Best history of psychology books according to redditors

I just picked up this book, The Story of Psychology, by Morton Hunt and this was, appropriately, the first bit of information in the prologue. Luckily, Wikipedia had an article on the subject that described the event relatively well.

> The Greek historian Herodotus conveyed an anecdote about Psamtik in the second volume of his Histories. During his travel to Egypt, Herodotus heard that Psammetichus ("Psamṯik") sought to discover the origin of language by conducting an experiment with two children. Allegedly he gave two newborn babies to a shepherd, with the instructions that no one should speak to them, but that the shepherd should feed and care for them while listening to determine their first words. The hypothesis was that the first word would be uttered in the root language of all people. When one of the children cried "βεκὸς" (bekòs) with outstretched arms, the shepherd concluded that the word was Phrygian because that was the sound of the Phrygian word for "bread." [OP's source: "Psamtik made inquiries and learned that becos was the Phrygian word for bread."] Thus, they concluded that the Phrygians were an older people than the Egyptians, and that Phrygian was the original language of men. [OP's source: "He concluded that, disappointingly, the Phrygian's were an older race than the Egyptians." I think this is an important inclusion, as Psamtik was not open to the idea that innate language did not exist, but rather, those who spoke the innate language first must have led to the first establishment of race. This must have been very disappointing to find out that his experiment disproved the commonly held belief that "they were the most ancient race on earth." This now discredited assumption must have had interesting sociological implications

Edit: Added Amazon link and Jesus, don't buy this book at Books-A-Million unless that's the kind of book store you want to support. Its half as expensive on Amazon. God damn I could've gotten the used hardcover for $.10... I'm only in the prologue since I took time to post this, but I can assure you, its certainly worth 10¢.

I was told that the link had been submitted, but I searched "Psamtik" and nothing but my post came up so I left it.

Here's the full quotation, which is even cooler but too long for a title.

> "When wireless is perfectly applied the whole earth will be converted into a huge brain, which in fact it is, all things being particles of a real and rhythmic whole. We shall be able to communicate with one another instantly, irrespective of distance. Not only this, but through television and telephony we shall see and hear one another as perfectly as though we were face to face, despite intervening distances of thousands of miles; and the instruments through which we shall be able to do his will be amazingly simple compared with our present telephone. A man will be able to carry one in his vest pocket." -Nikola Tesla, 1926

I found this quote in Steve Silberman's phenomenal NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity, which is a great read on the history of autism and its role in shaping the modern technological landscape.

I'm sorry to say that your doctor was misinformed and has put you through years of unintentional torture by being misinformed and loud about it.

Read NeuroTribes by Steve Silberman. This is the single best book on autism spectrum disorders (including Asperger's) out there.

Autism is not a new thing: it's been around since Euripides. If 'most' autistic people never get married and have kids -- where the hell are all the autistic people coming from? Shit's genetic and in vivo mutations are pretty darn rare.

First off, read anything by Carl Jung. His theories on archetypes and the collective unconscious form the groundwork upon which not only games, but the entire modern entertainment industry are built.

Basically Jung argues that there is a collective set of symbols and ideas that all humans, regardless of culture or upbringing will respond to. Understanding these symbols, and building your game around them - either as mechanics or story - allows you to influence how the player will respond.

Jung: A Very Short Introduction is a pretty easy way to get started. After you read that I'd suggest getting into the meat of Jung's own words with The Portable Jung (coincidentally edited by Joseph Campbell)

And with that, you should also read The Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell. He takes Jung's ideas, and shows the specific symbols used in the Hero's Journey - one of the most common story types. People talk about the Hero's Journey all the time - but it's a really important concept to understand if you're doing any sort of creative works. Here are two quick video primers on it:

A more serious one: Ted Ed: What Makes a Hero

A more awesome one: Glove and Boots: The Hero's Journey :)

If you want to go further on the narrative route I'd also suggest The Seven Basic Plots by Christopher Booker. He takes the Hero's Journey and shows how it is just one of several different plot archetypes, all of which have their own internal path, rules, and idiosyncrasies.

Now, in case you're thinking "Why are you sharing these books about narrative with me? Games are not stories!" remember that people have been responding to stories for all time - and good storytellers are masters at making people feel the desired emotion at the desired time.

Therefore I'd also direct you to Story By Robert McGee as well as Poetics by Aristotle. Both of these books look at story in a mechanical sense, and explain the precise methods storytellers (both ancient Greek ones and modern Hollywood ones) use to evoke emotions in the audience. These principles almost directly translate to game design.

After that I'd suggest looking at Chris Crawford's list of books all game designers should read. Unfortunately I can't find a copy of the list on the internet, but it's at the end of his book Chris Crawford on Game Design

I thought you'd never ask 😎

This is just some of my collection, any one of which would get you started, but I'd start with Dr Stevenson's stuff first:

Dr Ian Stevenson

https://www.near-death.com/reincarnation/research/ian-stevenson.html

https://www.amazon.com/Twenty-Cases-Suggestive-Reincarnation-Enlarged/dp/0813908728/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Twenty+Cases+Suggestive+of+Reincarnation&qid=1563082984&s=books&sr=1-1

https://www.amazon.com/Where-Reincarnation-Biology-Intersect-Stevenson/dp/0275951898/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Where+Reincarnation+and+Biology+Intersect&qid=1563083023&s=books&sr=1-1

Dr Loell Whitton

https://www.amazon.com/Life-Between-Joel-Whitten/dp/0446347620

Neville Randall

https://www.amazon.com/Life-After-Death-Neville-Randall/dp/0552114871/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=life+after+death+Neville+randall&qid=1563083067&s=books&sr=1-1

Dr Raymond Moody

https://www.amazon.com/Life-After-Bestselling-Investigation-Experiences/dp/006242890X/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=raymond+A+Moody&qid=1563083118&s=books&sr=1-1

Helen Wambach

https://www.amazon.com/Life-Before-Helen-Wambach/dp/0553254944/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=life+before+life+helen+wambach&qid=1563083173&s=books&sr=1-1

Dr Edith Fiore

https://www.amazon.com/You-have-been-here-before/dp/0698108833/ref=sr_1_7?keywords=Dr+edith+fiore&qid=1563083204&s=books&sr=1-7

Oh, I'd also check out the 4 part documentary: Life, Death and Reincarnation

Thanks to u/malibunyc for finding a low res 640x360 version of the show on YouTube, here are the links:

ep 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9bcNeLJTv8

ep 2 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycwZTYHqqoM

ep 3 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkcljsaaFXs

ep 4 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5URv5xxSFpo

Hope these help. Others will chime in with theirs too I'm sure.

I think Foucault's History of Madness would resonate strongly with your horizon and project. In it, he undertakes an almost historical analysis of the ideational genealogy (a term borrowed from Nietzsche) of 'madness', where he finds that the mad person has had ascribed an almost schizophrenic, if you will, range of attributes to them throughout history.

In ancient Greece, for instance, madness was linked to a notion of this particular individual being able to mediate attitudes of the gods through them; in Romantic art and thinking, there's a certain "Sturm und Drang" dignity and exaltedness surrounding the mad individual (as with for instance the somewhat sanguine character of Beethoven, and the role epilepsy played in the work and life of Dostojevskij); Freud and early psychoanalysis apprehended madness as somewhat more complex, in that it largely dissolved the traditional dichotomy of madness and 'normality' (claiming, for instance, that all of us are slightly neurotic), which in turn points outwards on the society that fosters and cultures us;

and today, primarily in European psychology, there's a growing focus on social psychology and an opposition to formal systems of diagnosis - after all, as you seem to grasp, or at least feel, very intimately yourself, isn't the very act of dubbing someone as a schizophrenic itself just a mode of conceptualizing what is, in fact, much more complex than what can be reduced to an instance of this or that particular mode of orientation on the part of the psychologist? And what effect does this have on the individual being diagnosed, being told that the entirety of what they are, the mental framework that constitutes them, and in turn the content of that constitution, is a certain anomaly by definition? All of a sudden, you're now a schizophrenic - this also has social implications, and as such in turn also pregnant implications to your idea of self, or identity.

This is where the 'power' aspect of Foucault starts to shine through - this particular individual above has had power exerted over them, they have been forcefully constituted in a certain way by the systemic surroundings they're present in; and these systemic surroundings, and the way they function in relation to people, are products of the historically mediated development of ideas, what we mean and understand by them.

I should mention that I'm aware my post so far presents itself as rather heavy-handedly critical. I'm merely trying to introduce some basics of Foucault, and 'walk through the motions' of what an initial result of a power relations analysis might look like. It's focal to mention in the above example, that yes, power was exerted, but no matter what, power will be exerted - Foucault is explicit about this himself. In the 80's and 90's, critical/continental academica seemed to jump all aboard the "analyze and decimate the repressive modes of power in society!", to varying degrees of success, while contemporary academica working with Foucault seems much more focused on applying his theoretical horizon and derived tools with regards to analysis - working out from the idea that complex problems require equally complex investigations, and that a Foucaultian approach possibly can grasp a fuller picture of a given status quo, than, say, a more formal systems analysis (e.g. Luhmann).

In this way, one can look at how power is distributed in a given situation or social sphere and how this in turn constitutes the people in it - as such, this would be a way of conceptualizing an analytical framework for looking into, for instance, how people's ethical beliefs and convictions come about. Obviously, also, one can look at how, for instance, their neurotic behaviours or ideas of self can come about - but my point is, such an analysis needn't be inherently critical in perspective.

With regards to your intentions of linking Western and Eastern perspectives on matters such as these, I'm in the dark, as I'm no expert on Eastern ideas of madness. I know that in Islamic philosophy, we find the sufi tradition which emphasizes mystical wisdom (often relating itself to religious, Islamic doctrines) mediated through trance, dance, meditation, "holy self-annihilation" and the like, but that's about the extent of my horizon there. You might want to check this and this out, if you're interested in this sort of thing.

That said, my personal opinion is that if you suspect that you're a clinical schizophrenic, you should definitely go and get that checked out. This happens to be one of the diagnoses that can be alleviated with medicine that has effects which are well documented. I happen to agree with you that once we're talking about these matters of mental health, normality, the medicated life, social apprehensions and stigma of disease, etc., a hard-liner approach based purely on biological/neuropsychology, behaviouristic models of human well-being and an itchy finger on the medicine trigger is a self-defeating institution, in that one very quickly, as you do, feel thoroughly alienated from this mode of conceptualizing the problems and feelings one can sit with. I've tried it once, and it drove me, paradoxically, to try and off myself two times.

However, as with anything there are no black and white arguments, and schizophrenia can be managed, among other things, by way of medicine - and taking this medicine will be beneficial, because it helps you, not because it'll keep you in line.

EDIT: grammar, wording.

Julian Jaynes - The origin of Consciousness in the breakdown of the bicameral mind.

Impossible to ignore

Free Play

On Repeat

Improv Wisdom

The closest I can think of for a documentation of this is Future Babble by Dan Gardner. Future Babble is about the perils of prediction and the cognitive biases that get in the way of our reasoning about the future, focusing heavily on the neo-Malthusians or "doomsters" of the late 20th century. I think this is a book people who read SSC would love and I can summarize some of the history it documents:

In 1948 an ornithologist named William Vogt published a book called The Road to Survival, in which he predicted that environmental degradation and population growth would cause humanity to exceed Earth's carrying capacity, leading to imminent famines, population decline, and civilizational collapse. Vogt's book was not read very widely at the time, but it was read by some very important people, and his perspective has dominated environmentalism ever since. Vogt's ideas burst into the mainstream in 1968 with Paul Ehrlich's The Population Bomb, which argued that populations were growing so quickly that they would soon outstrip our agricultural capacity, predicting widespread famines beginning in the 1970s. Ehrlich's book sold millions and was highly influential, and he successfully lobbied many third world government to implement involuntary sterilization programs. However, populations did not stop growing, but the famines never arrived. Agriculture caught up with the growing population, thanks in no small part to Norman Borlaug and the Green Revolution, which introduced new crop varieties and widespread fertilizer use to improve yields. This, however, did not convince Ehrlich, who simply moved the timetable for the inevitable famines forward.

Shortly after the publication of Ehrlich's book, a think tank called the Club of Rome produced the most systematic explication of these ideas to date, the Limits to Growth. Limits used the ideas of cybernetics and the emerging technology of computer simulation to argue project that, unless humanity worked together to limit population and economic growth, we were in for a doomsday scenario at the hands of resource depletion and pollution. Under even the rosiest scenario, gold would be completely used up by the end of the 20th century, oil soon after, and all other resources sometime towards the middle of the 21st century. But they also included a scenario which assumed resources were infinite, and found that the industrial growth this enabled would lead to spiraling pollution, with toxic chemicals polluting the environment so thoroughly that they would poison the land, making agriculture impossible. All of these scenarios led to what the Club called "overshoot and collapse": humanity would exceed Earth's carrying capacity, be unable to reproduce itself, and populations would collapse down to a low level.

The resource shortages projected in Limits never materialized, leading to it being mostly discredited by the 1990s, but one limit did seem to be approaching: Peak Oil. While the Population Bomb and Limits to Growth are less fresh in our minds, most people here are probably old enough to remember Peak Oil. It comes from M. King Hubbard's observations on the productivity of oil wells: production will ramp up, reach a peak, and then slide into decline, following the path of a bell curve. Hubbard noticed this trend applied not just to single wells, but to entire oil fields, and from there he projected this could apply to entire countries' oil production, and indeed world oil production as well. In the wake of the 70s oil crisis, Jimmy Carter had given a speech predicting the imminent exhaustion of oil reserves that had brought this idea into the mainstream, but it had been forgotten in the Reagan years where, despite declining domestic productivity, oil prices remained low. But by the early 2000s oil prices were on the rise again, provoking a panic, because Hubbard's projections had shown Peak Oil would arrive around this time. There was a rash of books and public commentary on the imminent Mad Max future this would induce, and even some of the heads of the oil majors were predicting that the age of oil was over. But it never happened. In response to rising prices oil companies began tapping reserves that were previously uneconomical, and deploying new technologies like fracking that allowed them to pump oil that had previously been unavailable. Oil prices plummeted after the 2008 crash and remained low on the back of these new sources of oil, and by 2018 US oil production had exceeded its previous 1970 peak, refuting Hubbard's hypothesis that national oil production followed a bell curve like that of a single well or field.

Doomsday scenarios don't pan out, but we keep making them. And the most infuriating thing is that, in the minds of those that make them, they're never refuted at all, and they get away with it. Paul Ehrlich is still around, still collecting accolades and prestigious appointments, and even though the famines he predicted are fifty years late he still argues they're imminent, with no detriment to his career. When you talk to people who believe in Limits to Growth, they argue that the fact the resource shortages never arrived is irrelevant: they point out that "overshoot and collapse" was projected to arrive only in the middle of the 21st century, and to the scenario that assumed resources were unlimited. I even saw an article in the Nation that claimed Limits "introduced the concept of anthropocentric climate change to a mass audience", which is just an outrageous lie. I've read it, and there's no mention of climate change or global warming at all. The collapse in the unlimited-resources scenario wasn't about carbon, it was about toxic chemicals rendering the Earth uninhabitable, and I don't know anyone who believes that's going to happen. As for the Peak Oil people, a lot of them think the new oil boom is an Indian summer and production will soon plummet anyway. But a lot of them are on to the next thing: EROEI/EROI, energy return on investment, which says that even if we don't actually deplete fossil fuels we'll still have economic collapse because it'll harder and more-energy intensive to extract them. And nothing can stop this, not a shift to renewables or nuclear, not even fusion power, nothing. Just like all of the previous failed apocalypses it's inevitable and imminent. These failed ideas never die, they're just tweaked and updated by ad-hoc reasoning.

But, while these doomsday scenarios are largely ignored, there's a very big one that's on everyone's mind: climate change. And even though I've very skeptical of doomsday scenarios, I have to concede that this one is more justified, better researched, and much scarier than any of the other ones I've mentioned here. But Garder's point isn't that bad, even terrible, things can never happen. It's just that we're terrible at predicting the future. He reports empirical research that demonstrates even experts are usually worse at prediction than flipping a coin, and identifies all sorts of cognitive biases that lead us astray. And with that in mind, we should probably be cautious about accepting the most exaggerated claims about how climate change is going to play out. It can be bad, even catastrophic, without being apocalyptic. And there's still ample reason to try and stop it even if it's not. Even if climate change isn't going to kill billions of people, I would still like to have coral reefs, the Everglades, and Bangladesh.

Anyway, check out the book. Probably the best explanation I've read of why people always think the world is about to end: it's inherent in their psychology, they usually don't know about all the old failed predictions, and even when they do they don't change their thinking.

Hello! I have Asperger's. I will keep this quick & to the point.

1. Read Neurotribes: The Legacy of Autism and Future of Neurodiversity (https://www.amazon.com/NeuroTribes-Legacy-Autism-Future-Neurodiversity/dp/158333467X) ... This book is an amazing compilation that not only gives you social context for how this diagnosis came to be but also how it has been treated over the decades. We've come a long way with psychiatric care in general, but this book introduces a philosophy of acceptance that resonates very strongly with me. It speaks towards cultivating the strengths of autistm/aspergers, and accepting shortcomings.
   
   
2. I am 30 years old myself, and I learned about asperger's and all of this late in my journey (3 years ago). If I could talk to little me today, at the age your affected family member is now, I wouldn't give them very much advice so much as I would listen and pay attention to what makes he or she tick. Listen and observe and don't let social norms get in the way of enabling that child's strengths and passions. True, this could just be general parenting advice, but it is especially true for autistic children. This world is generally not built for them, and much of their life will thus consist of adapting to adhere to the norms of the broader, more common, "neurotypical" methods. You have the unique chance to know about this early, and can thus co-create a world with the aspergian that serves them.
   
   
3. I spent 20 some odd years trying to unbecome who I am in order to fit into a neurotypical world. In the years since being diagnosed, I have now focused on re-becoming who I was born to be; the person I was socially conditioned OUT of being. I've reconnected with who I am fundamentally. And that's been difficult but rewarding. I stopped trying to beat my head against the wall at parties and resumed filling my head with knowledge, because I LOVE LEARNING FACTS AND IT MAKES ME VERY HAPPY and for too long I let social norms scare me away from being my more reclusive yet contented self. This is just one such example of how tricky it can be to remain authentic in a system typically designed to homogenize.
   
   A lot has changed since I was a kid, and you having the knowledge you have now, and forums like this, is an amazing resource. Raise that kid like he's different, because he or she is. But please, pretty please with a DSM-V on top, please... don't raise that kid like he's disordered.

If you're just getting started researching Church History, I'm sure you've stumbled across the CES Letter. It didn't have enough footnotes for me, so I started my own essay as I was doing my research. Lots of references. Thought it might be helpful.

On another note, I just finished the book, The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, by Julian Jaynes. In it he makes the case that as recently as 4,000 years ago, humans had a bicameral mind ("two-chambered") where "cognitive functions were divided between one part of the brain which appears to be 'speaking', and a second part which listens and obeys," a mind, in short, which would exhibit an internal life much like what a modern day schizophrenic might experience. Although we might say the ancients were hallucinating, when ancient Greeks, Egyptians, and Hebrews said that a particular diety spoke to them, they meant it literally.

A "god" was simply that voice in your head compelling you to act a certain way. Maybe that voice sounded like your tribal elder, or if you were the tribal elder, your father. Ancients assumed people kept on living after death because the voices in their head kept speaking even after the bodies they were originally attached to stopped moving. Idols, iconography, etc., were basically hallucination inducing artifacts. To them, the idols did speak. According to his theory, all of this occurred prior to humans being conscious, in much the same way that a dog will respond to commands, ants and bees will organize, but none of them are "aware" per se.

Jaynes posits that Bicameralism developed as language developed (language being an efficient way to transmit complex instructions from one side of the brain to the other) and as groups of humans (tribes, cities, civilizations) became more complex and clashed as cultures, the rigid nature of command-by-hallucination broke down.

He claims that consciousness is a byproduct of this collapse in the two-chambered mind; a function of the intersection of language, culture, and the neuroplasticity of the brain. If you've seen the movie Arrival, the underlying theme is based on the idea of linguistic relativity, which "holds that the structure of a language affects its speakers' world view or cognition." Kind of like Orwell's essay, The Principles of Newspeak, at the end of his book "1984,".

This all fits in the current discussion because if his hypothesis is true, there is still part of our brain that wants to be told what to do, to compulsively obey, to accept the existence of gods. We seek the certainty of religion, government, and (sadly) the daily grind at work. Although consciousness, the ability to break free of these voices in our heads, is thousands of years old, that is a flash in the pan speaking in evolutionary terms. We are still new at this, still growing out of old ways of thinking.

Taking a cue from where Jaynes left off, his analysis implies that as our culture and language evolve, so will our consciousness, our ability to perceive and understand our reality (whatever that means).

As far as Church History not being as bad as it seems, I guess it depends on what you expect. If you are expecting fear mongering, war mongering, misogyny, fraud, oppression, repression, manipulation, theft, attempted murder, and censorship, then yeah, it's probably better than you expected. Or at least not worse.

TL;DR Our brain is wired to accept authority and the existence of a "god." A lot of cultural puzzle pieces (religion, politics, business) fit in that spot. Good news is, we're growing out of it.

Edit: the part about where religion came from.

Just want to make sure, this is it right?

First, I think you're confusing me and /u/monkeypack.

Let's take a look at the source material and the actual contents of the show, shall we?

In Episode 3 @ 39:33, Ford tells us a story about the early days of the park.

Ford:The hosts began to pass the Turing Test after the first year. But that wasn't enough for Arnold. He wasn't interested in the appearance of intellect. He wanted the real thing. He wanted to create consciousness.

He imagined it as a pyramid. Memory, improvisation, self-interest...

Bernard: And, at the top?

Ford: He never got there.

So Arnold in this telling believed that "consciousness" and "intellect" were two different things. Passing the Turing Test just means an AI can think enough like a human to fool a human into believing it's conversing with another human. Arnold didn't accept that as the definition of "conscious".

Ford says Arnold based his theory of what might go at the top of the pyramid on the Theory of the Bicameral Mind. In Julian Jaynes' book about this theory Jaynes says that consciousness is not a copy of experience, it is not necessary to conceptualize, it is not necessary for learning, it isn't necessary for "thinking", and it isn't necessary for reason. So what is it necessary for? Jaynes says "It is built up with a vocabulary or lexical field whose terms are all metaphors or analogs of behavior in the physical world. Its reality is of the same order as mathematics. It allows us to shortcut behavioral processes and arrive at more adequate decisions. Like mathematics, it is an operator rather than a thing or repository. And it is intimately bound up with volition and decision." Jaynes thinks consciousness is what generates free will.

Jaynes identifies the most important metaphor that consciousness acts on as the analog "I", the self-awareness we have of ourselves, which is also the metaphor "Me". We can conceive both of having a conversation with "ourselves", and we can consider ourselves from outside ourselves as if watching a movie of our lives.

Jaynes argues that all animals are unconscious because they cannot metaphorically manipulate the analog "I" and "Me", and that humans were not conscious until they gained the ability to do that. Until then, the "unconscious" humans, like animals, existed in a pure Newtonian state - if you had a computer sophisticated enough to model every neuron in the brain and you had sensors capable of detecting every stimuli, you could always predict with total accuracy what behavior the entity would exhibit. These "unconscious" things have no free will.

Arnold believed that something happened to transform unconscious intellect into consciousness. He tried to kick-start that process using Jaynes' theory of the bicameral mind - to replicate Jaynes' ideas on how humans crossed that threshold by first externalizing their inner voices into "the voices of the gods" and then internalizing those voices as "speaking to themselves" as they crossed the threshold.

Let's call this the Arnold model of consciousness.

But what does Ford believe?

Ford is a highly unreliable narrator who is manipulating everyone around him for his own purposes so we have to be very careful accepting anything he says as "true". Even more so when he's talking about his own motives. So we must tread carefully.

In Episode 8 @37:45 Bernard and Ford have this conversation:

Bernard: Pain only exists in the mind. It is always imagined. So what is the difference between my pain and yours? Between you and me?

Ford: This was the very question that consumed Arnold. Filled him with guilt. Eventually drove him mad. The answer always seemed obvious to me. There is no threshold that makes us greater than the sum of our parts. No inflection point at which we become fully alive. We cannot define consciousness because consciousness does not exist.

Let's call this the Ford model of consciousness.

But does Ford believe it?

The answer appears to be no.

In Episode 10 @ 1:20:20, we start to get a new side of Ford's philosophy.

Ford: It was Arnold's key insight. The thing that led the hosts to their awakening. Suffering. Pain that the world is not as you want it to be. It was when Arnold died when I suffered that I began to understand what he had found. To realize I was wrong.

Thus we appear to have Ford indicating that what he originally told Bernard he doesn't actually believe, and that after Arnold's death he had a conversion to Arnold's model of consciousness. That there is something different between unconscious animals (and hosts) and conscious humans (and hosts).

Ford doesn't know what that is. He might speculate, but neither he nor Arnold ever fill in the top box of the pyramid. Ford has to treat consciousness like a black box. He knows it when he sees it but he cannot define it.

Unfortunately in Season One, no conscious or semiconscious host is ever hooked up to a diagnostic so we can see their thought processes. We come closest with Maeve but what we see is her programming not the actual flow of the execution thread of her programming. So we don't know if Delos has the technology to look inside a conscious hosts' mind and see how it is different than an unconscious host.

All we know is that in the end, Ford believed it would be.

I'll try to link to primary texts at the end. I would definitely search for the best translations to any texts you dive into since that could hamper you unnecessarily with texts that are all ready fairly difficult.

Structuralist linguistics was started up by Ferdinand De Saussure and expounded on in his "Course in General Linguistics". Structuralist linguistics talks about signs, which are basically a union of two parts: the signified and the signifier. The signified is the concept that is referred to by our written marks, sounds, etc. (/c/ /a/ /t/ refers to the concept "cat") and signifiers are written marks, sounds, etc. that are supposed to represent signifieds. What binds the signifier and signified together is a process called "signification", which is the process by which signs acquire meaning in a given linguistic system.

Something that you should take note of is the arbitraryness of signification (God does not will that /c/ /a/ /t/ refer to cat). The reason that this arbitrariness exists is because in Structuralist linguistics the sign doesn't gain meaning because of some relationship between the signified and signifier, but by being different ( cat and bat are different because cat has a /c/ rather than /b/ for example). Signifiers and Signifieds differ negatively (/c/ is not /b/) in the same way. Structuralist linguistics is also a type of of metalanguage that attempts to get outside of language to analyze the way in which signs operate in linguistic systems.

Post-structuralism is best understood as "after structuralism", or the working out of the conclusions of Structuralism to their logical conclusion. Let's move back to signification. We can make a diagram of the signified "cat" under the signifier /c/ /a/ /t/. These two are bound together to produce meaning (in so far as the signification is proper for the linguistic system). We can also say that cats represent a particular goddess. What has now happened is that our sign "cat" is now a signifier for a goddess. We can also say that goddess symbolizes royalty, which means that cat and goddess are signifiers for another sign. Post-structuralists say that this chain of signification is indefinite, or that signifiers only point to other signifiers. The consequence of this is that meaning is never fixed, but rather it is deferred endlessly down the chain. Post-structuralists will also criticize other attempts at metalanguages as being unable to escape language.

That is a very basic exposition of Post-structuralism. You are bound to get additions to what little bit I said when you read the various Post-structuralists and I'm sure someone who knows more about it than I do can give you a more in-depth answer.

Note: I have not touched on the Structural Anthropology of Levi-Strauss because I am not familiar with it, but I recommend you check it out.

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Primary Sources

Note: Post-structuralists can be horribly difficult to understand. I recommend you check out secondary literature and ask questions on places like /r/askphilosophy, /r/askliterarystudies, and /r/continentaltheory.

Derrida

• Writing and Difference (particularly the essays Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences; Cogito and the History of Madness; "Genesis and Structure" and Phenomenology)
  
• Specters of Marx
  
• Of Grammatology
  
• Signature Event Context
  
  Foucault (Foucault is unjustifiably classified as either a Structuralist or a Post-structuralist. He has periods in which his writings may reflect one or the other movements, but he is not someone that lends himself to easy classification)
  
  
• History of Madness (I recommend http://www.amazon.com/History-Madness-Michel-Foucault/dp/0415477263 . It also includes Foucault's reply to Derrida's analysis of his work [and a few other papers]. Madness and Civilization is an abridged version of History of Madness, which leads me to prefer the former over the latter)
  
• The Archaeology of Knowledge (Vintage should include "The Discourse on Language" in the appendix)
  
• Discipline and Punish
  
• History of Sexuality Volumes 1,2, and 3
  
  Deleuze
  
  
• Difference and Repetition
  
• The Logic of Sense
  
• Capitalism and Schizophrenia: Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus (Deleuze collaborated with the psychoanalyst Felix Guattari in writing these books)
  
  Roland Barthes
  
  
• Death of the Author
  
• Mythologies
  
• Writing Degree Zero
  
  I also recommend exploring some of the books from the "A Very Short Introduction" series and the "Introducing" series. They have books on Post-structuralism, Derrida, Post-Modernism, Psychoanalysis, etc. I love them and recommend them if other secondary literature is too obtuse. The SEP and IEP are also excellent sources of information.
  
  There are so many more individuals that I did not include in that list (influences on Post-structuralism and Post-structuralists alike): Althusser, Lacan, Kristeva, De Man, Levi-Strauss, Judith Butler, Heidegger (although not a Post-structuralist himself, he was a huge influence on Derrida), Nietzsche, and so on. Post-structuralism is a huge movement and I hope you enjoy exploring it!
  
  Edit: I also wanted to add that Post-structuralism has been an influence on Neo-Pragmatism and certain Death of God theologies. For example, Richard Rorty, a Neo-Pragmatist, and John Caputo, a philosopher and theologian, were noticeably influenced by the work of Derrida.
  
  Edit 2: Fixed the title of one of the essays in "Writing and Difference" and some wording in my explanation of why I like "History of Madness" more so than "Madness and Civilization".

There are non-Buddhist books on the matter, if you're interested.

Ian Stevenson is often mentioned in this conversation, and I think Other Lives, Other Selves is an interesting one by Roger Woolger.

There are a considerable amount of other ones out there too, I believe.

In general, Proving rebirth/reincarnation with a capital P is very difficult when someone is adamantly opposed to the idea. We tend to believe our ideas sometimes quite a bit, I think.

In general, if you're unsure of rebirth, you can put it to the side. It may be that if you cultivate goodness, avoid harm, and purify your mind, it starts to make more sense. And if it doesn't, it doesn't.

Het speelt meer in Amerika dan hier, maar het is er toch wel. Zie bijvoorbeeld dit boek, of dit boek, of fora zoals http://wrongplanet.net/, en Temple Grandin's gedoe over hoe ze zich door haar autisme zo goed kon inleven in de beleefwereld van koeien. Als autist sta ik zelf meer aan de kant van mensen die je hebt ontmoet, maar het zijn niet alleen maar nadelen.

Personally I think a better questions is 'how should one read Jung?' I have a friend who studied psychology with a neuroscience concentration, and that area doesn't tend to take Jung or most psychoanalysts seriously, and while that's not my background, I can see why. I used to be someone who took those methods of self-description and analysis very seriously, but in addition to occasionally taking me some weird places, it's really not taken seriously by most professionals in the fields of, say, psychology.

That said, there are a couple reasons to still study psychoanalytics. One is if you're interested in things like art, film or literature, which were all hugely influenced by ideas about the subconscious. I read a lot of James Joyce and Marcel Proust, and those writers can't be fully understood without some decent understanding of the understandings of psychology that fed into those authors works (Joyce even had his daughter be analyzed by Jung). Artists like Picasso and Pollock were heavily inspired by psychoanalysis, and much can be said for numerous filmmakers, and even some interesting religious study has been done with their work (Joseph Campbell comes to mind here). So if you're interested in that angle, I'd say go for it, as they've got a lot of interesting insights into how art, literature and even religion work.

Another way you can read them is for personal growth, rather than as a transmission of analytic information (I'm not sure I'm phrasing that very well; apologies). I have a few authors that I love to read, but would hesitate to use them to back up some assertion made in an academic paper, unless it was for a very specific purpose, or maybe just finding some flowery quote that I put at the front of a chapter to be pretentious. Jung's been great for me to understand myself, but I would be wary of using him in some academic setting (outside of some where it makes specific sense). I read him like I do Joseph Campbell, Peter Sloterdijk and Allan Watts.

TLDR: Yes, but only sorta. Expect personal growth, but not rigorous psychology, and you should find a lot of value in his work. I'd also recommend Joseph Campbell, since he developed a lot of psychoanalytic stuff into some somewhat more accessible work, and even edited some of Jung's work into an anthology.

Is psychiatry itself not highly politicized? One could argue that psychiatry is a political tool just as much as it is a legitimate medical practice. At the very least, psychiatry has been utilized for highly political purposes.

This is not a crackpot position -- lots of people have been skeptical/critical of psychiatry more or less since psychiatry began.
https://www.amazon.com/History-Madness-Michel-Foucault/dp/0415477263

Mythology is awesome - most box bookstores (like B&N) have at least a small mythology section where you can get your hands on original sources like The Prose Edda and such. Joseph Campbell is pretty popular and whoever owns the rights to his work keeps cranking out reprints of his lectures, so those are usually good too (sometimes they sound too "self-helpy" though). Anthropology (particularly folklore) dips into the same vein, so people like Ruth Benedict are good to read too. I'll mention a couple of things that might pique your interest as well, since you won't usually find them on reading lists.

• If you like the theme of universalism among myths and how those symbols reverberate in the human psyche, try Anthony Steven's Ariadne's Clue. Steven's draws from Jung to make an analysis of mythological symbols and tropes in those stories.
  
  
• Some scholars feel like myths embody a prehistoric awakening of sentience and intelligence - basically that these stories are early blueprints for what makes us human. If you're interested in that, try The Origins and History of Consciousness (Erich Neumann, the author, was also a Jungian and heavily relies on archtype theory in this book).
  
  
• For just a good read, try The Songlines by Bruce Chatwin.
  
  
• If you're curious about myth construction, try Roland Barthes Mythologies. It's actually pretty accessible compared to the stuffiness of other academics and philosophers, and focuses on modern myths.
  
  
• Oh yeah! If you like Grail lore (the holy grail and Arthurian studies, which is more about legends than myths I suppose), Jung's wife wrote a book about it. Which I still need to finish. (ugh)
  
  I love mythology so I'm always excited to hear people talking about it.

The Portable Jung, edited by Joseph Campbell is a great start. https://www.amazon.com/Portable-Jung-Library/dp/0140150706/ref=pd_sbs_14_4/138-0390382-5034008?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=0140150706&pd_rd_r=22352824-6871-4d67-9ff9-b86df902f665&pd_rd_w=qcbN7&pd_rd_wg=3sR8D&pf_rd_p=43281256-7633-49c8-b909-7ffd7d8cb21e&pf_rd_r=M0SP543AFA7CVB5CA533&psc=1&refRID=M0SP543AFA7CVB5CA533

The best piece of literature I read in recent years is a fanfic named Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. In chapter 24, Draco is reminiscing a memory from his childhood, when his father taught him about planning and the importance of not overthinking or overestimating one's intelligence.

> Father had once taken him to see a play called The Tragedy of Light, about this incredibly clever Slytherin named Light who'd set out to purify the world of evil using an ancient ring that could kill anyone whose name and face he knew, and who'd been opposed by another incredibly clever Slytherin, a villain named Lawliet, who'd worn a disguise to conceal his true face; and Draco had shouted and cheered at all the right parts, especially in the middle; and then the play had ended sadly and Draco had been hugely disappointed and Father had gently pointed out that the word 'Tragedy' was right there in the title.

> Afterward, Father had asked Draco if he understood why they had gone to see this play.

> Draco had said it was to teach him to be as cunning as Light and Lawliet when he grew up.

> Father had said that Draco couldn't possibly be more wrong, and pointed out that while Lawliet had cleverly concealed his face there had been no good reason for him to tell Light his name. Father had then gone on to demolish almost every part of the play, while Draco listened with his eyes growing wider and wider. And Father had finished by saying that plays like this were always unrealistic, because if the playwright had known what someone actually as smart as Light would actually do, the playwright would have tried to take over the world himself instead of just writing plays about it.

> That was when Father had told Draco about the Rule of Three, which was that any plot which required more than three different things to happen would never work in real life.

> Father had further explained that since only a fool would attempt a plot that was as complicated as possible, the real limit was two.

Plans who involve so many going according to plan, in order for us to return into power, are thus unrealistic. Instead of saying "We should get our policy shit together, then we'll present ourselves as the lesser evil and then Canadians will support us!" It's too many steps for a plan, and each of those steps includes many sub-steps. It's okay to cross bridges when you get there. Let's go one step at the time. Let's pick the right leader. Let's establish our policy agenda, our value - what we should stand for. Let's take a day at a time.

There's no secret recipe to power. Whatever you plan, your opponents may outplay you or you can screw up the execution at any point in time. By trying to see too far ahead, you risk on tripping on a pebble that was in your path. The future is complex. That's why experts suck at predicting it.

I'm a pretty tough critic on movies but one I really enjoyed is The Social Network. Now, a lot of it was overblown, exaggerated or questionable but they got one thing right: they portrayed how success is created correctly. Zuckerberg did not wake up one day and told himself "I am going to create the most successful social website of all times." First, he focused on Harvard. He made it exclusive. He found a way to get critical mass within Harvard, so the product would work successful from the get-go and slowly expended. Once he had conquered Harvard, he slowly added more campuses to his site until he reached critical mass on a very large scale. He never tried to bite more than he could chew. He took on a target he could reasonably reach and, once successful, moved on to a new one, accumulating victories until he dominated the market.

Simply put, what made The Social Network made a movie great for me is that it portrayed Zuckerberg as someone who understood that overnight success takes years. Major victories are composed of several smaller victories adding up to a triumph. The result may be greater than the sum of its parts, but it's still a sum.

When I year Liberals talking about how we only need to do X, Y and Z to return to power, I roll my eyes. I wish them luck - and I hope they're right, because winning is fun - but I laugh at their naiveté.

I prefer being pragmatic and taking things as they come.

Honestly, once you read up enough on anti-psychiatry/pro-psychiatry you start to realise that they're not really ideological positions and more pro/anti establishment movements that borrow each others ideas.

Given you're heavy on the biology side of things, you might find some value reading up on the biopsychsocial model.

Your anarchist/communist leanings will help you on the sociological side of things, although getting to grips with Foucault won't hurt. Don't know enough to make specific recommendations on him, but History of Madness, The Order of Things and The Birth of the Clinic might be relevant.

On the psychology side of things, try reading up on the Power Threat Vulnerability Framework. It argues powerfully against reductionism, although unfortunately that means you really need to read it in detail to fully get it.

Still looking for recommendations, but since posting, I've pulled together a list of books that seemed interesting. Wondering if anyone has any opinions?

MBTI Manual

Jung: A Very Short Introduction

Psychological Types

The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious

Jung's Map of the Soul: An Introduction

I'm not "defending" anything, but I see what you're saying. We don't have medical journals trying to explain the how a black cat crossing your path will put you on a path to demise. We don't have "black cat crossing" as a legitimate official cause of death. So it's not quite a good comparison.

We all have had a lot of medical and scientific myths come and go. Science weeds out the junk eventually, but new ideas will find their way in (many of which will turn out to not be objectively true), and old understandings and assumptions are stubborn. Not just in science, but every other area of life, people are just not good at reality. So if you want to understand people, you have to understand that they don't usually live in reality. And if you want to understand why people fly planes into buildings or spend their lives pursuing money that they don't need, you'll first have to suspend disbelief and make an effort to understand their reality. That is the postmodern approach to social science.

So you can understand how it can become reduced by new age wackos to, "There is no objective reality! We're all in a dream, herp derp!" Someone else here compared it aptly to the frustration of quantum physicists.

---
*edit: if I'm going to write an essay, I may as well have some footnotes, right? Examples of this approach: Foucalt's History of Madness and his _Archaeology of Knowledge & The Discourse on Language_ are two of the cornerstones.

>Too many books to read, and not enough time to read them all!

Oh, so, SO true.

The only book of his I own is The Wisdom of Insecurity. However, I have many audio files that I listen to when I am walking my dog or in the car. You can find a lot online- here are a couple of sources. I also really enjoyed reading/listening to Time and the More it Changes which is a long one at around 50 minutes. And last but not least, please enjoy this short animation, I go back to it frequently, it keeps me from worrying about truly unimportant things. :)

*grammar (as always)

I haven't read it but Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation is supposed to be a go-to resource.

You might try

• Joseph Campbell's Power of Myth
  
• Joseph Campbell's Hero With a Thousand Faces
  
• this Carl Jung Reader is pretty good
  
  Technically these deal with mythology, but they're sufficiently enlightening on the meaning of myth symbolic myth content to serve you for literature.
  
  One other thing worth reading: the Bible. Particularly a literary Bible like this or this.
  
  Much of the symbolism in literature hearkens back to religion or mythology (which is just old religion). So it's never a bad idea to study the most read religions in their own right. Snake, Apple, Water, Flood, Rain, Fire, Smoke. These are all fairly omnipresent symbols with a wealth of genesis in books like the Bible.

It's probably best to start with an overview by someone other than Jung himself. In that case maybe start with Jung: A Very Short Introduction.

If you want to read the man himself but aren't too familiar with him, try this in order:

• Two Essays on Analytical Psychology
  
  
• The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious
  
  
• Psychological Types
  
  I started with Man and His Symbols which is branded as a good introduction. But I found it little more than a series of anecdotes and disconnected case studies, and also only one of the five(?) sections was written by Jung himself. I wouldn't recommend it.

----

 

 

 




If you /u/blueishwings or /u/bulbabutt find this stuff interesting, understand that Joseph Campbell the author of the hero with a thousand faces is a scholar that studied comparative religions, comparative stories, and comparative mythologies / aesop fables, etc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hero_with_a_Thousand_Faces

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero%27s_journey

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Campbell

Joseph Campbell is also one of the big editors / summaries of Carl Jung (MBTI is not Carl Jung, but MBTI is based off Carl Jung's theories) in fact one of the most famous Carl Jung works is the essays that Joseph Campbell assembled various Jung essays and put them into one work known as The Portable Jung

https://www.amazon.com/Portable-Jung-Library/dp/0140150706

According to George Lucas the most influential work on Star Wars was The Hero with A Thousand Faces. If you look at the ROTJ Emperor and Vader vs Luke scene that is a perfect example of the transcendent hero that has mastered all aspects of the psyche ("You failed your highness, I am a Jedi like my father before me.")

The Joseph Campbell stuff was so influential on Lucas he allowed PBS during their making of a documentary series explaining Joseph Campbell work known as The Power of Myth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Power_of_Myth Which is 6 interviews between Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers. Bill Moyers actually died after the interviews were filmed but prior to the documentary being aired on PBS. Note in the various vhs and dvd releases the interviews with George Lucas with Bill Moyer and Leonard Maltin were trying to re-emulate the power of myth interviews with Joseph Campbell. ^(Bah I am getting side track) George Lucas is an extreme recluse (almost to the point of being a shutin), but during the filming of the Power of Myth he allows Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers to do some of the filming at Starwalker Ranch in the 1980s.

I am a child who got the 1995 VHS trilogy box set of Star Wars before understanding what star wars was. I was 9 at the time. So I remember the movies but I also remember the Leonard Maltin interviews which I watched several times, even though most of the times I watched the movies at the age of 9 I fast forward through the interviews with Leonard Maltin and George Lucas.

 

 

 

Oh one of my favorite Gilmore Girl References, note there were multiple Power of Myth references in the Spring Break episode.

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/34/f2/d2/34f2d221d94d7902d4bb22f29bc6c4f6.jpg

http://foreveryoungadult.com/2013/11/13/the-gilmore-girls-rewatch-project-29/

Got this for my dad for the same reason. It's a great book and I like to joke that reading it is more or less like getting a bachelor's in psych

About the two lives with the shared personality traits, yes. There were some written notes somewhere about the two women. Call it a "family history", if you will.

About the third life, with the physical resemblance: no. I recalled only a small fragment of that life, and didn't have enough info to go looking for an evidence.

If you want to learn about cases with compelling evidence, do check out this book:

Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation - The author is Dr. Stevenson, a professor in the University of Virginia School of Medicine. As you would expect, he is trained in the scientific method. Apparently, he performed a very methodical research on the subject, and compiled a list of 20 cases which, to him, strongly suggest reincarnation as the best explanation for what he observed.

If you are interested in exploring your own past lives, find out a reputed past-life regression professional, preferably one who was trained as a psychologist / psychiatrist (and therefore has a rational, scientific background).

Edit: Changed "our own past lives" to "your own past lives".

I recommend The Portable Jung. It's on my bookshelf, and it's your best bet.

the portable jung has a section on the shadow and many other bits that JP speaks about like 'the relations between the ego and unconscious' ...tis a good starting point that covers alot.
https://www.amazon.com/Portable-Jung-Library/dp/0140150706

Most people who predict things don't get them right, dummy.

Read a book. Start with this. https://www.amazon.com/Future-Babble-Pundits-Hedgehogs-Foxes/dp/0452297575

You're right on. I'm starting by talking about memory palaces (also called "the method of the loci"), which are apparently first referenced in Rhetorica Ad Herenium a book attributed to Cicero. If you're interested in the Medieval revival of the memory palace arts, check out Frances Yates, especially her book The Art of Memory.

Matteo Ricci used the method of the loci to help Chinese students study for their imperial examinations. If you're interested in learning more about him, read Jonathan Spence's The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci. Also, for something more contemporary, Jonathan Foer's book Moonwalking with Einstein discusses how memory palace techniques are still used to win memory competitions.

>Where do you recommend to study symbols??

It depends on what symbols you seek clarity and understanding of? Symbols are replete in myths and fairytales, in the occult, religion and art, mysticism and metaphysics. Immersing yourself in material from those regions will give you access to a comprehensive collection of symbols and symbolic content.

This relates to what Jung called amplification, though in his case that was employed in a therapeutic context.

There's an essay on the Purpose of Amplification here,

an archive of symbols here,

and their publication in a book here. Perhaps the archive and book in particular could prove useful for your needs?

Alternatively there's Anthony Steven's book Ariadne's Clue: A Guide to the Symbols of Humankind?

This is a very quick and super-understandable (1-2 sittings) overview of current thought on consciousness.

http://www.amazon.com/Introducing-Consciousness-Graphic-David-Papineau/dp/1848311710?ie=UTF8&qid=&ref_=tmm_pap_title_0&sr=

Second this. His influence on my life and reality is beyond explanation. The Book was my first read, but my favorite is The Wisdom of Insecurity.

With Jung you have his collected works, but this is like taking acid when you haven't even tried weed so its best to start with another persons perspective and work your way in: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0192854585/ref=cm_sw_r_fm_apa_9UjhAbJA5Q2C3

It also helps to look into the context of his life, he was alive during both world wars and a friend (sort of) of Freud. He was really on board with the East-West exchange of philosophy much like Aldous Huxley and the rock artists of the 70s. I think he is the epitome of what hippies would call "far out, dude".

Here you go: Neurotribes by Steve Silberman https://www.amazon.com/NeuroTribes-Legacy-Autism-Future-Neurodiversity-ebook/dp/B00L9AY254

I read "Jung: A Very Short Introduction" which was quite good.

https://www.amazon.com/Jung-Short-Introduction-Anthony-Stevens/dp/0192854585

uptoke for the prophet - that book was very inspiring for me. if you're down for some more "standard" (i.e. not poetry) hippie/beat/whatever-era lit/philosophy, look into alan watts. I've only read The Wisdom of Insecurity , but he's written a bunch of other stuff.

Oh, and happy rolling :)

Freud was a fraud. That's the facts, man. Your illiteracy isn't an excuse for insulting people with psuedo science. Read a book. https://www.amazon.com/Memory-Wars-Frederick-Crews/dp/0940322072

1. If you don't have any other basis for "ego" than Christians have a basis for "soul", then read the reddiquette and move on.
   
2. You can't treat /r/Zen like a indigenous culture you get to colonize.
   
3. Your beliefs about what is abrasive and disrespectful have no place in this forum. This is a forum about what Zen Masters think about abrasive and disprespectful.
   
   Sry.
   
   We get lots of ZeroDays old accounts like yours making up stuff in the forum. Don't be the guy who lies online.

The Story of Psychology is, in my amateur opinion, the best history of Academic, Western, Empirical Psychology that I have come across. I would encourage you to read the source material of the great clinicians and theoreticians, because for whatever reason, it isn't mandated in schools. Read Freud, and Adler, and Jung, and Rogers, and Maslow, and Piaget, and Fromm. Don't worry if it is incomprehensible at first, you will learn the language as you go.

Here is where my opinion deviates from the normative: if you really want to understand psychology, study preliterate cultures, mysticism, religious scripture and psychedelic experiences. These cultures, to whatever extent, never lost contact with the unconscious and needed to "discover" it, as with our Western cultures.

Beyond Good and Evil

I would simply like to read this book because I think it would help me grow as a person.Thanks for the contest by the way!

This might not be exactly what you're looking for, but if you're new to the world of Asperger's it might be helpful: Neurotribes by Steve Silberman. There's a lot about the history of autism and character sketches of autistic people. It's a good read.

I'm assuming that you have the revised version of Psychological Types from the Collected Works of C.G. Jung (Volume 6). Myers' quotes in Gifts Differing are from the original English translated publication in 1923.

Here are the CW6 version's page and paragraph numbers: Pg 340, Par 575 & Pg Pg 387, Par 637.

The Anthony Stevens diagram can be found in:

http://www.amazon.com/Jung-Short-Introduction-Anthony-Stevens/dp/0192854585/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1457802826&sr=8-1

or

http://www.amazon.com/Jung-Anthony-Stevens/dp/069101048X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1457802890&sr=8-1

To see the excerpt from the latter, go here:

http://personalitycafe.com/cognitive-functions/431786-jungian-analysts-take-jungs-functions.html

(if you don't have an account, the pic in that forum post is the same in my reddit post above.)

Jung's diagram was taken from:

http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Jungian-Psychology-Analytical-Bollingen/dp/0691152055/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1457803325&sr=8-1

Pg 137

I have a 3 year old son who was recently diagnosed. Uniquely Human sounds like a great read. I just finished Neurotribes by Steve Silberman and it was a game changer for me. I highly recommend it!

You might be interested in some of oliver sack's various books, such as this. Regarding the schizophrenia, you might enjoy this in case you haven't read it or read about his theory.

Just read this book, you'll know a lot more than from any Google search

https://www.amazon.com/NeuroTribes-Legacy-Autism-Future-Neurodiversity-ebook/dp/B00L9AY254

I'm partial to the Very Short Introduction series that Oxford publishes, including this one on Jung.

Hello! I majored in psychology in college (and loved it!), and here's what I've gleaned from my schooling as well as my own personal research:

• Cognitive science, more specifically cognitive psychology is a good field for understanding how that thing between your ears works. Pay special attention to the [Atkinson-Shiffrin model] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atkinson%E2%80%93Shiffrin_memory_model#Summary), but understand that it's not completely accurate. It is, however, a useful place to start when learning the basics.
  
  
• You may benefit from learning the tricks associated with mnemonics, which have a rich and fascinating history. I recommend "The Art of Memory" by Francis A. Yates.
  
  
• Just for fun, check out memory sports! If you like what you see, check out this awesome book, Moonwalking with Einstein, which covers Josh Foer's journey from being a complete novice to the realm of memory sports to a champion.
  
  I hope that this helped!

Mate, you're an idiot. You haven't had a single coherent thought since you've begun posting here. You flip-flop on issues and you find that exciting. I think you're young, naive, impressionable, and too optimistic. That's a solid recipe for wishful thinking.

But fuck, I'm human, I'm wrong most of the time.

I've been working my way through the works of Frances Yates recently, since I'm especially interested in her unique approach towards the occult traditions and their effect on prominent Renaissance figures and their ideas.

I'm currently reading The Art of Memory and one of the main themes that accompany the book is the notion of a forgotten body of knowledge/ability that was lost to humanity throughout the ages.

Do any of you have any similar examples of some kind of knowledge or ability humanity has lost from the past?, or maybe some of you have any thoughts on her works in general and can direct me to current researchers that expand her work in some way.

The first definitive book on the matter: Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation

Another book I love is The Witch in the Waiting Room: A Physician Investigates Paranormal Phenomena in Medicine

They are both written by doctors with a skeptical but open-minded view of the unexplained. The first I haven't read (just summaries and through reputation) but it is referenced by the second. The second has a bibliography which is great. The second is great and covers a whole bunch of things. Also if anyone can recommend similar books (or books the scientifically refute these experiences) to me I would appreciate it.

Relevant reading material: The Wisdom of Insecurity by Alan Watts

I would suggest this as a good intro.

Sure. Without anything to go on, I'll just recommend some of my favorites. :)

• Godel Escher Bach - Mindbending book that delves into connections between art, music, math, linguistics and even spirituality.
  
• Code - The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software - Ever wondered how the black box you're using to read this comment works? "Code" goes from transistor to a fully functioning computer in a sequential way that even a child could grasp. It's not at the "How to build your own computer from Newegg.com parts". It's more at the "How to build your own computer if you were trapped on a desert island" level, which is more theoretical and interesting. You get strong intuition for what's actually happening.
  
• The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind - An intriguing looking into the theory that men of past ages actually hallucinated the voices of their gods, and how that led to the development of modern civilization and consciousness.

I'm partial to Jungian psychology so I recommend anything dream-related by him or those he worked close with, namely Marie Louis Von Franz (IMO). A simple—and I mean simple—and good intro would be the book 'Inner Work' by Robert Johnson. It addresses a four-step approach to dream interpretation and active imagination. After that, I'd just read as much of Jung's writings about dreams as you can. Start with Dreams (from the Collected Works). Since Jung's psychology is so much about the unconscious, virtually everything you read will be relatable to dream interpretation in some way. There is a nice compendium edited by Joseph Campbell called The Portable Jung that features a great and mind-blowing essay called something like 'Relation Between the Ego and Unconscious,' and actually, now that I think of it, excerpts from the 'Dreams' book as well. 'Man and His Symbols' by Jung was the last thing he wrote and was intended to introduce the general public to his psychology, so you can also start there if you haven't checked out any Jung before. Get the one with pictures.

I can't say exactly what's going, but I can offer some recommended reading. If that or the advice of other redditors doesn't help, don't be afraid to try and get professional help.

I've been a big fan of Icon Books' "Introducing" series. They're sorta like intellectual comic books, but are able to give you a good precis of a given author or subject quite efficiently. I prefer them to Paul Strathern's 90 Minutes series because they go into better depth on the theoretical aspects of a thinker, whereas Strathern spends more time in biographical detail and only briefly dips into the theory. If you buy used, and look around for older editions you can usually find them going for about between a penny and a buck or less on Amazon, and with $3.99 shipping, it's a pretty cheap way to get a good start in a subject. The upside is their more recent books like the ones on Derrida and Zizek come with approval from the author they're covering. Derrida reportedly loved his, and Zizek was apparently quite excited about the medium and had many ideas for how to communicate with it.

Consciousness, Time, Ethics


But yeah, the best thing you can do for yourself though after or while sating your interests is to get a solid foundation in the Greeks, because EVERYBODY references them, everybody. They are great in and of themselves, but you will literally save yourself years of your own time that would have been spent trying to pin down this that or the other thing that so and so said if you don't have a solid basic understanding of the Greeks.

I'd go with this lil book, it'll give you an idea of the man and the basics of his ideas http://www.amazon.com/C-G-Jung-Speaking-C-G/dp/0691018715

His work can get pretty fucking dense but never fear, a man named Edward Edinger or a woman named Marie Louise Von Franz did immense work communicating the ideas in more understandable ways.

Also there's this one, it was the one book he approved for the layperson - http://www.amazon.com/Man-Symbols-Carl-Gustav-Jung/dp/0440351839/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1404996952&sr=1-1&keywords=man+and+his+symbols

but if you do find that his ideas are worth further reading there's a great compilation http://www.amazon.com/Portable-Jung-Library/dp/0140150706/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1404997014&sr=1-1&keywords=the+portable+jung

These are some of my favourites:

1. The Psychedelic Renaissance (talks about different psychoactive drugs) http://www.amazon.com/The-Psychedelic-Renaissance-Reassessing-Psychiatry/dp/1908995009
   
2. Be Here Now (hippie, buddhist/hinduism peace and love vibes with wonderful illustrations) http://www.amazon.com/Be-Here-Now-Ram-Dass/dp/0517543052/ref=sr_1_1_ha?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1411704494&sr=1-1&keywords=be+here+now
   
3. Why Does The World Exist? (more scientific and metaphysical) http://www.amazon.com/Why-Does-World-Exist-Existential/dp/0871403595/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1411704588&sr=1-1&keywords=why+does+the+world+exist
   
   That's apart from Timothy Leary's "The Psychedelic Experience" and Huxley's "Doors of Perception" thought, those are must-reads.

http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Gödel,_Escher,_Bach - experimentations on meaning, consciousness and thought

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B009MBTRHA/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 - the theory (since debunked) that our ancestors were hallucinating actual gods telling them to do everything

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/zen-art-motorcycle-maintenance/id360625670?mt=11 - About a man on a motorcycle going cross country with his son...he's a philosophy professor though, so it's about so much more.

Perhaps books like The Art of Memory, The Logic Of Failure, Prometheus Rising, Finite and Infinite Games could offer some new perspectives.

Edward De Bono's work on lateral thinking might also be of interest.

Predicting the price of oil is futile. No one knows what the price will be... not even the CEO of Exxon. If you don't beleive me, read "Future babble"

http://www.amazon.com/Future-Babble-Expert-Predictions-Believe/dp/0771035195

Check out Alan Watts' "The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety". He explores some aspects of eastern philosophy and psychology in a very straightforward, non-preachy manner, addressing the anxiety we experience lamenting the past and planning for the future, making it hard to find pleasure in the present . It's a quick read and you'll know as soon as you pick it up if it's something that might help.

This one. It's not super in-depth or exhaustive but it's a nice "intro" to the philosophy of consciousness. I'm enjoying it.

There isn't incontrovertible proof and probably never will be, but there is some good evidence presented by Ian Stevenson (a professor from the university of Virginia) and his team of researchers. They found a lot of cases of children who seem to remember details of a previous life. Details they couldn't have known from experiences involving their five senses.

If the Hannah Monsour/Suzanne Ghanem case is to be believed, that's as close as we'll get to proof, but there are lots more cases. One case allegedly led to a murderer being exposed ad confessing his crime.

Ian Stevenson wrote a few books (UK Amazon link - US link here) you might be interested in if you want more info. He has videos on YouTube as well.

>remember one of the three little girls walking down the street has or will be violated before she's 18, or that a couple of little boys out of a dozen having a water gun fight will be scarred for the rest of their life.

So let me get this straight - 33% of the american women, and at least 16% of american men have been molested, and this is according to "telephone surveys"? Sounds like a clear case of fear mongering to me. There's facts and then there's repressed Repressed Memory Quackery.

Neurotribes by Steve Silberman. The author goes through the history of autism and discusses not only how history impacted autism research but also talks about the controversial idea of neurodiversity and the idea that maybe autism is less of a 'thing to be fixed' but maybe more of a different way of thinking and analyzing the world. Fascinating read.

https://www.amazon.com/NeuroTribes-Legacy-Autism-Future-Neurodiversity-ebook/dp/B00L9AY254

You would find this book very interesting:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B009MBTRHA/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1

Julian Jayes hypothesizes that our minds, at one point in human development, were bicameral- two independent halves. He states that the right hemisphere would give orders to the left through hallucinations or commands. It's some seriously fascinating stuff.

I encourage you to start out with “The Portable Jung”, which is edited by Joseph Campbell.

The Portable Jung (Portable Library) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0140150706/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_aPU4CbVD7J8S3

[2 of 4]

• How curious are you? Do you have more ideas then you can execute? What are your curiosities about? What are your ideas about - is it environmental or conceptual, and can you please elaborate?
  
  • I think this is something I struggle with on a daily basis. I like many things, or so I like to believe. Like I feel that everything’s interesting and everything is connected somehow through symbols. I like thinking about these symbols and connections constantly. So my ideas are about concepts mostly. I can’t remember facts if I can’t attach them to concepts that make sense to me.
    
  • This has been my latest conflict I have to say. I started a career in EE, and then I shifted to computer science. I’ve wanted since I was an undergrad to start a research path, but I’ve been struggling to find something I really really love. I am not good at taking decisions, but an academic path looks now like my best bet for not working in a desk never again (I like having my own desk at home, though).
    
  • I’m confident everything will be good at the end, and I am confident I can do almost anything. Not trying to be cocky, is just that I know I’m physically and mentally capable of learning anything (in the realm of normal stuff, of course I won’t build a heavy falcon myself), so unless that does not change, I’m good. On the other hand, being so certain about that backfires at me, filling my head with “what ifs”
    
  • I have this bad habit of reading (and most of the time not finishing) books in parallel, now I’m reading about
    
    • Carl Jung (https://www.amazon.com/Jung-Short-Introduction-Anthony-Stevens/dp/0192854585 mostly motivated by understanding this mbti thingy)
      
    • About network science (https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/complex-network-analysis/9781680505399/ and https://www.amazon.com/Networks-Introduction-Mark-Newman/dp/0199206651 because network analysis can be applied to almost anything)
      
    • Machine Learning (http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920052289.do) because is what the cool kids do in IT now or so I’ve learned, I’m more into software architecture though, and
      
    • EGB (https://www.amazon.com/G%C3%B6del-Escher-Bach-Eternal-Golden/dp/0465026567) which is a beast and I wanted to get my feet wet about cognitive science and semiotic. I am at about 40% of all of them,
      
  • I pick a chapter until I finish it, and then I move on to the next book, when I have time. I’ve lost interest in reading fiction, I get that from reading graphic novels and manga, mostly. If it matters something, currently ongoing mangas I like are Hajime no Ippo, One Piece, Vinland Saga and The Promised Neverland.
    
• Would you enjoy taking on a leadership position? Do you think you would be good at it? What would your leadership style be?
  
  • I’m not very good at getting stuff done so I would probably suck as a leader of anything. But hey, I am good listening to people and helping them improve. I also don’t think I’m a good teamplayer. I’m bad at following instructions if I don’t trust them. During college I was the guy that ended redoing the work of others during group assignments, because I either I was not satisfied with their work or I was not good at giving instructions. I didn’t know at that moment I was being a dick and I know now, and it’s not something I’m proud of. I'm working on it.
    
• Are you coordinated? Why do you feel as if you are or are not? Do you enjoy working with your hands in some form? Describe your activity?
  
  • I used to draw more when I was younger, and did a bit of woodwork also. I had plants. I like to cook, and have strong opinions on food. I like creating stuff with my hands, I consider myself a creative person. In short, I am coordinated, but not so with team activities like team sports.
    
• Are you artistic? If yes, describe your art? If you are not particular artistic but can appreciate art please likewise describe what forums of art you enjoy. Please explain your answer.
  
  • It’s hard to pin down what kind of art I like, I just know I like something after I’ve seen it or told about, with no particular topic. I don’t understand sculpture, and I vaguely get poetry. Regarding drawing, I appreciate the flow and light in shapes. I was into human figure for some years, and I did a lot of drawings that were good.
    
  • I know a bit of guitar and ukulele, but I never played for others than girls I like. I am too shy of my voice, my singing and technique, I know it needs improving. I took singing classes once but with only the gist of it I got it’s something that requires more discipline and time than what I’m willing to spend.
    
• What's your opinion about the past, present, and future? How do you deal with them?
  
  • uhm, now I strive to live a life that maximises happiness and minimizes regret. At my age I think I know enough about the things I can control, and play along with that hand, always with the best intentions, and I am optimist about the future.
    
  • Sometimes I regret not being like this in the past, however, and I see myself revisiting things I would have done better, like studying more, eating better, loved more.
    
• How do you act when others request your help to do something (anything)? If you would decide to help them, why would you do so?
  
  • I always help, I believe in karma as a thing (I mean, not religiously) and that life has been really good to me. I don’t help when I know I can’t help, or when I’m being ordered to or asked in a bad way i.e. makes me feel bad. I have trouble noticing these situations though.

If you'd like to read up on the use of psychedelics for creative and technical problem solving, check out:

• AMAZON: LSD, the problem-solving psychedelic
  
  
• Great study that needs to be redone involving professionals within hard-science fields: "Psychedelic agents in creative problem-solving: A pilot study" doi:10.2466/pr0.1966.19.1.211
  
  
• Also check out this textbook published by a pioneer in drug-assisted psychotherapy: AMAZON: The Psychedelic Renaissance

You might enjoy Nietzsche: https://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Good-Evil-Philosophy-Editions/dp/048629868X

two years ago things had built up to a point where i felt completely lost. i had gone to therapy before, when things where less dramatic, but had no idea what i was looking for and felt underwhelmed by the results, to say the least. the thought of going through various therapists to find something that would work, seemed ridiculous to me, even more since i had no idea what was going on in my head. i just knew there was a whole box of issues, but didn't know where to start.


i did a lot of research on how to affect my mood and mental calmness and changed a lot of habits. meditation, exercise, outdoor activities, healthy food, active social life (the hardest part) and tons of reading on mental health (shows you're not alone), philosophy (shows people have battled these issues since, like, forever) and whatever interests there may be (shows the world doesn't revolve around you and your shit) all played their part.

at the same time, a friend offhandedly mentioned ayahuasca and i extended my research to the vast field of psychedelic "therapies", a topic i had incidentally been interested in since i was a kid, even with no real exposure up to this point. as a decidedly non-esoteric person i was put off by a lot of the lingo and out there-themes being discussed, but i also found a lot of medical, historical and scientific material on the use of psychedelics. i ended up going to peru and did four sessions with ayahuasca in a center dedicated to "healing". i won't bore you with another tale of "amazing" tripping and puking in the jungle, so to cut a long story short, it helped me a lot and in unexpected ways. biggest thing was probably that i came back to several weeks of positive mental clarity, which helped me find the kind of therapist that would get me ahead.




the most important thing when attempting to go down this road is to do your research. it's still almost impossible to legally use any psychedelics (i'm including mdma here) in an officially controlled setting, so extra care has to be taken to insure the right environment and quality.

i discussed the experience with my therapist and while she readily took it into account as something that had opened some doors for me, i was surprised to learn, that her knowledge of psychedelics seemed stuck in the 1950's. this isn't like homeopathy or some other old remedy that is based on esotericism, superstition or lack of knowledge. there is a huge body of serious scientific work on the topic and in growing numbers.


reading recommendation:

http://www.amazon.de/The-Psychedelic-Renaissance-Reassessing-Psychiatry/dp/1908995009

The Story of Psychology by Morton Hunt perfectly covers history of psychology from Ancient Greeks to German Psychophysicists to Behaviorism to Cognitive Psychology. It's some 600 pages, but very entertaining, easy to read and accurate at the same time.
The Other Side of Psychology by Denise Cummins gives a nice overview of cognitive psychology - memory, learning, emotion etc., plus famous experiments such as those of Milgram. Very interesting read.

>You espouse nothing but poor reasoning

You can't espouse poor reasoning. You can however espouse an idea supported by poor reasoning. Assuming this is what you meant, I still haven't done it. You have no examples for how my arguments rely on poor reasoning, you just keep insisting that they do. This is due to your own reliance on specious reasoning.

>You're an apologist. You've chosen that position and it's an ugly one.

Sigh.... You know what an apologist is right? Lets use the term in a sentence... "The christian apologists tried to defend their beliefs using reason, thinking that belief in god could be found through logic." Hmm... Maybe a definition would still be useful.

Ya... I'm not an apologist. I'm not arguing in defense of a belief. I'm arguing against a belief in moral realism. You, my friend, function as the apologist in this debate. Please stop using words without knowing how to use them.

>My morals are quite measured and I do not follow them blindly, with faith. I quoted this because this is all you do. You make stupid and baseless attacks because you have no defense.

Watch this: "My belief in God is quite measured and I do not follow him blindly, with faith." Just because you use reason to justify things after the fact does not make the original assumption true, or any less "faithful."

You seem to have a complete lack of knowledge when it comes to moral theory and what is possible through moral theory. Sam Harris, while an interesting individual, and right about many things, is fundamentally wrong when it comes to what science can do with regard to morals. Not in the sense that his moral system is untenable, but rather in the sense that you can't get his moral system strictly through scientific study—which he claims we can. Assumptions must be made before you can even begin the study of well-being and suffering, and even more must be made in order to say that you should promote one and avoid the other.

A person's insistence on the existence of universal objective morals is best termed as a FAITH. There is no evidence of universal objective morals, and they are fundamentally unscientific entities in the same sense God is—even if we wanted to, we could never find evidence of them. At best they are commonly assumed entities—like God is for most people.

And I repeat, because you seem to think I am some sort of moral heathen, THIS DOES NOT MEAN THAT MORALS ARE USELESS OR THAT WE SHOULD LET PEOPLE DO WHATEVER THEY WANT BECAUSE THERE ARE NO OBJECTIVE MORALS. Your feelings about me being somehow deficient are the same feelings a religious fundamentalist would have toward both of us due to our lack of belief.

That you think a bit of pop-science is somehow "important" for me to read is laughable. If what you know of morals comes from that book, I feel sorry for you. I understand that many atheists will praise anything that comes from the "canon" writers on atheism like Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins, however, being a fan of someone does not make all of their work good, or even relevant. At best, Sam Harris is simply endorsing the naturalistic fallacy. At worst, he's willfully ignorant of what the naturalistic fallacy is, and simply wishes to push his view as a "counterpoint" to religious morality.

Since you so kindly left me a link to a book, allow me to do the same, by linking you to the most important books in moral theory for you to read, some of which argue directly against me, but at this point the idea is to get you educated, not to get you to agree with me:

Alisdair MacIntyre — After Virtue

Nietzsche — Beyond Good and Evil

Nietzsche — The Genealogy of Morals

Kant — Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals

Aristotle — Nicomachean Ethics

G.E. Moore — Principia Ethica

I've done my best to find the best editions of these books available (I myself usually default to the Cambridge editions of works in the history of philosophy). You may also want to check out some Peter Singer, along with Bentham and Mill, if only to know what it means to be a utilitarian. After that, read John Rawls, because he'll tell you one reason why utilitarianism is so controversial in ethical theory.

I hope to hear back from you about the results of your studies. I figure you can easily find pdfs of these books (though perhaps not the same editions I linked) somewhere online. Given about a month or two to read them all (I'm not sure how much free time you have... maybe more like three months) you should be up to speed. Hopefully I'll hear back from you after the new year. At that point, I don't expect you to agree with my view on ethics, but I at least expect you will understand it, and be able to argue your own position somewhat more effectively than you are at the moment. If nothing else, think of this as a way to learn how to "stick it" to people like me.

Maybe by then you'll have gotten beyond the whole "I'm taking my ball and going home" disposition you seem to have when confronted with someone who's better than you at debating ethics. I can only hope.

If you take ethics seriously at all, do this for yourself: study the shit out of ethical theory.

I've actually done a fair bit of research into this subject. If you want to read more about it, check out The Art of Memory, Yates 2001

1q2w3e94 has explained the process of constructing a memory house pretty well. In a world before printed words (forget the internet), people really needed to remember everything they knew. It really wasn't feasible to just look stuff up all the time.

The art of memory was largely used in the realm of public speaking, as a way for you to memorize long speeches with a series of bullet points or key ideas to keep you on track as you recited. 1q2w3e94's example might be useful if you needed to make a big speech on the attractions that should be included in this year's Spring Carnival or something.

It hasn't exactly changed my life, but The Wisdom of Insecurity messes with you in a good way.

Nietzsche: Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future (Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0521779138/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_Q1SaBbYVM9MCT

Here is the mobile version of your link

Try "The Psychology Book: big ideas simply explained" I got it as a gift a while back and it's pretty awesome. It's actually simplified and not dumbed down and it's really colorful so maybe it'll keep his attention.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0756689708/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?qid=1450027180&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX118_SY170_QL70&keywords=the+psychology+book

While my Spirit Twin is Pinkie Pie for her unwielding goofiness and friendship-magic, I think my favorite fictional character is Kenneth from 30 Rock. He somehow sneaks in some incredibly dark comedy in between his "aw shucks" moments on the show. Plus, despite how small it seems, he's pretty much living his dream life.

I'd like a used copy of [The Portable Jung] (http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0140150706/ref=wl_it_of_o_pC_S_nC?ie=UTF8&colid=36FKHTABECFGT&coliid=IOXMVP4MRSFBE&condition=all), which has a handful of under a buck copies, from my Books WL. Or any of the used books on that list that fits the price criteria.

If you're getting into reincarnation you need to check out Ian Stevenson from the University of Virginia. Started studying it in 1967.

Here's his book
Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation: Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged https://www.amazon.com/dp/0813908728/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_tOJNzb72SRGD6

Top15s could do the best 15 cases. Mind blowing stuff.

Beyond Good and Evil

She just looked at me, they chattered and then left.

yes, kind of correct, but at some stage of evolution the bicameral mind will come into play. Animals haven't reached the same stage of Consciousness as humans, so they don't have religion forming as a result.

If you're interested I highly recommend reading The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind.

but be warned it's a big, heavy book, but well worth the read.

Go read a book bitch.