unity, a unitary something separable from the sum of the parts of which
it consists. It is, rather, a unity comparable to the unity of an animal
organism or a plant, which may be well described as consisting of so
many different parts functioning together according to definite laws.
Within the unity of the mind there are smaller groups which may also be
called unities, though in a restricted sense. The _I_ is one of these
subordinate unities. It, too, is not simple, but consists of parts,
sometimes a greater, sometimes a smaller number. It may expand and
include almost as much content as mind itself, provided that time is
given for such an expansion, and a sufficient stimulus. Usually the _I_
is very poor in content, hardly anything else than the word-idea which
is the representative of the whole concept.
3. _Intelligence_
It is but natural that thought is largely in harmony with the actual
facts. Its contents are derived from sensory experiences, are molded by
sensory experiences, and must therefore often be anticipations of
sensory experiences. With reference to its agreement or disagreement
with the actual facts, we give our thought the name of truth,
knowledge--or error. Both truths and errors, like perceptions and
illusions, are the results of the laws governing mental functions. But
truths are more common in the mental life of certain individuals than in
that of others. Youth is more apt than mature age to give free rein to
its imagination, no matter whether it agrees with reality or not. This
is partly the result of the mature man’s realizing the high value of
this agreement and therefore striving for it; partly the unintended
consequence of innumerable pleasant and sad experiences, of adaptations
which have proved now more, now less successful. But aside from such
differences developing during life, there are immense differences of a
similar kind resulting from native capacities. We speak of such
capacities as reason, judgment, intelligence.
Intelligence does not consist merely in a good memory, making possible
the exact reproduction of experiences of long ago. A good memory in this
sense contributes much toward a high degree of intelligence, but is not
identical with it. Even the feeble-minded are often found to possess an
astonishing capacity for retaining dates, poetry, music. But memory
adapts the thought processes only to very simple and frequently
recurring events. When the circumstances become complicated, it soon
proves inadequate.
Imagine a servant sent on an errand. He finds it impossible to execute
the instructions received from his master. That ends it, if he is
deficient in intelligence. No instructions have been given for this
case; thus there is nothing to do but to return home. But the thought of
an intelligent servant is more comprehensive. He recalls his master’s
situation and analogous cases; the probable purpose of the master’s
order; other possibilities of realizing the same end. Thus he succeeds
perhaps in reconstructing the totality of the conditions which led his
master to send him, and in meeting these conditions.
Take another example. Of several physicians, all but one are mistaken in
the diagnosis of a case. Why do they differ? Every disease is
characterized by a multitude of symptoms. Some of them are obvious, so
that no one can fail to notice them: the complaints of the patient.
Others are more hidden, but no less important. The physician must search
for them. Each symptom, for example, fever, lack of appetite, dizziness,
megalomania, may appear in very different diseases. A definite group of
symptoms in definite degrees of intensity is characteristic of a
particular disease. Two conditions, therefore, must be fulfilled to make
a correct diagnosis. The symptoms which are hidden must be called up by
those which are obvious, so that the physician can search for them and
determine whether they are present or absent; for without first thinking
of them he cannot search for them. Secondly, the thought of the present
and absent symptoms must reproduce the idea of the disease which is
characterized by the presence or absence of just these symptoms. This
reproduction is possible only in a mind in which all these ideas are
very closely connected, forming a well-organized system. Where this is
not the case, the less obvious symptoms cannot influence the decision,
and the correctness of the diagnosis becomes a matter of chance.
Lack of intelligence, then, means a _deficiency in the organization of
ideas_, a lack of those manifold interconnections by which a large
number of ideas may enter into a unitary group--no matter how
_effectively_ each idea is associated with a small number of others,
that is, how excellent the person’s _memory_. Intelligence means
organization of ideas, manifold interconnection of all those ideas which
ought to enter into a unitary group, because of the natural relations of
the objective facts represented by them. The discovery of a physical law
in a multitude of phenomena apparently unrelated, the interpretation of
an historical event of which only a few details are directly known, are
examples of intelligent thought which takes into consideration
innumerable experiences neglected by the less intelligent mind. Neither
memory alone nor attention alone is the foundation of intelligence, but
a union of memory and attention. Energy of concentration must be
combined with breadth of interest. It is clear that thought determined
by both these conditions is more likely to agree with the enormously
complicated events in the external world than thought which is governed
mainly by one of them.
How does human intelligence differ from that of animals? That man is
immeasurably superior to animals cannot be doubted. But human
superiority does not consist in the possession of a higher faculty--let
us call it reason--in no way dependent on the lower, animal faculties,
to which it is added as a jeweler’s tools might be added to a
blacksmith’s tools. The difference between the animal mind and the human
mind is simply this: that the imaginative anticipation of possible
experiences of the future is brought about in the human mind by means of
more abstract and therefore more comprehensive ideas than in the animal
mind. Man’s mind is by natural inheritance far more capable of forming
abstract ideas than is the mind of the highest animals. Man is further
immensely aided in abstract thought by language--his own
invention--which furnishes him with symbols taking the place of the most
complicated ideas, and because of their simplicity, effecting economy in
mental work as tools and machines do in manual labor. Animals, too,
possess symbols, cries; but their number is insignificant. The
difference between man and animals is therefore only one of degree in
properties which are common to both. But these degrees are indeed very
far apart in the scale.
QUESTIONS
160. How does coherent thought differ from dreaming?
161. How does coherent thought differ from mere recurrent thought?
162. What are the conditions on which coherent thought depends?
163. What is the significance of language for coherent thought?
164. What are the two sources of the idea of self?
165. What influence has language on the concept of the unity and
indivisibility of self?
166. What is the true concept of the unity of mind?
167. How does intelligence differ from memory?
168. How does the text describe “lack of intelligence”?
169. How does human intelligence differ from that of animals?
§ 18. BELIEF
It seems, then, that all our knowledge is a mere adaptation to external
circumstances, that truth is entirely relative, being only a fitting
relation between the subject and his surroundings. But are there no
truths whose evidence is inherent in them? Are there no axioms which are
immediately evident? Is it not our task to derive all other truths from
these axioms by means of logical rules the correctness of which we are
obliged to admit? Or, if there are also secondary truths, which we
recognize as such only because they suit our experience, are not those
immediately evident truths a superior kind, preëminently worthy of the
name? For example, the logical, mathematical, and religious truths?
Our previous discussion of truth and knowledge is indeed insufficient.
We called truth any mental state which is in harmony with objective
reality, no matter whether this relation of harmony is itself thought of
in the truth or not. But we may use the word _truth_, or _knowledge_, in
a subjective sense, meaning by it a complex mental state which
_includes the thought of its agreeing_ with objective reality; that is,
a state which includes the _belief_ of its objective counterpart. Most
people take it for granted that knowledge is mental activity which has
its objective counterpart. However, there are very many subjective
truths to which an objective reality cannot correspond. Christian,
Jewish, pagan, and philosophical martyrs have testified with their blood
to their faiths, which in certain respects contradict each other. They
must, therefore, have sacrificed their lives partly for something
objectively untrue. On the other hand, there are objective truths which
are not believed; for instance, theories which are rejected for some
time, but later prove to be right.
We have seen how objectively correct thought originates. Let us now
consider the origin of thought which includes the thought of the
existence of its objective counterpart; that is, the origin of belief.
An infant has no consciousness of either reality or unreality. He has
simply conscious states, without any such distinction. But he cannot
fail to learn the distinction. He is hungry. He cries. He becomes
conscious of reproduced former experiences of food and of the mother
bringing the food. And, indeed, the door opens, the mother enters with
the food, very similar to the imagined mother, and yet differing in
vividness, in permanence, in number of details. At a later time the
child imagines strange compositions: animals with legs both below and on
their backs, so that they can turn over and continue running when one
set of legs is tired; princes and princesses with golden crowns on their
heads; fairies carrying marvelous gifts in their hands. But nothing of
this kind appears with the vividness, permanence, and distinctness
characteristic of the mother entering the door. Human beings who appear
with a similar vividness, permanence, and distinctness, either are
bareheaded or wear plain-looking hats; and their gifts amount to but
little. When the child imagines the experience with his mother, he
recalls the substitution of the vivid and stable consciousness for the
feeble and fleeting image of the mother and the food. When he imagines
his dreams of princes and fairies, he recalls the substitution of those
vivid but homely mental states for less vivid but more beautiful ones.
When such experiences have been repeated hundreds of times, the child
begins to realize that there is a distinction of the greatest importance
between the two classes. He forms the abstract concepts of sensory
perception and of fancy--of consciousness of various sensory qualities
and characterized by indescribable vividness, permanence, and
distinctness; and on the other hand, of consciousness of various sensory
qualities and characterized by feebleness, fleetingness, and vagueness,
and in this respect flatly contradicted by the mental states of the
other kind. _In these abstract conceptions consists the consciousness of
reality and unreality._ Reality and unreality are not logical opposites,
but merely relative concepts.
As soon as the ideas of reality and unreality are once formed, ample
opportunity is found for their application. They are applied also to
cases which do not belong to either of the extremes of vividness,
permanence, and distinctness, or feebleness, fleetingness, and
vagueness. Finally, they are applied by mere analogy to cases which do
not directly call for their application--as in a discussion of
historical truths. At this point another distinction is made. Trees with
leaves of silver are never presented to our sense organs. But the
elements which make up even the most contradictory compounds of fancy
have been known through the sense organs and become known again as
sensory impressions. Trees with a foliage of silver are not seen in
everyday life; but trees are seen, and leaf-like things of silver, too.
Even if all our ideational thought were fancy, its elements would tend
to make us conscious of the concept of reality rather than of unreality
because separately the elements have often been experienced with a high
degree of vividness, permanence, and distinctness. The opportunities for
thinking of reality are incomparably more numerous in human life than
those for thinking of unreality. We develop the habit of conceiving our
thoughts as real, unless there is a positive force compelling us to
accept the opposite concept. Thus we understand why the child, as soon
as he has formed these two concepts, is immensely credulous.
Tell the child that the moon is going to drop from heaven, and he will
look up, expecting to see it fall. The child’s experience is limited.
There is but rarely a positive force tending to reproduce in his
consciousness the concept of unreality. Where there is no such force,
the child does not remain neutral, skeptical, but conceives his thought
as including objective reality. Language assists in this tendency, for
the first words acquired by the child mean objective realities, persons,
clothes, furniture, and so on. The frequent use of these words
strengthens the habit of thinking of things as realities. Of much
influence is also the use of the verb _to be_ as a mere copula and also
in the sense of _to exist_. The child is thus induced to regard a thing
as existing because it is thought _to be_ yellow, round, etc. That _to
be_ is used in this ambiguous manner in all languages seems to be
additional proof of what is historically certain, that the human race,
like the human child, has passed through a period of extreme credulity.
This racial credulity through the traditional usage of language
contributes now to the credulity of the individual.
Gradually the child’s experience becomes more extensive and begins to
exert upon the multitude of original beliefs an influence which
sometimes continues all through life, although ultimately the progress
becomes very slow. Experience steadily encroaches upon the realm of
belief, driving it from ground which it previously occupied. It also
gives additional authority to belief, enabling it to hold more firmly
that to which previously it possessed but a doubtful title.
Much that contradicts frequent experiences is taken out of the realm of
belief and called a fairy tale or a story. Trees with golden apples?
There is no such thing, the real apples assert--we are all mellow and
meaty, not hard as gold. A Santa Claus who distributes gifts to all the
children everywhere at the same time? Impossible, says everyday
experience. He who is here cannot also be yonder and in a thousand other
places.
On the other hand, experience gives strength to the child’s belief.
Single matters of belief are connected mutually and with the absolute
basis of all knowledge, the sensory perceptions of the present. When I
am obliged to think, however briefly and vaguely, that as really as I
now see this paper and perceive the words printed on it, I was at that
particular time, previous to those and those events of the meantime, at
a certain place witnessing a certain act, my belief in the reality of
this event is unshakable. Whatever can be connected in this manner with
this fixed point, is itself fixed, placed beyond doubt.
Why can I believe my dreams while I am dreaming them, but not after
waking up? Because consciousness is limited during sleep. There are _no
perceptions_ with their normal vividness, permanence, and distinctness,
with which the dream may be compared as to its reality. There are but
_few other ideas_ accompanied by a vivid idea of reality, with which the
dream may be compared. The dream has therefore the _maximum of reality_
of all mental states present at that time in the mind. This is meant
when we _believe_ our dreams while we dream them. In a dream it may seem
real to be shot toward the moon in an immense shell in company with
other people, as in Jules Verne’s story. But in waking life this thought
is altogether devoid of reality. In comparison with the reality of my
present experience and of my ideas of the limits of engineering, of the
low temperature of interstellar space, and so on, that thought of a
journey in a shell immediately makes me conscious of the vivid idea of
unreality. I cannot believe that story.
We call a verbal statement _proved_ as soon as the connection between it
and our present experience has been established in such a manner that
the idea of reality is aroused in our mind. The believing of that which
has been proved is called _knowing_. Belief is often used in a narrower
sense, excluding that which is known and including only that which does
not arouse either an idea of reality or an idea of unreality. Both
usages are justifiable, the narrower one and also the wider one.
Knowledge and belief are opposed as well as related. It is of much
practical importance to distinguish that which has been proved from that
which has not been proved. But it is also of practical importance to
distinguish that which is surely unreal from that which is merely
unproved. It is quite impossible in human life to prove every statement
before we permit it to affect our thought and our action.
The chief thing which a man must have learned when he arrives at
maturity is this: that the number of facts to be believed is very much
smaller than he thought originally. The belief of childhood and youth is
subject to continuous losses. Something is, indeed, confirmed and
strengthened by growing experience; but it was believed before it was
known, and cannot properly be called an additional belief. Much that has
been believed for some time is recognized as unreal. That apparent
errors have to be recognized as truths happens much more rarely.
Experience makes a man more and more skeptical, cautious. This is of
great advantage to him in his adaptation to the world, and higher
institutions of learning to a large extent have their purpose in aiding
the young to develop cautious, critical habits of thinking. A student
goes to college not merely in order to cram himself with bare facts, but
to be trained in the habit of seeing men and things in the abundance of
their relations, of asking for their passports before granting them free
passage.
Thus the original tendency to believe is gradually limited, more in one
individual, less in another. But it is never perfectly eradicated. This,
indeed, would not be advantageous. A limited tendency to believe is
indispensable. Two conditions contribute chiefly toward the retention of
a belief which can be neither proved nor disproved: authority and
personal needs.
“He told us so” is reported to have been a common remark among the
disciples of Pythagoras. And to the present time disciples of any master
have not failed to quote their master. It is not even necessary to be a
master in order to be a prophet. A strong voice, significant
gesticulation, and impressive speech are sufficient to guide the belief
of the masses of the people. When everybody holds a certain belief and
gives expression to it, no member of the crowd can escape the influence
of the constant repetition of the thought. I cannot help believing what
my friends or my associates in a profession believe. Even if I begin to
reflect on the reasonableness of accepting as a truth what I have merely
often heard, I can hardly free myself of the belief. Is it not highly
improbable that all of them should have been led into error without
noticing it? On the consensus of everybody, philosophers have frequently
founded their highest doctrines. Cicero calls it the voice of nature. On
the other hand, narrow-minded people often attempt to fight a truth
which they dislike by pointing out partial disagreements among its
adherents.
But the belief in statements which are neither proved nor disproved is
not always based on authority; that is, produced by emphatic and
often-repeated expression of these statements by the people among whom
we live. It is frequently the result of strong and deep-seated needs of
the human mind. As long as these needs make themselves felt, they call
up in the mind ideas of remedies and means in harmony with analogous
experiences; and unless these remedies and means are contradicted by
other experiences, they are believed. One may call this, in distinction
from the authoritative belief, practical or emotional belief.
Every one believes in his own destiny. Every mother believes in her son.
Napoleon believed in his star. A general who doubts if he is going to
win the impending battle has already half lost it. Can he prove it, that
is, can he interpret what he sees and what is reported to him in such a
manner that the idea of his winning the battle cannot appear in his mind
without the idea of reality? He is probably very far from giving his
experiences such an interpretation. Of course, he will do his best in
order to make victory come his way. But his knowledge constantly informs
him that the outcome is dubious. Yet this knowledge does not keep him
from believing that it is not dubious. He cannot help believing it. His
whole existence depends on this belief. His honor, his future career,
his nation, all is lost unless he wins. The idea of loss is impossible.
It is inhibited by the idea of success, by that idea which alone can
give him the prudence and presence of mind that are needed.
Or the mother who believes that her son will turn out a respectable man,
does she do it because of her experiences? Her experiences are perhaps
opposed to her belief; she believes, nevertheless. Circumstances were
unfavorable to her son, his father does not understand his real nature,
he merely enjoys his youth: thus she comforts herself. Experience is not
the foundation of her belief, but her belief interprets her experience.
The belief is founded on the fact that she needs it. The idea of a
wayward son would deprive her of the most valued part of her existence.
Therefore she cannot believe it.
Misfortune of any kind has a marvelous belief-creating power, because it
constantly revives ideas of remedying the misfortune. “Whoever has lived
among people,” says Spinoza, “knows how full of wisdom they feel,
insulted if any one should offer any advice, as long as their affairs
are prosperous. But let misfortune overpower them, and they are willing
to ask any one’s advice, and to accept it, however senseless and
ill-considered it may be.”
Experiential, authoritative, and practical belief differ according to
their sources, but they appear in life in various combinations. However,
one of three kinds can usually be found to be the chief component in a
system of conviction. That we cannot escape the authoritative belief is
plain. Who could repeat every observation made by others in order to
avoid the possibility of accepting erroneous reports? Practical belief
has different limits according to the amount of experience possessed by
each individual. And a whole class of people having about the same kind
and amount of experience may thus be distinguished from another class by
their practical beliefs. A practical belief of one, which is not shared
by another, is called by the latter a superstition. How much
superstitions differ and how much they change is well known. Recall, for
example, a superstitious means of improving one’s looks, of curing
diseases, of regaining a lost love. But wherever a superstition is
difficult to contradict because it is so stated as to concern only that
which is beyond experience (spiritualism), or when it is supported by a
famous name, it may successfully resist all attempts at overthrowing it.
We saw that practical belief is not altogether independent of
experiential belief. Neither is the latter independent of the former.
When two theories agree equally well with experiential facts, we accept
the one that is simpler. Not because we know that it is nature’s
obligation to proceed in the simplest manner possible, and that
therefore the simpler theory is more likely to be correct; but because
our practical needs compel us to accept a simpler theory whenever we
can. We believe the Copernican theory of the solar system and reject the
Ptolemaic system. Not because one is more correct than the other; but
because the Copernican system combines the same objective fitness with
an immeasurably greater simplicity. The simple we desire; the simple,
therefore, we believe. A simple connection of a variety of things is
pleasant, beautiful. It is easy to survey it. It takes but a small
amount of mental energy to imagine it. Whenever our experiences leave us
a choice, we choose what is simpler. In other cases, too, practical
belief comes to the aid of experiential belief. In the border regions of
knowledge and within the blank spaces found within the field of
knowledge, belief must take the place of knowledge.
QUESTIONS
170. What is the difference between objectively correct thought and
belief?
171. What is the wider and what the narrower meaning of “belief”?
172. How do the ideas of reality and of unreality originate in the
child?
173. Why are we more inclined to apply the concept of reality than
that of unreality?
174. What is the double influence of experience on the child’s
belief?
175. Should authoritative belief be eradicated? Give reasons for
your answer.
176. Should practical belief be eradicated? Give reasons for your
answer.
177. What is a superstition?
178. Why do we believe the Copernican theory and reject the
Ptolemaic theory?
B. _Affection and Conduct_
§ 19. COMPLICATIONS OF FEELING
1. _Feeling Dependent on Form and Content_
Perception and ideation rarely, if ever, occur in the isolation in which
they were shown above in order to make clear their structure: they are
accompanied by, interwoven with, feelings. A summer landscape not only
looks different from the same landscape when covered with snow, but also
arouses different feelings. I may look forward to the same event--an
ocean voyage or an automobile tour--as a danger or as a pleasure; I may
regard an assertion as a truth or as doubtful. The ideas of which I am
conscious surely differ much in the alternative cases. But still greater
is the difference of feeling to which we refer by such terms as _fear_,
_low spirits_, _disquietude_, _comfort_, _joy_. The exact make-up of
these complexes of feeling is difficult to describe, but we may try to
point out the conditions on which they depend. We shall first consider
form and content.
Sensations, images, perceptions, and so on, give rise to feelings, not
only on account of what they are, but also and indeed chiefly because of
their manner of connection, of succession, and of spatial relation.
Colors which we regard as most beautiful separately may compose a carpet
whose color scheme we dislike and call inharmonious; on the other hand,
the most uninteresting gray dots may compose a beautiful design. A piece
of music is beautiful not alone because of the clearness of the single
tones, but chiefly because of the relations of these tones in melody,
harmony, and rhythm.
One principle is generally applicable to this class of feelings: a
variety of mental contents is bound together into a unity for our
perception and imagination. A multitude of unconnected things is not
easily perceivable or thinkable; therefore it is unpleasant. A single
thing, so simple that it cannot be analyzed into component parts, cannot
occupy our mind for any length of time; it is tedious, unpleasant. A
combination of variety and unity is able to keep us mentally busy
without overburdening the mind; therefore it is pleasant.
The general principle, however, admits of a great many different
applications. The unity may consist, for example, in the similarity and
regularity of arrangement of the pickets of a fence. The unity may
consist in subordination of a number of equal elements to a dominating
element, as the larger fence post taking the place of a picket at
regular intervals, or the accented element in a rhythm. The unity may
consist in organic unity of the elements of a living thing. It may be
logical unity, as in a sentence or a lecture. Several of these and other
kinds of unity may appear simultaneously in the same matter; and one of
these unities may be subordinate to another, this again to another, and
so on, as in a Gothic cathedral, a symphony, or a drama.
Thus the variety and complication of the feelings based on the principle
in question is immensely great, depending on all these unities, their
harmonious relation or opposition, and the contents of impression or
imagination directly. This complication is further increased by the
conditions discussed below.
2. _Feeling Dependent on Association of Ideas_
Why does a sunny spring landscape give us pleasure? What is its
advantage over a gloomy winter landscape? Possibly green is a pleasanter
color than brown or gray, which predominate in the winter landscape.
Possibly the curved outlines of the trees in their foliage are more
beautiful than the naked branches appearing like a system of dark veins
on a gray sky. But these are hardly the main causes of the difference in
feeling, which are found rather in the different ideas associated with
the one and the other percept. The spring landscape reminds one of life,
warmth, travel, picnics; the winter scene suggests death and decay,
cold, moisture, overheated and ill-ventilated rooms. The feelings
aroused by these things when we actually experience them are likely to
be aroused now when these thoughts, however fleetingly, are reproduced.
For the same reason the cold sensation of touching a corpse is
accompanied by a feeling differing from that of touching a piece of ice.
It is a different thing to see a stream of blood or of cherry juice, and
in a lesser degree even of cherry juice or milk. In every case a
multitude of memories influence our feelings, or lead us directly into a
train of thought of pleasant or unpleasant character. Thus the feelings
which have their first origin in a simple percept may become exceedingly
complicated.
An especially important consideration is that these feelings increase in
intensity and finally become more conspicuous than the memories by which
they are aroused. A house in which I experienced an unpleasant scene
finally arouses unpleasantness directly, without any mediation by the
consciousness of that event. This kind of transference of feeling is
particularly noticeable when the same feeling is aroused by many
different memories, quite unconnected among themselves, though attached
to the same percept. No better illustration of this law can be found
than the feelings accompanying the thought of money. From early
childhood all through life man learns that it is money and again money
on which the realization of his desires depends. A definite memory of
any of these special experiences soon becomes impossible because of the
competition among them. But the pleasantness originally aroused by them
is not lost. It attaches itself directly to money. In a similar manner
our love for our parents, our friends, our home, and so on, originates.
A reverent child may reject as a brutal theory the statement that he
loves his parents because of the innumerable benefits received from
them, that this love is but a kind of precipitation of all the pleasures
derived from the actions of his parents and from his living with them.
This rejection is in so far justified as the child’s love is not a
conscious deduction from the memory of benefits received. Nevertheless,
it is quite certain that his love is in some way naturally derived from
them. Children who are brought up by foster parents, if they are as well
taken care of as by real parents, love them equally well.
We have pointed out that the idea of _I_ is almost omnipresent in our
thought, and that it constantly influences our feelings. To understand
this influence better, we may distinguish two relations between _I_ and
the rest of our thought, according as this or the _I_ is the predominant
part of our consciousness. The former case may be illustrated by our
perceiving the movements, gestures, and voice-sounds of a person or of
an animal as the expressions of conscious motives. Even into the
percepts of inorganic things the idea of _I_ is carried in a similar
manner. We speak of a bridge boldly swinging across the river, a
mountain rising proudly to the clouds, a beam resting heavily on
columns, lines crowding together or leaning against each other, tones
hiding before and seeking each other. We attribute contents of the _I_
to the things which we perceive; we give them mental life, feeling, and
conduct, and experience in consequence further responses of our own life
of feeling. In such cases, the influence of the _I_ on our thought is
obvious, but it does not predominate. On the other hand, the idea of _I_
may be predominant, but may receive its special coloring from the data
presented: as when I feel the tragic fate of a hero, not merely through
the sympathy or admiration which it arouses in me, but as my own pain;
when in the stress and striving of a Faust I feel my own dreams and
desires; when the precipice pulls me down or the towering rock uplifts
me.
Since the idea of _I_ is so influential for our life of feeling, it is
to be expected that the opposite idea, the idea of the external _world_,
is also of considerable importance in this respect. Very often we refer
to a thing by merely emphasizing that it is opposed to, different from,
or independent of the _self_. We frequently speak of _the world and its
ways_, of _the course of the world_, meaning all its sense and nonsense,
its kindness and cruelty. Naturally, this idea of the world also gives
rise to many complicated feelings.
3. _Irradiation of Feeling_
We mentioned above that feeling is easily transferred from one percept
or idea--its _substratum_--to another one which is associated with the
first. A special form of this law of feeling may be called irradiation
of feeling. A disagreeable message received early in the morning may
spoil the whole day; the news of a great success may for some time give
to every other experience a joyful aspect. Not that the unpleasant or
pleasant event is constantly recalled. It is recalled now and then; and
the feeling may be more intense at these moments. But the feeling does
not depend on this recall. It attaches itself to any other substratum,
even to one which is scarcely in any way related to the first. I have
been vexed by an employee’s failure to carry out an order in the proper
way and by the resulting consequences. Now I am provoked to anger by
everything that happens, by a harmless question of a child, by the visit
of a friend who is ordinarily welcome, by the happy looks of a neighbor,
by the fly on the wall, not least by myself, being so stupid and so
deficient in self-control that I give room to all this unpleasantness.
So many-sided are the complications of our life of feeling. The
contents, their mutual relations, their connections in the past, the
prevailing impressions of the present, all these are conditions on which
our feeling depends.
QUESTIONS
179. Illustrate the independence of form feeling and content
feeling.
180. Explain the pleasantness of unity in variety.
181. Give examples of unity in variety.
182. Illustrate feeling based on association of ideas.
183. What examples are given in the text of transference of
feeling?
184. What are the two relations between the _I_ and the rest of our
thought, important for our feeling?
185. What is irradiation of feeling?
§ 20. EMOTIONS
Our preceding discussion shows that an exhaustive description of all our
complicated feelings is an enormous task. We cannot enter upon it here.
But certain classes of feelings may be described in more detail; namely,
emotions and moods.
Those feelings which are based on associated ideas, and which rise at
once to great intensity, are called emotions. This definition is
somewhat deficient in so far as it is difficult to draw the line which
exactly separates great from small intensity and a quick from a slow
rise of intensity. Nevertheless, the stormy character of certain
feelings not directly attached to sensory stimulation is so conspicuous
that a special name is desirable. Anger, fright, distress, and hilarity
are such feelings: hilarity distinctly pleasant, fright and distress
equally unpleasant; anger also unpleasant, yet mixed sometimes with a
certain amount of pleasure. The feeling and the consciousness of its
cause are usually so intense in an emotion that there is little room for
coherent thought. The judgment of a person in a state of emotion is
narrow; his actions may be called shortsighted.
Those feelings which become separated from their original perceptual or
ideational substratum and attach themselves to any other kind of
perception or ideation--no matter what feelings properly belong to
these--are called moods. They are usually, probably because of the
separation mentioned, of small intensity. But their duration is often
very extended. As typical examples may be mentioned grudge, worry,
dejection, and cheerfulness.
Like all feelings, emotions and moods are in some way related to motor
activity. Of particular interest here are not the purposive movements,
which are by no means absent, but a large number of muscular activities
seemingly of little or no usefulness, resulting from inherited nervous
connections. In so far as these muscular activities become outwardly
noticeable they are called the expressions of the emotions or moods. The
angry man instinctively clinches his fist, the hilarious fellow dances
about. Laughing, weeping, wrinkling of the forehead, and blushing are
further expressions of this class. Contraction of the muscle fibers in
the skin causes goose flesh, or the hair to stand on end. Breathing
undergoes changes, becoming quicker or slower than normal. The blood
vessels expand or diminish in size through the activity of the muscle
fibers in their walls, causing the subject to look red or pale, to feel
warm or cold, and in the latter case to shiver. Secretion of saliva,
perspiration, and secretion of the lachrymal glands may result from the
changes in the circulation of the blood. Fatigue, nausea, lack of
appetite, and other symptoms of internal processes may occur.
These phenomena were almost entirely neglected by the older psychology,
although their significance was understood by physicians. More recently
their psychological import has been recognized and even overestimated.
It has been said that these phenomena not only occur in emotions, but
_are_ the emotions; that the emotions consist in the organic sensations
resulting from these reflex muscular activities (theory of James and
Lange). We do not weep because we are sorry, but we are sorry because we
weep. We do not tremble because we fear a pistol held up before us, but
we are frightened because we tremble. Two arguments favor this view. Let
all bodily symptoms be gone, and the strongest emotion is gone too.
Anger without clinching the hand is no anger. While I am sitting calmly
on a chair, smiling, I cannot be angry. And further, when the bodily
symptoms are exactly imitated or produced by drugs or by nervous
disease, the emotion is there. Alcohol makes a person hilarious and
courageous without any perception of the kind which usually produces
this effect. Certain poisons or mania cause rage very much like that
produced by an insult.
However, these facts do not prove that an emotion contains nothing else
than organic sensations. It is obvious that, according to the laws of
association, the contents of an emotion must be reproduced by those
organic sensations which were present innumerable times when that
emotion was present. The organic sensations resulting from poisons or
mania perhaps call up an idea of an insult, and the complete emotion of
anger naturally follows. Because of the firmly established associations,
it is also to be expected that the voluntary substitution of a different
set of organic sensations interferes with a present emotion.
Introspection makes it clear that an emotion contains much more than a
mere group of organic sensations.
The instinctive motor activities characteristic of the various emotions
may be classified under two headings: excitation and depression. The
difference is especially noticeable in unpleasant emotions: anger is an
emotion of excitement; fear, as a rule, of depression. But this
distinction is not entirely absent in pleasant emotions. The joy of a
grateful memory is characterized, not indeed by depression, but by a
restfulness very distinct from the excited joy of expectation or the
delight at a present experience, although the pleasantness felt may be
of exactly the same degree of intensity. A careful analysis of these
motor activities must distinguish, not only excitement and depression,
but also their occurrence in either the skeletal or the involuntary
muscles, the muscles of the vascular system. Thus one may distinguish
four classes of emotions, as characterized chiefly by heightened
activity of the skeletal or of the vascular muscles, or by weakened
activity of the skeletal or of the vascular muscles. Symptoms resulting
from abnormal contraction or relaxation of the vascular muscles are, for
example, a person’s growing pallid, or blushing, and the corresponding
sensations of cold and warmth.
Two other concepts relating to the emotional life deserve to be
mentioned, temperament and passion. Temperaments are inherited
tendencies of the life of feeling in special directions. Since ancient
times four have been distinguished: the sanguine, bilious (choleric),
melancholic (atrabilious), phlegmatic (lymphatic). The ancients held
that temperament is conditioned on the predominance of one of the four
humors, the blood, lymph, yellow bile, and black bile. This is of course
pure speculation of a prescientific period. But the distinction of the
four classes agrees well with common observation, although mixed forms
of temperament are more common than the pure types. People are either
optimistically or pessimistically inclined. The sanguine and the
phlegmatic are the optimists, the bilious and the melancholic the
pessimists. On the other hand, some people are excitable, impetuous,
others are not easily aroused. The sanguine and the bilious are quickly
excited, the melancholic and the phlegmatic are calm and sluggish.
Passions are acquired dispositions toward special kinds of pleasant
experiences. We might say that they are foreseeing, voluntary emotions.
We speak of the passion of the gambler, the smoker, the collector, the
lover. One may also compare an emotion with an acute disease, a passion
with a chronic disease. Animals, too, possess emotions, as joy, fear,
and rage. But it seems that they are not sufficiently capable of
anticipating emotions to be said to possess passions.
QUESTIONS
186. How are emotions defined?
187. How does an emotion influence coherent thought?
188. How are moods defined?
189. Mention a number of moods and an equal number of emotions,
each comparable to one of the moods.
190. What four classes of motor activities characteristic of
emotions are distinguished in the text?
191. What motor activities are called expressions?
192. Give examples of expressions of emotion.
193. Give examples of motor activities which are not expressions of
emotion, but nevertheless of much significance for the subject’s
experience of an emotion.
194. What is temperament?
195. What is a passion?
§ 21. COMPLICATIONS OF WILLING
We have shown in an earlier chapter how voluntary--that is,
foreseeing--actions develop out of instincts. Sensations result from the
instinctive action, are associated with those other impressions which
called forth the instinctive response, can then be reproduced by them,
and can themselves produce the action. When an action is thus foreseen,
it is called voluntary. Such simple voluntary actions are then combined
into complicated groups and chain-like progressions. The conscious
result of the first movement calls up the idea of a further movement,
its execution that of a third movement, and so on. Serial activities of
this kind often go on for a long time; for example, walking, eating,
dressing, writing, sewing, rowing. As experience of the relations
between the external things and practice in the performance advance,
such serial actions become more and more perfect in several respects.
Their conscious anticipation is more and more extended, so that they may
be adapted to very remote consequences, the occurrence of which is not
expected until days or weeks afterward. They are more and more refined
in that they adjust themselves accurately in direction, speed, and force
to the special circumstances of each case. They are performed in less
time and more economically; all detail movements which are either wrong
or merely superfluous come to be entirely omitted.
That the conscious processes in voluntary movements tend toward
simplification has been mentioned in § 10. A whole series of movements,
which was originally performed by each movement being consciously
anticipated in order, is now performed without further consciousness as
soon as the series has once begun. One fact, however, is highly
interesting in this connection because it shows how the several
movements of the series are actually caused. Although consciousness of
all those anticipations of the movements is no longer required, the
physiological sensory functions must run their course in the normal
order or disturbances occur in the movement. This may be demonstrated in
an animal by cutting all the sensory nerves of a limb, but carefully
leaving all the motor nerves intact. The limb nevertheless appears
paralyzed. A similar case in man has been described by Strümpell. A
workman received a knife wound in the spinal cord. Complete recovery
occurred, with the exception that the right hand and lower arm remained
perfectly anesthetic: no kind of cutaneous or organic sensation was any
longer perceived. The muscles of the hand and arm functioned almost
normally. But movements, even very moderately complicated, could no
longer be performed unless the man saw his hand and its movement. The
illustration (figure 18) shows his behavior when requested to form a
ring with his thumb and index finger. He could do this fairly well when
permitted to look at his hand. Otherwise it was impossible, in spite of
his will and the muscular capacity to perform this action. We see, then,
that the peripheral impressions are necessary to bring about the several
partial movements in this case of acquired serial activity, although
these impressions have long ceased to become conscious whenever the act
is done.
[Illustration: FIG. 18.--VISUAL AND KINESTHETIC CONTROL OF VOLUNTARY
ACTION: THE FORMER INTACT, THE LATTER LOST.]
When we anticipate a final result of an extended series of movements, it
frequently happens that the movement which directly leads to that result
is, for one cause or other, not immediately possible. Imagine that a
person for the first time sees some one pulling a cork from a bottle,
pouring some of the contents into a glass, and inviting him to drink.
Seeing the bottle again calls up in his mind the idea of a delicious
beverage and the movement of drinking. But drinking is impossible, for
there is no glass, and the bottle is corked. In such a case the idea of
the result, which because of its importance is being kept constantly in
mind, unrolls the total series of ideas in the reverse order. It calls
up first the thoughts directly preceding the final result, then the
thoughts preceding these, and so on, until an idea is reached which can
be realized by a movement. In our example the person becomes conscious
of the idea of pulling the cork, of the corkscrew used for this purpose,
the place where the corkscrew was found hanging, the movements of
preparing it for the task, and a similar set of ideas for the glass; and
he thus becomes able to carry out the whole series of movements which
result in the taste of the beverage.
QUESTIONS
196. Give examples of serial activities of the foreseeing kind.
197. In what ways are activities of the kind just mentioned
perfected?
198. What is the relation of sensory activity, consciousness, and
performance in perfected serial movements?
199. Illustrate by a pathological case the relation just spoken of.
200. What rule is illustrated by the example in the text of pulling
a cork from a bottle?
§ 22. FREEDOM OF CONDUCT
As experience of the connections, complications, and consequences of
things advances, the ideas called up by any impression must clearly
become very numerous. Ideas of near and remote, probable and improbable,
desirable and undesirable, consequences,--ideas of fit and unfit, direct
and indirect means of bringing about or preventing those
consequences,--ideas of difficulties and obstacles, facilities and
openings must tend to appear, to compete with each other, to disappear
and reappear in rapid succession, or merely to approach consciousness
ready to appear when their services should be needed. We refer to these
various mental states, according as they appear in one or another form
of connection, by such terms as _reflecting_, _considering_, _choosing_,
_desiring_, _rejecting_, _intending_, _deciding_, and many others, all
having in common the foreseeing of something to be experienced in the
future as the result of our action.
What action occurs in each possible case depends on the relative force
of the factors coming into play. The actual sensory impression is as a
rule a rather insignificant factor. It sets free the ideas derived from
innumerable previous sensory impressions. The resulting action is then
nearly always extremely different from the instinctive reaction
belonging to the sensory stimulation. Such actions, resulting
essentially from factors _within_ the mind, not from external factors
which happen to impress the mind at the moment, are called _free_
actions. Their freedom does not mean that they have no causation, that
they are free of causes, but they are free of the compulsion exerted by
the external stimuli of the moment. They are free actions as opposed to
instinctive actions, which are not free of these stimuli of the moment,
but on the contrary, completely determined by them.
Scholastic philosophy--and popular thought, which is still largely under
the influence of that philosophy--recognizes still another kind of
freedom of the mind. It assumes that mind, under the impression of
perfectly definite external conditions and with perfectly definite
internal motives of thought and action, possesses the faculty of
deciding in favor of the action opposed to its own motives and of
enforcing this action. This faculty of an absolutely causeless willing
is assumed to be added to all the other external and internal factors
determining action or, as the case may be, suppressing action. Such a
faculty we cannot accept, since according to our most fundamental
conceptions _mind_ is not a being added to its experiences, but the
totality of its experiences, in so far as it knows itself; whereas it is
called _brain_ in so far as it is known by other minds. The arguments
brought forward in favor of a freedom of the will in the sense of a
possibility of causeless action are inacceptable to the psychologist
because they would make a psychological science impossible.
Nevertheless, it is worth while to discuss the more important ones
briefly.
Three arguments are most commonly offered. First, immediate experience
tells us that, whenever we decide in favor of one action, we could have
decided differently. We were conscious of the possibility of acting
otherwise. The second and third arguments are of a practical nature.
According to the second, the idea of a uniformly effective causation of
our actions paralyzes our activity. If everything takes place by
necessity, the idea of influencing the physical world or human society
becomes meaningless. No one can believe in determination of our action
and at the same time make an effort to instruct and educate people to
act differently. Thirdly, no one can be held responsible for his actions
if he could not help performing them. If all actions are causally
determined, punishment becomes mere cruelty.
The first argument fails because our immediate experience under no
conditions informs us exactly as to what caused and what did not cause
our actions. We have just seen that a serial movement cannot be carried
out unless constant sensory impressions are received from the progress
of the partial movements. Immediate experience gives us no information
about this necessity, which was entirely unsuspected until physiological
experiment and pathological observation revealed the fact. Immediate
experience tells a person who in his boarding house praises a very
ordinary dinner in exaggerated terms, that _he might have kept silent_
as he usually does--he does not remember that the evening before when he
was in a state of hypnosis a suggestion was given to him to praise his
dinner the following day. Everybody else knows that he will, that he
must, do it. He alone thinks, on the basis of his immediate experience,
that it was an act of free will without causation. It was free,
uncaused, in the same sense in which the issue of a disease, the outcome
of a war, the weather, the crops, are free and uncaused; that is, _he
was ignorant of the cause_.
Paralysis of activity is said to be the consequence of a belief in
universal causation. But surely the energetic and ambitious man is not
paralyzed by this belief. He feels that he is the tool used by nature to
shape the destinies of the world. How could a consciousness of his
importance in the causal connections of events paralyze his activity?
The idle and indolent may excuse his lack of activity by saying that it
is his nature to love inactivity, that he cannot help it. But who would
have any more respect for him on that account? Of course it is not his
belief in universal causation that makes him indolent. The lesson from
history is very significant in this respect, but it must not be read
one-sidedly. It is all right to point out that the fatalistic Islam is
losing piece after piece of its dominion. But the same fatalistic Islam
also conquered a world and for centuries kept all Europe in terror. Thus
it cannot be its fatalism that determined both its rise and its
downfall. In recent years, did the belief in predestination make the
Boers less energetic than the belief in freedom the orthodox Spaniards?
We must say, then, that in general neither belief is of much practical
significance. But as a guide in special cases the belief in universal
causation is by far preferable. What can give more encouragement to the
educator than the conviction that his efforts will bear fruit in one way
or other because they must help to shape and direct his pupil’s
activities in later life? What can be more discouraging than the belief
that, whatever may be his efforts, they are just as likely to be lost on
his pupil as to be effective, since the latter has the faculty of
causelessly acting either in one way or in the opposite way?
The third argument asserts that universal causation is incompatible with
responsibility. But what do we mean by responsibility? Nothing but the
fact that society, if it can do so, will punish its members for certain
deeds. Why should a belief in universal causation prevent society from
punishing its members? Bismarck writes in a letter to his sister: “It is
not the wolf’s fault that God has created him as he is. That does not
prevent us from killing him whenever we can.” Holding a person
responsible, punishing or rewarding him, does not lose its meaning if we
regard his actions as being determined by causes. We do not then hold
him responsible for the single act, but for his being so natured that
under such circumstances he cannot help committing such a deed. The
question becomes this: What is the more plausible reason for punishing a
person, his abnormal deed or his abnormal, unsocial nature which made
this deed possible?
It is true that punishment dealt out by an individual or a small group
is often merely an instinctive act of revenge for a single deed. If a
person beats me, do I have less pain if I beat him and cause him pain
too? Should a gambler beat the roulette because it makes him lose and
the other man gain? Would the roulette act differently for having been
beaten? Am I sure that the person whose beating me was undetermined by
causes will treat me better the next time? If his actions are caused, he
probably will treat me better because the memory of the blows received
from me will act as a cause. The instinct of returning blows would be
incomprehensible if human action were independent of causes.
But the legal punishment dealt out by the officers of a nation has lost
the significance of an instinctive act of revenge. Does this fact make
it compatible with the doctrine of causeless activity? Would not
punishment, under this doctrine, be cruelty pure and simple? Punishment
can be justified only if it can act as a cause determining human
behavior. Society introduces fear of threatened punishment and memory of
suffered punishment as motives into the mental life of its members, in
order to inhibit criminal actions in those who are so natured that they
will commit acts inimical to society when occasion offers, or when they
are tempted. The degree of the penalty is adapted to the effectiveness
of the temptation under different circumstances. Children and
intoxicated and insane persons are treated in a different manner because
the fundamental condition of punishment--the existence of an idea of
punishment capable of serving as a motive of action--is not fulfilled in
them. All this becomes entirely purposeless, meaningless, if we accept
the doctrine that human actions are not completely determined by causes.
Responsibility, social order, and law, far from being called in question
by determinism, are, on the contrary, dependent on it for their
justification.
Indeterminism, the doctrine of causeless activity of the mind, of
freedom of a will which is regarded as an entity added to the contents
of the mind, is no better supported by these special arguments than by
general considerations. More than a hundred years ago Priestley said of
this doctrine: “There is no absurdity more glaring to my understanding.”
QUESTIONS
201. Give at least a dozen words all meaning the foreseeing of a
future experience resulting from action.
202. How are free actions defined?
203. What other name is mentioned in the text for unfree,
compulsory action, a name which has already been much used in a
previous chapter?
204. What are the three arguments mentioned in favor of the
assumption that causeless action is possible?
205. What do we learn from a post-hypnotic suggestion with respect
to the question of free will?
206. Give examples from history showing that both energy and
indolence are independent of theories about the will.
207. Can the belief in causeless activity be expected to contribute
to educational endeavor? Give reasons for your answer.
208. What is the aim of legal punishment? How is this aim related
to the doctrine of causeless activity?
209. Why are children not made subject to legal punishment?