Juiy 21, 1916] 



SCIENCE 



87 



cussed otherwise. W. MacDougall ('11) 

 argues the ease for vitalism on the basis of 

 philosophical dualism. The dualistic as- 

 sumption appears to underlie the ' ' common 

 sense" argument advanced by Professor 

 Henderson. James Ward ('03) advocates 

 the case of vitalism on the basis of a critical 

 idealism (spiritualism). 



That Jennings ('14, p. 18) accepts the 

 postulate of materialism is clear from his 

 assertion that "when the set of phenomena 

 we call matter reaches a certain complexity, 

 it gives rise to this particular manifestation 

 that we call personality. ' ' In other words, 

 unconscious matter in the course of evolu- 

 tion produced consciousness. Before this 

 stage of material evolution consciousness 

 did not exist — there was no consciousness. 

 Matter exists before mind, but later gives 

 rise to consciousness as a quality of an 

 underlying substance. The real thing then 

 is matter which indeed once existed inde- 

 pendently of any consciousness at all. 

 Whether there were any consciousness or 

 not, matter would still persist. The real 

 organic individual -is the physical individ- 

 ual, and all its qualities — psychical and 

 other — are manifestations of this basic ma- 

 terial body. This tacit assumption was 

 presumably behind the declination of Jen- 

 nings ( '14) to accept the two classes of con- 

 scious experience mentioned above. 



Is the materialistic assumption non- 

 valid? Does its postulation by Jennings 

 prejudice the case of vitalism ? Is the case 

 of vitalism "ruled out of court" and com- 

 pletely subverted if the materialistic pos- 

 tulate is admitted? "Unquestionably it is. 

 For materialism (philosophical, not scien- 

 tific) is the one philosophy with which vital- 

 ism is wholly irreconcilable. To assume it, 

 therefore, is to deny vitalism (neo-vitalism) . 

 The case doesn't have to be tried at all. 

 But the whole contest which has been waged 

 by vitalism has been against materialism. 

 In opposing mechanism the vitalist has 



been "barking up the wrong tree." His 

 mistake has been due to the inexcusable 

 identification of mechanism with philo- 

 sophical materialism. Vitalism has no real 

 issue with mechanism — not at least with 

 mechanism as a scientific method of inter- 

 pretation of spatialized phenomena. But 

 with philosophical materialism as a postu- 

 late of science the vitalist may for the best 

 of reasons take issue. Therefore, as Paul 

 appealed to Casar and to the higher court 

 of Rome, the vitalist may with justice ask 

 for a continuation of his case in the higher 

 court of philosophy. 



What then is the philosophical standing 

 of the materialistic postulate ? What really 

 is basic to individuality (human personal- 

 ity) ? Of what are we more certain — of an 

 external world independent of conscious- 

 ness and consisting of atoms or electrons in 

 motion, or of a world of ideas, of purposes 

 and of emotions? We therefore are com- 

 pelled to consider the philosophical prob- 

 lem of reality and the case of vitalism be- 

 comes in the higher court of philosophy the 

 Case of Idealism (or Dualism) vs. Mate- 

 rialism. To this, the second point of the 

 topic under discussion, we may now turn 

 our attention. 



II. THE PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEM OP INDIVID- 

 UALITY IDEALISM (OE DUALISM) 



VS. MATERIALISM 



The problem which is now before us is the 

 central problem of philosophy — the prob- 

 lem of reality. Is the materialist correct in 

 holding that the organic individual (human 

 personality) is in reality an aggregate of 

 atoms or electrons which might exist inde- 

 pendently of consciousness? Is, therefore, 

 the formula for the individual B(w) ? 



Is the dualistic philosopher correct in as- 

 serting that the individual consists of two 

 realities — body and mind — which are not 

 only distinguishable in thought, but also 

 separate in reality, although united tern- 



