any one is called, he answers, 'It is I,' and then recalls his other name, the one he bears."—(Brihadâranyata-Upanishad.)
Many disputations about principles in psychology arise from individual characterological differences in the disputants. Thus, in the mode that I have already suggested, characterology might play an important part. When one person thinks to have discovered this, the other that, by introspection, characterology would have to show why the results in the one case should differ from those in the other, or, at least, to point out in what other respects the persons in question were unlike. I see no other possible way of clearing up the disputed points of psychology. Psychology is a science of experiences, and, therefore, it must proceed from the individual to the general, and not, as in the supra-individualistic laws of logic and ethics, proceed from the universal to the individual case. There is no such thing as an empirical general psychology; and it would be a mistake to approach such without having fully reckoned with differential psychology.
It is a great pity that psychology has been placed between philosophy and the analysis of perceptions. From whichever side psychologists approached the subject, they have always been assured of the general validity of their results.
