Unconscious Memory(Fiscle Part-3) by Samuel Butler (classic books to read .TXT) 📕

Visitor,  Called Butler's Attention To This Essay,  Which He Himself

Only Knew From An Article In "Nature."  Herein Professor E. Ray

Lankester Had Referred To It With Admiring Sympathy In Connection

With Its Further Development By Haeckel In A Pamphlet Entitled "Die

Perigenese Der Plastidule."  We May Note,  However,  That In His

Collected Essays,  "The Advancement Of Science" (1890),  Sir Ray

Lankester,  While Including This Essay,  Inserts On The Blank Page

{0b}--We Had Almost Written "The White Sheet"--At The Back Of It An

Apology For Having Ever Advocated The Possibility Of The Transmission

Of Acquired Characters.

"Unconscious Memory" Was Largely Written To Show The Relation Of

Butler's Views To Hering's,  And Contains An Exquisitely Written

Translation Of The Address.  Hering Does,  Indeed,  Anticipate Butler,

And That In Language Far More Suitable To The Persuasion Of The

Scientific Public.  It Contains A Subsidiary Hypothesis That Memory

Has For Its Mechanism Special Vibrations Of The Protoplasm,  And The

Acquired Capacity To Respond To Such Vibrations Once Felt Upon Their

Repetition.  I Do Not Think That The Theory Gains Anything By The

Introduction Of This Even As A Mere Formal Hypothesis; And There Is

No Evidence For Its Being Anything More.  Butler,  However,  Gives It A

Warm,  Nay,  Enthusiastic,  Reception In Chapter V (Introduction To

Professor Hering's Lecture),  And In His Notes To The Translation Of

The Address,  Which Bulks So Large In This Book,  But Points Out That

He Was "Not Committed To This Hypothesis,  Though Inclined To Accept

It On A Prima Facie View."  Later On,  As We Shall See,  He Attached

More Importance To It.

The Hering Address Is Followed In "Unconscious Memory" By

Translations Of Selected Passages From Von Hartmann's "Philosophy Of

The Unconscious," And Annotations To Explain The Difference From This

Personification Of "The Unconscious" As A Mighty All-Ruling,  All-

Creating Personality,  And His Own Scientific Recognition Of The Great

Part Played By Unconscious Processes In The Region Of Mind And

Memory.

These Are The Essentials Of The Book As A Contribution To Biological

Philosophy.  The Closing Chapters Contain A Lucid Statement Of

Objections To His Theory As They Might Be Put By A Rigid

Necessitarian,  And A Refutation Of That Interpretation As Applied To

Human Action.

But In The Second Chapter Butler States His Recession From The Strong

Logical Position He Had Hitherto Developed In His Writings From

"Erewhon" Onwards; So Far He Had Not Only Distinguished The Living

From The Non-Living,  But Distinguished Among The Latter Machines Or

Tools From Things At Large. {0c}  Machines Or Tools Are The External

Organs Of Living Beings,  As Organs Are Their Internal Machines:  They

Are Fashioned,  Assembled,  Or Selected By The Beings For A Purposes So

They Have A Future Purpose,  As Well As A Past History.  "Things At

Large" Have A Past History,  But No Purpose (So Long As Some Being

Does Not Convert Them Into Tools And Give Them A Purpose):  Machines

Have A Why? As Well As A How?:  "Things At Large" Have A How? Only.

In "Unconscious Memory" The Allurements Of Unitary Or Monistic Views

Have Gained The Upper Hand,  And Butler Writes (P. 23):-

"The Only Thing Of Which I Am Sure Is,  That The Distinction Between

The Organic And Inorganic Is Arbitrary; That It Is More Coherent With

Our Other Ideas,  And Therefore More Acceptable,  To Start With Every

Molecule As A Living Thing,  And Then Deduce Death As The Breaking Up

Of An Association Or Corporation,  Than To Start With Inanimate

Molecules And Smuggle Life Into Them; And That,  Therefore,  What We

Call The Inorganic World Must Be Regarded As Up To A Certain Point

Living,  And Instinct,  Within Certain Limits,  With Consciousness,

Volition,  And Power Of Concerted Action.  It Is Only Of Late,

However,  That I Have Come To This Opinion."

I Have Italicised The Last Sentence,  To Show That Butler Was More Or

Less Conscious Of Its Irreconcilability With Much Of His Most

Characteristic Doctrine.  Again,  In The Closing Chapter,  Butler

Writes (P. 275):-

"We Should Endeavour To See The So-Called Inorganic As Living In

Respect Of The Qualities It Has In Common With The Organic,  Rather

Than The Organic As Non-Living In Respect Of The Qualities It Has In

Common With The Inorganic."

We Conclude Our Survey Of This Book By Mentioning The Literary

Controversial Part Chiefly To Be Found In Chapter Iv,  But Cropping Up

Elsewhere.  It Refers To Interpolations Made In The Authorised

Translation Of Krause's "Life Of Erasmus Darwin."  Only One Side Is

Presented; And We Are Not Called Upon,  Here Or Elsewhere,  To Discuss

The Merits Of The Question.

"Luck,  Or Cunning,  As The Main Means Of Organic Modification? An

Attempt To Throw Additional Light Upon The Late Mr. Charles Darwin's

Theory Of Natural Selection" (1887),  Completes The Series Of

Biological Books.  This Is Mainly A Book Of Strenuous Polemic.  It

Brings Out Still More Forcibly The Hering-Butler Doctrine Of

Continued Personality From Generation To Generation,  And Of The

Working Of Unconscious Memory Throughout; And Points Out That,  While

This Is Implicit In Much Of The Teaching Of Herbert Spencer,  Romanes,

And Others,  It Was Nowhere--Even After The Appearance Of "Life And

Habit"--Explicitly Recognised By Them,  But,  On The Contrary,  Masked

By Inconsistent Statements And Teaching.  Not Luck But Cunning,  Not

The Uninspired Weeding Out By Natural Selection But The Intelligent

Striving Of The Organism,  Is At The Bottom Of The Useful Variety Of

Organic Life.  And The Parallel Is Drawn That Not The Happy Accident

Of Time And Place,  But The Machiavellian Cunning Of Charles Darwin,

Succeeded In Imposing,  As Entirely His Own,  On The Civilised World An

Uninspired And Inadequate Theory Of Evolution Wherein Luck Played The

Leading Part; While The More Inspired And Inspiring Views Of The

Older Evolutionists Had Failed By The Inferiority Of Their Luck.  On

This Controversy I Am Bound To Say That I Do Not In The Very Least

Share Butler's Opinions; And I Must Ascribe Them To His Lack Of

Personal Familiarity With The Biologists Of The Day And Their Modes

Of Thought And Of Work.  Butler Everywhere Undervalues The Important

Work Of Elimination Played By Natural Selection In Its Widest Sense.

The "Conclusion" Of "Luck,  Or Cunning?" Shows A Strong Advance In

Monistic Views,  And A Yet More Marked Development In The Vibration

Hypothesis Of Memory Given By Hering And Only Adopted With The

Greatest Reserve In "Unconscious Memory."

"Our Conception,  Then,  Concerning The Nature Of Any Matter Depends

Solely Upon Its Kind And Degree Of Unrest,  That Is To Say,  On The

Characteristics Of The Vibrations That Are Going On Within It.  The

Exterior Object Vibrating In A Certain Way Imparts Some Of Its

Vibrations To Our Brain; But If The State Of The Thing Itself Depends

Upon Its Vibrations,  It [The Thing] Must Be Considered As To All

Intents And Purposes The Vibrations Themselves--Plus,  Of Course,  The

Underlying Substance That Is Vibrating. . . .  The Same Vibrations,

Therefore,  Form The Substance Remembered,  Introduce An Infinitesimal

Dose Of It Within The Brain,  Modify The Substance Remembering,  And,

In The Course Of Time,  Create And Further Modify The Mechanism Of

Both The Sensory And The Motor Nerves.  Thought And Thing Are One.

"I Commend These Two Last Speculations To The Reader's Charitable

Consideration,  As Feeling That I Am Here Travelling Beyond The Ground

On Which I Can Safely Venture. . . .  I Believe They Are Both

Substantially True."

In 1885 He Had Written An Abstract Of These Ideas In His Notebooks

(See New Quarterly Review,  1910,  P. 116),  And As In "Luck,  Or

Cunning?" Associated Them Vaguely With The Unitary Conceptions

Introduced Into Chemistry By Newlands And Mendelejeff.  Judging

Himself As An Outsider,  The Author Of "Life And Habit" Would

Certainly Have Considered The Mild Expression Of Faith,  "I Believe

They Are Both Substantially True," Equivalent To One Of Extreme

Doubt.  Thus "The Fact Of The Archbishop's Recognising This As Among

The Number Of His Beliefs Is Conclusive Evidence,  With Those Who Have

Devoted Attention To The Laws Of Thought,  That His Mind Is Not Yet

Clear" On The Matter Of The Belief Avowed (See "Life And Habit," Pp.

24,  25).

To Sum Up:  Butler's Fundamental Attitude To The Vibration Hypothesis

Was All Through That Taken In "Unconscious Memory"; He Played With It

As A Pretty Pet,  And Fancied It More And More As Time Went On; But

Instead Of Backing It For All He Was Worth,  Like The Main Theses Of

"Life And Habit," He Put A Big Stake On It--And Then Hedged.

The Last Of Butler's Biological Writings Is The Essay,  "The Deadlock

In Darwinism," Containing Much Valuable Criticism On Wallace And

Weismann.  It Is In Allusion To The Misnomer Of Wallace's Book,

"Darwinism," That He Introduces The Term "Wallaceism" {0d} For A

Theory Of Descent That Excludes The Transmission Of Acquired

Characters.  This Was,  Indeed,  The Chief Factor That Led Charles

Darwin To Invent His Hypothesis Of Pangenesis,  Which,  Unacceptable As

It Has Proved,  Had Far More To Recommend It As A Formal Hypothesis

Than The Equally Formal Germ-Plasm Hypothesis Of Weismann.

The Chief Difficulty In Accepting The Main Theses Of Butler And

Hering Is One Familiar To Every Biologist,  And Not At All Difficult

To Understand By The Layman.  Everyone Knows That The Complicated

Beings That We Term "Animals" And "Plants," Consist Of A Number Of

More Or Less Individualised Units,  The Cells,  Each Analogous To A

Simpler Being,  A Protist--Save In So Far As The Character Of The Cell

Unit Of The Higher Being Is Modified In Accordance With The Part It

Plays In That Complex Being As A Whole.  Most People,  Too,  Are

Familiar With The Fact That The Complex Being Starts As A Single

Cell,  Separated From Its Parent; Or,  Where Bisexual Reproduction

Occurs,  From A Cell Due To The Fusion Of Two Cells,  Each Detached

From Its Parent.  Such Cells Are Called "Germ-Cells."  The Germ-Cell,

Whether Of Single Or Of Dual Origin,  Starts