The evolution hypothesis : a criticism of the new cosmic philosophy

CHAPTER I. Introductory

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The Evolution Hypothesis has stamped its impress on thought of our time — Claims to dominate all experience — Here dealt with as formulating the entire cosmic movement— Examined as elaborated by Mr. Herbert Spencer — Tested at vital points — Term evolutionism defined — The question touches vitally the interests of men — Effect of the acceptance of the Hypothesis — Yearning after unity in the world and in our intellectual life — Evolution answers the craving for manifested continuity — Its acceptance due to its answering that craving rather than to evidence — The relations of Religion and Science not discussed — How best harmonized — The dominance of the new philosophy a peril to scientific progress — Would overbear intellectual freedom — The question not, What is truth ? but, Is evolutionism true % ... 1

CHAPTER II. The Complete Unification of Knowledge Impossible

Philosophy defined by Mr. Spencer as "completely unified knowledge" — Philosophy in that sense not possible — Its task to "unify all concrete phenomena" — Unity may be sought in God, or in unity of the object, or in the absolute self- revealing — Cannot be reached by way of the absolute — May be sought in manifested process of change — Problem stated — Facts to be unified — Lying in distinct

1^375301 iv Contents.

which the entire course of change may be deductively demonstrated — Under that principle every known law must be subsumed — It must account for all the known phases of all known phenomena — Mr. Spencer finds such principle in ' ' the law of the continuous redistribution of matter and motion " — This dynamic principle universal — The problem in the solution of which alone philosophy comes into existence a problem in dynamics — No other principle available on the evolution doctrine — Mr. Spencer embraces thought, emotion, and conscience under it — He denies that his doctrine is materialistic— So far as the universe of material forces reaches, it is admitted that dynamic law is universal — But all kinds of knowledge cannot be included under it — It does not account for life or sentience or thought — But to all these Mr. Spencer applies this law — He takes exception to the application of the term " mechanical " to his hypothesis — It is dynamical —We are carried back to the Greek atomists, . . 65

CHAPTER VIII.

The Persistence of Force.

Section I. — Is t'h^ Persistence of Force a datum of consciousness ? Mr. Spencer claims for it the authority of a datum of consciousness — The content of consciousness stated — If Mr. Spencer's reasoning be sound all existence is eternal— He identifies being and persistence — The force whose persistence is attested by consciousness is, on Mr. Spencer's theory, the absolute force — But the force we know is that with which alone science is concerned — What we know does not persist ; what persists we can never know — Mr. Spencer falls back on an impotence of thought — This will not avail in founding a system of positive philosophy, . . . . .78

Section II. — What is included in the term Force? Force used in two senses — We know it as an object of sense — We use the term metaphorically of mental activities — Does the persisting force include Spirit? — Spirit must have existed either as matter, or as a separate mode of

Contents, existence — If the latter, where during all the ages did it lie hidden? 87

Section III. — The Force persisting the Absolute Force. Mr. Spencer employs the word force to denote force as it is within the limits of definite knowledge, and force as it is for ever unknowable — Science requires the persistence of force within the reach of knowledge — The validity of the axiom requires that we should take the persisting force to be the absolute — Evolution is founded on the persistence of manifested force — But force as existing within the knowable does not persist — Force recedes into the unsearchable, . . . . . .89

Section IV. — Can ive predicate persistence in any Jcnowahle mode ? The predication of persistence in identity will not hold — The predication, Force continues to be force, yields no profitable result — Persistence may mean continuance in equality of amount — This predication also fails us — We must reject the predication of persistence in identity, or in kind, or in quantity — Removing these modes we reach the bare thought of bei^ig — We are not far from Hegel's identification of pure Being and pure No-thing — The knowable universe will not rest firmly on such a basis, . . . . . .95

Section Y.— Corollaries of the persistence of jorce. 1. — The indestructibility of matter. — The persistence of force does not guarantee the persistence of matter — Two essential attributes of matter, resistance and occupation of space — No sufiicient ground for affirming that matter, whether viewed as resistant or space-occupying, persists. 2. — The continuity of motion. — Persistance of force gives no warrant for affirming the ceaseless continuity of motion. 3. — The persistance of relations among forces. — The relations comprise space, time, quantity, quality, cause and effect — These relations do not all persist, else there could be no change — Mr. Spencer deals only with cause and effect — This relation examined as an instance of persistence— Final conclusion that the persistance of force has no validity as a universal truth — But Evolutionism is based on it, . . . . . . 103 vi Contents.

CHAPTER IX.

Postulates of Evolution.

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The Evolution Philosophy requires as its basis certain postulates— 1. It presupposes, as its primal conception, the cosmos as a force homogeneous or nearly homogeneous — It is either finite or infinite — examined under either supposition — 2. The evolving force must be assumed equal in amount throughout all time — This impossible of proof — 3. The hypothesis postulates the inclusion of all change and of every event under the law of the continuous redistribution of matter and motion — If mental phenomena cannot be included, this postulate is rejected — 4. The total of matter in the universe must be granted a fixed quantity — and also the total of motion — 5. It must further be granted that force as manifested in the cosmos includes in these manifestations all the causes of every change — This postulate examined, and found when enlarged so as to embrace all facts, to be worthless to the evolutionist — 6. There must be given a determinate extent and relation of parts — This postulate examined and the assumptions involved in it set out — These postulates essential to the Evolution Hypothesis, . . . 112

CHAPTER X.

The Formula of Evolution.

The formula — Is it a law ? — The terms examined — In what sense " indefinite " ? — This concept only thinkable as the negation of definite thought — " Incoherent " yields no precise conception — " Homogeneity " also vague — Summing all up, the total could hardly be surpassed in vagueness — Inconsistent with the conception of the imperceptible out of which the existing order rises — The '* definite, coherent heterogeneity," which is the evolved result does not yield a more exact conception — The words "integration of matter and concomitant dissipation of motion," do not furnish an instrument of exact reasoning — This

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formula cannot be applied to individual objects or classes of things — In them the force does not persist, but is continually changed in amount — Every principle of cosmic evolution is in such cases violated — The formula when tested is found wanting, .... 133

CHAPTER XL

Evolution as it gives Account of Inorganic Matter.

Evolution should throw clearest light on inorganic matter — Here dynamic law is supreme — Mr. Spencer does not apply his doctrine in this field — This to be regretted— It could have been more easily tested by known physical law — The atomic theory adopted by Mr. Spencer — The one quality of the atom resistance — Is the atom a force-bearer, or is the force inherent in the atom ? — Mr. Spencer favours the former — Then we have, besides the atoms, operative forces moving them — How can the law of these forces be reached ? — The atoms are combined in molecules and these in systems — All future changes lay in these co-ordinate movements — These movements are not explained— Of this world behind the visible evolution can tell us nothing — Yet the visible cannot be understood till it is known — It is a barren hypothesis — No instance of evolution in the whole range of dynamic operations — Differentiation the necessary form of all definite concepts — In pure physics evolutionism is silent in face of every fundamental question, ..... 145

CHAPTER XII.

The Transition from Inorganic Matter to Life.

Mr. Spencer repudiates "spontaneous generation" — His account of the transition to life — Instability of the inorganic compounds — Atoms aggregated into molecules — molecules into protein — Portions of inorganic matter displaying activities varying little by little into vital — Ceaseless adjustments between aggregates and their units viii Contents,

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differentiate organisms into kinds — This exposition a brilliant effort of scientific imagination — 1. The hypothesis assumes the evolution of molecules differentiated into kinds and reproduced in their kinds prior to the evolution of protoplasm — The two most difficult problems in organic life antecedent to the first beginning of life — 2. Mr. Spencer assumes, contrary to uniform experience, the existence of protoplasm prior to life — 3. He takes for granted that by minute variations molecular motion may become vital action — 4. To account for the varieties of kind he introduces the " physiological unit," . . 156

CHAPTER XIII.

The Physiological Unit.

The physiological unit is : 1. Extremely minute — 2. It is a highly organized body — 3. It is composed of system upon system of molecules — 4. These units differ in kinds — 5. They have a "more or less distinctive character" — The ' ' polarity " of the units — Immense variety of hereditary attributes stored up in each unit — 6. Individual characteristics of the unit— due to the incident forces — Adjustment of units as difficult to comprehend as adjustment of living bodies — 7. The units possess marvellous inherent powers — Proclivities, tendencies, power of arranging themselves — The environing forces the source of the power that effects re-arrangement, the polarity of the units determining the direction — This no addition to real knowledge — It carries us back to a defined, differentiated system — The physiological unit necessary to Mr. Spencer's hypothesis — It is a "special creation "of the evolution philosophy, ...... 168

CHAPTER XIV.

The Origin of Sentient Life.

Question discussed only in relation to lower animals — Take dog as an example — Facts to be explained : (a) his

Contents, ix intelligence, (6) his sense of pleasure and pain, (c) his complex and highly developed organism — Putting aside question of intelligence, what account does evolution give of the organism and its sensibility ? — Is the sense of pain seeming only or real ? — Where lies the source of the feeling ? — Suppose the universe composed of atoms and their motions; how does feeling arise? — Either the capacity for, feeling is a property resident in atoms, or something ■exists other than matter — In the former case the atoms are monads, possessing properties other than dynamic ; in the latter, we affirm the existence of concrete being other than the forces manifested in atoms and their motions — A supra-dynamical element is introduced — In •either case the dynamic doctrine is found defective — Feeling reveals another mode of being — It can never have its place assigned in an order dominated throughout by physical law — When feeling appeared, the process of change was profoundly modified — It affects all modifications of organisms — The physical process ^Zi/s the feeling determines the next process, and so on — The feeling necessary to the result — The operative cause not physical force alone, but physical force pZm feeling — Evolutionist unable to assign any knowable cause to account for the origin of sentient life — Nor any explanation of the part of sentience in working out modifications of organic forms, . . 178

CHAPTER XV.

The Origin of Organic Forms.

Vast multiformity in organized matter — Evolution bound to show that all forms mud have sprung from one primordial mode of living matter, and to show how — Only on these conditions can a philosophy of evolution be established — Facts divided into two classes, organisms as at present known and those found in the geological record — No direct evidence of transition from lower to higher species — Gradual advancement from lower to higher forms throughout the geological periods inevitable — Science looks in

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vain for the common ancestor of differentiated species — The genealogical tree is all branches and no stem — The proposal to treat man as an exception fore-doomed — If Divine intelligence be needful to account for man, it is needful to account for inferior species — Wallace regards man as exempt from the great law of organic change — Darwin's position safer as an evolutionist, in boldly including him — Spencer stakes his theory on the adequacy of dynamic law to account for the whole — He condemns Prof. Owen's ' ' continuous unknown process " — No more comprehensible by science than "special creations" — The causes recognized by Mr. Spencer are (a) an innate tendency or polarity in the physiological units, and (6) the play of incident forces — The unit has an internal system of forces equilibrated in harmony with ancestral form, the incident forces disturb this equilibrium — In regaining equilibrium the structure is modified — The explanation carries us back to the atom and its environment — The differentiation of sex — Differentiation of structure due altogether to environment — Physiological unit dethroned — How account for the diverse action of the same environment ? — Mr. Spencer gives two conflicting answers — Evolution cannot show in any comprehensible way the mode of operation of the causes producing variety of forms — The dynamic hypothesis furnishes basis for theory different from " natural selection " — Similarity of incident forces should produce similarity of structure — The vertebrate structure may be result of similarity of causes and not the outcome of identity of descent — In Darwinian theory the " incident forces " play a part that is negative — The removal of the less fit will not account for the production of the fittest — At bottom, the question is the production and continuance of any — The growth of a single germ cannot be accounted for on the dynamic theory — No vital activity can be explained wholly by knowledge of dynamic law — A cause continually operative — not to be confounded with physical force — Its truest representation the energy of self-conscious mind, . . . 187

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Chapter III. The Limits Of Physical Science

THE Physical Sciences have advanced with such rapidity, and have succeeded in so large a number •of instances in unifying what appeared to be altogether separate classes of facts by the discovery of their law, that at first sight it seems reasonable to hope for a still wider unification embracing all departments of truth.

" The truths of philosophy bear the same relation to the highest scientific truths, that each of these bears to lower scientific truths. As each widest generalization of science comprehends and consolidates the narrower generalization of its own division; so the generalizations of philosophy comprehend and consolidate the widest generalizations of Science. It is therefore a knowledge the extreme opposite in kind to that which experience first accumulates. It is the final product of that process which begins with a mere colligation of crude observations, goes on establishing propositions that are broader and more separated from particular cases, and ends in universal propositions. Or, to bring thfe definition to its simplest and

26 The EvohUion Hypothesis.

clearest form : — Knowledge of the lowest kind is ununified knowledge; Science is partially - unified knowledge ; Philosophy is com'pletely -unified knowledge." *

Mr. Spencer's system is framed of such " universal propositions" derived from generalizations of science besfinnincy "with a mere colliixation of crude observations." Do these generalizations furnish truths which may be turned into universals holding good over the whole universe of being, and dominating all thought ? They do not. The truths of experiential science cannot be so used legitimately : and the philosophy founded on such a basis is demonstrably false.

To make this position clear it is necessary to inquire into the limits of physical science. The physicist Imay not add anything to nature: it is his business to I see what is, and notbinor but what is. His science is strictly bounded by observation, and can speak only in the name of known facts, and of such facts as are, in the points of comparison, precisely similar. Physical science is imperatively enclosed within the actually known. Where it deals with that which is not actuall}^ known, it must invariably carry forward into the unknown that which is known, and with the assumption that the conditions, so far as affects the matter dealt with, are identical. Given other conditions, and the result will be different. Science may

* First Princlphs, § 37.

The Limits of Physical Science. 27

not invent a conjectural state of things, and profess,, by setting out the operation of known laws in such supposed circumstances, to extend the bounds of real knowledge. All scientific work of that kind — and it forms a considerable part of popular science — is merely imaginative ; it lies in the department of; romance.

There are bounds which ought not to be passed in framing hypotheses to account for phenomena that remain unexplained. It is not allowable to set up any hypothesis which lies outside the possibility of being established by evidence. Every legitimate conjecture lies within the possibility of actual proof. It is fatal to any hypothesis to show that it is incapable of beingproved. Its author is bound to point out a possible line of adequate evidence, or his conjecture must be rejected as illegitimate. The doctrine of universal evolution belongs to this class of illegitimate hypotheses ; if it were true, it could not be proved true. The requirements of satisfactory proof transcend the limits of human thought.

Every attempt to formulate truths derived from experiential science that shall be held to be good over the whole past, present, and future of concrete being, encounters insuperable difiiculties.

Man is not omniscient: he must gather his facts from experience, and must interpret them by comparison and inference. At every step he comes in contact with the inscrutable ; gftid his intelligence is in every process liable to error. Even if we grant that the mind is a quite perfect reasoning instrument, the physicist is beset with liabilities to misconceptions and mistakes. These sources of error may be grouped under five heads, — duration, extent, minuteness, complexity, and imperfection of the organs of sense.

(1.) Duration. The stretch of time which may be •called the period of observation is as nothing compared with the supposed duration of the universe ; and the period of skilled and reliable observation is still less. All scientific conclusions are based on observations made at one point in a boundless reach of movement and ceaselessly flowing change. Two sources of •doubt lie in every instance; — (a) whether the whole thing, or all that is essential to the right understanding of it for the purpose in hand, has been seen on the side within the field of observation; and (6) whether the facts observed adequately represent the whole series, which is conceived as extending backward to a measureless distance in time. Observation, to yield a valid result, must conform fully to both conditions. If there be room for questioning the exactness or •sufficiency of the facts observed, we are bound to refuse Acceptance to any doctrine built thereon, when it transcends the immediate bounds of experience and formulates a law for all time. The divergence from reality may be infinitesimal at the outset, and within the range of experience of no practical account, but •carried over the entire sweep of cosmic history, back-

The Limits of Physical Science. 29

ward and forward to infinity, the result will be whollyfalse.

When the order of the universe, as at the beginning of its history it emerges out of and at the close of itshistory it passes again into the imperceptible, isdeduced from present knowledge of phenomena, this liability to error is always present. Unless our knowledge of fact be precise and adequate — if aught be misread or omitted — all reasonings based on it, and extending before and after over unimaginable stretches of time, are fatally tainted with Uncertainty. The result is wholly unreliable. The amount of reality with which the physicist set out remains a fixed quantity, while the margin of error has increased at every step. That which, within experience, was an. imperceptible divergence from fact has widened to infinity.

(2.) The bounds of things as existing in space at any given point in time are practically infinite. However far scientific vision may reach, the cosmos extends beyond. The sphere of observation is but a speck in the limitless expanse. Now, to infer from the little portion observed to the vastly wider regions remaining for ever inscrutable, is fraught with peril.. We must be assured not only of the similarity, but identity, of concrete existences within experience and beyond it, before we can venture to draw any conclusion with an approach to certainty.

In every case we ar5 met by the initial difficulty of

The Evohttion Hypothesis.

assuring ourselves that the whole fact has been — for our purpose — discovered. It' all nature form one cosmos, as the scientist assumes, the whole is joined together in a real unity, so that no one part is separable from any other part. Each instance is in effect the entire universe. Every object of inquiry thus -extends immeasurably beyond the limits of possible experience ; and that vast unknown is as essential to the instance before us as that in it which may be brought within the field of vision. We may sufficiently understand the phenomenon, and its relations within the visible, to reach conclusions that will be valid within experience ; but we should need to exhaust every relation in which the object stands to every other mode of existence in the cosmos, before we could reason with confidence from the instance and its law to the limitless totality of things. Such completeness of knowledge is not given to man. The scientific inquirer must always remain in the attitude of expectance, willing to modify his doctrine should any new phase of the phenomena under investigation be presented. There are laws, within their proper limits, well-established and sure: but when the physicist carries them beyond the bounds of experience he is always beset by doubt ; he cannot reason with the full assurance of one who deals with universal and necessary truth.

When, therefore, an h3^pothesis is framed to cover the whole extent of knowable existence, and is based

The Limits of Physical Science. 31

•on professed observation, it must be always open to the objection, and its certainty qualified by the consideration, that the vastly greater part of the contemporaneous fact was beyond the ken of the observer.

This source of error will appear the more formidable, if we keep in view that the concrete existence forming the matter of investigation is united with other existences not in our plane only, but in an infinite number of planes intersecting at the point of observation. We are not situated at a point in a level surface •over which the eye may range to the utmost stretch of vision ; we are enclosed within a sphere whose centre is in relation to us everywhere, and its circumference nowhere. The instances examined by the scientist, and on the precise and complete knowledge of which our cosmic theories are built, are assumed to be one organically with every part of that unbounded whole, which in every direction passes beyond the range of our experience into infinity.

We are not warranted, then, in concludinsf w^th assured certainty, from the limits of our narrow and imperfect experience, over the whole universe of concrete being. For whatever doubt attaches to the completeness of our interpretation of nature, as seen, •expands and grows with every step outward, increasing as the sphere widens in every direction towards illimitable space. A scientific truth, as close to reality as any induction of physical science can be, and valid within the range of exjferience, becomes, when carried from the central point of observation over the wholfr extent of co-existent things, so doubtful as to be valueless. The error has enlarged at every step, while the truth has remained a fixed quantity.

(3.) A further source of error presents itself when we bring into view the fact, that as nature stretches out of view beyond us in time and space, so it passes out of view beneath us in indiscernible minuteness.. The instrumental aid by which the physicist brings within the range of observation a vast extent of phenomena, imperceptible to unaided sense, has revealed at the same time regions still more minute, forming a part of the concrete whole, whose law science undertakes to expound. These infinitesimal forms of existence are beyond the reach of observation — " monads,, compared with which a grain of sand is an earth."* But they are an integral part of the world we know- It is made up of them. They are factors, it may be the most important factors, in the processes of change.. Our rude manipulation leaves them in every experiment untouched. Too subtile to be apprehended, they are none the less potent. What part they have played, or may play, in the drama whose movement philosophy would formulate, we can never learn. They may have been the leading actors in former scenes. In omitting them when we write out the plot, we may be leaving out the Hamlet of the play. This, at

* Spencer : T&xjch. Vol. II., Part VII., Chap. II.

The Limits of Physical Science, 2iZ'

any rate, we may boldly affirm, that the hypothesis which formulates the law of concrete being and explains the whole series of cosmic and individual change while it is confessedly ignorant of the law of that ever present and ceaselessly active world of real existence lying around us, and touching us at every instant, must have in it a large imaginative element.

(4.) The inexactness of all observation and experiment is further illustrated, when we bring into view the endless complexity of all causes and effects. Every experiment is complicated by the co-existence of a countless number of co-operating forces, each of which is correlated with all the rest, and contributes its part to the combined result. The scientific principle of the correlation of physical forces brings this aspect of the intricateness of nature very emphatically into view. The relations of forces, whether in masses or in molecules, are for man limitless. Every new discovery of correlation among the special sciences is fresh evidence of the boundless complexity of causes, and additional ground for questioning the perfect exactness of any experimental truth. Every correlation on which attention is fixed shows, with greater clearness, the exhaustless inter-relations of things. As we become more fully alive to the inconceivably complex whole which constitutes the totality of the universe,, we shall advance with less assurance to universal truths from generalizations of science, valid so longas the scientist continues on the solid ground of

34 T^fi^ Evolution Hypothesis,

experience, but which are not safer than the wings •of Icarus when he attempts a flight towards the boundless distances of the cosmos, or poises himself above the ever-rolling ocean stream of change.

(5.) When we turn from the objects of knowledge to test the instruments of observation, the grounds of mistrust are multiplied. The field is narrowed by the limitations of the organs of sense. On the evolution theory the trustworthiness of the organs of sense is extremely limited. They are products of evolution, shaped in the gradual adaptation of man to his surroundings. They are in number and range determined by their utility in adjusting his organism to his environment. What is useful for this purpose, and nothing further, has been evolved. But the elaboration of a true system of philosophy is not a condition of the continuance of the human species. The race lias persisted for a long period with, as the advocates of evolution believe, a very incorrect conception of the universe. It is not clear, then, how sense organs evolved for a quite difiPerent end can be relied on to give such a full and complete knowledge of the phenomena as will furnish a basis for a perfect €0smic theory. There may be, probably there are, many modes of activity continually operating throughout the universe, affecting the relations of its parts, and directing its movement, which are not in relation to our sensibility, and which we have no means of apprehending. The senses with which we are en-

The Limits of Physical Science. 35

cloweJ are, on the hypothesis of evolution, defective in their adaptation to any purpose except the practical end of adjustment to environment, and so to the maintenance of man's life on the earth. Admirably fitted to serve the purpose for which they have been evolved, they fail us when applied to any other use. They cannot, therefore, be depended on as instruments of exact knowledge. The power of sight, for example, is extremely restricted in its compass. Our perception of colour is limited to a narrow range, and within that range is very imperfect. The lower animals are in many instances endowed w^ith more perfect organs than man. Defective sense-perception is corrected by comparison, but even then the means are not furnished for attaining absolute precision. " The mind of man, as Francis Bacon said, is like an uneven mirror, and does not reflect the events of nature without distortion."* The most skilful observer cannot adjust his intellectual compensations with perfect success to defects of nerve and organ. The gift of exact observation is extremely rare. We tend to see that for which we look. "It is exceedingly rare," says Professor Jevons, " to find persons who can, with perfect fairness, estimate and register facts for and against their own peculiar views and theories."f The mind brings with it an anticipation which colours the event. Those parts of the concrete whole which favour the conclu-