284 SCIENCE AND THE HUMAN MIND 



many changes go on in various organs, to be repre- 

 sented ultimately by combinations and recombina- 

 tions among the atoms and molecules of the different 

 chemical elements which make up his frame. To the 

 physicist he illustrates processes such as osmosis or 

 electrolytic conduction, and the atoms of the chemist 

 are resolved into corpuscles or electrons, the vibrations 

 of which emit the electromagnetic radiation known as 

 radiant heat. By the physiologist he is resolved into 

 a collection of cells, and the changes studied by the 

 physicist and chemist are considered in their bearing 

 on the general life of the organism. To the anthropolo- 

 gist and zoologist the man is an individual of a certain 

 race which can be placed in its due class among the 

 other races of men and amid the long sequence of 

 geological specimens of other animals. To the psy- 

 chologist the man is primarily a mind, and his typical 

 product is a thought. To his doctor he is an obscure 

 and ill-understood piece of machinery, mechanical, 

 chemical and psychological ; while to his vicar he is 

 essentially an immortal soul to be saved or lost. 



Each action of the man may be dealt with from 

 many points of view. One of his thoughts to the 

 parson may be a sin, to the psychologist an illustration 

 of the effect of suggestion, to the physiologist a func- 

 tion of the grey matter of his brain, while to the 

 physicist and chemist the thought may be represented 

 by electrical or chemical changes in those cerebral 

 cells. 



In the present state of science, it is impossible 

 to say that any one of these aspects is more funda- 

 mental than the others, even if we reduce them to the 

 three main aspects of physics, biology and psychology. 



