PSYCHE

PSYCHE (from Greek psyche-soul). Soviet psychology builds its understanding of P. on the basis of developing the theoretical heritage of Marx-Engels-Lenin, the works of Stalin. Marx pointed out that 'consciousness can never be anything other than conscious being, and the being of people is the real process of their life... Even the vague formations in the human brain are necessary sublimates (products) of their material life process... It is not consciousness that determines life, but life that determines consciousness'. In the same vein, Engels wrote that 'our consciousness and thinking, however supernatural they may seem, are products of a material bodily organ, the brain. Matter is not the product of spirit, but spirit is only the highest product of matter. This is, of course, pure materialism'. Lenin developed this understanding of mental processes and consciousness especially deeply in connection with the theory of reflection he developed. Criticizing empiriocriticism, Lenin pointed out that 'if color is a sensation only in dependence on the retina (as natural science forces us to recognize), then this means that light rays, falling on the retina, produce color sensations. This means that outside of us, independently of us and of our consciousness, there exists the movement of matter, say, waves of ether of a certain length and a certain speed, which, acting on the retina, produce in a person sensations of one color or another. This is exactly how natural science looks... This is materialism: matter, acting on our sense organs, produces sensation. The existence of matter does not depend on sensation. Matter is primary. Sensation, thought, consciousness are the highest product of matter specially organized. Such are the views of materialism in general and of Marx-Engels in particular'. Lenin developed these same thoughts earlier in connection with the criticism of the subjective sociology of the Narodniks. It should also be pointed out here how Lenin widely used psychology in the struggle against idealism, thereby showing us the path of a materialist understanding of P... 'His (materialism's) conclusion about the dependence of the course of ideas on the course of things is the only one compatible with scientific psychology'. Further, Lenin shows how the metaphysical psychologist differs from the scientific psychologist. 'The metaphysical psychologist reasoned about what is the soul? The approach was already absurd here. One cannot reason about the soul without explaining in particular the mental processes... he, this scientific psychologist, rejected the philosophical theories about the soul and directly took up the study of the material substrate of mental phenomena-nervous processes and gave, say, an analysis and explanation of such and such mental processes'. These propositions already show that in opposition to idealism, we proceed from the objectively-material essence of P., based on the fact that: a) psyche arises at a certain stage of development of highly organized matter, being a property of this matter, i.e., that P. has a material origin and a certain material substrate-the brain and nervous processes; b) the processes of P. are a reflection of reality existing outside of us and independently of us, being products of the real process of human being, which emphasizes the objectively material content of the processes of P. in their subjective function; c) the processes of P. are objectified, manifested, revealed and developed in the socially-practical activity of people, from which alone the objective study of the processes of P. is possible. These propositions are inextricably linked to the assertion of the historical understanding of mental processes in humans and the active nature of their essence. However, Soviet psychology explains the activity of psyche and consciousness not from 'inner purposiveness' and self-development, as idealism does, but from the active character of the relationship of socially-labor practice to nature. Lenin pointed out that our consciousness reflects not nature, detached from man, but the transformation of nature by man. It is precisely from this that it is possible to explain the historical development of the processes of P. in connection with the history of the division of labor and the active character of the processes of P., reflecting 'the transformation of nature by man' on the basis of socially-labor practice. Only on the basis of developing the Marxist-Leninist heritage is it possible to correctly understand the psychophysical problem, which is one of the main ones in the history of psychology. In this problem, the question is raised about the relationship of consciousness to being, of P. to the brain*. The cardinal significance of these questions is emphasized by the fact that depending on how they are solved, the methodological content of psychology is determined, including the facts of the relative connection between the complexity of P. and the size and complexity of the brain, the exclusion or pathological distortion of P. in experimental-neurological studies of animals (e.g., by the method of extirpation), in organic nervous diseases, in deep degrees of oligophrenia, etc. Understanding of psyche by the main trends in psychology. Subjective empirical psychology considered psyche as the only immediate reality, free from causal relationships and regularity. Indeterministic understanding of psyche therefore considered matter as a subjective complex of sensations or representations, denying the objective essence of P. and the possibility of objective cognition of another's psyche. Since psyche is not objectively material in essence and is not objectified in human activity and in collective communication, science in studying P. must limit itself to the subjective method of introspection (self-observation). Solipsistic, bourgeois-individualistic assertion as the only immediate certainty only of one's own P. and the subjective method of its cognition form the idealist understanding of P., based on self-development and immanence of P., denial of its material essence and historical nature. To get out of this situation, which divorced psychology from positive knowledge, psychophysical dualism tried. Thus, the theory of psychophysical interaction (Bussé, Stumpf, Külpé) considered P. and nervous processes as fundamentally opposite to that substance, the bearers of which are material bodies and souls, and the brain was considered as an external condition of psyche, as an organ used by P. to influence the external world. For P. a developed brain is needed just as much as a good instrument is needed for a pianist. Hence P. is an active, creative principle, the brain and matter in general are an inert, passive mass. The appearance of a connection with natural science was created by the fact that the brain was considered not only as an object and condition of P., but also as a cause producing sensations and thoughts, so that this physical phenomenon was transformed into P. and vice versa. Thus, these double transformations form interaction. P. cannot 'shake its head' or 'raise its hand', but its slightest effect on the body is enough to release great forces, which subsequently obey purely material laws. Without formally solving the question on what basis the interaction or so-called functional interdependence occurs, this theory in essence posits as such a basis P. as a creative substance, thereby revealing its idealistic character. The theory of psychophysical parallelism and the identity hypothesis (Fechner, Paulsen, Wundt, Ebbinghaus, Gjedde) put forward arguments against the indeterministic understanding of P., 'reconciling' thereby psychology with natural science, namely with its: a) understanding of natural causality as a closed system and b) the law of conservation of energy and matter. According to the first, every bodily phenomenon can be generated only by another bodily fact, which denies the possibility of P. influencing the material processes of the organism. The organism and brain as material bodies must be studied without regard to psyche, because they represent a closed system, inaccessible to the intrusion of non-material forces. Based on this, mechanistic natural science left no place in nature for the processes of P. According to the second proposition, the sum of atoms remains the same with any changes in matter, so that the acquisition of new properties by a body is due to a change in the combination of atoms, the transformation of one form into another by equivalent substitution. Mechanistically applying this law as well, they found no place for P., because if material energy is transformed into P. as a non-material substance or vice versa, this would mean that the total energy decreased or increased, which contradicts this law. This theory 'reconciled' these laws with psychology to prove the reality of P. so as not to violate the accepted position on the continuous closedness and purely physical causality of brain processes and the absence of influence on them by P. In the end, this theory 'freed' the brain from P. in order to free P. from the brain: although they are placed side by side and simultaneously in time, they relate to each other in such a way that 'the members of one series do not cause the members of another series and do not intrude into it by internal connection. By causal connection, both series remain completely foreign to each other' (Gjedde). Being in the world is given simultaneously as dual: as brain and as P.'

What is objectively given to an observing observer as Brain and nervous process, is subjectively experienced by the experiencing subject only as Psyche. The definition of this theory as psychophysical parallelism does not reflect its basic idea: the recognition of the identity of Psyche and the physical on the basis of Psyche. The identity of their content under parallelism of forms is emphasized by analogies: a) Psyche and brain are similar to a phrase spoken in two different languages, b) they are similar to the convex and concave sides of the same curve. Psyche and bodily life are placed side by side and simultaneously in such a way that each moment of Psyche corresponds to a moment of the material, but not because of their interconnection, but because of the double refraction of being: as brain and as sensation. Denying the material essence of Psyche and its influence on other aspects of the development of matter, this theory freely admits the emergence of psychic phenomena as a result of the influence of another person without any intermediary of the body, in fact admitting direct 'communion of souls'. Thus, this assertion connects with the proof of the possibility of studying the brain and body without any reference to the role of Psyche, also the:: transformation of Psyche into a pale shadow of physical phenomena had as its reverse side the transformation of the brain into a parallel-double of Psyche, e.g. in Spencer, who constructed nerve elements similar to constructions of logical concepts.-Thus, matter was deprived of all potential abilities, activity and Psyche as its property in accordance with the basic principles of any idealism, and the human organism in accordance with mechanistic biology and medicine was shown 'disembodied', without any active participation of its Psyche. Physical laws, introduced by this theory, turned out to be needed not for the natural-scientific explanation of Psyche, but in order that, with the sanction of mechanistic natural science: a) exclude Psyche from material nature and its causality, b) transform the brain and matter into a shadowy parallel of Psyche. Thus, this dualistic theory turns out to be idealistic.-In the same plane, theories of pan- and biopsychism solve the problem of psychogenesis, the origin and development of Psyche. At their foundation lies the assertion of the passivity, inertia and inactivity of matter, which therefore cannot produce from its own development such a complex quality as Psyche, represented by them as 'original' and 'eternal'. They do not explain the emergence of psyche, replacing this explanation with a reference to its 'original preparedness', created by the creative path of the 'divine principle', 'absolute spirit', 'spiritual principle of nature'. Panpsychism holds that phenomena of Psyche are inherent in nature as a whole, that the world as a whole is animated because Psyche is the essence, driving force, active condition of the existence of matter. This can include theories of the 'unconscious world soul' (Hartmann), 'cellular consciousness' (Haeckel), 'psychology of minerals' (De la Grasserie), etc. 'Atomic souls', 'interpsychic sphere' form 'cosmic consciousness', through which idealism in psychology attempts to solve the problem of psychogenesis. Biopsychism attributes Psyche to all organized matter. The ability to think and feel therefore constitutes the essence of life, forming its motivating cause, internally laid down activity. Instead of explaining Psyche by organized matter, it explains organized matter by psyche, asserting that 'life is consciousness given in material form' (Bergson). For this theory there is also no problem of psychogenesis, since Psyche is not deducible from matter, but is given to it in ready form. Everything that was 'in the beginning' characterizes both man and protoplasm, but only in different degrees and forms, which denies any real development of Psyche, represented as^simple realization of innate predispositions. Thus, the possibility of the emergence of one form as a result of the development of another is denied (e.g. intellect from the development of instinct, consciousness from the unconscious), and Psyche is deduced from 'eternal forces', 'teleology', etc.-Idealism introduced so much mysticism into the understanding of Psyche that materialist psychologists and natural scientists tried to eliminate this concept altogether, throwing it out of the positive content of science and replacing it with behavior and higher nervous activity. Materialist psychology considered Psyche only on the basis of material regularities, but due to the mechanistic understanding of matter it could not be consistent materialism in psychology. It put forward two concepts of Psyche: a) Psyche exists, but only as an epiphenomenon, a by-product and inactive, devoid of specific regularity and causality. Every psychic phenomenon finds its direct explanation in a material cause, because psyche only subjectively registers changes in the external environment reflected by the brain. Each psychic phenomenon is parallel to some material,, which can be expressed as follows: m_a -> m₂ -> m₃ -> m₄..... II and II II .Щ П_a П₃ П₄...... This concept is represented mainly by Huxley, Maine de Biran, partly Ribot. The second concept of this psychology-understanding Psyche as matter itself, as a conditional designation of the nervous act. Thus, Büchner considered Psyche as an excretory process of the brain, Noak-_:as the movement of nerve particles, Bekhterev-as the tension of the nerve current and* combined nerve movement. In opposition to idealism with its separation of Psyche from the brain, this psychology identified Psyche with the brain, just as in opposition to the concept of the internal regularity of self-development of Psyche it put forward exclusively its external conditioning. Psyche turned into a passive product of adaptation to the environment, since the brain was considered only as an adaptation apparatus of the organism, which is a 'function of the environment'. All the above led to the denial not only of the activity of Psyche, but also of its reality. To understand Psyche, proceeding from its material substrate-this is the strong materialist position of this theory, but its inconsistently materialist character is revealed ^;in the fact that it is unable to resolve the question of how material processes,-producing material processes, form ^phenomena of Psyche as their specific properties. Along with the tendency to eliminate the reality of Psyche as a phenomenon of nature in this psychology, there was a tendency to recognize Psyche, but to refuse its objective-scientific study due to its subjective character. Considering Psyche as an inactive introspective expression of physiological processes, this psychology did not consider it a subject of science, since it exists as immediately certain reality only for the experiencing subject itself and therefore is not universally valid. Here 'objectivism' connects with 'subjectivism' of idealist psychology, since in their understanding the objective method studies only the external objective, while subjective processes can be studied only subjectively, i.e. it is impossible to objectively know subjective processes. Refusal of the objective study of psyche is an expression of inconsistent, mechanistic materialism, connecting here with idealism, is a typical expression of the main tendency of bourgeois psychology, its deep crisis. Only Soviet psychology, developed on the basis of Marxist-Leninian theory, outlines the only correct paths for solving this basic psychological problem and in connection with it the scientific understanding of Psyche itself. Development of psychic processes. In psychology, two concepts of development indicated by Lenin found their reflection: mechanistic and dialectical. The first considers psychological development as growth and stratification, a simple superstructure of homogeneous elements, only as a decrease or increase of a known quantitative mass of reactions and their morpho-physiol. substrate. Hence any complex, higher can be reduced to simple, lower, since the development of Psyche is represented as a process of continuous evolution. This concept found its complete expression in the psychological system of Spencer, also reflected in all mechanistic tendencies to reduce the behavior of higher animals to lower ones (e.g. in Loeb's doctrine of tropisms), the Psyche of man to the behavior of higher animals, also in attempts at anthropomorphic explanation of animal behavior. The dialectical concept of psychological development, in opposition to the first, considers this process as a qualitative change reflecting discontinuous transitions, the struggle of opposites in the development of matter itself. In the process of this qualitative change, new forms of Psyche arise, which however do not represent merely a superstructure over the old ones. The formation of a new form of Psyche is the transformation of the old form, its conversion from main to subordinate, from basic to secondary. Thus, the habit of an animal arises on the basis of instinctive-reflex activity, but at the same time it denotes the process of its restructuring. This moment is brilliantly captured by the remarkable theory of Academician Pavlov in his works on conditioned reflexes, to which Professor Ukhtomsky once drew attention.

Keller's experiments on the intelligence of anthropoids showed that the formation of an intellectual act depends on the optical situation of perception and the direct skill of the animals, but at the same time revealed the activity of this act as a factor in the restructuring of perception and the skills of anthropoids. In the light of the dialectical concept of development, it becomes obvious that a change in any of the processes of the P., taken in their unity and interconnection, is a change in all the connections and relations between these processes. If perception and skill precede thinking and consciousness in the order of development, then thinking and consciousness, arising on their basis, transform, mediate, and change their usual functions. The intellectualization of perception and skill in man is the natural course of the restructuring of the P. as a whole on the basis of the socially-labor activity of man. Consciousness plays a special role in the restructuring and development of the P. of man as a specific quality of all the psych. processes of man and its two main forms: speech and thinking, taken in the aspect of the personality. Under the influence of the development of thinking, memory is restructured from mechanical to logical, perception acquires a number of new analytical functions, emotions and needs acquire a conscious character, etc. Speech plays a planning, organizing role in the process of conceptual thinking, serving as a means of memorization and reproduction, voluntary attention, the process of perception, etc. On the basis of the dialectical concept of psychological development, it is possible to explain the enormous number of facts collected by modern psychology, including bourgeois psychology (which cannot explain them due to its class and theoretical character), regarding the formation of processes of the P., their dynamic transformation and mutual influence on the basis of the leading role of consciousness. Hence, before Soviet psychology arises the task of constructing a new system of psychological facts based on the dialectical-materialist concept of development, in connection with which it is necessary to fundamentally reconsider both the metaphysical boundaries between intellect, will, and feeling, created by the old psychology of abilities (and developed to the extreme by empirical psychology), and the reduction of the entire diversity of processes of the P. to a single known form (perception, thinking, experiencing, etc.). There are every grounds to assert not only the development of the P., the changeability of old and the educability of new qualities of the P. (which is especially important for the practice of pedagogical and medical influence on the personality), but also that the relations between different groups of psych. development change historically on the basis of the change in consciousness as a whole in connection with the history of the division of labor. As already indicated, modern natural science and materialist dialectics establish the connection between the emergence of psyche and the emergence and development of the central nervous system (especially the cortical parts of the brain). It is precisely on this basis that it is possible to determine to which systematic groups of animals the P. is characteristic and in what exact form. Objective-material criteria are all the more necessary since scientific comparative psychology has established, for example, in relation to the simplest organisms, that what externally, by analogy with human behavior, appears to be P., is merely physico-chemical reactivity, elementary irritability, and biologically adaptive action. Therefore, in the aspect of the history of the development of the P., the criteria proposed by Yerkes can be considered the most important, namely: 1) morphological: a) the general form of the organism, b) the presence of a nervous system, c) specialization in the forms of its structure; 2) physiological: a) the general character of the organism's reactions (differentiation of irritations), b) the variability of reactions (trainability of the animal), c) autonomy, spontaneity of reactions. The prerequisites for the psyche of animals are therefore: a) the evolution of the anat.-morphol. structure of the organism and especially the history of the brain and its cortical apparatuses, b) the evolution of the methods and techniques of the fnkts. activity of the organism, c) the physico-geographical and biol. conditions of existence of a given animal species, d) the place occupied by a given systematic group in biological evolution and in connection with this—the type of relation between the individual (ontogenesis) and the history of the species (phylogenesis). The main line of development of behavior and the P. of animals is expressed in the transition of the leading role from phylogenetic (hereditarily-automatized forms, e.g., segmental or spinal reflex) to the sequentially-individual form of the P. (elementary intelligence of animals) through the direct combination of individually acquired forms with inherited ones (conditioned reflex according to Pavlov, skill, training). Thus, it can be considered with good reason that the reflex is the historically biophysiological basis for the emergence of sensation in the evolution of animal behavior, instinct—the same basis for the elementary functions of memory and emotions, the conditioned reflex—the material basis for more complex processes of the P. (for example perception, representation, memory, association, skill). Consequently, the conditioned reflex in animals is not only a biophysical mechanism of the signaling activity of the cerebral cortex, but also a form of behavior with which the emergence of a number of complex processes of the P. is connected. The psyche of animals reaches its highest development in the intellectual behavior of higher animals, formed on the basis of highly differentiated sensitivity in the form of elementary intellectual operations, especially the simplest analysis and synthesis, perception of form, spatial relations, etc. To the present time, in animal psychology, the theory of development is represented mainly by mechanistic concepts (e.g., Spencer's), according to which the development of the P. is a simple evolutionary process of growth and superimposition of homogeneous elements, representing a continuous, quantitative transition from simple to complex, from homogeneous to heterogeneous, decrease or increase in brain mass, differentiation of its constituent parts. Therefore, there are no discontinuities, boundaries, leap-like transitions between different stages in the development of the P.; all that is in the simple is in the complex, but only in greater quantity. - The idealistic understanding of the development of the P. as the unfolding of immanent features lies at the basis of this concept of the identity of different forms of development of the P., which reduces man to animals, transferring animal qualities to man. In reality, the development of the P. is not only a simple increase or decrease, growth, differentiation, superimposition of properties, but an internal change in the laws and methods of development, the acquisition of new properties and the transformation in this process of old ones, the change of their functions, their subordination to a subsequent higher form, conditioned by the struggle of their contradictions. Hence the specificity of the transition of one form into another, and the essential difference between them forms certain boundaries which are their qualitative features. It is precisely for this reason that the primary is not yet the fundamental, just as the new in the development of the P. is not a simple loss of the old, but a radical transformation of it, a sublation, as it were, an internal overcoming of this old. The P. of animals develops in accordance with the main directions of the biological process, which refutes the theory of 'steps' in the evolution of the P. Thus, we know that intelligence arises from the development of instinct-reflex activity through the conditioned-reflex transition, but this does not mean that a high development of instinct gives an equally high development of intelligence. On the contrary, where instinct reaches its greatest perfection (e.g., arthropods), there intelligence and learning are weakly represented. Where individual learning and intellectual behavior are highly developed (e.g., mammals), instinct-reflex activity and the phenomena of the P. associated with it are less perfect. Instinct here appeared as the genetic basis and is 'sublated' by these higher forms, subordinating to their regularity, but continuing in other animals to remain a typical form of the P. The historically changing method of interrelation between the old and new form in the development of the P. transforms the early form in the new system (e.g., instinct in conditioned-reflex activity, conditioned reflex in intellectual behavior) from main to subordinate, from basic to secondary, so that the very method of functioning of this form, its mechanism and biological role changes. The history of the development of the P. on the basis of the development of organic matter and the history of the development of the P. of animals reveal the exceptionally active biol. role of the P. in the orientation of the animal in the environment, especially under its rapidly changing conditions. The biophysiological content of the P. determines its active, and not passively-contemplative, character. The emergence of the P. of man and consciousness as its specific quality was thus preceded by a long history of the behavior and psyche of animals, determining the genetic unity of the psyche of man and the psyche of animals.

However, man is not only a product of biological evolution, but also a significant factor in its further development, since with the formation of man and his socially-labor impact on nature, the laws and forms of behavior and the psyche of animals have changed through the selection, domestication of certain animal breeds, and the alteration of the natural conditions of existence of wild animals, through the influence on the psyche of domestic animals (dog, horse) of their daily communication with people, which Engels particularly emphasized. The development of the human psyche is not simply a more complex variant of animal psyche, as those who reduce the human psyche to reflexes, instincts, habits, etc., and biologize its laws and forms would like to present it. This is outwardly a misunderstanding of the specific laws of social development of the human psyche, but in essence it is a warring mechanismism, distorting the facts of natural science about the unity and difference between man and animals, using them to assert the 'unchangeability' and 'naturalness' of the bourgeois legal order. In the process of socially-labor transformation of nature, man played a special role in the joint activity of the hand, brain, and speech, as a result of which the neuromotor, psychomotor, and sensory organization of man was transformed - on the basis of the diverse labor functions of the hand, and in connection with this, the entire system of human sense organs changed through the transformation of central cortical nervo-psychic processes. Marx pointed out in this connection that 'the human character of the sense-organs arises through the humanized nature' and 'the formation of the five senses is the product of the whole world history'. This historical change in sensory, psychomotor, and consequently central apparatuses and functions shows how, at its very foundation, human nature became socially-historical. Engels' thought that 'the sense of touch... developed in man along with the development of the hand itself, by means of labor' is confirmed by a number of studies (e.g., the works of Bellé, Noiré, etc.) in regard to its historically mediated through labor characteristics (this distinction in the sense of touch between man and animal is also confirmed by morphogenetic analysis of the cortical and subcortical localizations of this feeling in man and animals). This emphasizes the fundamental historical difference between the active touch of man through his hand and its socially-labor tools from the adaptive touch of animals by their natural organs directly. This mediated type of activity of human sense organs is revealed in all their apparatuses and functions, but especially in the historical-labor mediation of the psychophysiology of the visual apparatus. However, psychology has not yet developed the problem of the historical nature of the immediate sensory basis of the human psyche, whereas, for example, sensation and perception, components of this basis, can be truly understood only in the plane of a historical theory of development. The labor impact on the transformation of the human psyche cannot be conceived in such a way that the brain and the human psyche only and directly developed from the tool of labor. The 'transition' of the tool of labor into the nervo-psychic formation is possible only through its social content, through the collective connections and communication of people, the form of which is also language. The history of language contributed to the formation of such a higher form of the human psyche as conceptual thinking, which reflects not only individual phenomena and their external connections, but also their essence discovered by labor, objectively real essence. The historical transformation of the human psyche formed a new historical-labor regularity of the immediate sensory basis of the psyche, psychomotorics, and behavior, of historically developing motivation (needs, drives, interests, etc.), thinking, speech, and consciousness, and led to a fundamental change in psychic functions. The historical, social understanding of the human psyche is yet not a true Marxist-Leninist understanding. Under the recognition of the socially-historical and labor essence, it is possible to smuggle in bourgeois social theories (cf., for example, the sociomorphic theory of Bogdanov), which identify or separate the forms of the psyche from the socio-economic formations, denying the basic law of human history from the moment of the formation of the division of labor and private property, which consists in the fact that the entire history of mankind is the history of the struggle of classes. Abstract sociologism and historicism, divorced from the class-historical consideration of psychology in its dependence on ideology on the basis of the material base of society and the existing mode of production, leads to the typical bourgeois understanding of the psyche and personality. These bourgeois traditions of studying the human psyche outside the connection with the history of class struggle were severely mocked by Marx and Engels in their critique of Stirner's teaching, which pointed out that 'he consistently abstracts from historical epochs, nationalities, classes, etc., or, what is the same, takes the prevailing consciousness of the class closest to him in his environment for the normal consciousness of human life'. There is no society, history, labor in general. There is a specific way of the division of labor, a socio-economic formation, in connection with the history of which it is necessary to study the history of consciousness and the psyche of man. 'With the division of labor,' wrote Engels, 'man himself was torn into fragments. In order to develop any one of his activities, all his other physical and mental abilities were sacrificed. This fragmentation of man grows simultaneously with the development of the division of labor, which reaches its highest degree in manufacture. It cripples the worker, turns him into some kind of monster, purely hothouse fashion developing in him detailed skills and suppressing a whole world of productive talents and abilities... The personality itself is shattered, turning into an automatic cog, performing one partial work'. Marx and Engels wrote in the 'Communist Manifesto' that 'in bourgeois society capital is independent and personal, while the working individual is not independent and impersonal'; they pointed out that in bourgeois consciousness personality and private property are so identified that the abolition of private property is regarded by them as the abolition of personality. On this identification they based their slander on socialism as the leveling of personality, and in the field of psychology such bourgeois theorists as Le Bon, Mantegazza, etc. Lenin, criticizing the old society, wrote that 'people brought up in this society, so to speak, absorb with their mother's milk the psychology, habits, conceptions...'. In capitalist society 'the means of my subsistence are the means of another person; what is the object of my desire is inaccessible property for me' (Marx). Emphasizing the world-historical significance of the socialist revolution for the development of personality and its psychic processes, Marx wrote that man 'appropriates his many-sided essence in many-sided ways, i.e. as a whole man. Each of his human relations to the world - sight, hearing, smell, taste, feeling, thinking, contemplation, sensation, willing, activity, love, in short - all organs of his individuality... are in their object relation or in their relation to the object an appropriation of the latter; private property has made us so one-sided and blunt that an object is ours only when we possess it, i.e. when it exists for us as capital, when we directly possess it, eat it, drink it, wear it on our bodies, live in it, etc., in short; consume it. Therefore, in place of all physical and spiritual senses there has come the simple estrangement of all these senses, the sense of possession. To such an absolute poverty has the human essence been brought... Therefore, the abolition of private property is the complete emancipation of all human senses and properties'. The history of the dictatorship of the proletariat in our country already in the first five-year plan showed that 'in the psychology of the masses and in their attitude to labor there has been a tremendous turn, which has fundamentally changed the appearance of our factories and plants' (Stalin). Socialist construction has fundamentally changed not only the geography, economy, and ideology of the country, but also the psychology of the people building a socialist society. The elimination of the opposition between city and countryside, the gap between mental and physical labor, socialist forms of labor, communist education, and polytechnical training of the younger generations of socialism, etc., are the real foundations of the concrete socialist transformation of consciousness and the psyche of people, carried out by the Party and Soviet power in the first country that has eliminated the exploitation of man by man and is building socialism. The greatest transformation of the human psyche will be the result of the Bolshevik implementation of the tasks set by the XVII Party Conference, on overcoming the survivals of capitalism not only in the economy, but also in the consciousness of people.'

Thus, Soviet psychology, developing the historical theory of the development of the human psyche, finds its decisive justification in socialist practice, forming new socialist characters, consciousness, thinking, transforming the entire holistic unity of the processes of the human psyche, the one building socialism.