Review of: Nuovi orizzonti della psicologia sperimentale

Reviews the book, Nuovi orizzonti della psicologia sperimentale by Agostino Gemelli. This book, in second edition, revised and augmented, but undated, is dedicated to F. Kiesow "in spite of differences on particular questions." It consists of three main parts, in the reviewer's judgment. For 125 pages the author gives us one of the traditional histories of the "experimental psychology" of the nineteenth century, raising the curtain before such familiar names as Fechner, Lotze, Helmholtz and, of course and especially, Wundt. Many pages are devoted to discussing the proper place for psychology within philosophy and for philosophy within psychology. Very little good is expected by the author from the intrusion of biologists into the field of psychology. For 147 further pages we are then given a rather good report of the methods used by the "Würzburg school" for the investigation of the "thought processes." The last 81 pages the author devotes to an "examination of a notion fundamental for psychology," to the problem of the possibility of a science of conscious phenomena.