Nature from Within: Gustav Theodor Fechner and His Psychophysical Worldview

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Summary: Fechner's Theory of Mental Hypothesis Testing
Review: This amazingly thoughful study of the 19th-century influence of physicist, psychophysicist, estheticist and philosopher Gustav Fechner (1801-1987)provides a compehensive analysis of the intellectual crosscurrents of 19th-century European thought. Fechner's creation of "mental hypothesis testing" created the methodology for experimental psychology and the foundation for statistical hypothesis testing and descriptive statistics. This fine book permits us to see the intellectual forces at work and the stuggle, by Fechner, to define the relation of mind and body. A welcome translation from the 1992 German original. A must read for students of psychology and history of science.