Consciousness 

 Conservation 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



122 



GO 1 . CONSCIOUSNESS, CONTINUITY 



OF Individuality Endures through All Change 

 Sleep Does Not Sunder. When Paul and 

 Peter wake up in the same bed, and recog- 

 nize that they have been asleep, each one of 

 them mentally reaches back and makes con- 

 nection with but one of the two streams of 

 thought which were broken by the sleeping 

 hours. As the current of an electrode buried 

 in the ground unerringly finds its way to 

 its own similarly buried mate, across no 

 matter how much intervening earth, so 

 Peter's present instantly finds out Peter's 

 past, and never by mistake knits itself on to 

 that of Paul. Paul's thought in turn is as 

 little liable to go astray. The past thought 

 of Peter is appropriated by the present 

 Peter alone. He may have a knowledge, and 

 a correct one, too, of what Paul's last 

 drowsy states of mind were as he sank into 

 sleep, but it is an entirely different sort of 

 knowledge from that which he has of his 

 own last states. He remembers his own 

 states, whilst he only conceives Paul's. 

 .. . . This community of self is what the 

 time-gap cannot break in twain, and is why 

 a present thought, altho not ignorant of the 

 time-gap, can still regard itself as continu- 

 ous with certain chosen portions of the past. 

 . . . A " river " or a " stream " are the 

 metaphors by which it is most naturally de- 

 scribed. JAMES Psychology, vol. i, ch. 9, p. 

 238. (II. H. & Co., 1899.) 



602. CONSCIOUSNESS DEAD TO 



EVER-PRESENT FACT Sound Always in 

 the Ear Never Heard. It is a law of nerv- 

 ous stimulation that a continued activity 

 of any structure results in less and less 

 psychic result, and that when a stimulus is 

 always at work it ceases in time to have 

 any appreciable effect. The common illus- 

 tration of this law is drawn from the region 

 of sound. A constant noise, as of a mill, 

 ceases to produce any conscious sensation. 

 This fact, it is plain, may easily become the 

 commencement of an illusion. Not only may 

 we mistake a measure of noise for perfect 

 silence, we may misconceive the real nature 

 of external circumstances by overlooking 

 Mome continuous impression. SULLY Illu- 

 sions, ch. 4, p. 56. (A., 1897.) 



603. CONSCIOUSNESS DEPENDS ON 



CONTRAST An Unvarying Sensation Is Un- 

 perceived Incessant Ticking of Clock. It 

 is a familiar observation that an unvarying 

 action on any of our senses has, when long 

 continued, the same effect as no action at 

 all. We are not conscious of the pressure 

 of the atmosphere. An even temperature, 

 such as that enjoyed by the fishes in the 

 tropical seas, leaves the mind an entire 

 blank as regards heat and cold. The feeling 

 of warmth is not an absolute, independent, 

 or self-sustaining condition of mind, but the 

 result of a transition from cold; the sensa- 

 tion of light supposes a transition from 

 darkness or shade, or from a less degree of 

 illumination to a greater. To use a familiar 



illustration, a watchmaker is not conscious 

 of the unintermitted ticking of his clocks; 

 but were they all suddenly stopped, he 

 would at once become aware of the blank. 

 BAIN Mind and Body, ch. 4, p. 12. (Hum., 

 1880.) 



6O4. 



Enjoyment by Trans- 



ition Advantages of Wealth. People are 

 generally aware that the first shock of trans- 

 ition from sickness to health, from poverty 

 to abundance, from ignorance to insight, is 

 the most intense; and that, as the memory 

 of the previous condition fades away, so 

 does the liveliness of the enjoyment of the 

 change. Shakespeare speaks of the miser's 

 looking but rarely at his hoards for fear of 

 " blunting the fine point of seldom pleas- 

 ure " ; and makes the versatile Prince Hal 

 say that 

 " If all the year were playing holidays, 



To sport would be as tedious as to work." 

 The blessings of leisure, retirement, and rest 

 are pleasant only by contrast to previous 

 toil and excitement. The incessant demand 

 for novelty and change, for constant ad- 

 vances in wealth, in knowledge, in the ar- 

 rangements of things about us attest the 

 existence and the power of the law of rela- 

 tivity in all the provisions for enjoyment. 

 It is a law that greatly neutralizes one part 

 of the advantages of superior fortune, the 

 sense of the superiority itself, but leaves an- 

 other part untouched namely, the range, 

 variety, and alternation of pleasures. BAIN 

 Mind and Body, ch. 4, p. 12. (Hum., 1880.) 



605. CONSCIOUSNESS NOT A PROD- 

 UCT OF PHYSICAL FORCES Nature of 

 the Soul Still a Mystery (Eccl. Hi, 21). 

 Whence came the soul we no more know 

 than we know whence came the universe. 

 The primal origin of consciousness is hid- 

 den in the depths of the bygone eternity. 

 That it cannot possibly be the product of 

 any cunning arrangement of material par- 

 ticles is demonstrated beyond peradventure 

 by what we now know of the correlation of 

 physical forces. FISKE Destiny of Man, ch. 

 5, p. 42. (H. M. & Co., 1900.) 



606. CONSCIOUSNESS NOT EXPLI- 

 CABLE BY MECHANICAL OR MOLECU- 

 LAR THEORY We may even affirm that 

 the brain of man the organ of his reason 

 without which he can neither think nor feel, 

 is also an assemblage of molecules, acting 

 and reacting according to law. Here, how- 

 ever, the methods pursued in mechanical 

 science come to an end; and if asked to de- 

 duce from the physical interaction . of the 

 brain molecules the least of the phenomena 

 of sensation or thought, I acknowledge my 

 helplessness. The association of both with 

 the matter of the brain may be as certain as 

 the association of light with the rising of 

 the sun. But whereas in the latter case we 

 have unbroken mechanical connection be- 

 tween the sun and our organs, in the former 



