From: Andrew Phelps <math_anxiety@yahoo.com>
To: withholdapadues@yahoogroups.com
Date: Wednesday, July 8, 2009, 9:26 AM
Subject: Re: [withholdapadues] Re: Seligman selected for Wiley Prize in Psychology
Ooo:
I find your piece "measured" and cannot take offense.
Still, I find that a more productive way to look at this is from the critique of community psychology. Seligman has chosen to take on the "torture denial" system but in a way is insufficient to the problem. One aspect as you note is that he lives by the "doctrine of silence" and abides by the "CIA culture" approach to public advocacy .. he "bites the bullet" when he figures it's politic to do so.
One could read his "positive psychology" advocacy and find that his notion of "community organizing" is narrow-minded and .. limited. My first action - as a college student - was in suburban Philadelphia (protesting Goldwater's campaign for President) and I think all the complexities that arise from community advocacy are .. not fully engaged .. by Seligman.
"Positive psychology" + poor community organizing is .. a deficient package. What we need to put together is .. an upgrade on the "positive psychology" insight which will properly engage the spectrum of human rights issues implied by society's present .. addiction .. to "learned helplessness."
Andrew Phelps
Haverford College Class of 1965
On Wed, 7/8/09, Ooo wrote:
..
One of the columnists in the local paper here wrote a chipper column on Seligman's Positive Psychology as a resource in difficult times. I responded with the following, which I don't believe makes any unproven allegations. Free to use any or all, modify, etc.
Ooo
LETTER TO THE EDITOR:
There is an unpleasant paradox in Roberta de Boer's Column on Positive Psychology (March 29, 2009). Ms. De Boer highlights psychologist Martin Seligman in her column promoting individual peace and happiness. The story isn't so simple.
Seligman achieved his fame as a psychologist for his research on "Learned Helplessness" in the 1960s, conducting experiments on caged dogs, in which he used electric charges to shock them randomly. Seligman discovered that the random mistreatment destroyed the dogs so completely that they no longer had the will to escape, even when offered a way out.