Introduction to Psychology, Part 1 - by @amitvegada

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The gears inside your brain work constantly to make all the tasks and actions you do possible, from keeping yourself safe to running a society smoothly. This includes all the things you like about doing and the ones you wish you could stop doing.

It is your own mind that is currently the most complicated thing in the universe, excluding other human minds. We don't fully understand the rules that govern it yet. We don't fully understand ourselves, maybe our brains aren't sophisticated enough. However, trying is the most satisfying part!

Although its formal definition has evolved over recent decades, we can call psychology today the science of mental processes and behavior. The word psychology comes from the Latin word "psychos" for "study of the soul."

Psychologists didn't begin practicing what we would now call science until the mid-1800s. The word itself wasn't coined until around the turn of the sixteenth century, and the concept of psychology didn't actually emerge until the mid-1800s. Yet, humans have always been curious about what's going on within them and what's happening in the universe.

In his exploration of the seed of human consciousness, Aristotle concluded that it grew from the heart rather than the head. The first psychological exams around two thousand years ago were conducted by Chinese rulers, who subjected public officials to intelligence and personality tests. It was also Persian physician Muhammad ibn Zakariya al-Rhazes also known as Rhazes who described the mental illness in the late 800s and who even treated patients in what was essentially a very early mental health unit in Baghdad hospital.

The following big questions have dominated psychology since the very beginning:

• How can humans commit crimes against humanity such as genocide and torture
• How do we know that these things are horrible?
• Our environment, biology, and non-conscious influences drive our reactions, or do we have free will?
• Where does mental illness come from, and what can we do to prevent it?
• How does consciousness work?
• Who are we?
• Would I still be human if I lost awareness of myself?

I DON'T KNOW!

But over the next few lessons, these are the questions that we're gonna be exploring together:

1. How our brains function?
2. How they can be damaged?
3. How they can be repaired?
4. Why we behave in the ways we do when we don't want to?
5. What it means to be alive and thinking and feeling?

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Psychology, to the average person, would bring to mind a picture of a therapist listening to a patient divulge detailed information about his day. Maybe the therapist wears glasses, smokes a cigar, and strokes his whiskered chin with his hand.

Admit it! You probably think of Freud when you think of psychology. One of the greatest, if not the greatest, thinkers in history, Sigmund Freud was tremendously influential and controversial. Theories based on his work helped develop our understanding of childhood, personality, dreams, and sexuality.

As a result, his legacy generated both positive and negative reactions. A number of important events in history occurred during his long life, including the American Civil War and World War II. Like most great scientists, Freud worked heavily on the work of others to develop his revolutionary ideas, but the innovations didn't stop there.

Psychological theories, methods, and schools of thought make it one of the most interesting, multifaceted scientific disciplines when it comes to proposing questions, applying methods, and containing disciplines. The psychology of human behavior is really more than just a big old melting pot, as it involves a lot of different approaches.

We will be talking more on this in our next lesson, until then. Take care and see you all later.