国外英文文学系列 Problems of Life and Mind.docx

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1、国外英文文学系列 Problems of Life and MindTitle: Problems of Life and Mind. Second series: The Physical Basis of MindAuthor: George Henry LewesPREFACE.The title indicates that this volume is restricted to the group of material conditions which constitute the organism in relation to the physical worlda group

2、 which furnishes the data for one half of the psychologists quest; the other half being furnished by historical and social conditions.The Human Mind, so far as it is accessible to scientific inquiry, has a twofold root, man being not only an animal organism but an unit in the social organism; and he

3、nce the complete theory of its functions and faculties must be sought in this twofold direction. This conception (which has been declared “to amount to a revolution in Psychology”), although slowly prepared by the growing conviction that Man could not be isolated from Humanity, was first expounded i

4、n the opening volume of these Problems of Life and Mind; at least, I am not aware that any predecessor had seen how the specially human faculties of Intellect and Conscience were products of social factors co-operating with the animal factors.In considering the Physical Basis a large place must be a

5、ssigned to the mechanical and chemical relations which are involved in organic functions; yet we have to recognize that this procedure of Analysis is artificial and preparatory, that none of its results are final, none represent the synthetic reality of vital facts. Hence one leading object of the f

6、ollowing pages has been everywhere to substitute the biological point of view for thevi metaphysical and mechanical points of view which too often obstruct researchthe one finding its expression in spiritualist theories, the other in materialist theories; both disregarding the plain principle that t

7、he first requisite in a theory of biological phenomena must be to view them in the light of biological conditions: in other words, to fix our gaze upon what passes in the organism, and not on what may pass in the laboratory, where the conditions are different. Analysis is a potent instrument, but is

8、 too often relied on in forgetfulness of what constitutes its real aid, and thus leads to a disregard of all those conditions which it has artificially set aside. We see this in the tendency of anatomists and physiologists to assign to one element, in a complex cluster of co-operants, the significan

9、ce which properly belongs to that cluster: as when the property of a tissue is placed exclusively in a single element of that tissue, the function of an organ assigned to its chief tissue, and a function of the organism to a single organ.Another object has been to furnish the reader uninstructed in

10、physiology with such a general outline of the structure and functions of the organism, and such details respecting the sentient mechanism, as may awaken an interest in the study, and enable him to understand the application of Physiology to Psychology. If he comes upon details which can only interes

11、t specially educated students, or perhaps only by them be really understood, he can pass over these details, for their omission will not seriously affect the bearing of the general principles. I have given the best I had to give; and must leave each reader to find in it whatever may interest him. Th

12、e uses of books are first to stimulate inquiry by awakening an interest; secondly, to clarify and classify the knowledge already gained from direct contemplation of the phenomena. They are stimuli and aids to observation andvii thought. They should never be allowed to see for us, nor to think for us

13、.The volume contains four essays. The first, on the Nature of Life, deals with the speciality of organic phenomena, as distinguished from the inorganic. It sets forth the physiological principles which Psychology must incessantly invoke. In the course of the exposition I have incorporated several pa

14、ssages from four articles on Mr. Darwins hypotheses, contributed to the Fortnightly Review during the year 1868. I have also suggested a modification of the hypothesis of Natural Selection, by extending to the tissues and organs that principle of competition which Mr. Darwin has so luminously applie

15、d to organisms. Should this generalization of the “struggle for existence” be accepted, it will answer many of the hitherto unanswerable objections.The second essay is on the Nervous Mechanism, setting forth what is known and what is inferred respecting the structure and properties of that all-impor

16、tant system. If the sceptical and revolutionary attitude, in presence of opinions currently held to be established truths, surprises or pains the reader unprepared for such doubts, I can only ask him to submit my statements to a similar scepticism, and confront them with the ascertained evidence. Af

17、ter many years of laborious investigation and meditation, the conclusion has slowly forced itself upon me, that on this subject there is a “false persuasion of knowledge” very fatal in its influence, because unhesitatingly adopted as the ground of speculation both in Pathology and Psychology. This p

18、ersuasion is sustained because few are aware how much of what passes for observation is in reality sheer hypothesis. I have had to point out the great extent to which Imaginary Anatomy has been unsuspectingly accepted; and hope to have done something towards raising a rational misgiving in the stude

19、nts mind respectingviii “the superstition of the nerve-cell”a superstition which I freely confess to have shared in for many years.The third essay treats of Animal Automatism. Here the constant insistance on the biological point of view, while it causes a rejection of the mechanical theory, admits t

20、he fullest recognition of all the mechanical relations involved in animal movements, and thus endeavors to reconcile the contending schools. In this essay I have also attempted a psychological solution of that much-debated questionthe relation between Body and Mind. This solution explains why physic

21、al and mental phenomena must necessarily present to our apprehension such profoundly diverse characters; and shows that Materialism, in attempting to deduce the mental from the physical, puts into the conclusion what the very terms have excluded from the premises; whereas, on the hypothesis of a phy

22、sical process being only the objective aspect of a mental process, the attempt to interpret the one by the other is as legitimate as the solution of a geometrical problem by algebra.In the final essay the Reflex Theory is discussed; and here once more the biological point of view rectifies the error

23、 of an analysis which has led to the denial of Sensibility in reflex actions, because that analysis has overlooked the necessary presence of the conditions which determine Sensibility. In these chapters are reproduced several passages from the Physiology of Common Life.According to my original inten

24、tion, this volume was to have included an exposition of the part I conceive the brain to play in physiological and psychological processes, but that must be postponed until it can be accompanied by a survey of psychological processes which would render the exposition more intelligible.The Priory, Ma

25、rch, 1877.PROBLEM I.THE NATURE OF LIFE.“La Physiologie a pour but dexposer les phnomnes de la vie humaine et les conditions do ils dpendant. Pour y arriver dune manire s?re, il faut ncessairement avant tout dterminer quels sont les phnomnes quon dsigne sous le nom de vie en gnral. Cest pourquoi la p

26、remire chose faire est dtudier les proprits gnrales du corps quon appelle organiques ou vivans.”Tiedemann, Trait de Physiologie de lHomme, I. 2.“Some weak and inexperienced persons vainly seek by dialectics and far-fetched arguments either to upset or establish things that are only to be founded on

27、anatomical demonstration and believed on the evidence of the senses. He who truly desires to be informed of the question in hand must be held bound either to look for himself, or to take on trust the conclusions to which they who have looked have come.”Harvey, Second Dissertation to Riolan.3THE NATU

28、RE OF LIFE.CHAPTER I.THE PROBLEM STATED.1. Although for convenience we use the terms Life and Mind as representing distinct orders of phenomena, the one objective and the other subjective, and although for centuries they have designated distinct entities, or forces having different substrata, we may

29、 now consider it sufficiently acknowledged among scientific thinkers that every problem of Mind is necessarily a problem of Life, referring to one special group of vital activities. It is enough that Mind is never manifested except in a living organism to make us seek in an analysis of organic pheno

30、mena for the material conditions of every mental fact. Mental phenomena when observed in others, although interpretable by our consciousness of what is passing in ourselves, can only be objective phenomena of the vital organism.2. On this ground, if on this alone, an acquaintance with the general pr

31、inciples of structure and function is indispensable to the psychologist; although only of late years has this been fully recognized, so that men profoundly ignorant of the organism have had no hesitation in theorizing on its highest functions. In saying that such knowledge is indispensable, I do not

32、 mean that in the absence of such knowledge a man is debarred from understanding much of the results reached by investigators,4 nor that he may not himself make useful observations and classifications of psychological facts. It is possible to read books on Natural History with intelligence and profi

33、t, and even to make good observations, without a scientific groundwork of biological instruction; and it is possible to arrive at empirical facts of hygiene and medical treatment without any physiological instruction. But in all three cases the absence of a scientific basis will render the knowledge

34、 fragmentary and incomplete; and this ought to deter every one from offering an opinion on debatable questions which pass beyond the limit of subjective observations. The psychologist who has not prepared himself by a study of the organism has no more right to be heard on the genesis of the psychica

35、l states, or of the relations between body and mind, than one of the laity has a right to be heard on a question of medical treatment.THE POSITION OF BIOLOGY.3. Science is the systematic classification of Experience. It postulates unity of Existence with great varieties in the Modes of Existence; as

36、suming that there is one Matter everywhere the same, under great diversities in the complications of its elements. The distinction of Modes is not less indispensable than the identification of the elements. These Modes range themselves under three supreme heads: Force, Life, Mind. Under the first, r

37、ange the general properties exhibited by all substances; under the second, the general properties exhibited by organized substances; under the third, the general properties exhibited by organized animal substances. The first class is subdivided into Physics, celestial and terrestrial, and Chemistry.

38、 Physics treats of substances which move as masses, or which vibrate and rotate as molecules, without undergoing any appreciable change of structural integrity;5 they show changes of position and state, without corresponding changes in their elements. Chemistry treats of substances which undergo mol

39、ecular changes of composition destructive of their integrity. Thus the blow which simply moves one body, or makes it vibrate, explodes another. The friction which alters the temperature and electrical state of a bit of glass, ignites a bit of phosphorus, and so destroys its integrity of structure, c

40、onverting phosphorus into phosphoric acid.4. The second class, while exhibiting both physical and chemical properties, is markedly distinguished by the addition of properties called vital. Their peculiarity consists in this: they undergo molecular changes of composition and decomposition which are s

41、imultaneous, and by this simultaneity preserve their integrity of structure. They change their state, and their elements, yet preserve their unity, and even when differentiating continue specific. Unlike all other bodies, the organized are born, grow, develop, and decay, through a prescribed series

42、of graduated evolutions, each stage being the indispensable condition of its successor, no stage ever appearing except in its serial order.5. The third class, while exhibiting all the characteristics of the two preceding classes, is specialized by the addition of a totally new property, called Sensi

43、bility, which subjectively is Feeling. Here organized substance has become animal substance, and Vegetality has been developed into Animality by the addition of new factors,new complexities of the elementary forces. Many, if not most, philosophers postulate an entirely new Existence, and not simply

44、a new Mode, to account for the manifestations of Mind; they refuse to acknowledge it to be a vital manifestation, they demand that to Life be added a separate substratum, the Soul. This is not a point to be discussed here. We may be content with the6 assertion that however great the phenomenal diffe

45、rence between Humanity and Animality (a difference we shall hereafter see to be the expression of a new factor, namely, the social factor), nevertheless the distinctive attribute of Sensibility, out of which rise Emotion and Cognition, marks the inseparable kinship of mental with vital phenomena.Thu

46、s all the various Modes of Existence may, at least in their objective aspect, be ranged under the two divisions of Inorganic and Organic,Non-living and Living,and these are respectively the objects of the cosmological and the biological sciences.6. The various sciences in their serial development de

47、velop the whole art of Method. Mathematics develops abstraction, deduction, and definition; Astronomy abstraction, deduction, and observation; Physics adds experiment; Chemistry adds nomenclature; Biology adds classification, and for the first time brings into prominence the important notion of cond

48、itions of existence, and the variation of phenomena under varying conditions: so that the relation of the organism to its medium is one never to be left out of sight. In Biology also clearly emerges for the first time what I regard as the true notion of causality, namely, the procession of causes,th

49、e combination of factors in the product, and not an ab extra determination of the product. In Vitality and Sensibility we are made aware that the causes are in and not outside the organism; that the organic effect is the organic cause in operation; that there is autonomy but no autocracy; the effect issues as a resultant of the co-operating conditions. In Sociology, finally, we see brought into prominence the historical conditions of