VITALITY AND WILL
Another and particularly happy illustration of the way in which the
higher space concepts enable one to solve awkward dilemmas is to be
found in the problems of Vitality and Will. Readers who are interested
in these topics would do well to refer to Mr. Hereward Carrington's
"Problems of Psychical Research" or to his "Vitality, Fasting, and
Nutrition."
There are in general two main views which may be taken about Vitality.
We may either suppose that Life is purely a product of the body, that
it is a mere physiological function and nothing more, or one may
suppose that so far from the body being the primary cause of Life the
exact converse is the case--that Life is the _raison d'etre_ of the
body. It may be that everything that we recognize as "vital," every
attribute which enables us to distinguish animate from inanimate
objects, is no more than a purely physical phenomenon the product
of unusually complicated chemical actions: or it may be that the
chemico-physical complex which we call the body is only the means
whereby the pressing tide of Life manages to manifest itself in the
world. This latter is the view held by M. Bergson, by Mr. Carrington
and by myself.
"M. Bergson regards matter as the dam which keeps back the rush of
life. Organise it a little (as in the protozoa), _i.e._, slightly
raise the sluice,--and a little life will squeeze through. Organise
it elaborately (as in man), _i.e._, raise the sluice a good deal, and
much life will squeeze through."
(The Right Hon. A.J. Balfour.)
This is the "transmissive" as opposed to the "productive" theory and
the whole position is very like that which obtained in Psychology some
years ago. William James then showed that although it was possible to
interpret the observed facts of Psychology on the hypothesis that the
brain "produced" consciousness it was equally legitimate to do so on
the hypothesis that it "transmitted" it.
As he said " ... Mere coincidence in two sets of phenomena does
not prove that they are causally connected, that one produces the
other. They may be quite separate from one another (psycho-physical
parallelism) or both may be aspects of something else."
Personally I should be prepared to admit only the latter possibility.
Causeless parallelism is incredible; as James himself admits elsewhere.
The analogy is very close. Just as consciousness is usually conceived
to be due to the functioning of the brain but may, on the contrary
exist apart from it and merely use the brain as a channel of
manifestation, so also may Life exist apart from and use the body.
I will not go into the various arguments which support this view.
Perhaps the most striking is that from the necessity for sleep--a
phenomenon which appears to be exclusively associated with Life.
A mechanism needs replenishing with fuel, it must have worn parts
replaced and both these processes are accurately paralleled in the
body of any living organism. But an engine does not need sleep,
whereas a living organism not only needs it but cannot be satisfied
with any substitute for it. It looks therefore as if Life could not be
maintained from purely physical sources and this lends support to the
view that it is an essentially extra-physical thing transmitted by, but
not arising from, physical actions.
But this view leaves us with the difficulty that if we suppose that
Life is transcendent to the Physical and uses it only as a means of
manifestation we cannot see how it can do so without partaking of the
nature of the physical and so losing its "selective," "guiding" or
"intelligent" qualities. For in order that things should be causally
connected they must have qualities in common. Are then we to say that
life is a form of energy or that it is not?
As Mr. Carrington says: "We are ... driven into this dilemma: life must
be an energy--but, as such, it cannot be purposive! Life is purposive,
yet it must be an energy--for otherwise it could not affect the bodily
energies and the material world."
M. Bergson adopts the "hair trigger" theory and supposes the Life only
affects the physical energies of the body _very slightly_, just enough
to deflect them this way or that. But this is not getting out of the
difficulty at all, for the problem is one not of degree but of kind;
it is just as difficult to imagine "non-energy" affecting energy "very
slightly" as to imagine it affecting it a good deal.
Nor does it help matters to suppose, with Mr. Carrington and other
authorities, that Life is a wholly distinct and unique kind of energy;
an "absolutely separate force _per se_ different from any other mode
of energy of which we have any knowledge." If this is so we must ask
"How is it that this force combines sufficient of the qualities
common to all the physical forces to enable it to affect them, with
characteristics of so different a nature that we can call it an
absolutely different force _per se_ and emancipate it from the ordinary
laws and limitations of physical forces?"
A very similar, if not identical, dilemma arises in the case of Will
which must either be supposed to be a purely physical force--which
hypothesis commits us at once to a creed of thoroughgoing materialistic
determinism or else we must suppose it to be distinct from physical
energy by virtue of some added non-physical quality which must be
wholly outside the physical realm. Yet this extra quality of "conscious
intent" which is the essential characteristic of the act of willing
does, as a matter of common experience, enable us to control physical
matter and forces.
In fact, the whole trouble is simply this.
The universe presents a closed circle of matter and energy. Anything
within it must be bound by law, blind and unintelligent. Nothing
without it can affect anything within it--if for no other reason
than that if it could it would violate the fundamental law of the
conservation of energy. But Will _does_ affect matter, therefore it
must be within the circle: it is _not_ blind, for its very essence is
initiative, independence, and intelligence and it must, therefore, be
outside the circle.
Now let us introduce the idea of higher space and see where it leads us.
Suppose that the energy which we term "Life" is located to start with
in higher space--in four-dimensional space for example. Suppose that
it is really pressing against the "dam" of three-dimensional matter
trying to use it for a vehicle of manifestation. The extent to which
it will be able to do so will depend on the presence or absence in the
matter concerned of those qualities which enable it to be acted on by
four-dimensional forces. What these qualities are it is at present
impossible to say although one might hazard a guess to the effect
that the essential factor might be one of greater or less molecular
extension in the direction of the fourth dimension.
But wherever matter exists which possesses the suitable properties,
there will Life "squeeze through the dam" to a greater or less extent
and we shall have a "living" organism which will continue to live until
the matter through which Life is--in each particular case--manifesting,
loses the properties which enable it to be made use of.
Whether there is any sort of matter which can truly be called
completely inanimate or whether, as some people hold, all matter is to
some extent "alive" I am not prepared to say. Personally I should be
sorry to have to draw a distinct dividing line anywhere and it seems
more in accordance with the general continuity of things to suppose
that no such line can really be drawn.
For myself I tend more and more to the view that Life, Vitality,
Consciousness--call it what you will--is something which dips down, as
it were, for the purpose of gaining experience and of self-evolution,
from its original location--wherever and whatever that may be--through
successive limitations of consciousness until it reaches this, the
lowest, the most restricted and the most individual state of all.
These successive limitations may conveniently be represented by saying
that consciousness functions in spaces of successively decreasing
dimensionality although it must be borne in mind, as was pointed out at
the end of the last chapter, that this may be only a convenient way of
expressing the effect of a change which belongs to the consciousness
itself more properly than to its environment.
At each successive descent consciousness must find a suitably
organised vehicle in which to function and through which it can
receive impressions. But each such vehicle will involve corresponding
circumscriptions and, conversely, each upward stage will involve an
extension of consciousness, until finally, when our evolution is
entirely accomplished, we shall be completely and fully Conscious and
independent of all limitations of any sort or kind. On the downward
half of the journey the characteristic process would, on this theory,
be the gaining of individual at the cost of "communal" consciousness,
whereas during the second half the latter would continually increase
and at last lead to complete "communion" in the widest possible sense
without any loss of individuality. This view, which has a good deal
to support it especially in point of continuity and general coherence
with other well established ideas, has much in common with that held by
the Theosophists, which is, to my mind, the strongest plank in their
platform.
But to revert to the original idea of Life as primarily a
four-dimensional force.
This does not involve any contravention of the Law of the Conservation
of energy for we have only to suppose that the Law is exact only for
the Cosmos and for the physical universe, as commonly understood, no
more than a very close approximation.
The amounts of energy which we must suppose to enter the physical or
three-dimensional universe from four-dimensional space may be very
small, so small as to defy detection by the methods we are able to
apply to the study of living organisms in which alone they could be
observed; and yet, by virtue of the "hair-trigger" theory to which I
have already referred they might produce effects as large as we please.
The foregoing is clearly incomplete, but I think I may fairly claim to
have removed the fundamental dilemma which first confronted us.
We have seen that life may be supposed to exist entirely apart from
ordinary physical matter and yet to affect it so long as we suppose it
to do so from some region of higher space. It is a form of energy if we
wish to call it so and yet it is distinct from the ordinary forms of
physical energy and free from the limitations which would be imposed
upon it if we reckoned it as subject to the Law of Conservation as
commonly understood.
And yet the latter is not broken but rather strengthened; for we now
suppose it to be not merely of Universal but of Cosmic application.