Reflex Actions and Mental Adjustments| OKWAVE

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Without, therefore, entertaining the question as to the connexion between Body and Mind, it is enough to say that under any view concerning the nature of this connexion, we are justified in drawing a distinction between activities which are accompanied by feelings, and activities which, so far as we can see, are not so accompanied. If this is allowed, there seems, to be no term better fitted to convey the distinction than the term Choice ; agents that are able to choose their actions are agents that are able to feel the stimuli which determine the choice. Such being our Criterion of Mind, it admits of being otherwise stated, and in a more practically applicable manner, in the following words which I quote from " Animal Intelli gence :" — " It is, then, adaptive action by a living organism in cases where the inherited machinery of the nervous system does not furnish data for our prevision of what the adaptive action must necessarily be — it is only here that we recognize the objective evidence of mind. The criterion of mind, therefore, which I propose, and to which I shall adhere throughout the present volume, is as follows : — Does the organism learn to make new adjustments, or to modify old ones, in accordance with the results of its own individual experience ? If it does so, the fact cannot be merely due to reflex action in the sense above described ; for it is impossible that heredity can have provided in advance for innovations upon or alterations of its machinery during the lifetime of a particular individual".

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Two points have to be observed with regard to this criterion, in whichever verbal form we may choose to express it. The first is that it is not rigidly exclusive either, on the one hand, of a possibly mental character in apparently non- mental adjustments, or, conversely, of a possibly non-mental character in apparently mental adjustments. For it is certain that failure to learn by individual experience is not always conclusive evidence against the existence of mind; such failure may arise merely from an imperfection of memroy, or from there not being enough of the mind-element present to make the adjustments needful to meet the novel circum stances. Conversely, it is no less certain that some parts of our own nervous system, which are not concerned in the phenomena of consciousness, are nevertheless able in some measure to learn by individual experience. The nervous apparatus of the stomach, for instance, is able in so con siderable a degree to adapt the movements of that organ to the requirements of its individual experience, that were the organ an organism we might be in danger of regarding it as dimly intelligent. Still there is no evidence to show that non-mental agents are ever able in any considerable measure thus to simulate the adjustments performed by mental ones ; and therefore our criterion, in its practical application, has rather to be guarded against the opposite danger of defying the presence of mind to agents that are really mental For, as I observed in " Animal Intelligence," " it is clear that long before mind has advanced sufficiently far in the scale of development to become amenable to the test in question, it has probably begun to dawn as nascent subjectivity. In other words, because a lowly organized animal does not learn by its own individual experience, we may not therefore con clude that in performing its natural or ancestral adaptations to appropiate stimuli, consciousness, or the mind-element, is wholly absent ; we can only say that this element, if present, reveals no evidence of the fact. But, on the other hand, if a lowly organized animal does learn by its own individual experience, we are in possession of the best available evi dence of conscious memory leading to intentional adaptation. Therefore, our criterion applies to the upper limit of non- mental action, not to the lower limit of mental[action]''.

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It is, then, adaptive action by a living organism in cases where the inherited machinery of the nervous system does not furnish data for our prevision of what the adaptive action must necessarily be — it is only in such cases that we recognize the element of mind. In other words, ejectively con sidered, the distinctive element of mind is consciousness, the test of consciousness is the presence of choice, and the evidence of choice is the antecedent uncertainty of adjustive action between two or more alternatives. To this analysis it is, however, needful to add that, although our only criterion of mind is antecedent uncertainty of adjustive action, it does not follow that all adjustive action in which mind is con cerned should be of an antecedently uncertain character; or, which is the same thing, [it does'nt follow] that because some such action may be of an antecedently certain character, we should on this account regard it as non-mental. Many adjustive actions which we recognize as mental are, nevertheless, seen before hand to be, under the given circumstances, inevitable ; but analysis would show that such is only the case when we have in view agents whom we already, and from independent videuce, regard as mental.

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Mental Evolution in Animals(1883). In the family of the sciences Comparative Psychology may claim nearest kinship with Comparative Anatomy; for just as the latter aims at a scientiﬁc comparison of the bodily structures of organisms, so the former aims at a similar com parison of their mental structures. Moreover, in the one science as in the other, the ﬁrst object is to analyze all the complex structures with which each has respectively to deal. When this analysis, or dissection, has been completed for as great a number of cases as circumstances permit, the next object is to compare with one another all the structures which have been thus analyzed; and, lastly, the results of such comparison supply, in each case alike, the basis for the ﬁnal object of these sciences, which is that of classifying, with reference to these results, all the structures which have been thus examined.

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In positing the evidence' of Choice as my objective (or ejective) criterion of Mind, I do not think it necessary to enter into any elaborate analysis of what constitutes this evidence. In a subsequent chapter I shall treat fully of what I call the physiology or objective aspect of choice ; and then it will be seen that from the gradual manner in which choice, or the mind element, arises, it is not practically possible to draw a definite line of demarcation between choosing and non-choosing agents. Therefore, at this stage of the enquiry I prefer to rest in the ordinary acceptation of the term, as implying a distinction which common sense has always drawn, and probably always will draw, between mental and non-mental agents. It cannot be correctly said that a river chooses the course of its flow, or that the earth chooses an ellipse wherein to revolve round the sun. And similarly, however complex the operations may be of an agent recog nized as non-mental — such, for instance, as those of a calcu lating machine — or however impossible it may be to predict the result of its actions, we never say that such operations or actions are due to choice ; we reserve this term for operations or actions, however simple and however easily the result may be foreseen, which are performed, either by agents who in virtue of the non-mechanical nature of these actions prove themselves to be mental, or by agents already recognized as mental — i.e., by agents who have already proved themselves to be mental by performing other actions of such a non- mechanical or unforeseeable nature as we feel assured can only be attributed to choice. And there can be no reasonable doubt that this common-sense distinction between choosing aud non-choosing agents is a valid one. Although it may be difficult or impossible, in particular cases, to decide to which of the two categories this or that being should be assigned, this difficulty does not affect the validity of the classification — any more, for instance, than the difficulty of deciding whether Limulus should be classified with the crabs or with the scorpions affects the validity of the classification which marks off the group Crustacea from the group Arachnida.

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The other point which has to be noted with regard to this criterion is as follows. I again quote from " Animal Intelligence :"— " Of course to the sceptic this criterion may appear un satisfactory, since it depends, not on direct knowledge, but on inference. Here, however, it seems enough to point out, as already observed, that it is the best criterion available ; and, further, that scepticism of this kind is logically bound to deny evidence of mind, not only in the case of the lower animals, but also in that of the higher, and even in that of men other than the sceptic himself. For all objections which could apply to the use of this criterion of mind in the animal kingdom, would apply with equal force to the evidence of any mind other than that of the individual objector. This is obvious, because, as I have already observed, the only evi dence we can have of objective mind is that which is furnished by objective activities ; and, as the subjective mind can never become assimilated with the objective so as to learn by direct feeling the mental processes which there accompany the objective activities, it is clearly impossible to satisfy any one who may choose to doubt the validity of inference, that in any case, other than his own, mental processes ever do accompany objective activities.

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It is obvious, then, to start with, that by Mind we may mean two very different things, according as we contemplate it in our own individual selves, or as manifested by other beings. For if I contemplate my own mind, I have an imme diate cognizance of a certain flow of thoughts and feelings, which are the most ultimate things — and, indeed, the only things— of which I am cognizant. But if I contemplate Mind in other persons or organisms, I can have no such immediate cognizance of their thoughts and feelings ; I can only infer the existence of such thoughts and feelings from the activities of the persons or organisms which appear to manifest them. Thus it is that by Mind we may mean either that which is subjective or that which is objective. Now throughout the present work we shall have to consider Mind as an object ; and therefore it is well to remember that our only instrument of analysis is the observation of activities which we infer to be prompted by, or associated with, mental antecedents or accompaniments analogous to those of which we are directly conscious in our own subjective experience. That is to say, starting from what I know subjectively of the operations of my own individual mind, and of the activi ties which in my own organism these operations seem to prompt, I proceed by analogy to infer from the observable activities displayed by other organisms, the fact that certain mental operations underlie or accompany these activities.

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It is refreshing to return to the often-echoed remark, that it could not have been the object of a Divine revelation to instruct mankind in physical science, man having had faculties bestowed upon him to enable him to acquire this knowledge by himself. This is in fact pretty generally admitted; but in the application of the doctrine, writers play at fast and loose with it according to circumstances. Thus an inspired writer may be permitted to allude to the phenomena of nature according to the vulgar view of such things, without impeachment of his better knowledge; but if he speaks of the same phenomena assertively, we are bound to suppose that things are as he represents them, however much our knowledge of nature may be disposed to recalcitrate. But if we find a difficulty in admitting that such misrepresentations can find a place in revelation, the difficulty lies in our having previously assumed what a Divine revelation ought to be. If God made use of imperfectly informed men to lay the foundations of that higher knowledge for which the human race was destined, is it wonderful that they should have committed themselves to assertions not in accordance with facts, although they may have believed them to be true? On what grounds has the popular notion of Divine revelation been built up? Is it not plain that the plan of Providence for the education of man is a progressive one, and as imperfect men have been used as the agents for teaching mankind, is it not to be expected that their teachings should be partial and, to some extent, erroneous? Admitted, as it is, that physical science is not what the Hebrew writers, for the most part, profess to convey, at any rate, that it is not on account of the communication of such knowledge that we attach any value to their writings, why should we hesitate to recognise their fallibility on this head?

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Now in this necessarily ejective method of enquiry, what is the kind of activities that we are entitled to regard as indicative of mind ? I certainly do not so regard the flowing of a river or the blowing of a wind. Why ? First, because the subjects are too remote in kind from my own organism to admit of my drawing any reasonable analogy between them and it; and, secondly, because the activities which they present are invariably of the same kind under the same circumstances : they therefore offer no evidence of that which I deem the distinctive character of my own mind as such — Consciousness. In other words, two conditions require to he satisfied before we even begin to imagine that observable activities are indicative of mind ; the activities must be dis played by a living organism, and they must be of a kind to suggest the presence of consciousness. What then is to be taken as the criterion of consciousness ? Subjectively, no criterion is either needful or possible ; for to me, individually, nothing can be more ultimate than my own consciousness, and, therefore, my consciousness cannot admit of any criterion having a claim to a higher certainty. But, ejectively, some such criterion is required, and as my consciousness cannot come within the territory of a foreign consciousness, I can only appreciate the latter through the agency of ambassadors — these ambassadors being, as I have now so frequently said, the observable activities of an organism. The next question, therefore, is, What activities of an organism are to be taken as indicative of consciousness ? The answer that comes most readily is, — All activities that are indicative of Choice; wherever wo see a living organism apparently exerting inten tional choice, we may infer that it is conscious choice, and, therefore, that the organism has a mind. But physiology shows that this answer will not do ; for, while not disputing whether there is any mind without the power of conscious choice, physiology, as we shall see in the next chapter, is very firm in denying that all apparent choice is due to mind.

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The task which sundry modern writers have imposed upon themselves is to prove, that the Mosaic narrative, however apparently at variance with our knowledge, is essentially, and in fact true, although never understood properly until modern science supplied the necessary commentary and explanation. Two modes of conciliation have been propounded which have enjoyed considerable popularity, and to these two we shall confine our attention. The first is that originally brought into vogue by Chalmers and adopted by the late Dr. Buckland in his Bridgewater Treatise, and which is probably still received by many as a sufficient solution of all difficulties. Dr. Buckland's treatment of the case may be taken as a fair specimen of the line of argument adopted, and it shall be given in his own words.

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From this statement of the case it will be apparent that our knowledge of mental activities in any organism other than our own is neither subjective nor objective. That it is not subjective I need not wait to show. That it is not objective* may be rendered obvious by a few moments' reflec tion. .For it is evident that mental activities in other organisms can never be to us objects of direct knowledge ; as I have just said, we can only infer their existence from the objective sources supplied by observable activities of such organisms.. Therefore all our knowledge of mental activities other than our own really consists of an inferential inter pretation of bodily activities — this interpretation being founded on our subjective knowledge of our own mental activities. By inference we project, as it were, the known patterns of our own mental chromograph [chromograph=chromolithograph] on what is to us the otherwise blank screen of another mind ; and our only knowledge of the processes there taking place is really due to such a projection of our own subjectively. This matter has been well and clearly presented by the late Professor Clifford, who has coined the exceedingly appropriate term eject (in contradistinction to subject and object), whereby to designate the distinctive character of a mind (or mental process) other than our own in its relation to our own. I shall therefore adopt this convenient term, and speak of all our possible knowledge of other minds as ejective.

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A third opinion has been suggested both by learned theologians and by geologists, and on grounds independent of one another -- viz., that the days of the Mosaic creation need not be understood to imply the same length of time which is now occupied by a single revolution of the globe, but successive periods each of great extent; and it has been asserted that the order of succession of the organic remains of a former world accords with the order of creation recorded in Genesis. This assertion, though to a certain degree apparently correct, is not entirely supported by geological facts, since it appears that the most ancient marine animals occur in the same division of the lowest transition strata with the earliest remains of vegetables, so that the evidence of organic remains, as far as it goes, shows the origin of plants and animals to have been contemporaneous: if any creation of vegetables preceded that of animals, no evidence of such an event has yet been discovered by the researches of geology. Still there is, I believe, by no sound critical or theological objection to the interpretation of the word day' as meaning a long period.' Archdeacon Pratt also summarily rejects this view as untenable:

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The word beginning,' he says, as applied by Moses in the first verse of the book of Genesis, expresses an undefined period of time which was antecedent to the last great change that affected the surface of the earth, and to the creation of its present animal and vegetable inhabitants, during which period a long series of operations may have been going on; which as they are wholly unconnected with the history of the human race, are passed over in silence by the sacred historian, whose only concern was barely to state, that the matter of the universe is not eternal and self-existent, but was originally created by the power of the Almighty.' The Mosaic narrative commences with a declaration that in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.' These few first words of Genesis may be fairly appealed to by the geologist as containing a brief statement of the creation of the material elements, at a time distinctly preceding the operations of the first day; it is nowhere affirmed that God created the heaven and the earth in the first day, but in the beginning; this beginning may have been an epoch at an unmeasured distance, followed by periods of undefined duration during which all the physical operations disclosed by geology were going on.' The first verse of Genesis, therefore, seems explicitly to assert the creation of the universe; the heaven, including the sidereal systems; and the earth, especially specifying our own planet, as the subsequent scene of the operations of the six days about to be described; no information is given as to events which may have occurred upon this earth, unconnected with the history of man, between the creation of its component matter recorded in the first verse, and the era at which its history is resumed in the second verse: nor is any limit fixed to the time during which these intermediate events may have been going on: millions of millions of years may have occupied the indefinite interval, between the beginning in which God created the heaven and the earth, and the evening or commencement of the first day of the Mosaic narrative.'

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The point is that, notwithstanding special difficulties in assigning this or that being to one or the other class, the psychological classification which I advocate resembles the zoological classification which I have cited ; it is a valid classification, inasmuch as it recognizes a distinction where there is certainly something to distinguish. For even if we take the most mechanical view of mental processes that is possible, and suppose that conscious intelligence plays no part whatever in determining action, there still remains the fact that such conscious intelligence exists, and that prior to certain actions it is always affected in certain ways. Therefore, even if we suppose that the state of things is, so to speak, accidental, and that the actions in question would always he performed in precisely the same way whether or not they were thus connected with consciousness, it would still remain desirable, for scientific purposes, that a marked distinction should be drawn between cases of activity that proceed without, and those that proceed with this remarkable association with consciousness. As the phenomena of subjectivity are facts at any rate no less real than those of objectivity, if it is found that some of the latter are invariably and faithfully mirrored in those of the former, such pheno mena, for this reason alone, deserve to be placed in a distinct scientific category, even though it were proved that the mirror of subjectivity might be removed without affecting any of the phenomena of objectivity.

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It should be borne in mind,' says Dr. Buckland, that the object of the account was, not to state in what manner, but by whom the world was made.' Every one must see that this is an unfounded assertion, inasmuch as the greater part of the narrative consists in a minute and orderly description of the manner in which things were made. We can know nothing as to the object of the account, except from the account itself. What the writer meant to state is just that which he has stated, for all that we can know to the contrary. Or can we seriously beleive that if appealed to by one of his Hebrew hearers or readers as to his intention, he would have replied, My only object in what I have written is to inform you that God made the world; as to the manner of His doing it, of which I have given so exact an account, I have no intention that my words should be taken in their literal meaning? We come then to this, that if we sift the Mosaic narrative of all definite meaning, and only allow it to be the expression of the most vague generalities, if we avow that it admits of no certain interpretation, of none that may not be shifted and altered as often as we see fit, and as the exigencies of geology may require, then may we reconcile it with what science teaches. This mode of dealing with the subject has been broadly advocated by a recent writer of mathematical eminence, who adopts the Bucklandian hypothesis, a passage from whose work we shall quote.

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It being understood, then, that the present essay is restricted to a consideration of mental evolution in animals,I should like to have it also understood that it is further restricted to the psychology as distinguished from the philo sophy of the subject. In a short and independent essay, published elsewhere,* I have already stated my views con cerning the more important questions of philosophy into which the subject-matter of psychology is so apt to dip ; but here it is only needful to emphasize the fact that these two strata of thought, although assuredly in juxtaposition, are no less assuredly distinct. My present enquiry belongs only to the upper stratum, or to the science of psychology as dis tinguished from any theory of knowledge. I am in no wise concerned with " the transition from the object known to the knowing subject," and therefore I am in no wise concerned with any of the philosophical theories which have been pro pounded upon this matter. In other words, I have every where to regard mind as an object and mental modifications as phenomena; therefore I have throughout to investigate the process of Mental Evolution by what is now generally and aptly termed the historical method. I cannot too strongly impress upon the memory of those who from previous reading are able to appreciate the importance of the distinction, that I thus intend everywhere to remain within the borders of psychology, and nowhere to trespass upon the grounds of philosophy.

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和訳してもらえますか。 Two opposite errors, both common, are to be guarded against. On the one hand, men who are more familiar with books than with affairs are apt to over-estimate the influence of philosophers. When they see some political party proclaiming itself inspired by So-and-So's teaching, they think its actions are attributable to So-and-So, whereas, not infrequently, the philosopher is only acclaimed because he recommends what the party would have done in any case. Writers of books, until recently, almost all exaggerated the effects of their predecessors in the same trade. But conversely, a new error has arisen by reaction against the old one, and this new error consists in regarding theorists as almost passive products of their circumstances, and as having hardly any influence at all upon the course of events. Ideas, according to this view, are the froth on the surface of deep currents, which are determined by material and technical causes: social changes are no more caused by thought than the flow of a river is caused by the bubbles that reveal its direction to an onlooker. For my part, I believe that the truth lies between these two extremes. Between ideas and practical life, as everywhere else, there is reciprocal interaction; to ask which is cause and which effect is as futile as the problem of the hen and the egg.

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The question of the meaning of the word bara,'create,'has been previously touched upon;it has been acknowledged by good critics that it doesn't of itself necessarily imply 'to make out of nothing upon the simple ground that it is found [to be]uesd in cases where such a meaning would be inapplicable . But the difficultly of giving to it the interpretation contended for by Dr Buckland and of uniting with this the assumption of a six days' creation, such as that described in Genesis, at a comparatively recent period, lies in this,that the heaven itself is distinctly said to have been formed by the division of the waters on the second day. Consequently , until. The first Mosaic day of creation, there was no sky, no local habitation for the sun,moon and stars, even supposing those bodies to have been included in the original material. Dr Buckland doesn't touch this obvious difficulty, without which his argument that the sun and moon might have been contemplated as pre-existing , although they aren't stated to have been set in the heaven until the forth day, is of no value at all.

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Now assuredly we have here a most important issue, and as it is one the discussion of which will constitute a large element of my work, it is perhaps desirable that I should state at the outset the manner in which I propose to deal with it . The question, then, as to whether or not human intelli gence has been evolved from animal intelligence can only be dealt with scientifically by comparing the one with the other, in order to ascertain the points wherein they agree and the points wherein they differ. Now there can be no doubt that when this is done, the difference between the mental faculties of the most intelligent animal and the mental faculties of the lowest savage[savage=wild beast] is seen to be so vast, that the hypothesis of their being so nearly allied as Mr. Darwin's teaching implies, appears at first sight absurd. And, indeed, it is not until we have become convinced that the theory of Evolution can alone afford an explanation of the facts of human anatomy that we are prepared to seek for a similar explanation of the facts of human psychology. But wide as is the difference between the mind of a man and the mind of a brute, we must remember that the question is one, not as to degree, but as to kind ; and therefore that our task, as serious enquirers after truth, is calmly and honestly to examine the character of the difference which is presented, in order to determine whether it is really beyond the bounds of rational credibility that the enormous interval which now separates these two divisions of mind can ever have been bridged over, by numberless inter mediate gradations, during the untold ages of the past.

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Now, in answer to this objection, I have only to say that no one can have a more lively appreciation than myself of the supreme importance of experimental or historical veri fication, in all cases where the possibility of such verification is attainable. But in cases where such verification is not attainable, what are we to do ? We may clearly do either of two things. We may either neglect to investigate the sub ject at all, or we may Jo our best to investigate it by employ ing the only means of .investigation which are at our disposal. Of these two courses there can be no doubt which is the one that the scientific spirit prompts. The true scientific spirit desires to examine everything, and if in any case it is refused the best class of instruments wherewith to conduct the examination, it will adopt the next best that are available. In such cases science clearly cannot be forwarded by neglect ing to use these instruments, while her cause may be greatly advanced by using them with care. This is proved by the fict that, in the science of psychology, nearly all the con siderable advances which have been made, have been made, not by experiment, but by observing mental phenomena and reasoning from these phenomena deductively. In such cases, therefore, the true scientific spirit prompts us, not to throw away deductive reasoning where it is so frequently the onlyinstrument available, but rather to cany it with us, and to use it as not abusing it.

Reflex Actions and Mental Adjustments

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Reflex Actions and Mental Adjustments

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