Reflex Actions and Mental Adjustments
- The host of reflex actions is arrayed against the proposition.
- The only test we have is to ask whether the adjustments displayed are invariably the same under the same circumstances of stimulation.
- Reflex actions, under the influence of their appropriate stimuli, may be compared to the actions of a machine under the manipulations of an operator.
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The host of reflex actions is arrayed against the proposition, and, in view of such non-mental, though apparently intentional adjustments, we find the necessity for some test of the choice- element as real or fictitious. The only test we have is to ask whether the adjustments displayed are invariably the same under the same circumstances of stimulation. The only distinction between adjustive movements due to reflex action, and adjustive movements accompanied by mental perception, consists in the former depending on inherited mechanisms within the nervous system being so constructed as to effect particular adjustive movements in responso to particular stimulations, while the latter are independent of any such inherited adjustment of special mechanisms to the exigencies of special circumstances. Reflex actions, under the influence of their appropriate stimuli, may be compared to the actions of a machine under the manipulations of an operator : when certain springs of action are touched by certain stimuli, the whole machine is thrown into appropriate action ; there is no room for choice, there is no room for uncertainty ; but, as surely as any of these inherited mechanisms is affected by the stimulus with reference to which it has been constructed to act, so surely will it act in precisely the same, way as it always has acted. But the case with conscious mental adjust ment is quite different. For, without going into the question concerning the relation of Body and Mind, or waiting to ask whether cases of mental adjustment are not really quite as mechanical in the sense of being the necessary result or correlative of a chain of psychical sequences due to a physical stimulation, it is enough to point to the variable and incalcu lable character of mental adjustments as distinguished from the constant and foreseeable character of reflex adjustments.All in fact, that in an objective sense we can mean by a mental adjustment, is an adjustment of a kind that has not been definitely fixed by heredity as the only adjustment possible in the given circumstances of stimulation. For, were there no alternative of adjustment, the case, in an animal at least, would be indistinguishable from one of reflex action.
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以下のとおりお答えします。（すみませんが、最後の２つの段落については、正確に読解できたかどうかあまり自信がありません。） 反射作用（説）に関しては、その提案に対しても、明らかに意図的な調整（適応）であるのに、それを非精神的とする見方についても、大勢がこぞって反対しています。真実か捏造かの選択要素をテストする必要性があると思います。私たちがしているただ一つのテストは、表示された調整が、同じ刺激状況の下で恒常的に同じであるかどうかを尋ねることです。 反射作用に基づく調整動作と精神的知覚の伴った調整動作との間の唯一の相違は、以下のような構図になっています。すなわち、前者が、神経系内で遺伝的に持ち合わせる機構に依存して、特定の刺激に感応して特定の調整的動作の結果を生じるように構築されているのに対し、一方後者は、特殊状況の要求に対して、いかなる相続的調整にも依存せず独立している、ということです。 反射作用は、それに対する適切な刺激の影響下で、オペレーターの操作下にある機械の作動と比較され得るでしょう。すなわち、ある種の作動への動機が何らかの刺激を受け取るとき、機械全体が適切な作動に向けて動き出します。選択の余地はありませんし、不確実性の余地もありません。しかし、これらの（遺伝として）相続した機構はすべて、作動用に構築されているのに照応した刺激によって確実に影響されるのと同様、それまで常に作動してきたのとぴったり同じ仕方で、それは作動することでしょう。 しかし、意識の精神的調整が付随する場合はまったく異なります。なぜなら、「身体と心」の関係についての問題に踏み込むことなしで、あるいは、精神的調整の事例は、物理的刺激に基づいた心霊的連鎖の必然的な結果や相関関係にあるという意味において、実際に完全に機械的ではないかどうかの問いを待つまでもなく、反射的調整の定常的で予測可能な特徴から分離識別されるものとして、精神的調整の変幻かつ計量不能の性格を示すことで十分だからです。 実際、客体の意識中でこれが精神的調整だとし得るのは、所与の刺激状況において唯一可能な調整（現象）として、遺伝によって決定的に固定されているようなものではない種類の調整（現象）がそのすべてです。なぜなら、少なくとも動物の場合には、そこに調整に関する別の選択肢がなければ、その状況は反射作用のうちの1つと判別が不能でしょうから。 以上、ご回答まで。
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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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