No. 559] DOCTRINES HELD AS VITALISM 415 



Summary 



In conclusion, the point of view developed in the fore- 

 going may be briefly characterized and compared with 

 that presented in certain other discussions. It agrees, 1 

 take it, with Lovejoy, Spaulding, and others, in admitting 

 the possible validity of a "vitalism" that makes no dis- 

 tinction between the science of the living and that of the 

 non-living, holding merely that mechanistic formulation 

 is not adequate to nature in general; such "vitalism" 

 being synonymous with "energetics" or "temporalism," 

 or some similar doctrine. Confusion of such a doctrine 

 with a vitalism that holds to a deep-lying distinction be- 

 tween the science of the living and that of the non-living 

 is a common source of misunderstanding. 



As to doctrines which attempt to make such a deep 

 lying distinction, dividing science into two contrasted 

 kind?, vitalistic and non-vitalistic, it farther admits (with, 

 I judge, Lovejoy, Bergson, "Woodruff, Ritter, Spaulding, 

 (rlaser and others) that configurations perhaps exist in 

 the living, whose laws of action are not predictable from 

 a formulation of what happens in configurations occur- 

 ring in the non-living. But this is held to be merely an 

 example of a general principle, equally well exemplified 

 when diverse inorganic configurations are compared: 

 from formulating the action of one configuration, that of 

 another can not be predicted with certainty, until its ac- 

 tion has also been experienced; this continual recourse 

 to observation and experiment being one of the essen- 

 tial features of science in general. Hence it holds that 

 such facts present no ground for dividing science into 

 two divisions, vitalistic and non-vitalistic ; but also that 

 study of the organic configurations of matter gives re- 

 sults that are as fundamental as the study of inorganic 

 configurations; results which no exclusive study of the 

 latter could ever supply. Parts of biology are therefore 

 "antonomous" in the same sense, and in no other sense, 

 that the science of the compounds of carbon is autono- 



