PHILOSOPHICAL ASPECTS OF EVOLUTION 



inanimate and animate matter? To say that the phenomena of 

 life can be explained by physics and chemistry seems tan- 

 tamount to denying such a distinction. Yet, a more thorough 

 analysis will show us that there is a great distinction between 

 the two problems and it will also throw a new light on the 

 dispute between mechanicism and vitalism. 



Any dispute needs a common ground, a common assump- 

 tion, a common frame of reference without which the dispute 

 would lose its sense. Mechanicism and vitalism had in common 

 the assumption that, in principle, physics and chemistry are 

 capable of giving a complete understanding of the inanimate 

 material world. They argued about the question whether or 

 not these sciences could fully explain also the animate world. 



Mechanicism was convinced that they could, and vitalism 

 that they could not. According to the latter, there was a 

 mystery of life, unattainable by science. Both mechanicism 

 and vitalism agreed, therefore ,that if the phenomena of life 

 could be explained by chemistry and physics, the whole 

 mystery of life would be solved, for life would be reduced to 

 purely material principles without any mystery. 



The mistake in this line of thought lies in the starting-point 

 — namely, the assumption that physics and chemistry ade- 

 quately explain inanimate nature (for this very reason the 

 inanimate world is often called the physico-chemical world). 

 The assumption, however, is wrong in two ways. For the 

 object of physics and chemistry is, on the one hand, broader 

 than the inanimate world and, on the other, more limited. 

 Physics and chemistry are abstract sciences, which means that 

 their object is not the material world in its full concreteness, 

 but only certain aspects of that world. On the one hand, their 

 object is therefore not limited to inanimate nature, but animate 

 nature belongs to it also regardless of the problem whether 

 or not there is an essential distinction between them. On the 

 other hand, even the inanimate world can never be fully 

 explained by physics and chemistry. The correct evaluation 

 of the status of physics and chemistry as abstract sciences is, 

 therefore, of the greatest importance for the understanding of 

 the dispute between mechanicism and vitalism. 



Vitalism was not mistaken when it asserted that there is a 

 mystery of life, but it was wrong in the assumption it had in 



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