LIFE: ITS ORIGIN AND NATURE 53 
to common sense and daily experience that it 
is unnecessary to dwell upon it. 
INTERACTIONISM: (Animism) Here we 
have the world-old notion of mind or soul, and 
body, existing as separate entities, influenc¬ 
ing each other. Mind is here supposed to in¬ 
fluence matter, and utilize it for the purposes 
of its manifestation. Were such a theory true, 
it would of course enable us to accept not only 
the reality of psychic phenomena but the per¬ 
sistence . of individual human consciousness 
after death. The main objection to this doc¬ 
trine is that it postulates a form of dualism, 
which is very obnoxious to many minds! It 
is possible, however, that such a doctrine may 
one day be forced upon us by the gradually 
increasing evidence furnished us by psychical 
research. 
Professor William James, in his little book 
on “Human Immortality,” while admitting the 
undoubted fact that brain and mind are in some 
way related one to another, disputed the idea 
that the nature of this connection was neces¬ 
sarily causal. He contended that it is quite 
possible to assume or believe that the functions 
of the brain are “transmissive,” and that they 
merely transmit or express the flow-of-thought, 
which constitutes consciousness. This view 
was subsequently worked-out in considerable 
detail by Professor P. C. S. Schiller, and to 
some extent by Bergson. On this view, the un¬ 
doubted fact of the connection between brain 
and mind can be accepted, without necessar¬ 
ily accepting, at the same time, the ordinary 
