446 INTRODUCTION TO PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE 



brings his instruments and begins to explore. What does he 

 find? Merely atoms, electrons, and fields of force, all ar- 

 ranged in a spatio-temporal system. His knowledge of think- 

 ing proves to be just like his knowledge of inorganic objects. 

 If he explores further he finds only such things as energy, 

 temperature, and entropy — none of which proves to be 

 thinking itself. What, then, is to be done with thought? Is 

 it to be waved aside as an illusion? There seems to be no 

 reason for this. For there is nothing in his knowledge of 

 atoms that makes it impossible for them to be at the same 

 time thinking objects. Science does not talk about the in- 

 trinsic natures of things. An atom is a schedule of pointer 

 readings. Presumably, however, it is not merely a schedule 

 of pointer readings. There must be some unknown back- 

 ground to which the symbol is attached. Now in the case of 

 introspective knowledge I know what this background is. 

 It is precisely that spiritual nature which I discover when I 

 examine thinking independently of science. Hence the two- 

 fold character of my knowledge of my own thinking permits 

 me to fill in the scheme of pointer readings with a definite 

 content. This content is something which may be called 

 "mind' or "consciousness." ! One might almost say that 

 modern science "had deliberately left room for the reality 

 of spirit and consciousness." 2 



The character of the inference can now be clearly seen. 

 It is analogical. Both mind and nature are such as to be 

 describable through metrical symbols; but mind is also such 

 as to be describable in qualitative terms; hence nature is 

 susceptible of a similar description. Nature, therefore, may 

 be presumed to be like mind in its essential stuff. But our 

 knowledge of this realm is not merely analogical, since we 

 are immediately acquainted with it in the mystic experience. 

 Hence we know it both indirectly and directly. 



The nature of the inferred realm is thereby determined. 

 The 'stuff' of the world is mind-stuff. 3 Just what this 



1 Ibid., pp. 258-259. 2 New Pathways in Science, p. 320. 



3 Nature of the Physical World, p. 276. 



