206 



THE AMEBICAN NATURALIST [Vol. LIII 



not extensive. As an illustration of an " intensive mani- 

 foldness" lie instances one of our own states of con- 

 sciousness, in which many elements are presented simul- 

 taneously, though not spatially separated from one an- 

 other. But entelechy is not to be identified with mind. 

 It is an unknown something which stands in the same 

 relation to our mental life as it does to other organic 

 phenomena. 



2. Driesch's next "proof" of vitalism is somewhat 

 similar to the first, though it rests upon the facts of nor- 

 mal life history, instead of upon artificial disturbances 

 of this. The primitive germ cells, each of which, accord- 

 ing to the hypothesis he combats, should contain the 

 "machine" or spatial prearrangement of parts neces- 

 sary for the development of an entire organism, undergo 

 in the gonads an extensive series of divisions, leading to 

 the formation of the mature ova and spermatozoa. 

 "Can you imagine," he asks, "a very complicated ma- 

 chine, differing in the three dimensions of space, to be- 

 divided hundreds of times and in spite of that to remain 

 always the same whole? "^ 



3. The last "proof" of vitalism is based upon an anal- 

 ysis of animal behavior. Driesch makes much of the 

 fact that an action of a higher animal, particularly of an 

 intelligent one, is something more than the sum of many 

 simpler elements, each depending upon an element in 

 the complex of stimuli to which the organism responds in 

 a given case. The response of the organism is a unified 

 whole, corresponding to a total situation in the outer 

 world. A slight change in this complex of physical stim- 

 uli, provided that it has significmice for the organism, 

 may result in a totally different kind of response. On 

 the otlier linnd, an entirely diftVivnt set of ])hysical ele- 

 ments --having, however, the sniii.. >nra,iiHri I'or the or- 



other words, there is no functionality (in the mathemat- 

 ical sense) between the response and the stimulus. 

 This line of argument, different as it may seem, rests 



5 "Science and Philosophy of the Organism," Vol. I, p. 225. 



