844 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XL. No. 1041 



ment of a particle from a straight line, or any 

 retardation or acceleration of its motion, in- 

 volves work in precisely the same sense as does 

 the initiation of the movement. Now it is 

 evident that guidance or regulation of the 

 sequence of events in any material system 

 must involve one or other of these kinds of 

 processes. In other words, it is physically 

 impossible for any agency to modify the proc- 

 esses in any material system without modify- 

 ing the energy-transfers in that system, and 

 this can be done only by the introduction of 

 compensating or reinforcing factors of some 

 kind — i. e., by altering the energy-content of 

 the system — which is equivalent to the per- 

 formance of work. One is forced to conclude 

 that all such attempts at the solution of 

 biological problems are based on fundamental 

 misunderstandings. Dogmatism must be 

 avoided in scientific criticism; nevertheless it 

 seems to the reviewer that the following gen- 

 eral considerations are incontrovertible, and 

 that they are quite inconsistent with the t.ype 

 of vitalism represented by Driesch and John- 

 stone. First, the organism is a system whose 

 development and continued existence are de- 

 pendent on the rigid constancy of physico- 

 chemical modes of operation ; here, if anywhere 

 in nature, stability of the internal or vital con- 

 ditions is indispensable; otherwise it is incon- 

 ceivable that the complex living system could 

 persist, and maintain its characteristic activ- 

 ities and often delicate adjustment to the sur- 

 roundings. Clearly the numerous and diverse 

 processes whose integration constitutes life 

 could not deviate far from a definite norm 

 without fatal derangement of the whole 

 mechanism. Second, the basis for this reg- 

 ularity is the regularity of physico-chemical 

 processes in general. These, the more closely 

 they are subjected to scientific scrutiny, ap- 

 pear the more definite and constant in their 

 character : this conclusion is not — as many phil- 

 osophical critics of scientific method maintain 

 — an illusion resulting from the inherently 

 classificatory nature of inteUeetual operations; 

 it is simply a matter of observation and experi- 

 mental verification. Eepeat the conditions of 

 a phenomenon and the phenomenon recurs. We 



find this to be equally the case in living organ- 

 isms and in non-living systems ; and it appears 

 to be as true of psychical as of physical phe- 

 nomena. The difficulty in dealing with organ- 

 isms is to secure exact repetition of condi- 

 tions, because organisms are in their nature 

 complex, and complexity means a large num- 

 ber of factors which may vary. Eegularity, in 

 fact, may be said to be of the very essence of 

 vital processes; special devices for securing 

 regularity (e. g.j constancy of body-tempera-i 

 ture, of the osmotic pressure and reaction of 

 the tissue-media, etc.) are highly character- 

 istic of organisms. It would seem that an 

 entelechy disturbing this regularity, however 

 intelligently, would be not only superfluous 

 but detrimental. Moreover, we must always re- 

 member that unequivocal evidence for the 

 existence of such an agency is quite lacking. 

 Thus there seems to be no valid reason to 

 believe that organisms differ essentially from 

 non-living systems as regards the conditions 

 under which the processes underlying vitality 

 take place. The conditions of natural exist- 

 ence and happening appear everywhere and 

 at all times to be homogeneous, whatever 

 existence itself may be. This conclusion 

 seems unavoidable to the impartial observer 

 of natural processes; the repetition so 

 characteristic of nature is apparently an 

 expression of this central fact. The flux- 

 like character of natural existence, so in- 

 sisted upon by Bergson and the other Hera- 

 cleiteans, is to be admitted only in a highly 

 qualified sense. Eepetition and the existence 

 of discontinuities and abrupt transitions are 

 equally characteristic; and all of the evidence 

 of physical science goes to show that a repe- 

 titious or atomistic construction lies at the 

 very basis of things. So far from the intel- 

 lect arbitrarily imposing a diagrammatic uni- 

 formity and repetition upon a nature which in 

 reality is a progressive flux and never repeats 

 itself — to the student of natural science it ap- 

 pears rather true that the conceptualizing 

 characteristic of the reasoning process is 

 itself one expression of this fundamental mode 

 of natural occurrence — that it is, in fact, the 

 derivative of a peculiarity which pervades na- 



