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Psychological Progressions
Jan. 27th, 2023 10:42 pmIn the past few days I've finished the readings for the cognitive science course The Behaving Brain at Auckland University; one short exam to go for this penultimate course. One of the final topics on the subject was memory and how it is less than perfect. Some discussion ensued on the forums on the matter leading to the matter of memory and people with Borderline Personality Disorder, which apparently I know a little bit about, and then an invitation to take up the matter of memory, identity diffusion, and BPD as a topic for postgraduate research. I had to decline that one, I'm already too damaged by it. Still, nice to receive the invitation, I suppose. Apropos, I have also just finished the latest edition of the well-titled (and well-researched) popular science book on the topic, "I Hate You - Don't Leave Me". One day I should make a list and short reviews of the perhaps too many books I have read on this subject; perhaps as an appendix to my existing, more formal, summary.
Another matter of the final topic of the cognitive science course was (finally) a bit of a mention of "positive psychology". The basic precepts of positive psychology I find quite correct - such as the argument that traditional psychology is "half-baked", dealing primarily with the clinical and pathologies rather than providing at least more input to encouraging even better outcomes for people who are, more or less, emotionally healthy. As a result, I have enrolled in the Yale University short course, "The Science of Well Being" which comes with very good reviews. I am, of course, very cynical of individualistic "toxic positivity" as it has been called ("turn that frown upside down!"), and find myself far more interested in "tragic optimism" as an alternative. At least, from initial viewing, there is greater evidence in support of such an approach. Because despite my cheery exterior, by both temperament and character, I am a pretty miserable person inside and it is really only in recent years than I have found myself able to speak of it. "But O yet more miserable! Myself my sepulchre, a moving grave" (Milton).
Another matter of the final topic of the cognitive science course was (finally) a bit of a mention of "positive psychology". The basic precepts of positive psychology I find quite correct - such as the argument that traditional psychology is "half-baked", dealing primarily with the clinical and pathologies rather than providing at least more input to encouraging even better outcomes for people who are, more or less, emotionally healthy. As a result, I have enrolled in the Yale University short course, "The Science of Well Being" which comes with very good reviews. I am, of course, very cynical of individualistic "toxic positivity" as it has been called ("turn that frown upside down!"), and find myself far more interested in "tragic optimism" as an alternative. At least, from initial viewing, there is greater evidence in support of such an approach. Because despite my cheery exterior, by both temperament and character, I am a pretty miserable person inside and it is really only in recent years than I have found myself able to speak of it. "But O yet more miserable! Myself my sepulchre, a moving grave" (Milton).
