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Raymond Cattell
(20 Mar 1905 - 2 Feb 1998)
English-American psychologist who applied mathematical techniques to the study of psychology and developed the 16 Personality Factor (16PF) test.
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Science Quotes by Raymond Cattell (7 quotes)
[I] browsed far outside science in my reading and attended public lectures - Bertrand Russell, H. G. Wells, Huxley, and Shaw being my favorite speakers. (The last, in a meeting at King's College, converted me to vegetarianism - for most of two years!).
— Raymond Cattell
Autobiography collected in Gardner Lindzey (ed.), A History of Psychology in Autobiography (1973), Vol. 6, 64.
A taxonomy of abilities, like a taxonomy anywhere else in science, is apt to strike a certain type of impatient student as a gratuitous orgy of pedantry. Doubtless, compulsions to intellectual tidiness express themselves prematurely at times, and excessively at others, but a good descriptive taxonomy, as Darwin found in developing his theory, and as Newton found in the work of Kepler, is the mother of laws and theories.
— Raymond Cattell
From Intelligence: Its Structure, Growth and Action: Its Structure, Growth and Action (1987), 61.
But psychology is a more tricky field, in which even outstanding authorities have been known to run in circles, ‘describing things which everyone knows in language which no one understands.’
— Raymond Cattell
From The Scientific Analysis of Personality (1965), 18.
Intelligence is important in psychology for two reasons. First, it is one of the most scientifically developed corners of the subject, giving the student as complete a view as is possible anywhere of the way scientific method can be applied to psychological problems. Secondly, it is of immense practical importance, educationally, socially, and in regard to physiology and genetics.
— Raymond Cattell
From Intelligence: Its Structure, Growth and Action: Its Structure, Growth and Action (1987), 1.
Plato compared the intellect to a charioteer guiding the powerful horses of the passions, i.e., he gave it both the power of perception and the power of control.
— Raymond Cattell
From Intelligence: Its Structure, Growth and Action: Its Structure, Growth and Action (1987), 2.
Psychology appeared to be a jungle of confusing, conflicting, and arbitrary concepts. These pre-scientific theories doubtless contained insights which still surpass in refinement those depended upon by psychiatrists or psychologists today. But who knows, among the many brilliant ideas offered, which are the true ones? Some will claim that the statements of one theorist are correct, but others will favour the views of another. Then there is no objective way of sorting out the truth except through scientific research.
— Raymond Cattell
From The Scientific Analysis of Personality (1965), 14.
The original Upper Paleolithic people would, if they appeared among us today, be called Caucasoid, in the sense that they lacked the particular traits we associate with Negroid and Mongoloid types.
— Raymond Cattell
From The Structure of Personality in its Environment (1979), 341.
See also:
- 20 Mar - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Cattell's birth.
- Raymond Cattell - context of quote “Psychology is…in language which no one understands” - Medium image (500 x 250 px)
- Raymond Cattell - context of quote “Psychology is…in language which no one understands” - Large image (800 x 400 px)
- The Scientific Analysis of Personality, by Raymond B. Cattell. - book suggestion.
- Booklist for Raymond Cattell.
In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
(1987) -- 
