The Emergence of Thought through a Psychological Reading from Sprigge's Perspective: Towards a Macro Cognitive Framework

Human beings are temporal existents, social creatures, and beings cast in a particular context. Depending on this temporal nature and worldly existence, the human mind is open to the external world, receiving and shaping impressions from it. Following this openness and formation, it must be said that thoughts, beliefs, attitudes, inclinations, cultural worldviews, insights, and political discourses do not emerge from nothing; rather, they are socially constructed. In other words, internal cognition is not separate from the external world. In this regard, Semen and Smith support the view of "contextual cognition," asserting that cognitive processes are tightly interconnected with the social world and inseparable from it. People, in response to the particularities of their time and life context, turn to a specific historical, cultural awareness and intellectual framework. Therefore, to understand their thoughts, actions, and behaviors, we must examine the context of their time. In this context, the perspective of Thomas Sprigge can be discussed. He regards thoughts as a process that unfolds in four stages. According to Sprigge, the first step in thinking or the emergence of an idea is "chronotopology" or contextual analysis, where one observes the hardships and challenges of the time. At this stage, the thinker stands outside of time or existence and grapples with questions such as: How is existence or time? What characteristics does it have? Following this step, it can be said that any thought arises from the observation of turmoil in the life system. Therefore, the process of thinking engages when people open their eyes to their existence and find it sick and in distress. In this regard, Sprigge writes, "Most political theorists begin their research by observing disorder in the political society. Observing disorder creates intellectual problems and reveals anomalies that need to be explained." The second step is "root analysis," where the thinker seeks to identify the origins of misfortune, which is crucial because until the source of the problems is identified, no proper solution can be suggested to restore order to a disordered existence. In this process, the thinker, by moving beyond the superstructure and turning to the underlying or hidden layers of observation, looks at various aspects and addresses questions such as: What causes the disorder and confusion of the time? Why is the political and social structure chaotic and malfunctioning? What has torn apart the connections between its components? After identifying the root causes of problems and crises, the thinker proceeds to "idealism." Here, the thinker asks what an orderly existence is and where it is. Indeed, idealism is an effort to escape the painful world of appearances by representing a harmonious world of thought and the hope of reaching it. Finally, in the last step, the thinker engages in "solution-seeking," asking how one can achieve the ideal and create the desired world of thought. It is true that the foundation of a thought must be sought in its relation to the political, social, and cultural structures of its time, but the influence of context (position and condition) on action (in this case, thinking) should not be seen as direct and unmediated. Rather, this influence has a strong mediator, which is the psychological system of individuals. As Sprigge himself states, the mind cannot and should not be considered separate from the world and time. These two are intertwined and act upon one another. Therefore, the point to note here is that these questions and four steps of Sprigge are not alien to psychological perspectives, and for this reason, to understand thoughts, we must explore the psychology of thinkers and identify the psychological traits influencing their ideas. In light of these preliminary remarks, the current paper seeks to offer a psychological reading of Sprigge's perspective and to answer the question of how a thought emerges from a new angle. The fundamental premise of this paper is that thought is a "process" that passes through long-term social processes (temporal features) and short-term psychological processes. Psychological processes are the cognitive, emotional, and motivational mechanisms that are activated and transformed depending on the nature of the life context. These mechanisms play a significant role in thinking and are among its main drivers. Thus, without considering them, we cannot adequately understand how theories are constructed. While Sprigge was aware of this, he did not incorporate it into his four-step analysis. This is when we can link his four cognitive steps to psychological mechanisms. Step one is related to "initial evaluation and emotions." In this process, people assess whether a specific context or event is beneficial or harmful, whether it adds to or diminishes their values and possessions, and whether the external world is as it should be. If the existing situation does not align with the imagined ideal and is identified as a major threat to self-worth, well-being, and survival, emotional responses are triggered. These emotional reactions can manifest in language—both speech and writing. Emotional language consists of meaningful signs that inform us about the state of existence and time. In this regard, Sprigge suggests that researchers must trace the disturbance of time in the language or discourse of thinkers. Based on the evaluation perspective, emotions are the result of the evaluation of external events and contexts. Viewing existence and assessing it will result in emotional reactions that impact behavioral patterns and cognitive processes—such as thinking—and play a key role in what we think and do. Step two is associated with the cognitive process of "attribution." Attribution is a process in which people address causes and seek to identify underlying factors of events in order to predict and control them. In simpler terms, attribution is the response to why questions and the causal explanation of phenomena. In this process, causes fall into two broad categories: external causes and internal causes. The first category pertains to environmental and structural contexts, everything outside of the individual. The second category relates to the personal characteristics and functions of individuals. Step three is connected to "motivations." Motivations and needs guide individuals in choosing and pursuing desires and objectives. They affect the desires people choose and the behaviors they display to achieve them. Therefore, the pursuit of desires and goals is a way to fulfill motivations and needs. Motivations and needs arise from the misalignment between "what is" and "what should be" or the contradiction between the existing reality and the imagined ideal. If the current reality does not align with motivations and needs and cannot fulfill them, the imagined ideal is emphasized to achieve the fulfillment of these motivations and needs. For example, the need for progress becomes prominent when people feel backward. Thus, many motivations and needs arise from the pressures of the time, and most of what is within the individual at present was once external. Following the interactive approach, humans are connected to their time, and these two factors affect one another. Hence, many of the needs and desires of humans arise from "pressures of the time." Finally, step four is the "second evaluation." This psychological process also seeks to escape and create, determining what can be done to transform an unpleasant situation and improve it. In other words, the solution-seeking of the thinker can be regarded as the second evaluation, as it entails identifying "coping strategies" for managing pressing crises, controlling them, and restoring lost alignment. In this process, people assess the tools, options, and accessible strategies for overcoming difficulties and how to enhance happiness and well-being by eliminating troubles. Coping strategies encompass two domains: the "individual" domain, which pertains to human characteristics, and the "macro" domain, which refers to structures and institutions. By linking these processes, this paper aims to present a larger cognitive framework for analyzing political theories. We call this framework "larger" because, on the one hand, it represents the temporality of thought, and on the other hand, it illustrates its psychological construction, showing that theoretical and practical actions emerge depending on the nature of time and the cognitive and psychological processes. Consequently, these actions are dynamic and subject to change, with different characteristics. In other words, this model demonstrates that although thinking begins with contextual analysis and the observation of the disorder of time, it progresses only when the thinker engages in psychological processes—such as evaluating and assessing—and undergoes psychological transformations. The emergence of these transformations is contingent upon the "how" of evaluating the time. Therefore, it can be said that thinking passes through the psyche, and without this passage, no one becomes a thinker, and no theory is created. Perhaps this is why some societies and individuals in crisis have not processed or created political thoughts. Since cognitive beliefs, emotions, and motivations play a pivotal role in action, this model helps us understand which emotions and motivations drive individuals to think, and which of them plays a more prominent role. This model reveals that the cognitive, emotional, and motivational mechanisms of thinkers can be diverse. For example, the emotional driver of one thinker may be "fear," while that of another may be "anger." One's motivation may be "power," while another's may be "progress." Understanding these diversities is especially important in comparative studies, and in this regard, the proposed model of this paper can be beneficial.