Part 33

Münsterberg’s fourth _Heft_ begins with studies in association. If _a_ and _b_ have been independently associated with _m_, can _a_ call up _b_ without the appearance in consciousness of _m_? The affirmative answer of common experience was confirmed by Scripture’s experiments. Associating five Japanese symbols with two series of five German words, he found that a word of one series tended (without conscious recollection of the Japanese symbol) to revive the particular word in the other series that had been associated with the same symbol. Münsterberg, after repeating and varying the experiment in a number of fields, denies that any such relation can be observed. He may very well be right on the question of facts. It is _a priori_ improbable that a transitory and arbitrary association of a meaningless symbol could modify appreciably the independent and accidental associative attractions of familiar words and presentations. The philosophic interpretation is another question. For our real knowledge it is a matter of indifference whether we fill out “missing links” with “_dunkel bewusst_,” “_unbewusst_,” or “cerebral processes that have no psychical correlates.” And yet how much of contemporary psychologising is a logomachy raging around just this question.

Münsterberg’s second series of experiments show clearly the part played by such missing links in perception. A word is called out just before a complicated picture is exhibited to the subject. He will usually perceive first in the picture some object naturally associated with the word, even though the word has aroused no conscious associations.

Similarly (III) a hastily seen misprinted word will be interpreted variously according to the associations of another word called out to the subject in advance.

Another series of experiments has for result that even the most commonly associated word-couples, as table and chair, have no fixed, unconditional associative attraction for each other in the same or in different minds, but that the unit of attraction is the “associative constellation.” This is only common sense, and artificial experiments will never reveal anything in this field that we cannot learn quite as well in the class room. “Table” will suggest “logarithm” if the boy is fresh from the class in trigonometry.

“The difference between men is in their principle of association” said Emerson long ago. Münsterberg, who has in his archives records of fifty thousand experiments in verbal associations, presents a table of the comparative frequency with which substantives are associated with superior (more general) or inferior class names, with adjectives or with verbs to which they stand in the relation of subject or of object. His chief result is that minds which associate a noun with its higher class name (_Ueberordner_) think of it as the subject of a verb and do not associate it with an adjective. The _Unterordner_ thinks of the noun as object of a verb and associates it with an adjective. The adjective, then, is not the higher class to which the substantive belongs, but a limitation of the substantive. The French, if they please, may use this conclusion to refute Spencer’s contention that “white horse” is a more natural order than _cheval blanc_.

The first topic in “memory studies” is the persistence in the psycho-physical mechanism of the disposition to an acquired automatic movement, even after the memory of the nerve has been seemingly displaced by the habit of its contrary. The experiments were trivial, such as shifting the position of an inkstand from right to left in alternate months, or wearing a watch alternately in the right or left fob. The result, a progressive diminution of the mistakes made after every change, may plausibly be explained by the stimulated attention and consequent care of the experimenter. The second topic treats of the effect of a time interval on the exactness of our memory of sensations of movement in eyes and limbs. The section on “chain reactions” is a methodological study of the various applications of this experimental method. “The influence of nervous stimulants on psychic activities” is rather interesting reading, but yields no important results. Alcohol depresses, tea and coffee heighten the powers of memory and perception for an hour or two after absorption. But the harmful effect of the alcohol sometimes passes away after the first hour. _Grössenschätzung_ is a study of our estimates of distances on a surface, made by passing the hand over it at arm’s length, at half arm’s length, etc. From experiments as to the estimate of absolute tone-distances (as distinguished from musical intervals) Münsterberg concludes that pure measurements are not possible with three tones only. Experiments with four tones do not, he says, confirm the law that distances corresponding to equal differences of vibration are felt as equal.

Physiologists have assumed that the symmetrical movement of the limbs as in swimming or rowing is the natural one; and the alternating or independent movements, as in walking or writing, are an acquisition involving inhibitions of the natural innervations. “Even in adult life,” says Professor James, “there is an instinctive tendency to revert to the bilateral movements of childhood.” Professor Münsterberg was led to doubt this view by observing the unsymmetrical motions of a baby in a warm bath, and experiment has confirmed his scepticism. Complicated joint motions of both hands (tracing circles or other geometrical figures on a surface) do not exhibit any tendency, when the attention is distracted, to assume the symmetrical form. They rather tend to compensate each other in such a way as to preserve equilibrium with the minimum strain on the other muscles of the body, and this law leads as often to alternating as to symmetrical movements of the arms or legs. The case is different of course with the muscles of the trunk, and may be different in birds, as it would in us if we spent our lives in swimming or rowing.

A new method of attacking the problem of localisation is to observe the effect of altering the circulation in different parts of the brain. Tentative experiments on one subject seem to show that verbal associations are readiest when the victim lies on his left side, which is a happy coincidence with the localisation of the speech centres in the left frontal convolutions. If these statistics can be trusted, it is inadvisable to undertake hard mental labor with the head hanging back over the edge of a chair!

In the last chapter, certain simple experiments in our estimates of voluntary movements in varying conditions of mind and body are made the basis of a far-reaching theory of pleasure, pain, and judgment, the elements of which can be found in Aristotle, Herbert Spencer, and James. Münsterberg found by repeated experiments that the accuracy of attempted reproduction of a fixed and familiar amount of centripetal or centrifugal movement of finger and thumb along a rod perpendicular to his waistcoat varied with his condition of fatigue, pleasure, or pain. In a pleasurable state of consciousness the centrifugal movement was exaggerated while the centripetal fell short. In pain the reverse relation obtained. Hence he infers a connection between pain and muscular flexion and pleasure and muscular extension, or rather, he distinguishes the mere sensation of pain (_Schmerz_) and pleasure (_Lust_) which may depend on integrations and disintegrations in the nerve-tissue, from the accompanying feelings of agreeableness (_Wollust_) or disagreeableness (_Unlust_) which are due to sensations aroused at the centres by movements of flexion and extension throughout the body. He thus attaches his special theory of pleasure and pain to Lange’s and James’s theory of the identity of the emotions with their bodily concomitants—though he protests against the metaphysical implications of the doctrine. The origin of the existing coördination of muscular flexions and extensions with pleasure and pain, he explains teleologically on the principles of the Spencerian psychology of evolution. He then proceeds, after Sigwart and Brentano, to revive the old idea of Aristotle (whom he does not mention) that the judgment (affirmative or negative) is rather the assumption of an attitude toward a presentation (_Stellungsnehmende Akte_) than a mere conjunction of presentations. The affirmative judgment is a faint incipient represented movement of the self towards a suggested conjunction of presentations. The negative judgment is a similar movement in the opposite direction. Ontogenetically these inchoate movements are later than the movements of acceptance or rejection called forth by a painful or pleasurable stimulus, and must therefore be treated as derivative phenomena. But the Kantians may derive some comfort from Münsterberg’s final assurance that he too believes that “_Erkenntnisstheoretisch das Urtheil primär ist_.”

PAUL SHOREY.

THE SPIRIT OF MODERN PHILOSOPHY. By _Josiah Royce_, Ph. D. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin & Co.

We are told by Professor Royce in the preface to this book, that we are indebted for it to the lady friend to whom it is gracefully dedicated, who asked him “for some account of the more significant spiritual possessions of a few prominent modern thinkers,” to be related “in comparatively brief and untechnical fashion.” The larger portion of the work is taken up with that subject, exhibiting the general growth of modern philosophical thought beginning with Spinozism, and terminating with Monism as the outcome of the doctrine of Evolution. The author’s purpose is constructive, however, as well as expository. He has his own philosophical creed, suggested by what he knows of the progress and outcome of modern thought, and the second portion of the work is the expression of his thoughts on the world-conception which he regards as embodying the true spirit of modern philosophy. Professor Royce justly lays stress on the fact that the theory of evolution is the product of a genuine and continuous growth. He dwells particularly, moreover, on the distinction between the _epistemological_ sense of idealism, which “involves a theory of the nature of our human knowledge,” and its _metaphysical_ sense, in which it is “a theory as to the nature of the real world, however we may come to know that nature.” It is in accord with the latter sense that Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, and their allies, as believing matter to be an expression of the world-spirit, are referred to as the idealistic school; and it is in the metaphysical and not the epistemological sense that the term idealism has been used since Hegel. The opposite of a metaphysical idealist is “one who maintains the ultimate existence of wholly unspiritual realities at the basis of experience and as the genuine truth of the world—such unspiritual realities for instance as an absolute ‘Unknowable,’ or, again, as what Hobbes meant by ‘Body.’” This is not, however, the view of the author, who thinks that the metaphysical idealist alone is in possession of a successful solution for the epistemological problem.

Professor Royce divides modern philosophy into three great periods, of which the first was one of pure and simple naturalism. The supernatural had then only a secondary interest, and thought was governed by three ideas—“that nature is a mechanism, that human reason is competent to grasp the truth of nature, and that, since nature’s truth is essentially mathematical, geometry is the model science, whose precision and necessity philosophy, too, must imitate.” During the second period of modern philosophy there was a gradual change of thought objectivity. Reason was still the instrument, but it was employed on the mind itself. It came to be recognised that if man is part of nature’s mechanism, he is a knowing mechanism. The age was, however, more than one of self-analysis. Rousseau introduced a sentimental tendency from which came “a revival of passion, of poetry, and of enthusiasm, whose influence we shall never outgrow.” To it is traceable the French Revolution which overthrew all the mechanical restraints of civilisation, and “demonstrated afresh to the world’s outer sense the central importance of passion in the whole life of humanity.”

The period of modern philosophy, which still continues, began with the publication of Kant’s “Critique of Pure Reason,” the essential doctrine of which is that man’s nature is the real creator of man’s world, that visible nature is the expression of the human spirit, the inner structure of which is therefore the deepest truth for us. This idea is “as old as deeper spiritual faith itself,” and yet it is the very soul of all our modern life because it is “the essentially humane view of reality.” For fifty years Kant’s ideas ruled philosophic thought, and then, through the progress of science, the doctrine of evolution received formulation, and confirmation and “external nature has once more gained for us an imposing authority which makes us in many ways sympathise afresh with the pure naturalism of the seventeenth century.” We are compelled to omit any account of the author’s study of the philosophies of Spinoza, Locke, and Berkeley, or the philosophic systems of Kant and his successors of the German School of Idealists. Nor can we say anything as to the doctrine of Evolution, which Professor Royce rightly regards as having had its rise long before Darwin or Herbert Spencer. Before proceeding to state his own views, the author takes a cursory glance at modern empirical monism which he affirms to be rather a suggestion than a philosophy. It is not surprising, therefore, that he is not content with it although he makes use of its ideas.

Let us now see what are the “Suggestions” which Professor Royce offers as his contribution towards the formation of a world-conception. These occupy the last four chapters of the work, which are supplemented by a general summary in the appendix, to the book. For the sake of conciseness we will make use of this summary, according to which there are two phases of idealistic doctrine, the Analytic Idealism of Berkeley and the Synthetic Idealism of Kant and his successors. The former shows that if the world is to be knowable at all, it must be, in its deepest nature, a world of ideas, that is, it exists “only in so far as beings with minds actually _know it to be_.” The objection that nobody can _know_ any reality beyond his own self, is met by the synthetic phase of idealism which shows us that “there is but one self in the world, the logos or world-mind. The _finite_ self knows truth beyond its own limitations, just because it is an organic part of the complete Self.” What are the demands of idealism as thus stated? They have relation, first, to the interpretation of the facts of experience, which must be in terms of the doctrine of the world-mind, and, secondly, to experience itself, on which we depend “for the revelation of that truth which, for us finite beings, must remain a fast ‘outer’ truth, just because it is the content of other mind than our own bits of selfhood, and is universally true for all intelligences.” The philosophy of experience having to do with facts and with the interpretation of facts, it is necessary to distinguish between what is really “outer” and what is “inner” about our finite experience. The former embraces the world of facts, and a fact is something which must be describable in some sort of universal terms. The principle of ordinary realism, “that you must not be sentimental or otherwise emotional in your account of the truth of things, but rather _exact in your descriptions of what things are_,” has a thoroughly idealistic justification. Not appreciation, but description gives us outer truth, and this is the characteristic presupposition of all natural science, which is concerned with the universal aspects of things, as opposed to momentary and transient aspects. That presupposition involves the assumption that the world is _essentially describable_. But as only the well-knit, the orderly, that which conforms to law, can be described science assumes the universality and rigidity of the laws of nature. It assumes further, since the most exact descriptions are possible only in the case of processes in Space and Time, of a mechanical type, that everything including man himself, is a part of nature’s mechanism. A closer analysis, however, shows that, as one can only describe what has been first appreciated, there must be universal types of appreciation, and therefore, that “Ideals must be deeper than Mechanism, so that, in order to be relatively describable, nature must embody purposes, and so be possessed of worth.” The author’s conclusion is that the natural order is also a moral order, and that therefore “the world of absolute self must appear to us as having two aspects, one a temporal, the other an eternal aspect, one of law and one of worth. Man then turns out to be at once a part of nature’s mechanism, and a part of the moral order; at once temporally determined and morally free.”

The final lecture presents the author’s views as to the solution of the problem of evil. Professor Royce believes that all evil is part of a good order, and hence he agrees with Hegel, who declared that life, however good, will always be restless, longing, suffering, and who gloried in the paradox as the very essence of spirituality; rather than with Schopenhauer, whose recognition, in another light, of the universality of the same truth led him to abandon all hope in life. The justification of the existence of an evil impulse comes just at the instant when it is hated and condemned. Thus “condemning and conquering the evil will, makes it part of a good will”; as pain and suffering have their compensation in their chastening effect on the spirit. But to the enlightened soul it is not so much the painfulness as “the blind irrationality of fortune that seems to drive God out of our thoughts when we look at our world.” It is the capriciousness of life, arising from human stupidity, that really makes it seem like an evil dream. What is the explanation of this caprice given by the author? It is to be found in the creed of his idealism, “This world is the world of the Logos.” It is “the suffering God, who is just our own true self, who actually and in our flesh bears the sins of the world, and whose natural body is pierced by the capricious wounds that hateful fools inflict upon him.” And as our defeats are his, so his triumph and his eternal peace are ours also.

Prof. Royce in making “only one more effort to define a ‘double-aspect’ theory of the relations of the physical and the moral and æsthetic worlds,” affirms that our philosophic insight teaches us that the world of matter in motion is simply an external aspect of the appreciable world, that is, of the world of the Logos. Of this, it is such an aspect “as can be expressed by finite consciousness in terms of the space and time forms, and of the categories of empirical science.... Consequently all its laws, all its necessity, its causation, its uniformity, belong, not to its inner nature as such, but to the external show of this nature.” That which actually appears to us is matter in motion, which furnishes the fact of the double aspect, the inner intelligibility of which fact is problematical to us, but not so for the Logos, who is our true Self, and who “completes the insight that for us is so fragmentary.” This true Self, the Logos, is the only Self, and with it the deeper self of man is identical. That this deeper self is “the self that knows in unity all truth,” is declared to be no hypothesis, and therefore the existence of the Infinite Self is perfectly sure. This Self “infinitely and reflectively transcends our consciousness, and therefore, since it includes us, it is at the very least a person, and more definitely conscious than we are; for what it possesses is self-reflecting knowledge.” Finally, the true world, that is the world of appreciation, is the system of the thoughts of the Logos, whose unity we know, just so far as we ourselves consciously and rationally enter into it and form part of it. Therefore “in so far as we have inner unity of thinking, in so far as we commune with our fellows, and in so far as we rightly see significance in the outer universe, we are in and of the world of appreciation that embodies the thought of the Logos.”

Ingenious as this theory is, and notwithstanding the elements of truth it possesses, we cannot accept it as conclusive. Its weakness is revealed in the last line of the paragraph just quoted. If only the world of appreciation embodies the thought of the Logos, what becomes of the world of fact? The latter is said to be the outer aspect of the former, a notion which is apparently derived from the association with man of body and mind. But the existence of mind, which we must understand by the term Logos, in nature, although declared by Professor Royce to be the only thing certain, is a mere inference, and even if the analogy of the human organism justifies such an inference; it would require that if priority has to be given to mind or matter in the universe it must be allowed to the latter. At birth a human being has no mind, properly so-called, since it is the result of the activity after birth of the organism, through the agency of the brain. It is true that the human body possesses from the first the elements of the mind, or rather of the feeling which thus exhibits itself; or, better still, the organic structure of which feeling is the general function. The utmost that can be properly asserted of the universe, therefore, is that it possesses a certain organic arrangement of its parts, and therewith such a condition of feeling, or, what in this relation would be a better term, sensitiveness, as is required by its organic character. In relation to such a state of things the terms thought, consciousness, reflection, have no meaning so far as we can judge. That organic aspect of the universe, moreover, leaves no room for duality. Just as the human organism constitutes a perfect unity, although it is made up of various organs and exhibits the properties attributed to both mind and matter, so must the universe be such a perfect unity whatever its nature and attributes. The human organism may, however, be strictly described as matter under organic conditions, a description which is equally applicable to the universe, without determining what those conditions are. Professor Royce objects to the Unknowable of Herbert Spencer, but there is very little practical difference between it and his own true Self, which, as the Absolute, is unknowable, although he is known in the inner self of man, as Spencer’s Unknowable is known in the human consciousness. Both Absolute and Unknowable are, however, merely names for Organic Nature, which is seen in all things visible and is known by all her operations. These are governed by the laws of her very existence, and it is the uniformity of which those laws are the expression which constitutes the moral law of the universe, the breach of whose eternal order, whether this is established in the world of matter or in the human mind, must be attended with consequences that are designated by man as evil. We find only a world of description, which is nevertheless one of moral order.