Editing Gustav Fechner (section)

== Influence ==

Fechner, along with [[Wilhelm Wundt]] and [[Hermann von Helmholtz]], is recognized as one of the founders of modern experimental [[psychology]]. His clearest contribution was the demonstration that because the mind was susceptible to measurement and mathematical treatment, psychology had the potential to become a quantified science. Theorists such as [[Immanuel Kant]] had long stated that this was impossible, and that therefore, a science of psychology was also impossible.

Though he had a vast influence on [[psychophysics]], the actual disciples of his general philosophy were few. [[Ernst Mach]] was inspired by his work on psychophysics.<ref>[https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2011/entries/ernst-mach/ Pojman, Paul, "Ernst Mach", ''The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' (Winter 2011 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)]</ref> [[William James]] also admired his work: in 1904, he wrote an admiring introduction to the English translation of Fechner's ''Büchlein vom Leben nach dem Tode'' (''Little Book of Life After Death'').

The composer [[Gustav Mahler]] read Fechner as a student, and he identified with Fechner when writing his [[Symphony No. 2 (Mahler)|Second Symphony]], his [[Symphony No. 3 (Mahler)|Third]], and [[Das Lied von der Erde]].<ref>{{cite book |first1=Michael Lee |last1=Harland |title="My life transparently revealed": interpreting Mahler's worldview through an analysis of his middle-period symphonies |url=https://core.ac.uk/reader/227521207 |publisher=University of Texas at Austin, PhD dissertation |date=2019 |pages=265–270}}</ref>

Furthermore, he influenced [[Sigmund Freud]], who refers to Fechner when introducing the concept of psychic locality in his ''The Interpretation of Dreams'' that he illustrates with the microscope-metaphor.<ref>{{cite book |first1=Angus |last1=Nicholls |first2=Martin |last2=Liebshcher |title=Thinking the Unconscious: Nineteenth-Century German Thought |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MCJzE-SxDUgC&pg=PA272 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=24 June 2010 |isbn=9780521897532 |page=272}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |first=Sigmund |last=Freud |author-link=Sigmund Freud |title=The Interpretation of Dreams |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MKtzBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA35 |location=Mineola New York |publisher= Courier Dover Publications |translator= [[A. A. Brill]] |date=18 March 2015 |isbn=978-0-486-78942-2 |page=35}}</ref><ref>Sulloway, Frank J. (1979). ''Freud: Biologist of the Mind.''(pp. 66-67). Basic Books.</ref>
 
Fechner's world concept was highly [[Animism|animistic]]. He felt the thrill of life everywhere, in plants, earth, stars, the total universe. Fechner was a panpsychist; he viewed the entire universe as being inwardly alive and consciously animated, instead of being dead “stuff” as accepted by most of his contemporary colleagues, who had become devotees to what was becoming known as material science. Yet he based his panpsychism on a well thought out description of consciousness as waves. He believed that human beings stand midway between the souls of plants and the souls of stars, who are angels.<ref>{{Citation
|pmid = 11610088
|last=Marshall
|first=M E
|publication-date=Jan 1969
|year=1969
|title=Gustav Fechner, Dr. Mises, and the comparative anatomy of angels.
|volume=5
|issue=1
|periodical=Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences
|pages=39–58
|doi = 10.1002/1520-6696(196901)5:1<39::AID-JHBS2300050105>3.0.CO;2-C
}}</ref> God, the soul of the universe, must be conceived as having an existence analogous to human beings. Natural laws are just the modes of the unfolding of God's perfection. In his last work Fechner, aged but full of hope, contrasts this joyous "daylight view" of the world with the dead, dreary "night view" of [[materialism]]. Fechner's work in [[aesthetics]] is also important. He conducted experiments to show that certain abstract forms and proportions are naturally pleasing to our senses, and gave some new illustrations of the working of aesthetic association.<ref name="EB1911"/> [[Charles Hartshorne]] saw him as a predecessor on his and [[Alfred North Whitehead]]'s philosophy and regretted that Fechner's philosophical work had been neglected for so long.<ref>For Hartshorne's appreciation of Fechner see his [http://www.anthonyflood.com/hartshorneaquinas.htm ''Aquinas to Whitehead – Seven Centuries of Metafysics of Religion'']. Hartshorne also comments that William James failed to do justice to the theological aspects of Fechner's work. Hartshorne saw also resemblances with the work of Fechner's contemporary [[Jules Lequier]]. See also: Hartshorne – Reese (ed.) ''Philosophers speak of God''.</ref>

Fechner's position in reference to predecessors and contemporaries is not very sharply defined. He was remotely a disciple of [[Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling|Schelling]],<ref name="EB1911"/> learned much from [[Baruch Spinoza]], [[Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz|G. W. Leibniz]], [[Johann Friedrich Herbart]], [[Arthur Schopenhauer]], and [[Christian Hermann Weisse]], and decidedly rejected [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel|G. W. F. Hegel]] and the [[Monad (philosophy)|monad]]ism of [[Rudolf Hermann Lotze]].

Fechner's work continues to have an influence on modern science, inspiring continued exploration of human perceptual abilities by researchers such as [[Jan Koenderink]], [[Farley Norman]], [[David Heeger]], and others.