Ragsdale (2003) Beyond Relativism and Absolutism: Value and Meaning in Gestalt Psychology and Depth Psychology

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Beyond Relativism and Absolutism: Value and Meaning in Gestalt Psychology and Depth Psychology

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CONTRIBUTORS:

Author:

Ragsdale, Edward S. (b. ----, d. ----)

JOURNAL:

Gestalt Theory - An International Multidisciplinary Journal, 25(1/2), 53 - 62.

YEAR:

2003

PUB TYPE:

Journal Article

SUBJECT(S):

Gestalt psychology, Gestalt theory, psychology of values, relativism, depth psychology

DISCIPLINE:

Psychology

HTTP:

http://gestalttheory.net/gth/

LANGUAGE:

English

PUB ID:

103-404-794 (Last edited on 2007/04/26 03:26:15 GMT-6)

SPONSOR(S):

ABSTRACT:
This paper first re-examines Gestalt contributions to the psychology of values, specifically Karl Duncker’s (1939) work on the relation of meaning and value, and the role of context in their apprehension. Duncker drew attention to a critical, previously implicit assumption of ethical relativism: that of meaning constancy. Rejecting this proposition, he advanced the hypothesis of an invariant relation between meaning and value. That thesis, which is the basis of the Gestalt principle of relational determination of meaning and value (Asch, 1952), provides an alternative not only to relativism, but absolutism as well, since both share the same question-able assumption of meaning constancy. A second task is to explore the role of depth psychological processes in the relational determination of meaning. Even if relational determination is true, there are clearly times when that determination is not a matter of full conscious experience. Where the role of context goes unrecognized, relational characteristics may appear as indwelling properties of things themselves, thus providing a phenomenal basis for the illusion of meaning constancy. Drawing upon the depth psychological work of Erich Neumann (1969), I explore psychodynamic processes that might help ac-count for the human tendencies to absolutize experience and to impute meanings and valuations as though they were context-free facts.

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