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SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. IX. No. 221. 



fourthly, upon the quantitative amount of 

 the discharge. The first two factors are, of 

 course, determined by the incoming current, 

 which can be replaced by an inti-acortical 

 stimulation from an associated center, while 

 the last two factors are determined by 

 the dispositions of the centrifugal sj'stem. 

 The association theory, which considers 

 the first two factors alone, thinks them 

 parallel to the kind and sti'eugth of the 

 sensation. The action theory accepts this 

 interpretation and adds that the two other 

 factors determine the values and the 

 vividness of the sensation — the values par- 

 allel to the local situation of the discharge, 

 the vividness to the openness of the cen- 

 ti'ifugal channel, and thus to the intensity 

 of the discharge. 



If the centrifugal discharge is inhibited, 

 the channel closed, then the sensory process 

 goes on as before, but the impression is un- 

 vivid, unperceived, while it may become 

 vivid later as soon as the hindrance of the 

 discharge disappears. The inhibition of 

 ideas which remains unexplainable to the 

 associationists would then mean that a 

 special path of discharge is closed, and thus 

 the idea which needs that discharge for its 

 vividness cannot come to existence ; the 

 hj^notizer's words, for instance, close such 

 channels. Only discharges, actions, can be 

 antagonistic and thus under mutual inhibi- 

 tion ; ideas in themselves may be logically 

 conti'adictory, but not psychologically, while 

 one action makes the antagonistic action, in- 

 deed, impossible, and the inhibition of ideas 

 results merely from the inhibition of dis- 

 charges. If this view is correct it is clear 

 that while we strictly deny the existence 

 of special innervation sensations we can 

 now say that every sensation without excep- 

 tion is physiologically an innervation sensa- 

 tion, as it must have reached some degree 

 of vividness to exist psychologicallj' at all. 



With regard to the local situation of the 

 motor discharge the mauifoldness of pos- 



sibilities is evident. The channels may be 

 closed in one direction, but open in others ; 

 the actually resulting discharge must be 

 the product of the situation in the whole cen- 

 trifugal system, with its milliards of rami- 

 fications, and the same sensory stimulus 

 may thus under a thousand different condi- 

 tions produce a thousand different centrifu- 

 gal waves, all, perhaps, with the same in- 

 tensit}\ The vividness would then be 

 alwaj's the same, and yet the difference 

 of locality in the discharge must give new 

 features to the psychical element. A few 

 cases as illusti-ations must be sufficient. 

 We may instance the shades of time-direc- 

 tion ; the same idea may have the subjec- 

 tive character of past, present and future. 

 It corresponds to three types of discharge : 

 the discharge which does not include action 

 on the object any more appears as past ; that 

 which produces action as present, and that 

 which prepares the action as future. In 

 this group belong also the feeling tones : the 

 pleasurable shade of feeling based on the 

 discharge towards the extensors ; the un- 

 pleasant feelings based on the innervation 

 of the flexors. Here belong the differences 

 between mere perception and apperception, 

 as in the one case the discharge is deter- 

 mined by the impression alone, in the other 

 case by associations also. Here belong 

 the characteristics of the abstract concep- 

 tion which may be represented by the 

 same sensational qualities which would 

 form a concrete idea and yet has a 

 new subjective tone because the cen- 

 trifugal discharge is for the concrete idea 

 a specialized impulse, for the conception a 

 general impulse which would suit all objects 

 thought under the conception. Here be- 

 longs, also, the feeling of belief which 

 characterizes the judgment ; the judgment 

 differs psj^chophj^sically from the mere idea 

 in the fact that the ideas discharge them- 

 selves in a new tonicity, a new set of the 

 lower motor centers, creating thus a new 



