346 SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY OF THE ORGANISM 



The History of the Individual 



But might we not find something like a teleological 

 unity in the elements of the historical process, in the life 

 of the single human individual ? Is there anything like 

 unity or purposefulness in rny own life and in your life, the 

 word life to be understood here as the sum of all, or at least 

 part of all, that has happened to you ? I believe that all of 

 us have a certain amount of experience inclining us to give 

 an affirmative answer to this question but I doubt if it is 

 strong enough to be considered as a scientific fact as certain 

 as Newton's law of gravitation. That degree of certainty, 

 however, would be necessary. 



Phylogeny 



As to a " phylogeny ' or history of the different forms 

 of the Living in general, we have confessed that we 

 know absolutely nothing, except that " Darwinism ' and 

 " Lamarckism ' are equally unable to solve the problem. 

 There may be a real reXo? to be attained in phylogeny, but 

 there may also be autonomy in phylogeny, and yet the 

 pedigree of the organisms may be a mere cumulation and 

 not a real teleological constellation. 1 Of course, the reXo? 



of possibility objective and subjective possibility as such is, of course, 

 beyond the scope of these lectures, and so is the analysis of the relation of 

 "possibility" to the concepts of determination iu general and freedom 

 (comp. Max Weber, Archiv f. Sozialwiss. 22, p. 143). I only say here that 

 from the highest point of view there is not much room for objective " possi- 

 bility " at all, either in the face of mere causality or in the face of "individu- 

 ality," since both of these are subclasses of determination at least in the 

 objective sphere (comp. page 304). 



1 Comp. vol. i. page 30.^. Bergson, in his Devolution creatrice, also 

 advocates an autonomous but endless phylogeny. 



