ABSTRACT
The notion of gestalt dynamics in perception is just as old as the notion of gestalt conformance to laws in general. It is a special case of the latter. That indeed is how Wertheimer already conceived it, when in his search for gestalt laws he was brought to ascribe definite “tendencies” to gestalten, the tendencies towards a “good gestalt”, towards a “precise gestalt” and so forth, which are supposed to determine the inner gestalt organization. Before he himself made any communications on the matter, Köhler—without more pertinent experimental work, but purely on the basis of his gestalt physiology—also set out to lay the foundations (1920) constructionally, “from the starting point of physics,” for gestalt dynamics, at any rate in a tentative way, thus to assure it a framework of principles. Only later did particular experimental analyses endeavour to collect material intended to give empirical support to the idea. Our criticism will turn first of all to Köhler’s general observations.
