TITLE:
Metaphysics and Fundamentals of Transcendental Psychology Approach
AUTHORS:
Sergei L. Artemenkov
KEYWORDS:
Metaphysics, Psychology of Perception, Product Basis Paradigm, Transcendental Psychology Approach, Form-Generation, Structurally-Generative Process, Model
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Philosophy,
Vol.11 No.1,
February
5,
2021
ABSTRACT: The Transcendental Psychology Approach to the study of perception has
been developed by A.I. Mirakyan at the Psychological Institute (Moscow, Russia)
about 30 years ago. This article considers the results of theoretical and
experimental investigations and provides a historical overview of the approach’s
development. Started with the investigations of constancy in perception, it went beyond the traditional Product Basis
Paradigm (relying on perceptual features for finding perceptual mechanisms)
into Philosophical Metaphysics of “nothing” and “something” concepts for
revealing the form-generating principles as fundamental axiomatics of the Transcendental Psychology Approach.
Several principles were developed and justified: structure-process anisotropy,
spatial-temporal discreteness, the formation of anisotropic (particularly,
symmetric) relations, the coexistence of alternatives, and some others.
Principles are explanatory for the regulations of sensory-perceptual processes
and are the direct object of further specification and experimental
verification using hypothetical transcendental models of perceptual structures.
The theory suggests that the internal mechanisms of these models would not
naturally manifest themselves in experiments within the functional range of
perception, and to see the phenomena, it is necessary to bring the perceptual system out of its natural
functional range. The form-generating processes are named adiaphorous in the
sense that they specifically generate new structures and forms, regardless of
the characteristics of products used and produced in the processes. In general,
it is possible to speak about the class of so-called structurally-generative processes that are specific to the process of transition between the
system-generating structures studied by different hierarchically interrelated
sciences. The proposed two-staged qualitative model of the perceptual process
consists of two substantially different parts: the direct sensory perception
and a process of form designation or sensory name assignment. Further
investigations of structurally-generative processes seem likely to shed light
on the mechanisms of brain function and to contribute strategically to new
directions in philosophical psychology and neuroscience.