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CHAPTER 5

Psychology

I. EARLY MACH CONTRIBUTIONS

Ge stal i Qualitics

Ernst Mach is oftcn creditcd with having first brought attcntion to (Icstalt qu:ilitics, that is, to cxpcricnced wholcs that do not mercly with thc sum of pcrccivcd parts. DifTcrcnt cbservcr$, howcvcr, refer to diłlcrcnt Mach articles and obscrvations. In fact, Mach’s “holistic” im-prcssions sccin to go back at Icast to thc agc of thrcc whcn hc “saw” tablcs as rectangułar, and rcfuscd to acccpt cithcr dircct visual imagcs or wall-picture represcntations that tapcrcd at one end as legitimate. His first adult conccrn with “visual holism” may well havc becnhis 1861 analv-sis of visual symmetry. Christian von Ehrenfcls, who is sometimćs considered dic first person to write on gcstalt qualities, oncc wrote to a friend: “I sent Mach ‘Gcstalt Qualitics’ [an artide published in 18901 and he replied in a friendly manner that he had already given thc main thoughts in 1865 in voIumc 46 of Fichte’s magazinc, and had exprcsscd them in a morę psychological way.” ¹

Hut Ehrenfcls seems to have considered another Mach artide as thc real start of gcstalt analysis.

The theory of gcstalt qualitics began with thc attempt to answer a qucs-tion: What is mclody? First and most obvious answer: thc sum of thc in-dividual notes which make up thc mclody. But opposed to this is thc fact that thc same mclody may be madc up of quitc diflcrcnt groups of notes, as happens whcn thc sclfsamc mclody is transposcd into different kcys. lf thc mclody wcrc nothing clse than thc sum of thc notes, JilTcrcnt mclodics would havc to be pruduccd, bccausc dilferent groujvs of notes arc herc in-

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