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The Centrality of Aesthetics for Psychology: Sciences and Arts United Through Poetic Instants

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Psychology as the Science of Human Being

Part of the book series: Annals of Theoretical Psychology ((AOTP,volume 13))

Abstract

Historically, aesthetics deal with two main issues related to human experience: order and sensation. These key concepts open the scenario for almost all the dilemmas of science in general and psychology in particular. The intuition of order relates to the notion of form from gestalt psychology, which at the same time speaks of sensation. From the perspective of Octavio Paz and Gaston Bachelard, this chapter suggests the notion of the poetic instants as a possibility to extend the understanding that psychology has of higher and lower mental functions in an attempt to penetrate deeper into the foundations of human culture and creativity. Furthermore, we highlight the role of sensations in connection with the notion of the aestheticological leaded by Alexander G. Baumgartner, bridging psychology with modern aesthetics at the core of contemporary challengers for theories and methodologies in cultural psychology.

Beauty will save the world.

Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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Notes

  1. 1.

    We thank the poet Ã…smund Vonheim Seip for the reference to the Nobel discourse of Solzhenitsyn.

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Acknowledgments

We specially thank Allen Kelly PhD, University of Glasgow, for his thoughtful comments on our manuscript regarding to English Grammar and Style, as well as to the clarity and strength of the ideas.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway

    Olga V. Lehmann & Sven Hroar Klempe

Authors
  1. Olga V. Lehmann
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  2. Sven Hroar Klempe
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Olga V. Lehmann .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Aalborg University, Aalborg, Denmark

    Jaan Valsiner

  2. University of Salerno, Salerno, Italy

    Giuseppina Marsico

  3. University of Delhi, New Delhi, India

    Nandita Chaudhary

  4. Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto, Japan

    Tatsuya Sato

  5. Universidade Federal da Bahia, Salvador, Brazil

    Virginia Dazzani

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Lehmann, O.V., Klempe, S.H. (2016). The Centrality of Aesthetics for Psychology: Sciences and Arts United Through Poetic Instants. In: Valsiner, J., Marsico, G., Chaudhary, N., Sato, T., Dazzani, V. (eds) Psychology as the Science of Human Being. Annals of Theoretical Psychology, vol 13. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-21094-0_4

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