THE PROSPECTS OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 



that he takes such a statement literally; but his faithful 

 and devout parishioners are expected to do so, and many 

 of them do. 



Now the progress of modern science has consisted essen- 

 tially in replacing mystical spiritistic causes of phenomena 

 by real, natural ones. While there were many adumbrations 

 of the modern realistic view, it was not until the findings 

 of Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton showed the universe 

 in the large to be self-sufficient and self-regulating that a 

 really mortal blow was dealt to any considerable part of the 

 ancient view. A few daring minds thereafter dreamed of 

 the extension of the idea of natural causation to all phe- 

 nomena. Nevertheless, not much impression was made 

 upon popular thought until Darwin gave a naturalistic 

 explanation of the origin of man and placed him definitely 

 within the system of animate nature. 



Since then the spread of scientific presumptions has been 

 rapid. Psychology not only has failed to find any trace of a 

 human soul in the traditional sense; but, just as biology 

 and biochemistry have shown life to be not a thing but a 

 form of functioning or behavior, so psychology finds mind 

 to be not a something but the functioning or behavior of 

 highly organized and coordinated neurological systems. 

 Likewise the ethnologist and sociologist find in tribe and 

 nation purely naturalistic groupings of men, and in moral 

 codes, man-made rules of behavior enforced by group 

 authority and differing with social history and circum- 

 stance. Nevertheless, the logic of scientific concepts, of 

 universal causation, and evolutionary naturalism has 

 only begun to penetrate the basic assumptions of popular 

 thought regarding moral conduct and social destiny. 

 While it would be thought wholly incongruous to pray for 

 a change in the location of the heavenly bodies, multi- 

 tudes still think that prayer and candle-burning will alter 

 the hereditary endowment of a prospective child, cause 



[29] 



