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SOCIOLOGY AS DISTINCT FROM SOCIAL SCIENCES 51
social psychology. The latter is nothing but a special
branch of general psychology. It deals with the same subject-matter,
namely, the forms of the psychological processes,
and it is therefore not an independent science.
The idea of a special social psychology and the efforts
to justify its existence as an independent science are mainly
due to an insufficient analysis of certain complex problems.
The result has been the postulation of an independent
superindividual mind whose manifestations were to be investigated
by social psychology. The objective psychical
structures like law, religion, and morals, the unitary aspect
of the results of collective activity, and the phenomena
of crowd psychology have suggested the existence of a social
consciousness, a spirit of the times, a group mind, or a
national conscience as actually creative forces and independent
entities. A further analysis will show, however,
that the question regarding a psychical bearer of these
psychical phenomena of a superindividual nature is wrongly
formulated.
Laws, morals, and religion are products of mind, but
their development extends far beyond anything contained
in the individual mind, and in their entirety they are relatively
independent of the individual’s participation. The
language forms, the legal and moral norms, the dogmatic
content of religions have a validity and dignity independent
of the individual applications. This validity, however,
still differs from the superhistorical validity of the
laws of nature or of logic. But this validity of their content
is not a psychological occurrence which requires an
empirical bearer. They are valid just as the Pythagorean
theorem is valid, quite independently of the fact whether
they are thought or conceived in the individual mind.
As an objective mental content, language, law, and
morals are not of a psychological nature. Neither is the
