260 POINTER READINGS 



more specialised attributes of consciousness.* But in 

 regard to my one piece of insight into the background 

 no problem of irreconcilability arises; I have no other 

 knowledge of the background with which to reconcile it. 

 In science we study the linkage of pointer readings 

 with pointer readings. The terms link together in endless 

 cycle with the same inscrutable nature running through 

 the whole. There is nothing to prevent the assemblage 

 of atoms constituting a brain from being of itself a 

 thinking object in virtue of that nature which physics 

 leaves undetermined and undeterminable. If we must 

 embed our schedule of indicator readings in some kind 

 of background, at least let us accept the only hint we 

 have received as to the significance of the background — 

 namely that it has a nature capable of manifesting itself 

 as mental activity. 



Cyclic Method of Physics. I must explain this reference 

 to an endless cycle of physical terms. I will refer again 

 to Einstein's law of gravitation. I have already ex- 

 pounded it to you more than once and I hope you gained 

 some idea of it from the explanation. This time I am 

 going to expound it in a way so complete that there is 

 not much likelihood that anyone will understand it. 

 Never mind. We are not now seeking further light on 

 the cause of gravitation; we are interested in seeing 



* For example, we should most of us assume (hypothetically) that 

 the dynamical quality of the world referred to in chapter v is characteris- 

 tic of the whole background. Apparently it is not to be found in the 

 pointer readings, and our only insight into it is in the feeling of "becom- 

 ing" in our consciousness. "Becoming" like "reasoning" is known to us 

 only through its occurrence in our own minds; but whereas it would be 

 absurd to suppose that the latter extends to inorganic aggregations of 

 atoms, the former may be (and commonly is) extended to the inorganic 

 world, so that it is not a matter of indifference whether the progress of 

 the inorganic world is viewed from past to future or from future to past. 



