LOGETIC CHARACTER OF GROWTH 63 



WEBER'S LAW IN PERCEPTIVE AND SOMATIC PROCESSES 



It is impossible for me to enter into a discussion at length of 

 the experiments which have been made on Weber's law in con- 

 nection with phenomena of growth. I will only say that the 

 rather general importance of this law, to which also van Wayen- 

 burg has called attention in his thesis, has been confirmed more 

 and more of late. 



That the stimulation, which can bring about a modification in 

 situation, forms a constant percentage of the already active in- 

 fluexces, has been shown by Pfeffer for chemotactic, by Massart 

 for heliotropic movements of seed. 



Regarding growth it is, of course, very difficult to show that 

 the general growth of a body, either of a plant or animal, experi- 

 ences arithmetical consequences of geometrically increasing in- 

 fluences, but the chemotropic researches of Miyoshi and the pho- 

 totropic researches of Miss Wisse, who examined molds, prove 

 that Weber's law holds for specially directed, tropistic phenomena 

 of growth, so that it seems that this law so important in percep- 

 tions is to be traced back in growth. 



SUMMARY 



In summing up the results of my considerations, I come to the 

 following conclusion : 



Different factors, which play a part in our conscious experience 

 or in the construction of our mental conceptions, as association, 

 memory, attention, and Weber's law, are conscious realizations 

 of general properties of life, which can be demonstrated equally 

 in the unconscious development of the body. 



In our thinking their influence is experienced directly or real- 

 ized by introspection (in perceptions by the results of certain 

 reflexes) ; in the growth of the body they appear however 'in 

 concrete' 



Mental life and bodily development are also related in this 

 respect that the unity of our being in both precedes external 

 influences, which influences in both cases activate a primary 

 'many-in-oneness' (ego). 



