Makch 24, 1899.] 



SCIENCE. 



445 



is iu principle replaced by the objectitying 

 view as soon as the experience of the sub- 

 ject is acknowledged as a series of psycho- 

 logical objects. 



But does this bankruptcy of all varieties 

 of apperception theories necessarily force us 

 back to the association theory? I do not 

 think so. The demand of the association 

 theory that every psj'chosis should be ac- 

 companied by a neiirosis cannot be given 

 up, but this neurosis may be thought in a 

 richer way than in the scheme of the asso- 

 ciationists. It seems to me, indeed, that 

 the physiological theory works to-day with 

 an abstract scheme with which no observa- 

 tion agrees. We do not know of a cen- 

 ti'ipetal stimulation which does not go over 

 into centrifugal impulses. The studies on 

 tonicity and actions of voluntary muscles, 

 on the functions of glands and blood vessels, 

 on tendon reflex centers, and so on, show 

 how every psychophysical state discharges 

 itself into centrifugal functions. And yet 

 these perceivable peripheral effects are, of 

 course, merely a small part of the centrif- 

 ugal impulses which really start from the 

 end stations of the sensory channel, as most 

 of them probably produce only new disposi- 

 tions in lower motor centers without going 

 directly over into movement, and others 

 may fade away in the unlimited division of 

 the discharge in the ramification of the sys- 

 tem. Those milliards of fibers are not 

 merely the wires to pull a few hundred 

 muscles ; no, the centrifugal sj^stem repre- 

 sents certainly a most complex hierarchy of 

 motor centers too, and the special final mus- 

 cle impulse is merely the last outcome of a 

 very complex cooperation of very many fac- 

 tors in the centrifugal system. Manifold as 

 the incoming nerve currents must be, thus, 

 also the possibilities of centrifugal dis- 

 charge, and the dispositions in the nervous 

 motor system determine the degrees in 

 which the ganglion cells can transform the 

 centripetal into centrifugal stimulation. It 



is thus not only the foregoing sensory pro- 

 cess, but in exactly the same degree also the 

 special situation of the motor sj'stem, its 

 openness and closeduess, which governs the 

 process in the center. Whether the special 

 efferent channel is open or plugged implies 

 absolutely different central processes in spite 

 of the same afferent stimulus. 



Here we have, then, a new factor on the 

 physiological side which is ignored in the 

 usual scheme that makes the psychical facts 

 dependent upon the sensory processes only 

 and considers the centrifugal action of the 

 brain as a later effect which begins when 

 the psychophysical function is over. There 

 is no central sensory process which is not 

 the beginning of an action too, and this cen- 

 trifugal part of the central process neces- 

 sarily varies the accompanying psychical 

 fact also. As here the action of the center 

 becomes the essential factor in the psycho- 

 physical pi'ocess, we may call this view an 

 action theory as over against the association 

 and apperception theories of the day. The 

 action theory agrees, then, with the asso- 

 ciationism in the postulate that there is no 

 psychical variation without variation on the 

 physiological side and with the appercep- 

 tionism in the conviction that the mere as- 

 sociation of sensory brain processes is in- 

 sufficient to play the counterpart to the 

 subjective variation of the psychical facts 

 as vividness and values of the sensations. 

 It tries to combine the legitimate points in 

 both views, and claims that every psychical 

 sensation as element of the content of con- 

 sciousness is the accompaniment of the 

 physical process by which a centripetal stim- 

 ulation becomes transformed into a centrif- 

 ugal impulse. 



This centi-al process thus clearly depends 

 upon four factors : firstly, upon the local 

 situation of the sensory track ; secondly, 

 upon the quantitative amount of the in- 

 coming current ; thirdly, upon the local 

 situation of the outgoing discharge ; and 



