THE ORIGINS OF MIND II9 



alike are beginning to see that life, instead of being explained 

 by matter and energy, will eventually give a fuller and more 

 understandable explanation of matter and energy and mind. 

 Some philosophers and scientists (Sinnott, Schrodinger, 

 Haldane, and Sullivan among the latter) think that organ- 

 ization is one of the major categories in nature and may 

 actually control matter, rather than arise from matter. These 

 thinkers feel that the centers of organization are primary 

 things, and that they may exist independently of the matter 

 in which they are now individualized. Schrodinger offers 

 the possibility that each is a part of a universal spiritual 

 whole. Haldane asserts that the conception of organism, 

 since it is more concrete than matter and energy concepts, 

 must ultimately be used in the interpretation of the physical 

 world— a biological conception turned to the use of physics. 

 In 1933, J. W. N. Sullivan concluded his work The Lhn- 

 itations of Science with this prediction: 



It is possible that our outlook on the physical universe will again 

 undergo a profound change. This change will come about through 

 the development of biology. If biology finds it absolutely necessary, 

 for the description of living things, to develop new concepts of 

 its own, then the present outlook on "inorganic nature" will also 

 be profoundly affected. For science will not lightly sacrifice the 

 principle of continuity. The richer insight into the nature of living 

 matter will throw the properties of dead matter into a new per- 

 spective. In fact, the distinction between the two, as far as may 

 be, will be abolished. ... In order to avoid a break of continuity 

 the notions of physics will have to be enriched, and this enrich- 

 ment will come from biologv. We can look forward to a further 

 synthesis. The science of mind, at present in such a rudimentary 

 state, will one dav take control. In the service of the principle of 

 continuitv its concepts will be extended throughout the whole of 

 nature. Onlv so will science reach the unitv towards which it is 

 aiming, and the difi^erences between the sciences of mind, life, and 

 matter, in their present form, will be seen to be unreal.* 



* J. W. N. Sullivan, The Limitations of Science (New York: New 

 American Library of World Literature, Inc., 1949), pp. 188-89. Origi- 

 nally published by Viking Press, Inc., 1933. 



