An Introduction to Philosophy

IS TH

ect that men do not seem to know very clearly and definitely, though they feel so sure of its existence that they regard it as

had pains and pleasures, memories and fancies. In short, they have within their reach all the materials needed in framing a conception of the mind, and in drawing clearly the distinction between their minds and external things. Nevertheless, they are incapable of using these materials; their attention is e

tin spiritus, originally a breeze. The Latin word for the soul, the word used by the great philosophers all through the Middle Ages, anima (Greek, anemos), has the same significance. In the Gree

hat elusive entity the mind should confuse it with that breath which is the most

ently common to identify it with the breath, we know from direct evidence. A glance at the Greek philosophy, to which we owe so much tha

he soul is a fiery vapor, evidently identifying it with the warm breath of the living creature. In the fifth century, B.C., Anaxagoras, who accounts for the ordering of the elements into a system of things by referring

atoms and empty space. He conceived the soul to consist of fine, smooth, round atoms, which are also atoms of fire. These atoms are distributed through the whole body, but function

very long time. Those who are interested in seeing how a materialistic psychology can be carried out in detail by an ingenious mind should read the cur

e Stoics. Certainly the Stoics differed in many things from the Epicureans; their view of the world, and of the life of man, was a mu

use those twin stars that must ever remain the glory of literature and science, Plato and Aristotle, of being materialists. Plato (427-347, B.C.) distributes, it is true, the three-fold soul, which he allows man, in various parts of the human body, in a way that at least suggests the Democritean distribution

he insists upon its complete detachment from everything material. Man's reason is not subjected to the fate of the lower psychical functions, which, as the "form" of the body, perish with the body; it enters from without, and it endures after the body has passed away. It is interesting to note, however, an occas

s become curiously abstract and incomprehensible. It is described as an immaterial substance This substance is, in a sense, in the body, or, at least, it is present to the body. But it is not in the body as material things are in this place or in that

o them! If he can go as far as Plotinus, perhaps he can go as far as Cassiodorus (477-570, A.D.), and mainta

en of sense should be led to speak in this irresponsible way? and when they do speak thus

tle by little men are impelled along the path that leads to such conclusions. Plotinus was a careful student of the philosophers that preceded him. He saw that mind must be distinguished from matter, and he saw that what is given a location

inconsistent bit of matter, that is somehow in space, and yet not exactly in space, a something that can be in two places at once, a logical monstrosity. That his doctrine did not meet with instant rejection wa

losophers of the Middle Ages. How extremely difficult it has been for the world to get awa

relation of mind and body in the loose terms that had prevailed up to his time. He had made a careful study of anatomy, and he realized that the brain is a central organ to which messages are carried by the ner

serve as the seat of the soul. To this convenient little central office he relegated it; and he describes in a way that may to-day well provoke a smile the movements that the soul imparts to

the blood, which, participating in the impressions of the spirits, can carry them through the arteries to all the members." And again: "Thus, when the soul wills to call anything to remembrance, this volition brings it about tha

of as though it pushed the gland about; it is affected by the motions of the gland, as though it were a bit of matter. It seems to be a less inconsist

ps remarked above that he speaks of the soul as having her chief seat in the pineal gland. It seems odd that he should do so, but he still held, even after he had come to his defin

onception. But we have seen, also, that the attempt to conceive it as immaterial was not wholly successful. I

as to the nature of the mind usually held by the intelligent persons about us to-day who mak

e mind is i

cts and react

a substance w

nonextended a

ns are the echoes of old philosophies. They are a heritage from the past, and have become the common property of all intelligent persons who are even

e to them merely for the reason that they find in their o

men who erred in this way were abler than most of us can pretend to be, and they gave much thought to the matter. And when at last it came to be realized that mi

e mind is a nonextended and immaterial substance? Surely they have not thought all this out for themselves. They have taken up and appropriated unconsciously notions which were in the air, so to speak. They

ain man does not put the mind into the body quite unequivocally. I think it would surprise him to be told that a line might be drawn through two heads in such a way as to transfix two minds. And I remark, further

he last two articles of

up the ruler on my desk; it is recognized at once as a bit of wood. How? It has such and such qualities. My paper-knife is of silver. How do I know it? It has certain other qualities.

with the mind, have I direct evidence of the existence of anything mo

as it were, holding them together. It was believed in by philosophers who were quite ready to admit that they could not tell anything about it. For example, John Locke (1632-1704), the En

t is a useful distinction, and we could scarcely get on without it. But an increa

es that are revealed at a given time, but all those that we have reason to believe a fuller knowledge would reveal.

not make very clear to himself just what is in his thought, but I think we do him no injustice in maintaining that he is somet

these affirmations we may heartily agree; but we must admit that the plain

s pole. Where is the image? We say, in the mind. Is it extended? We feel impelled to answer, No. But it certainly seems to be extended; the white and the red upon it

al point should yet appear to have parts and to be extended. On the other hand,

n be answered, I shall try to show in the last section of this chapter. But one cannot an

was inconsistently material rather than immaterial. It was not excluded from space; it was referred to space in an absurd way. The mind as common sense conceives it, is t

they differ more or less from each other in their opinions. When we say "the psychologist" believes this or that, we mean usually no more than th

he psychologist's opinion is touching the four points set forth i

mind to the body in some way, although he may

ogous to that in which they are commonly used, there is a division in the camp. Some a

elieved in by many men now. To him the mind is the whole complex of mental phenomena in their interrelations. In other words, the mind i

are composite. To him, as to the plain man, the image held in the memory or imagination seems to be extended, and he can distinguish its parts. He does not do much towards clearing away

hat sense the mind may be said to be in the body, and how it may be conceived to be related to the body, are topics that deserve to be treated by themselves in a

ience of it; it is revealed to no sense; it is, indeed, a name for a mere nothing, for when we abstr

y sort cannot possibly be the reality to which this or that appearance is referred. Appearances and realities are experiences which are observed to be related in certain ways. That which is not open to observation at all, that of which we have, an

nknowable" is an "unknowable" in any case, and we may simply discard it. We lose nothing by so doing, for one cannot lose

g the "Unknowable" (Chapter V). The things are complexes of qualities, of physical

are conscious of mental phenomena as well, of the phenomena of the subjective order, of sensations and ideas. Why no

all we call the mind as thus known a substance? That depends on the significance which we give to this word. It is better, perhaps, to avoid it, for it is fatally easy to slip into the o

vocating, we shall find an easy way out of the difficulties that se

to—certainly appear to be extended. Are they really extended? If I imagine a tree

ortion of real space, a thing must be a real external thing; that is, the experiences constituting it must belong to the objective order, they must not be of the class called mental. We all recognize this, in a way. We know that a real

ree fill? The question is a foolish one. It assumes that phenomena not in the objective order are in the objective order. As well ask how a

his apparent extension with a real mathematical point, and call the tree nonextended in this sense. If we do this we are still in the old error—we have not gotten away from real space, but

conception. The mind is constituted of experiences of the subjective order. None of these are in space

mena of the subjective order, and by what is material the phenomena of the objective order, surely we ma

" Articles 34 and