Psychophysical Dualism 129 



of fact to which appeal can be made if we would under- 

 stand them. So why do biologists speculate so much as 

 to the mode of transmission of variations, when the ques- 

 tion of the mode of use and development of them is so 

 generally neglected ? 



§ 3. Psychophysical Dualism 



The only additional point which I may claim a little 

 time to speak of is that to which Professor James 

 referred in describing the current doctrines of the rela- 

 tion of mind and body. He described the view that 

 consciousness does not in any way interfere with the 

 activities of the brain, as the 'automaton theory,' and 

 spoke as if in his mind a real automatism — the view 

 which considers the brain processes as the sufficient 

 statement of the grounds of all voluntary movement — 

 is the outcome of any denial of causal energy to con- 

 sciousness ; in other words, that there is no alternative 

 to what is called the epi-phenomenon theory of con- 

 sciousness except a theory holding that the law of con- 

 servation of physical energy is violated in voluntary 

 movement. 



Now this reduction of the possible views to two is, 

 in my view, unnecessary and indeed impossible. In 

 speaking of the antecedents of a voluntary movement 

 we have to consider the entire group of phenomenal 

 events which are always present when voluntary move- 

 ment takes place ; and among the phenomena really 

 present there is the conscious state called volition. To 

 say that the same movement could take place without 

 this state of consciousness is to say that a lesser group 

 of phenomenal antecedents occurs in some cases and a 



