Unconscious Memory(Fiscle Part-3) - Samuel Butler (digital e reader TXT) 📗

Regarded Fleeming Jenkin's Demonstration As A

Mathematical Deduction Which He Was Bound To Accept Without

Criticism.

 

Mr. William Bateson,  Late Professor Of Biology In The University Of

Cambridge,  As Early As 1894 Laid Great Stress On The Importance Of

Discontinuous Variations,  Collecting And Collating The Known Facts In

His "Materials For The Study Of Variations"; But This Important Work,

Now Become Rare And Valuable,  At The Time Excited So Little Interest

As To Be 'Remaindered' Within A Very Few Years After Publication.

 

In 1901 Hugo De Vries,  Professor Of Botany In The University Of

Amsterdam,  Published "Die Mutationstheorie," Wherein He Showed That

Mutations Or Discontinuous Variations In Various Directions May

Appear Simultaneously In Many Individuals,  And In Various Directions.

In The Gardener's Phrase,  The Species May Take To Sporting In Various

Directions At The Same Time,  And Each Sport May Be Represented By

Numerous Specimens.

 

De Vries Shows The Probability That Species Go On For Long Periods

Showing Only Fluctuations,  And Then Suddenly Take To Sporting In The

Way Described,  Short Periods Of Mutation Alternating With Long

Intervals Of Relative Constancy.  It Is To Mutations That De Vries

And His School,  As Well As Luther Burbank,  The Great Former Of New

Fruit- And Flower-Plants,  Look For Those Variations Which Form The

Material Of Natural Selection.  In "God The Known And God The

Unknown," Which Appeared In The Examiner (May,  June,  And July),  1879,

But Though Then Revised Was Only Published Posthumously In 1909,

Butler Anticipates This Distinction:-

 

 

 

 

 

"Under These Circumstances Organism Must Act In One Or Other Of These

Two Ways:  It Must Either Change Slowly And Continuously With The

Surroundings,  Paying Cash For Everything,  Meeting The Smallest Change

With A Corresponding Modification,  So Far As Is Found Convenient,  Or

It Must Put Off Change As Long As Possible,  And Then Make Larger And

More Sweeping Changes.

 

"Both These Courses Are The Same In Principle,  The Difference Being

One Of Scale,  And The One Being A Miniature Of The Other,  As A Ripple

Is An Atlantic Wave In Little; Both Have Their Advantages And

Disadvantages,  So That Most Organisms Will Take The One Course For

One Set Of Things And The Other For Another.  They Will Deal Promptly

Introduction Pg 13

With Things Which They Can Get At Easily,  And Which Lie More Upon The

Surface; Those,  However,  Which Are More Troublesome To Reach,  And Lie

Deeper,  Will Be Handled Upon More Cataclysmic Principles,  Being

Allowed Longer Periods Of Repose Followed By Short Periods Of Greater

Activity . . . It May Be Questioned Whether What Is Called A Sport Is

Not The Organic Expression Of Discontent Which Has Been Long Felt,

But Which Has Not Been Attended To,  Nor Been Met Step By Step By As

Much Small Remedial Modification As Was Found Practicable:  So That

When A Change Does Come It Comes By Way Of Revolution.  Or,  Again

(Only That It Comes To Much The Same Thing),  It May Be Compared To

One Of Those Happy Thoughts Which Sometimes Come To Us Unbidden After

We Have Been Thinking For A Long Time What To Do,  Or How To Arrange

Our Ideas,  And Have Yet Been Unable To Come To Any Conclusion" (Pp.

14,  15). {0g}

 

We Come To Another Order Of Mind In Hans Driesch.  At The Time He

Began His Work Biologists Were Largely Busy In A Region Indicated By

Darwin,  And Roughly Mapped Out By Haeckel--That Of Phylogeny.  From

The Facts Of Development Of The Individual,  From The Comparison Of

Fossils In Successive Strata,  They Set To Work At The Construction Of

Pedigrees,  And Strove To Bring Into Line The Principles Of

Classification With The More Or Less Hypothetical "Stemtrees."

Driesch Considered This Futile,  Since We Never Could Reconstruct From

Such Evidence Anything Certain In The History Of The Past.  He

Therefore Asserted That A More Complete Knowledge Of The Physics And

Chemistry Of The Organic World Might Give A Scientific Explanation Of

The Phenomena,  And Maintained That The Proper Work Of The Biologist

Was To Deepen Our Knowledge In These Respects.  He Embodied His

Views,  Seeking The Explanation On This Track,  Filling Up Gaps And

Tracing Projected Roads Along Lines Of Probable Truth In His

"Analytische Theorie Der Organische Entwicklung."  But His Own Work

Convinced Him Of The Hopelessness Of The Task He Had Undertaken,  And

He Has Become As Strenuous A Vitalist As Butler.  The Most Complete

Statement Of His Present Views Is To Be Found In "The Philosophy Of

Life" (1908-9),  Being The Giffold Lectures For 1907-8.  Herein He

Postulates A Quality ("Psychoid") In All Living Beings,  Directing

Energy And Matter For The Purpose Of The Organism,  And To This He

Applies The Aristotelian Designation "Entelechy."  The Question Of

The Transmission Of Acquired Characters Is Regarded As Doubtful,  And

He Does Not Emphasise--If He Accepts--The Doctrine Of Continuous

Personality.  His Early Youthful Impatience With Descent Theories And

Hypotheses Has,  However,  Disappeared.

 

In The Next Work The Influence Of Hering And Butler Is Definitely

Present And Recognised.  In 1906 Signor Eugenio Rignano,  An Engineer

Keenly Interested In All Branches Of Science,  And A Little Later The

Founder Of The International Review,  Rivista Di Scienza (Now Simply

Called Scientia),  Published In French A Volume Entitled "Sur La

Transmissibilite Des Caracteres Acquis--Hypothese D'un Centro-

Epigenese."  Into The Details Of The Author's Work We Will Not Enter

Fully.  Suffice It To Know That He Accepts The Hering-Butler Theory,

And Makes A Distinct Advance On Hering's Rather Crude Hypothesis Of

Persistent Vibrations By Suggesting That The Remembering Centres

Store Slightly Different Forms Of Energy,  To Give Out Energy Of The

Introduction Pg 14

Same Kind As They Have Received,  Like Electrical Accumulators.  The

Last Chapter,  "Le Phenomene Mnemonique Et Le Phenomene Vital," Is

Frankly Based On Hering.

 

In "The Lesson Of Evolution" (1907,  Posthumous,  And Only Published

For Private Circulation) Frederick Wollaston Hutton,  F.R.S.,  Late

Professor Of Biology And Geology,  First At Dunedin And After At

Christchurch,  New Zealand,  Puts Forward A Strongly Vitalistic View,

And Adopts Hering's Teaching.  After Stating This He Adds,  "The Same

Idea Of Heredity Being Due To Unconscious Memory Was Advocated By Mr.

Samuel Butler In His "Life And Habit."

 

Dr. James Mark Baldwin,  Stuart Professor Of Psychology In Princeton

University,  U.S.A.,  Called Attention Early In The 90's To A Reaction

Characteristic Of All Living Beings,  Which He Terms The "Circular

Reaction."  We Take His Most Recent Account Of This From His

"Development And Evolution" (1902):- {0h}

 

 

 

 

 

"The General Fact Is That The Organism Reacts By Concentration Upon

The Locality Stimulated For The Continuance Of The Conditions,

Movements,  Stimulations,  Which Are Vitally Beneficial,  And For The

Cessation Of The Conditions,  Movements,  Stimulations Which Are

Vitally Depressing."

 

 

 

 

 

This Amounts To Saying In The Terminology Of Jenning (See Below) That

The Living Organism Alters Its "Physiological States" Either For Its

Direct Benefit,  Or For Its Indirect Benefit In The Reduction Of

Harmful Conditions.

 

Again:-

 

 

 

 

 

"This Form Of Concentration Of Energy On Stimulated Localities,  With

The Resulting Renewal Through Movement Of Conditions That Are

Pleasure-Giving And Beneficial,  And The Consequent Repetition Of The

Movements Is Called 'Circular Reaction.'"

 

 

 

 

 

Of Course,  The Inhibition Of Such Movements As Would Be Painful On

Repetition Is Merely The Negative Case Of The Circular Reaction.  We

Introduction Pg 15

Must Not Put Too Much Of Our Own Ideas Into The Author's Mind; He

Nowhere Says Explicitly That The Animal Or Plant Shows Its Sense And

Does This Because It Likes The One Thing And Wants It Repeated,  Or

Dislikes The Other And Stops Its Repetition,  As Butler Would Have

Said.  Baldwin Is Very Strong In Insisting That No Full Explanation

Can Be Given Of Living Processes,  Any More Than Of History,  On Purely

Chemico-Physical Grounds.

 

The Same View Is Put Differently And Independently By H. S. Jennings,

{0i} Who Started His Investigations Of Living Protista,  The Simplest

Of Living Beings,  With The Idea That Only Accurate And Ample

Observation Was Needed To Enable Us To Explain All Their Activities

On A Mechanical Basis,  And Devised Ingenious Models Of Protoplastic

Movements.  He Was Led,  Like Driesch,  To Renounce Such Efforts As

Illusory,  And Has Come To The Conviction That In The Behaviour Of

These Lowly Beings There Is A Purposive And A Tentative Character--A

Method Of "Trial And Error"--That Can Only Be Interpreted By The

Invocation Of Psychology.  He Points Out That After Stimulation The

"State" Of The Organism May Be Altered,  So That The Response To The

Same Stimulus On Repetition Is Other.  Or,  As He Puts It,  The First

Stimulus Has Caused The Organism To Pass Into A New "Physiological

State."  As The Change Of State From What We May Call The "Primary

Indifferent State" Is Advantageous To The Organism,  We May Regard

This As Equivalent To The Doctrine Of The "Circular Reaction," And

Also As Containing The Essence Of Semon's Doctrine Of "Engrams" Or

Imprints Which We Are About To Consider.  We Cite One Passage Which

For Audacity Of Thought (Underlying,  It Is True,  Most Guarded

Expression) May Well Compare With Many Of The Boldest Flights In

"Life And Habit":-

 

 

 

 

 

"It May Be Noted That Regulation In The Manner We Have Set Forth Is

What,  In The Behaviour Of Higher Organisms,  At Least,  Is Called

Intelligence [The Examples Have Been Taken From Protista,  Corals,  And

The Lowest Worms].  If The Same Method Of Regulation Is Found In

Other Fields,  There Is No Reason For Refusing To Compare The Action

To Intelligence.  Comparison Of The Regulatory Processes That Are

Shown In Internal Physiological Changes And In Regeneration To

Intelligence Seems To Be Looked Upon Sometimes As Heretical And

Unscientific.  Yet Intelligence Is A Name Applied To Processes That

Actually Exist In The Regulation Of Movements,  And There Is,  A

Priori,  No Reason Why Similar Processes Should Not Occur In

Regulation In Other Fields.  When We Analyse Regulation Objectively

There Seems Indeed Reason To Think That The Processes Are Of The Same

Character In Behaviour As Elsewhere.  If The Term Intelligence Be

Reserved For The Subjective Accompaniments Of Such Regulation,  Then

Of Course We Have No Direct Knowledge Of Its Existence In Any Of The

Fields Of Regulation Outside Of The Self,  And In The Self Perhaps

Only In Behaviour.  But In A Purely Objective Consideration There

Seems No Reason To Suppose That Regulation In Behaviour

(Intelligence) Is Of A Fundamentally Different Character From