Üsküdar Üniversitesi Founding Rector, Psychiatrist Prof. Dr. Nevzat Tarhan was the guest of Manisa Celal Bayar Üniversitesi. Tarhan, who made presentations on the topic “Yunus Emre as a Social Psychologist,” emphasized the importance of being a good person. Tarhan said, “Besides being smart, hardworking, and achieving moral success, one also needs to be a good person. While providing academic teachings to young people, we also need to teach them how to be good people. We need to do this through the teachings of Yunus Emre, Mevlana, who hold a significant place in our culture, which we call Anatolian Wisdom, and their contemporary representatives. As a result, academic success plus moral success equals life success.” Tarhan also pointed out that the ego defines concrete pleasures and is like nuclear energy, stating, “The ego chases pleasure, it is hedonistic…”
“I observed that the West systematized and adopted Eastern science”
Prof. Dr. Nevzat Tarhan stated that Western countries apply the teachings of Anatolian wisdom in their curricula. In the program moderated by Prof. Dr. Ayşe İlker, Tarhan said; “Some statistics in the USA show that people are getting richer but not happier. To understand the reason for this unhappiness, Seligman and his team conducted research for three years. After 2008, they held a congress, and the official name of this congress is Positive Psychology. It is also commonly known as the science of happiness or the science of well-being. When I examined Positive Psychology, I saw that they had systematized and adopted our Anatolian wisdom and Eastern science. They developed a methodology and introduced it as a course. In 2015, Harvard included it as a course; in 2018, Yale Üniversitesi, and in 2019, Bristol Üniversitesi in England also incorporated it into their curricula as a course. Since I was involved, I noticed it earlier. As Üsküdar Üniversitesi, we had included it in our curriculum as a course in 2013.”
“The ego chases pleasure, it is hedonistic…”
Prof. Dr. Tarhan said; “Positive Psychology attempts to do the same ego discipline that Yunus Emre did with his poems, using scientific methodology. The ego is about chasing pleasure. Humanistic Psychology states that there are no evil or malevolent parts within a person, but later followers of Psychoanalysis claim that there is an evil part within us. The ego defines concrete pleasures. It is like nuclear energy, the ego chases pleasure, it is hedonistic.”
“We must achieve this synthesis now”
Prof. Dr. Tarhan stated that 21st-century skills are not currently taught to young people, saying, “Currently, efforts are being made to teach emotional and social skills to students. This realization has only just emerged. We will now achieve this synthesis, or rather, we must achieve it. Only with 21st-century skills can we be the subject, not the object, in the race of civilizations. Currently, developed countries produce, and we consume. But now we need to produce, and for us to produce, adopting 21st-century skills is important.”
“Besides academic success, being a good person is necessary”
Prof. Dr. Nevzat Tarhan stated that being smart and hardworking alone is not enough; “When raising a person, our child, or students, we say, let them be smart and hardworking. But two parameters are not enough. Being smart and hardworking is sufficient for academic success. There's a young man who came to a doctorate program from prison. This young man is a computer engineer and a super-intelligent kid. Because he is intelligent, he has genius chambers in his brain. He gets involved in an espionage case and receives a 20-year prison sentence for a few pennies. This young man is smart, hardworking, and has high academic success, but he uses these talents in bad areas. Therefore, in addition to being smart, hardworking, and achieving moral success, one also needs to be a good person. While providing academic teachings to young people, we also need to teach them how to be good people. We need to do this through the teachings of Yunus Emre, Mevlana, who hold a significant place in our culture, which we call Anatolian Wisdom, and their contemporary representatives. As a result, academic success plus moral success equals life success.”