722 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



face of this significant admission, " is absolutely distinct from the non- 

 living world, and, instead of being a necessary outcome of it, is, com- 

 pared with the antiquity of matter, probably a very recent addition to 

 it not, of course, an addition of mere transformed or modified matter 

 and energy, but of transcendent power conferred on matter, by which 

 both matter and its forces are controlled, regulated, and arranged, ac- 

 cording, it may be, to laws, but not the laws of inert matter." This 

 additional agent is, of course, our old acquaintance the vital force. 

 Dr. Beale adds : " It may be freely admitted that, if we attribute to 

 vital power certain phenomena of the living world which have not 

 been, and can not be, explained or accounted for by any physical laws 

 yet discovered, we thereby assume an agency which we are unable to 

 isolate or demonstrate, and the existence of which we can not in any 

 way prove. On the other hand, it is only fair to observe that, if we 

 assume that phenomena peculiar to life will some day be explained by 

 physics, we certainly act in a manner which is not sanctioned by sci- 

 ence we assume, we prophesy ; and prophetic assumptions of every 

 kind are contrary to the spirit of science. . . . But is it not in accord- 

 ance with reason," he concludes, "to assume the existence of a pecul- 

 iar power to account for phenomena which are peculiar to living be- 

 ings, which differ totally from any known physical phenomena, and 

 which can not be imitated and is it not contrary to reason to proph- 

 esy that such phenomena will one day be explained by ordinary forces 

 or powers ? " Such is his statement of the case, and such the argu- 

 ment by which he supports his side of it. 



A few words, I think, will suffice to show the invalidity of the ar- 

 gument. The question, fortunately, hinges on a point which science 

 has determined definitively. 



A genuine hypothesis, in the scientific sense, is capable of proof or 

 disproof ; for an hypothesis capable of neither must always remain an 

 hypothesis, and, instead of leading to an explanation of phenomena, 

 serves to block the way to it. I may say here, parenthetically, that 

 too much verbal respect, as it seems to me, is usually paid by scientific 

 thinkers to assertions of this transcendent sort ; strictly speaking, an 

 assertion, of which it is said that it can be "neither proved nor dis- 

 proved," is disproved by denying it, for the denial, being of equal 

 validity with the assertion, nullifies it, leaving zero as the logical re- 

 sult, and an assertion reduced to zero is effectually disproved. But to 

 return. An unverifiable hypothesis, as incompetent to lead to cer- 

 tainty, has no reason of being ; and, consequently, science pronounces 

 it illegitimate. But the hypothesis of a vital force, Dr. Beale admits, 

 is unverifiable. It assumes " an agency," he owns, " which we are 

 unable to isolate or demonstrate, and the existence of which tee can not 

 in any way prove." It is, therefore, illegitimate on his own showing. 



Moreover, a genuinely scientific hypothesis does not assume an un- 

 known cause, much less an unknowable one, before the inadequacy of 



