CHAPTER VI. THE PROBLEM STATED. 71. If the preceding attempt to disengage the question from the ambiguities of its terms has been successful, we shall find little difficulty in rationally interpreting all the facts adduced in favor of Animal Automatism, without having recourse to a mechanical theory of biological phenomena. The objections to that theory are that it employs terms which have very misleading connotations even when they do not denote phenomena of widely different orders; so that the moral repugnance commonly felt at the attempt to treat the animal organism as if it were a machine, is sustained by the intellectual repugnance at the attempt to explain biological phenomena on principles derived from phenomena of a simpler order. Remark, in passing, this piquant contradiction: the Automaton theory of Descartes, when applied to the animals, generally excited ridicule or repulsion; whereas the far more inconsistent and mechanical theory of Reflex Action has been almost universally welcomed as a great discovery, though it banishes the Sensibility which Descartes preserved. And further, the philosophers who most loudly protested against the idea that animals were machines, were the philosophers who most insisted that these animals were made, not evolved - planned by their maker, as a watch is planned by its maker, with a distinct purpose and prevision in the disposition of every part; whereas the philosophers who most emphatically reject this notion of organisms being made, are often those who liken organisms to machines. 72. The paradox propounded by Descartes loses much of its strangeness when we understand his meaning. Its terms are infelicitous because of their misleading connotations. When he says that all the actions of animals which seem to be due to Consciousness are in fact produced on the same principles as those of a machine, he means that animals have not souls to direct their actions; but since, on being questioned, he is ready to admit that animals have sensation, perception, emotion, and memory, his denial of their souls practically comes to much the same as the ordinary position that animals have not Thought nor Consciousness of Self. The admission of sensation is, however, quite enough to mark the essential difference between an organism and a machine. 73. It was really a great step taken by Descartes when he directed attention to the fact that all animal actions were executed in strict conformity with mechanical principles, because both before his time, and since, we may observe a great disregard of the animal mechanism, and a disposition to interpret the phenomena on metaphysical principles. But the connotations of the term "machine DESCARTES expressly calls them sensitive machines. He refuses them Thought, but neither “la vie ou le sentiment." He adds, “Mon opinion n'est pas que les bêtes voient comme nous lorsque nous sentons que nous voyons."— Œuvres, IV. p. 339. This example is cited by him in proof of human automatism: "Que ce n'est point par l'entremise de notre âme que les yeux se ferment, puisque c'est contre notre volonté, laquelle est sa seule ou du moins sa principale action; mais c'est à cause que la machine de notre corps est tellement composée que le mouvement de cette main vers nos yeux excite un autre mouvement en notre cerveau qui conduit les esprits animaux dans les muscles qui font abaisser les paupières." All indeed that we assign to Sensibility, he assigns to these hypothetical animal spirits, and thence he concludes, "Qu'il ne reste rien en nous que nous devions attribuer à notre âme sinon nos pensées." - Les Passions de l'Âme, art. 13 and 17. Comp. Discours de la Méthode, partie iv. were such as to lead the mind away from the special conditions of the vital mechanism, and fix it exclusively on the general conditions of machinery. Hence his opponents misunderstood him, and some of his followers made the same oversight, and ended by eliminating sensation altogether. In pursuance of this mechanical point of view, to the exclusion of the biological, Thought and even Consciousness have been eliminated from among the organic agencies, and are said to have no more influence in determining even human actions than the whistle of the steam-engine has in directing the locomotive. There are thus two metaphysiological theories. According to the one, Consciousness directs indeed the actions of the organism, but is not itself an organic process-it sits apart, like a musical performer playing on an instrument. According to the other, it is not a directing agency, but an accessory product of certain organic processes, which processes may go on quite as well without any accompaniment and interference of Consciousness. 74. Two observations arise here. First, we observe a want of due recognition of the objective and subjective aspects, and their respective criteria. Secondly, we observe mental facts of irresistible certainty interpreted by material hypotheses of questionable value; and not only so, but a higher validity is assigned to the material hypotheses than to the mental facts they are invented to explain. That we are conscious, and that our actions are determined by sensations, emotions, and ideas, are facts which may or may not be explained by reference to material conditions, but which no material explanation can render more certain. That animals resemble us in this as in other respects is an induction of the highest probability. It is also a fact that many actions take place, as we say, unconsciously and involuntarily; and that some take place now consciously, now unconsciously. VOL. III. 19 BB These facts also we endeavor to explain: and when we find that some of the unconscious and involuntary actions take place after the brain has been removed, this is interpreted on the material hypothesis of the brain being the sole seat of sensation and consciousness; and is urged in favor of the hypothesis that consciousness cannot be an agent in the mechanism. Here the confusion of objective and subjective aspects is patent. Consciousness as a subjective fact cannot be a material or objective fact. But may it not be another aspect of that which is objective? So long as we are dealing with the objective aspect, we have nothing but material processes in a material mechanism before us. A change within the organism is caused by a neural stimulation, and the resulting action is a reflex on the muscles. Here there is simply a transference of motion by a material mechanism. There is in this no evidence of a subjective agency; there could be none. But when we come to investigate the process, we find that it differs from similar processes in anorganisms, by the necessary co-operation of special conditions, and among these the vital conditions- there are those which in their subjective aspect we express not in terms of Matter and Motion, but in terms of Feeling, i. e. not in objective. but in subjective terms. I see a stone move on being struck; I also see a man shrink on being struck, and hear a dog howl on being kicked. I do not infer that the stone feels as the man and dog feel, because I know the stone and the dog to be differently constituted, and infer a corresponding difference in their reactions. I infer that the man and dog feel, because I know they are like myself, and conclude that what I feel they feel, under like conditions. 75. Descartes says that animals are sensitive automata. They always act as we sometimes act, i. e. when we are not conscious of what we do, as in singing, walking, playing the piano, etc. We are said to do these things mechanically, automatically, and hence the conclusion that these actions are those of a pure mechanism. But it would be truer to say that we never act mechanically, we always act organically. "When one who falls from a height throws his hands forwards to save his head," says Descartes, "it is in virtue of no ratiocination that he performs this action" (that depends on the definition: in the Logic of Feeling there is a process of ratiocination identical with that in the Logic of Signs). "It does not depend upon his mind" (again a question of definition), "but takes place merely because his senses being affected by present danger" (senses, then, have a perception of danger?) "some change arises in his brain which determines the animal spirits to pass thence into the nerves in such a manner as is required to produce this motion, in the same way as in a machine, and without his mind being able to hinder it. Now since we observe this in ourselves, why should we be so much astonished if the light reflected from the body of a wolf into the eye of a sheep has the same force to excite in it the motion of flight?" Here, both in the case of the man and the sheep, there is presupposed the very mental experience which is denied. The young child will not throw out its arm to protect itself; but after many experiences of falling and stumbling, there is an organized perception of the impending danger, and the means of averting it, and it is this which determines the throwing out of the arms. If this is not a mental fact—a process of judgment - then the logical conclusion by which a financier on hearing a war rumor orders his broker to sell stock, is not a mental fact. The light reflected from the body of a wolf would not disturb the sheep unless its own, or its inherited organized experience were ready there to respond. But this organized |