Part 18

In this final essay on the philosophy of Proudhon, M. Sorel considers the theory of justice by the light of the notion of free will. He differs somewhat from Proudhon, and affirms that “the just man is the upright man such as our ideal conception of antiquity represents him to us, but transformed by our consciousness as refined by the influence of Christianity.” In dealing with the real organisation of societies it is necessary to distinguish between matters of justice and those of right, which includes that of force, of which war is an application. After showing the connection of the economic _contradictions_ of Proudhon with the state of war, and the value of education for the realisation of equilibrium in the state. M. Sorel affirms that education ought to be based on manual labor, for the explanation of which science should be taught; and that instruction should endure throughout life, so that men can elevate themselves and that an equilibrium may be obtained between knowledge and industrial needs. (Paris: Félix Alcan.)

Ω.

APPENDIX.

PLATES BELONGING TO THE ARTICLE “THE NERVOUS GANGLIA OF INSECTS.”

KEY TO THE PLATES.

col. ven.—ventral column. lob. dors.—dorsal lobe. lob. ven.—ventral lobe. lob. v. inf.—inferior or lower ventral lobule. lob. cr.—crural lobule. con. dors. sup—superior (or upper) dorsal connective filaments. con. dors. moy.—medial dorsal connective filaments. con. dors. inf.—inferior (or lower) dorsal connective filaments. con. v.—ventral connective filaments. n. cr.—crural nerve. n. al.—alary nerve. lob. al.—alary lobule. rac. sup—upper (or superior) root. rac. moy.—medial root. rac. inf.—lower (or inferior) root. fa. as.—ascending fasciculus.

VOL. III. JANUARY, 1893. NO. 2.

THE MONIST.

THE DOCTRINE OF AUTA.

In the “Scientific Proceedings of the Royal Dublin Society” (Vol. VI, Part IX, p. 475, 1890), Dr. Johnstone Stoney, F. R. S., published an interesting and carefully-reasoned paper “On the Relation between Natural Science and Ontology.” The same author had previously (1885), in a Friday evening discourse at the Royal Institution of London, discussed the problem, “How Thought Presents Itself Among the Phenomena of Nature.” Dr. Stoney’s communications have not (I venture to think) received the consideration to which they are entitled alike on the score of their logical consistency, if his premisses and assumptions be granted, and by reason of the author’s scientific eminence as a physicist. I therefore propose, first, to endeavor to set forth his monistic _Doctrine of Auta_; and secondly, to offer some criticisms thereon. Unfortunately Dr. Stoney’s pages bristle with new technical terms, which, though no doubt they have been serviceable to him in the attainment of precision of thought, make his paper hard reading. Some of these I shall introduce; others which seem less essential to the argument I shall omit. It would be scarcely fair on the reader’s teeth or on the author’s store to transfer all these hard nuts from Dublin to Chicago.

No philosophical discussion of a problem involving perception can be regarded as complete without the introduction of an orange. Dr. Stoney, indeed, substitutes a fire; but this, though it shows philosophical independence, cannot for a moment be sanctioned by any good Berkeleyan. An orange then, as such, is a phenomenal object formed, in a way we need not now consider, by the synthesis of perceptions. These perceptions, themselves synthetic, Dr. Stoney calls “tekmeria,” since they are signs within my mind that events are happening in a part of the universe that is distinct from my mind. The phenomenal object is supposed by men untrained in inquiries relating to the mind to have a non-egoistic existence—that is, an existence independent of the percipient mind. But this supposition is found on careful scrutiny to be an error. It is a product of mental synthesis, and is therefore termed by Dr. Stoney a “syntheton.” It is also termed a “protheton” in contradistinction to an “antitheton,” which we shall come to shortly.

Now if the phenomenal orange is a “syntheton”—that is, a product of perceptual synthesis—it clearly cannot be regarded as the _cause_ of the perceptions, through and by means of which it is constructed in mental synthesis. Here popular thought and ordinary language are apt to mislead us. For ordinary language is throughout built upon the popular belief that the objects of the phenomenal world are non-egoistic or independent _existences_, and, moreover, that they are the cause of the perceptions which come into existence when we exercise our senses. This is, however, “to put the car before the horse.” It is to imagine that a structure built up out of the effects of a thing can be the cause of those effects. The phenomenal orange is built up of perceptions instead of being the cause of them. Their cause is therefore to be sought elsewhere than in the phenomenal world of objects. The orange, _qua_ orange, is therefore a “syntheton,” and cannot as such be the cause of the perceptions or “tekmeria,” which go to its synthesis.

Let us now look at these perceptions or “tekmeria” from another point of view. They are states of consciousness: they are _thoughts_, if we use this word in its widest extension to embrace everything of which I or my fellow-men or the lower animals are conscious. But my own thoughts are, so long as they last, things that exist. They may be representative of something outside me, but they _are_ also _real existences_. While they last they constitute a part of the universe of existing things. They are, in Dr. Stoney’s terminology, _auta_ (τά ὄντα αὐτά), the very things themselves. An _auto_ (we shall throughout _italicise_ all that belongs to this autic order of existence) is a _thing which really exists_, and in no wise depends on the way we, human minds, may happen to regard it. Our impressions or beliefs about it may be correct or may be erroneous; but the term _auto_ means the _thing itself_.

Perceptions, then, inasmuch as they are thoughts, are _auta_. They belong, moreover, to that class of real existences which, since they are woven into the tissue of _minds_ (my mind and the minds of my fellow-men and of the lower animals) are termed _egoistic auta_. They do not remain, however, persistent and unchanged; for perceptions come and go and are modified as they pass like waves over the surface of consciousness. What causes this coming and going, and these changes in the _egoistic auta_ we call perceptions? Not, as we have already seen, the world of phenomenal objects! What then, but other _auta_, which, since they produce effects upon men’s minds through their senses, may be termed _sense-compelling auta_? The phenomenal orange is thus a “syntheton” produced through a synthesis of the effects wrought upon my _mind_ by an autic existence, called by Mr. Stoney the _onto-orange_. The phenomenal orange is, as we have seen, a “protheton”; the _onto-orange_ is its _antitheton_ in the universe of real existences.

We are now beginning to open up Dr. Johnstone Stoney’s conception of the relation of the autic _universe_ to phenomenal Nature. Nature is the totality of phenomenal objects; but corresponding with each phenomenal object or “protheton” there is an _onto-object_ or _antitheton_; and the totality of _antitheta_ constitute the _universe_. _Minds_, mine and those of other beings, constitute the egoistic part of the universe; the rest of the universe is constituted by _sense-compelling auta_.

We may liken the _sense-compelling universe_ to a great machine in motion, and the _tekmeria_ or perceptions which it produces within our minds to shadows cast by it. The laws of the movements of the machine are the real laws of the universe—laws of nature are but the laws of the changes which the shadows in consequence undergo. It is these shadow laws alone which natural science can reach: the real laws of the _universe_ of which these are shadows are beyond its grasp. In Nature the reflective eye of science sees not only phenomenal objects, but the relations which they bear to each other. But such relations are themselves phenomenal; they are protheta of which the _onto-relations_ of the real _universe_ are the _antitheta_. Every space-relation, therefore, in Nature—for instance, that my foot is at present three yards from the fender—has a real autic relation in the sense-compelling _universe_, which is its _antitheton_; an _onto-relation_ between the _onto-foot_ and _onto-fender_, meaning by these terms the _auta_ which send men the tekmeria which, when synthesised, furnish these two phenomenal objects. The space-relations of Nature are but the shadows cast by the _autic relations_ within the _minds_ of men, and perhaps some other animals.

But among these shadows there can be no efficient causation. When a change takes place in the sense-compelling _universe_, the mighty machine will cast one shadow before the change and another after. The second shadow will accordingly succeed the first in orderly sequence, but the relation between the shadows is not the relation of cause and effect. Accordingly, in the laws of Nature which have been discovered by scientific investigation, we find abundant instances of unfailingly concomitant events and of uniformities of sequence, but not one single instance of cause and effect. There is nothing competent to cause one body to exclude another from the space it occupies. A statement of the fact is one of the laws of Nature. If a stone be allowed to drop in the vicinity of the earth, its downward speed is accelerated by a perfectly definite law. This law is one of the Uniformities of Nature which scientific inquiry has brought to light. But within the domain of Physics there is no cause of acceleration. The facts as to what occurs in Nature can be observed; the circumstances under which they occur can be investigated; similar cases can be compared; and the laws to which the simultaneous or successive events conform may be brought to light. But here our knowledge ends. Physical science has said its utmost.

Now all this is changed when we turn to the only field of observation accessible to us in which we are dealing directly with _auta_. The _thoughts_ of which _I_ consist, the thoughts which are my _mind_, are _auta_; a very small group of _auta_, no doubt, in the mighty _Universe_, but still an actual sample, though a very special and one-sided sample of what _auta_ really are. Now in the operations that go on in my mind I do find instances, some few instances, of causes producing effects. The familiar case of a geometrical demonstration producing in a man’s mind a belief in the truth of the conclusion is a case in point. Here the understanding of the proof is the efficient cause of the belief in the conclusion which accompanies that understanding. A wish to accomplish something, and a knowledge of how to go about it, both of which are _thoughts_ in the _mind_, are a part of the efficient cause of subsequent events, unless counteracted by other causes. A few other examples can be obtained from the same small field of observation; and this is all that man, in his isolated position, has any right to expect; for the bulk of his thoughts are due, at least in large part, to autic causes which lie outside his mind, and it is there also that those of his thoughts that are known to be causes, usually exhibit their effects. When perceptions arise in my mind, the effect indeed is within my mind, but the cause is beyond it; and when I move my muscles the cause is within my mind, but it is outside the mind that it operates. The instances are indeed few where the causes and the effects are both within my tiny group of _auta_, and it is only in these cases that I can have the process of causes producing effects under my inspection.

But since cases can be cited, however few, they suffice to establish the fact that the relation of cause and effect, in its full sense, does exist in some instances in the autic _universe_; whereas it has nowhere any place within the domain of physical science. The relation of cause and effect among other _auta_ cannot from the nature of the case be proved. But from its occurrence in that small part of the _universe_ which we do know, we may fairly assume its occurrence in all parts of that _universe_. Such an assumption is at any rate justifiable by scientific method.

We must now pass to another point. The scientific analysis of Nature by the physicist has led to an hypothesis which may be regarded as the utmost simplification of which the shadows cast within the human mind by the sense-compelling autic _universe_ are susceptible. This Dr. Stoney calls the Diacrinomenal Hypothesis; according to which Nature is made up of objects each of which consists of almost inconceivably minute and swift motions. The phenomenal orange is a group of molecular motions; and if I bowl it across the table the visible molar motion is a secondary motion of that group of primary molecular motions which constitutes the phenomenal object as such. And not only is the phenomenal object a group of minute and swift motions, but all the steps between that object and our brain, all that takes place in the air or æther, in our organs of sense and nerves, can also be represented in terms of motion. And finally a change consisting of motions takes place in the brain itself, whereupon we become conscious of thought. That change which would be appreciated as motions by a bystander who could search into our brains while we are thinking, we should experience to be _thought_. Thus we find that in certain cases the _autic existence_ that corresponds with motion, namely in the motions of our own brain molecules, is _thought_. And the most probable hypothesis as to the true relation of phenomenal Nature and the autic _universe_ is that what we have found to be true in some cases is always true, and that in every case it is _thought_ (or rather a change in the causal relation in which thought stands to thought) which is the _antitheton_ of motion; so that the totality of all actual existences, the _universe_, is in fact identical with the totality of existing _thought_. Of course all this _thought_, with the exception of that tiny group that is my _mind_, is as much outside my consciousness as are the thoughts of my fellow-men and of the lower animals.

Under this view the _minds_ of men and of other animals are specialised specks, as it were, of a vast ocean of _thought_, to which they bear a like inconspicuous proportion to that borne by the few brain motions of which they are the _antitheta_, to the totality of motions throughout Nature. Under this view the laws of the _universe_ are the laws of _thought_. This is a very different thing, be it noted, from saying that they are the laws of human thought. The laws of human thought bear to them the same small proportion which the laws of the action of the wheels of a watch upon one another bear to the entire science of dynamics. The science of dynamics could never be evolved from a study of these laws. But perhaps it may not be hopeless for man to attain some sound knowledge of the laws of cosmic _thought_, inasmuch as we have some few instances of the way _thought_ acts upon _thought_ open to our investigation in our own minds, and since this is supplemented by our knowledge of the physical laws of nature, which are a shadow, a probably complete shadow, of all the laws of causation which operate throughout the _universe_, throughout the all-embracing _Mind_ of the great _Autos_.

Such is Dr. Johnstone Stoney’s conception of the relation of Natural Science to Ontology. I have presented it partly in his own words, partly in mine. It has been my conscientious endeavor to put it in as strong and favorable a light as possible, and not in any way to weaken the strength of its logical consistency. The main thesis may now be briefly summarised in the following propositions:

The phenomenal object is a syntheton or product of mental synthesis.

Its efficient cause is a _real existence_ or _antitheton_.

Nature is the totality of phenomenal syntheta.

The _universe_ is the totality of autic _antitheta_.

There is no causation in Nature; but the Uniformities of Nature are the shadows of the causal Laws of the Universe.

_Thought_ has no place in Nature: it is part of the autic _universe_.

The syntheton of which _thought_ is the _antitheton_ is the motion of brain molecules.

It is a probable hypothesis that the _antitheta_ of which the motions of Diacrinomenal Nature are the syntheta, are _thought_.

This is the monistic hypothesis, that there is but one kind of existing thing, viz. _thought_; in contradistinction to the dualistic hypothesis that there are two kinds of existing things, _thought_ and _motion_.

I now pass from the attitude of expositor to the attitude of critic. And first I will attack a quite outstanding position, namely Dr. Stoney’s assumption that Clifford’s hypothesis which he supports and extends is _the_ monistic hypothesis, and by implication that it is the _only_ monistic hypothesis. In opposition to this I venture to affirm that there are several forms or phases of monism. I have not space to discuss the matter; and must content myself with a bare enumeration of some of the logically possible forms of Dualism and of Monism.

1) DUALISM.

_A._ _Synthetic Dualism_: according to which there are two entities, the mind and the body; and these

_a_) either work side by side, without interaction, in pre-established harmony (_philosophic dualism_),

_b_) or interact the one on the other (_empirical dualism_).

_B._ _Analytic Dualism_: according to which there are two elements as the result of analysis; _motion_ (with or without a material basis) and _consciousness_; the two elements being related in such a way that consciousness is inseparably associated with certain complex modes of motion.

2) MONISM.

_A._ _Synthetic monism_: according to which there is but one entity. And this entity may be:

_a_) The body, of which consciousness is a product (_materialistic or physical monism_);

_b_) The mind, of which the body in common with the world of phenomena is a fiction (_idealistic monism_);

_c_) The conscious organism, exhibiting certain transformations of energy which are felt as psychical states (_scientific monism_).

_B._ _Analytic monism_: according to which analysis discloses but one element; and this may be

_a_) _motion_, of which (or of one phase of which) consciousness is merely the psychical aspect (_analytic materialism_);

_b_) _consciousness_, of which motion is merely the phenomenal aspect (_analytic psychism_);

_c_) _x_ (_the unknowable_) of which motion is the physical aspect and consciousness the psychical aspect (_monistic agnosticism_).

Such are some of the forms or phases of monism as compared with those of dualism. It will be seen that Dr. Johnstone Stoney’s speculations fall under the head of what I have termed analytic psychism, according to which the sole ultimate reality disclosed by analysis is consciousness or thought. So far I have only reminded my readers that this, though one form of monism, is not the only form. To which Dr. Stoney may very possibly reply that it matters not to him whether there are five or fifty-and-five monistic heresies besides the true creed of which he is the prophet. He is only concerned with the establishment of the true monistic faith. And as herein I should very heartily agree with him, I will pass on without delay to criticise an assumption that lies close to the heart and centre of his hypothesis.

On the first page of Dr. Stoney’s essay we read: “Let us, for convenience, call these real existences _auta_—the very things themselves. An _auto_ is a thing that really exists, and in no wise depends on the way we, human minds, may happen to regard it.” And on the second page we read: “My own thoughts are, at all events, things that exist: they at least are _auta_ so long as they last. They are, accordingly, while they last, a part of the _universe of existing things_.” No proof is offered of this latter assumption that my thought, human thought, is part of the universe of _auta_. I venture to call this assumption in question. I demand proof of its validity. Nay, I am ready to go further and roundly assert that my thoughts are not _auta_, and furnish no evidence whatever as to the nature of such _auta_. I am quite aware that I may seem to be giving the lie to a direct deliverance of consciousness; and that it will be said that it is obviously impossible to deny the existence of thought without at the same time exercising that, the existence of which is denied—a dictum which contains a very pretty play upon two different uses of the word “existence.”

I go back to the orange, without which as a philosopher I am lost. I hold it in my hand, look steadfastly at it, and drink in with my nostrils its fragrant aroma. What says consciousness? That the phenomenal object I call an orange exists. It says nothing about independent existence, nothing about _auta_. The direct deliverance of consciousness is that an object-in-consciousness exists. If a “plain man” says that the orange has a real existence, as such, independent of consciousness, he is going beyond the direct deliverance. And if a philosopher says that consciousness has a real existence, as such, independent of the object, he too is going beyond the direct deliverance. And if, as would seem to be the case, Dr. Stoney relies on the deliverance of consciousness for the justification of his statement that “perceptions, while they last, are _auta_, real existences,” I submit that he is relying on a misinterpretation of the deliverance of consciousness.

The existence of the object-in-consciousness is the datum from which plain man and philosopher alike must start. On this foundation we must base all our reasonings and speculations. Physical science directs its attention to the “object” side of the given relation. And it reaches its “diacrinomenal” result that the orange may for physical purposes be represented as a group of swift and rapid molecular motions. But can physics at any stage of its analysis shake itself free from the “consciousness” side of the relation? Assuredly not. All that it can do is to represent the object-in-consciousness we call an orange in terms of other objects-in-consciousness we term molecular motions. Psychology directs its attention to the “consciousness” side of the given relation. It analyses the object-in-consciousness into percepts, sensations, and so forth. But can psychology at any stage of its analysis shake itself free from the “object” side of the relation? Assuredly not. All that it can do is to represent the consciousness-of-the-object we call an orange, in terms of the objects-in-consciousness we term sensations, relations between sensations, and so forth.