The unfolding universe

Front matter

EDGAR L.HEERMANCE thus. BBjTJTI Book_ M 4^_

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT,

BY

Chapter I

Ideas valid only when concretely applied, 3. Theories must be derived from observed facts, 4. The possibility of knowing, 5. A typical scientific induction, 6. Philosophy must adopt the inductive method, 7. The relativity of knowledge, 8. Philosophical scepticism, 9. Knowledge an adjustment to the external world, 10. Kant's view of the idea of space, n. Space as interpreted through child and animal psychology, 12. Stages of mental adjustment: percepts and their objective validity, 13. Recepts, 15. Concepts, 17.

Chapter II

The physical group of phenomena, 21. The stellar universe of limited extent, 22. Number and distribution of the stars, 25. Classification, 27. Double stars, clusters, variables, 28. The nebulas, 30. Stages of stellar evolution, 31. Action of tides, 33. Meteoric hypothesis, 34. Electrons, 35. The life of a star, 35. Contribution of astronomy: the world a unity, 36. A finite universe, 37.

Chapter III

The atomic theory now proved, '39. Structure of the atom: discovery of electrons, 39. Radioactivity, 42. Atoms in the making, 46. Mass of the electron is due to its motion, 46. Is the mass of the positive ion electro-magnetic? 47.

Chapter IV Is There An Jether?

The aether theory, 49. Is the aether in motion? 50. Assumptions of the Newtonian mechanics, 51. The principle of relativity, 52. Mass now regarded as a function of the velocity, 54. Collapse of the aether theory, 55. Rejection of the idea of infinity, 56. The new mechanics and its units, 56. The category of number, 57. Space as measurable relation, 57. Time as measurable sequence, 59. A limited universe and the conservation of energy, 60.

Chapter V

Classification of forces: A. Electrical attraction, 61. B. Magnetic attraction, 61. C. Pressure of radiation, 62. D. Molecular attraction, 62. E. Gravitation, 62. Forms of kinetic energy: 1. Electrical, 63. 2. Magnetic, 64. 3. Radiant, 64. 4. Molecular, 64. 5. Molar, 65. Law of the conservation of energy, 67. Is the universe running down? 67. Probable identity of matter and force, 68. The universal energy, 69. Uniformity and intelligence, 70. Physics can tell us nothing as to plan and purpose, 72.

Chapter VI

The physical history of the earth, 75. Simplest existing forms of life; the vegetable kingdom; higher protozoa, 78. Metazoa, 81. Vertebrates, 83. Mammals, 85. Species and varieties, 87. Physical and social environment, 88. Wide range of experimenting in nature, 89. The origin of species: weakness of Darwin's summation theory, 90. Mutations, 91. Mendel's law allows mutations to survive cross-breeding, 92. True place of natural selection, 93. Origin of mutations still unsolved, 94. The gradual perfecting of species, 95. Evolution a grand laissez faire, 96. Changes on earth's surface due to the presence of life, 96.

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Chapter VII

The cell as the unit of organism, 97. The cell-body, 97. The nucleus, 98. The centrosome, 99. The process of cell-division, 100. Conjugation of germ-cells, 100. Ripening preparatory to conjugation, 102. Distinctive features of germ-cells, 103. Regeneration, 105. No biological units smaller than the cell, 105. Relation of the cell to the organism, 106. Reactions in solution; colloids and crystalloids, 107. Metabolism of plants, essentially constructive, 108. Animal metabolism, both constructive and destructive, 111. Chemical changes following the death of the organism, 113. Organic heat; carbon, 113. Nitrogen, 116. Making albumins in the laboratory, 117.

Chapter VIII How Far Does Chemistry Carry Us?

Chemistry the key to biological problems, 118. Effect on the cell of the surrounding medium: Loeb's experiments, 118. Work of Carrel and Burrows in cultivating tissues outside the body, 121. Ross discovery of the chemical basis for cell-division, 122. Anti-bodies and immunity, 123. Hormones, 124. Enzymes and their effect on chemical reaction, 125. The cell as an energy-transformer, 127. What is life? The characteristics of a living organism: 1. Active movement, 128. 2. Metabolism, the control of the necessary chemical changes, 131. 3. Regeneration, 132. 4. Variation, 133. Provisional definition of life, 134.

Chapter IX

Exteme complexity of even the simplest forms of life, 135. No evidence for spontaneous generation, 136. Chance assembling of an albumin molecule ruled out by the doctrine of chances, 136. Life has not been brought to the earth by meteorites, 137. The conditions of protoplasmic life; not fulfilled by any other planet of our system, 138. Mars; criticism of Lowell's argument; could only produce low vegetable forms, 139. Existence of habitable planets in other systems not probable, 140. Return to question: What is life? Current theories, 142. Life resembles a force in

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its transformation of energy, 144. There is life in the universe, interwoven with the physical, 145. Tne individual, 146. Question of plan and purpose beyond the scope of biology, 148. Life as evidence for a control of the physical, 148.

Chapter X

Relation between psychology and biology, 153. Evidence that the human species is descended from lower forms: (a) Comparative anatomy, 153. (b) Embryology, 154. (c) Rudimentary organs, 155. (d) Comparative psychology, 156. Mental life of lower organisms, 157. Increase of automatic action in higher stages, 158. What distinguishes man from the other anthropoidea, 162. Importance of the social instinct, in the development of speech, 164. Question of the antiquity of, man, 165. Links discovered, 167. Further mutations in the human species: the three races of Europe, 167. Evidence that race or inheritance makes no difference in educability: the Australian aborigines, 170. Summary, 173-

Chapter XI

Principal parts of the vertebrate nervous system, 175. Functions of the various parts, 178. The cortex: areas where sensory and motor nerves terminate, 181. The unmapped areas; Flechsig's theory of association centers, 182. The evidence from studies in aphasia, 182. Development of speech centers in one or other hemisphere through education, 183. Some substitution of function possible, in the same hemisphere, 186.

Chapter XII

Neurones and their outgrowths, 188. The neurone as a specialized conductor, 191. Rate of conduction, 192. The reflex-arc: the receptor, 192. The sensory neurone series, 195. The motor-neurones, 196. Example of scratch-reflex in dog, 197. The coordination of the nervous system by

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the higher centers, 199. Leading segments; distance receptors, 200. Problems suggested by the training of the nerve-cells in the cortex, 205. Nothing in the individual brain-cells to explain the mental processes of the higher animals, 206.

Chapter XIII

Mind as the fused and cooperative life of the nerve-cells, 207. The study of human behavior. What the normal human mind is able to do: perception; conception; speech; memory; self-consciousness; imagination; emotion; reasoning; volitional control, 208. Laws governing man's response to environment, 213. Mind as the specialization of the organism's active adjustment to environment, 215. Question whether brain or mind is fundamental ; biological evidence pointing toward the latter view, 215. Education of the talking lobe of the brain an example of mental control, 217. Further evidence furnished by the subconscious, 220. Provisional definition of mind, 221.

Chapter XIV

(a) Intuition: in special crises; the mathematical prodigy; the musical prodigy; genius, 222. (b) Sleep. General features, 228. Activity of the mind in partial consciousness, 230. Dreams, 231. Waking hallucinations, 233. Motor suggestion; somnambulism, 233. (c) Hypnosis, 234. Possible physiological explanation, 235. Physical effects of suggestion without hypnosis, 236. Example of stigmatization under hypnosis, 237. Memory in the hypnotic state, 238. Patient not an automaton, 240. (d) Double and multiple personality: case of Felida X, 241. Thomas C. Hanna, 243. Alternate personalities in the trance medium, 244. (e) The subconscious. Summary of what has been learned regarding the subconscious mind, 245. Morality and intelligence of the subconscious, 250. Relation of the subconscious mind to the physical organism, 251. (f) Telepathy. Transfer of tastes, pains and visual images, 254. In hypnosis, 255. Telepathy at a distance, 256. Apparitions; may be given a telepathic explanation, 257. The same true of clairvoyance, 259.

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Chapter XV

Is the vertebrate merely a colony of segments? 261. The unity of the organism is essentially psychical, 263. The light thrown on problem of personality by study of the subconscious. Person of the older psychology remains a fact,

264. Ego not as fixed a quantity as was formerly supposed,

265. Janet's experiments show personality in the making, 265. Personality in the ordinary sense the playing of a part, 266. The deeper "mind" ; its characteristics, 267. Its control of the physical, 269. When does the individual begin and end? 269. Some evidence that mind is 1 independent of the physical organism, 270. Summary of psychology's contribution: there is mind in the universe, 271.' Possibility of a cosmic mind in communication with the minds known on this planet. Proof of this is beyond the scope of psychology, 272.

Chapter XVI

Increasing richness of reality due to the coming of man, 274. With human species, evolution becomes predominantly psychical, 275. Social progress represents the accumulation of ideas, 275. Sketch of the stages through which society has passed: (a) The horde, 276. (b) The metronymic tribe, 277. (c) The patronymic tribe, 278. (d) The patronymic confederation, 278. Development of civilization, 279. New accumulation after the barbarian invasions, 281. The modern industrial era, following the introduction of steam, 282. Inventions were due to greater opportunity for the individual, 282. The gradual enfranchisement of the masses, 283. Jesus' contribution to democracy, 287. Earlier ethical accumulations, 288. Hebrew law and prophecy, 290. The achievements of the race in individual character, 291.

Chapter XVII

Estimate of the total number of human beings; small proportion of "the elect," 293. Physical degeneration due to civilization, 294. Economic conditions in the United States, 303. The Pittsburgh Survey, 304. Wages of women

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workers, 306. Child labor, 306. New York tenement houses, 307. Distribution of wealth, 308. The idle rich, 309. Must we expect another French revolution? 311. The higher life of man a fact, 311. Rapid economic changes in the last century; time is required for readjustment, 312. Man likely to become an increasingly important factor for philosophy, 313.

Chapter XVIII

Comparative religion; system of classification proposed, 317. (a) The primitive stage; tribes of north-central Australia, 318. The Dakotas, 322. (b) Democratic clan organization. Samoan islands, 326. Fiji, 331. To this stage is due the association of gods and animals, 332. The goddess, 332. (c) Patronymic stage, reshaping religious ideas on model of paternal authority, 1. Household worship, 334. Worship of ancestors. Amazulu of Natal, 335. 2. Female divinities becoming male, 337. 3. Rise of tribal or district gods. Baganda of Central Africa, 337. The Amazulu again, 338. (d) Patronymic confederation and rise of a national religion. 1. Another set of gods added: Tahiti, 339. 2. Single god or pair of gods. The Semites, 342. 3. Syncretism. Ewe peoples of West Africa, 342. Greece, 344. Babylonia, 345. 4. Conflicting deities arranged in a pantheon, 345. (e) Stage of individual leadership, 346.

Chapter XIX

Religion is an accumulation of ideas, 348. Assumption that a spiritual world exists, 349. Beliefs constantly changing) 35°- Persistence of rites and customs, 351. Many religious ideas originate in experience. Example of a theophany, 352. Survivals apart from experience, 352. Ideas of a spiritual world remarkably persistent, 353. Presumptions of psychology have become the working hypotheses of religion. Our discussion necessarily limited to the existence of a cosmic mind, 353. Evidence of communication must be

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sought in the subconscious rather than the conscious, 354. General rules of evidence, 355. Use made of the religious experience of Jesus; the sources, 356.

Chapter XX

Mysticism, 359. Strongly developed in Jesus, 359. Paul, 362. Plotinus, 363. Ruysbroek, 364. St. Teresa, 364. Great mystics were not unpractical dreamers, 366. The Puritans; George Fox, 366. Henry Ward Beecher, 367. Mysticism common in religious >experience, 368. Examples of an unusual sense of the divine presence, 369. Mysticism in other religions; among positivists, 370. Prayer, the establishment of a wider self. Prayers of childhood; growing discrimination, 372. Contemplative tendency in prayer: adoration; absorption; peace; nervous recuperation; comfort in sorrow; thanksgiving; renewal of faith and love, 374.

Chapter XXI

Increase of knowledge: a case of religious clairvoyance, 380. Clairaudience: Hebrew prophecy, 381. Jesus, 383. Paul, 383. A case of personal discovery of new truth, 383. George Fox and the doctrine of the inner light, 384. Beecher's loss of self-consciousness in preaching, 385. Prayer a help in utilizing one's subconscious resources, 386. Prayer for practical guidance, 386. Prediction of future events: George Fox again, 387. Isaiah and the inviolability of Jerusalem, 388. The prophetic statesman; Jeremiah, Jesus, 389. A warning before the outbreak of the Jewish war; other examples of premonition, 390. Inspiration in any sphere represents the emergence of subconscious impressions into consciousness, 391.

Chapter XXII

A case of spontaneous self-cure, 392. Self-cure in answer to prayer, 392. Cases from Lourdes, 393. Christian Science, 395. Non-religious cases; a cure by hypnotic suggestion, 396. Cases of suggestion without hypnotism, 398.

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No way of determining whether the divine mind has anything to do with it, 398. Prayer a therapeutic agent of great value, 399. George Miiller and his prayers for money, 400. The prayer for protection; its psychological value, 402.

Chapter XXIII

Conversion a distinctively adolescent phenomenon, 403. The physical and mental revolution during adolescence, 404. Motives and forces in conversion, 409. Relation between conscious and subconscious elements, 412. Results of conversion, 413. A process of social adjustment; religion the determining factor, 413. The two types, 414. Spiritual illumination: David Brainerd, 416. Horace Fletcher; Ralph Waldo Trine, 417. Moral transformation: one of Begbie's cases, 419. Represents the sudden appearance of a new personality, 422. Quieter reconstruction in adult life, 424. Religious growth without definite transitions: Edward Everett Hale, 424. Prayers for forgiveness and moral improvement, 425. Religious faith the most powerful moral instrument, 427. Religion taking the form of practical activity; the teaching of Jesus, 427. Loss of the social emphasis; its revival in modern Christianity, 429. Modern social crusade essentially religious, 430.

Chapter XXIV

Does religion give evidence of a cosmic mind? 432. The religious hypothesis; not a survival, or pathological, 433. The contribution of religion to the life of man, 435. Is God objective? 437. Review of the indirect evidence furnished by the last four chapters; man's adjustment to the universe, 438. Objectivity of religion the condition of social progress, 441. Religion the key to the meaning of the universe, 443-

Chapter XXV

1. The cosmic mind is active. Cooperation of God in man's mental life, bodily processes, adjustment to environ-

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ment, reproduction, shaping of Providence, moral struggles, social service, 444. 2. The cosmic mind as purposeful activity; the perfecting of humanity, 448. The return to a geo-centric universe, 449. 3. God one, not many; identical with the universe, 450. 4. What is meant by the personality of God? 452. 5. Is God limited by space and time? 453. 6. Relation of the cosmic mind to the units of biology, 453. A parable of the evolutionary process, 455. 7.. Relation between the cosmic mind and the minds of men; a pluralism,

456. God's concern is with the perfecting of the individual,

457. But through the evolution of a higher social order,

458. 8. The mind of man: the waking personality and its adjustment, 459. The deeper mind, not dependent on a physical organism, 459. 9. The spiritual universe: a higher social order beginning, 461. The cosmic mind organizing and limiting itself, 461. The challenge of an uncompleted universe, 462.

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CHARTS AND ILLUSTRATIONS

Table of Radio-Elements 45

Chart Showing Conversions of Kinetic Energy . 66

General Table of Geologic Time Divisions . . 76

Diagram Showing Development of Vertebrate

Nervous System 176

Sketch of Typical Neurone 189

Diagram Illustrating Neurone Series . . .194

Diagram Illustrating Scratch-Reflex in Dog . . 198

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INTRODUCTORY

Chapter I

T T OW do we know? This question confronts us -*- *■ at the beginning of any serious work in philosophy. It demands an answer before we proceed. The thinker must have a working theory of knowledge, clearly defined in his own mind and plainly expressed for the guidance of his readers.

My position may be summarized as follows. The ideas or concepts which we use in our thought have their basis in our experience of the external world. They represent habitual occurrences, relations and characters that have come under our observation. The breadth of our experience makes such abstraction necessary ; the symbolism of words renders it possible. The concepts represented by words are objectively valid only when concretely applied, since the process of abstraction has been merely for convenience in handling the great mass of material.

Our mental faculties have developed by adjustment to the spacial world in which we live. Within that world, therefore, we are powerful. Throughout that world, knowledge is the correlate of being. Whatever is, is knowable, in a sense, simply because it is. All we need is the vantage-point from which to observe it.

Whether we can penetrate beyond that spacial world remains to be seen.

To the philosophy which discards the a priori and reasons solely from experience, the actual is the only possible, though the actual may have bounds beyond the widest horizon of human observation. This principle follows from the detailed study we are about to make of the process of; human thought and the validity of ideas. It should be stated in the form of a warning as we start our introductory chapter. If we heed this warning, we may not form as many or as elaborate theories, but we shall know fewer things that are not so.

The abstractions which we call ideas are precious; we must be extremely careful in our use of them. The actual is, legitimately, the sole basis of the hypothetical. The material of our knowledge is derived from observed facts. From the observed facts, also, must be derived the hypotheses by which we seek to arrange and explain this material. In inductive philosophy, as in inductive science, while in a sense there is only one canon — that any hypothesis is legitimate which can make good — at the same time there is a law of parsimony that forbids us to form any theory to which the facts themselves do not compel us. The theory which we form may be a trial theory that further study may lead us to reject, but it must be a hypothesis honestly derived from the facts before us. It cannot be mere guesswork, a toying with possibilities, the superstition of some "phlogiston" escaping in chemical decomposition, or of the mind secreting thought as the liver secretes bile — a fancy that the moon is made of green cheese, or that a book of philosophy is necessarily as dull as its first chapter. The reader who is not interested in theories of knowledge is advised to pass over the remaining sections, in which I develop the position outlined above.

How do we know? Our point of view is suggested by the form given to the question. I do not ask: "Is it possible to know?" That we do know, in some sense, that we reach a satisfactory degree of certitude, is evidenced in various ways. For one thing, language proves it. All the higher languages have words for "knowing" and "knowledge." Again, our daily life implies knowledge. Man has that power in action which comes only from mental certitude; he can because he kens. A man "knows" that the sun will rise tomorrow. His experience has taught him that it has always done so; he has drawn the conclusion that it always will. He adjusts his life and work accordingly. And the theory works; it is constantly confirmed by new facts of experience. What he calls the sun does do what he calls rising on what he calls the morrow. Our whole life is built upon this and similar items of knowledge. Without them we should be powerless, afraid to move, unable to do a stroke of work.*

The progress of science is a progress in knowledge, in certitude. Ask the scientist : Is it possible to know ?

* Though developed independently, this position is practically identical with that taken by Prof. Dewey and his co-workers in their Studies in Logical Theory, 1909.

and he will answer, if he deigns to answer at all, by pointing to the world's libraries, its laboratories, its factories, its pneumatic drills and wireless telegraphs, its geologic time-scale, its spectrum analysis, its prediction of eclipses, the evolution of the horse's hoof or the process by which a cell's nucleus divides. And the knowledge of science, like that of daily life, is inductive — it is derived from experience. We reach our general laws through the study of individual cases. By gathering and classifying and generalizing certain facts of experience, we form a working theory of these facts. We apply this theory — or hypothesis — to the facts, testing it, correcting it when necessary, even substituting a new one that better accords with the facts.

If any reader needs a definition of induction, he may gather it from the following outline of a typical inductive process. Kepler's work in astronomy furnishes as good an example as any. Starting with Copernicus' idea of the revolution of the planets in circles, he proceeded to test it by elaborate calculations based on the positions of Mars. He was surprised to find that Mars travelled in an ellipse, with the sun as one of its foci. Further calculation gave him the law that a planet's velocity throughout the ellipse is not uniform, but varies in a certain inverse ratio according to its distance from the sun. The reason for these laws was not apparent until Newton's studies on universal gravitation, and Kepler's own explanations were fantastic. But the laws themselves served as working hypotheses.

By direct study Kepler extended them to the earth. He then reasoned by analogy that they must hold true of the other planets, an assumption confirmed by later studies.

This is the same process which our common man goes through in reasoning about the sunrise; only in Kepler's case it was carried out systematically and with a wider store of observations. Modern psychology has shown that, outside of medieval logic books, all thinking which advances our knowledge is inductive in character. We do not mumble over the old deductive formula: all cats are vertebrates; Tommy is a cat; therefore Tommy is a vertebrate. We proceed to dissect Tommy, and fit the discoveries we make into the framework of our previous knowledge. John Stuart Mill has been justified in his position that "all inference, consequently all proof, and all discovery of truths not self-evident, consists of inductions, and the interpretation of inductions: that all our knowledge, not intuitive, comes to us exclusively from that source."* We do not think in syllogisms; we think in experiences. All conclusions are hypotheses.

Here is a lesson for philosophy. She must, under pain of death, adopt the systematized inductive method which has been used by science in the last century with such conspicuous success. If we are to learn the nature of the universe, or of personality, or of God, it must be in the same way as the physicist learns the nature of radium or of negative electricity. We must observe,

* Logic, Bk. Ill, Chap. i.

and form hypotheses based on the facts before us. The test of- our hypothesis is whether it works or not — whether renewed observation confirms or discredits it. No other method of reasoning is acceptable today. We have no valid knowledge except that, derived from experience, broadly considered.

Philosophy should have learned this lesson even before the Age of Science. Kant reduced to absurdity all a priori thinking — the thinking we do prior to experience. The great critic never did a better piece of work than in his Antinomy of Pure Reason, where the abstract ideas of earlier systems are made to destroy one another, like the cats of Kilkenny. Since Kant's day, all a priori thinking ought to be under the ban. Such speculation is valueless for extending our knowledge. Inductive study has taken its place.

The knowledge, the state of mental certitude, which we reach by this process is not absolute, either in daily life or in science and philosophy. Since knowledge is derived from experience, absolute knowledge would require an absolute experience, covering all facts and relations which may ever exist. This men do not possess, even collectively. Our knowledge is constantly subject to enlargement and revision. By this constant revision it approaches the absolute truth, which we hold before us as an ideal and to which we suppose all our knowledge to be in relation. For example, the theory of the permanence of species gave place to the theory of the gradual evolution of species through natural selection. The first had a large element of truth in it. It served man as a working hypothesis for several thousand years. It did an invaluable service in preparing the way for the second. And finally it gave way to evolution as a truer theory. But he would be bold indeed who claimed that we have at length reached absolute certainty. It is now doubtful whether natural selection is a positive factor in evolution. We know vastly more about the origin of species than did our fathers. Yet we have gone but a little way on our pilgrimage toward the truth. To reach that goal we are studying still, correcting, generalizing anew, and our descendants will be doing the same to the world's end. It is the relativity of all knowledge which lends a zest to its pursuit.

Probability, as Butler teaches us, is the guide of life. We have no other guide. Induction can give us nothing more satisfying. But the problem becomes more complex when we pass from the possibility of knowing at all to the value of our knowledge for purposes of thought. Strange as it may seem, the certitude which is adequate for practical life or even for science may be entirely inadequate for philosophy. It has proved to be so with many modern thinkers. "The evolution of species!" they would say to the scientist. "You claim to derive this from the facts of your experience, which is doubtless true. But that means that you derive it from your states of consciousness. You have made a beautiful synthesis out of your states of consciousness. Have you done more than that? Have you really learned anvthing of the external world ? What is 'species' itself but an idea, the product of your synthetic faculty?"

This philosophical scepticism is seriously meant and must be answered seriously. I can only outline my reply; to discuss the subject fully would require a separate treatise on the theory of knowledge. I will first state my own view, and then give a specific instance of scepticism and suggest the answer.

Briefly my position, the position reached by modern psychological study, is this: While our knowledge and the experience on which it is directly based are undoubtedly facts of consciousness, our knowledge and experience are not confined to the facts of consciousness for their field. Simply because all knowledge comes through consciousness, it is not necessarily limited to consciousness. Any knowledge of the self and its states implies, by an evident non-identity, knowledge that the "not-self" exists. As a matter of fact, the not-self is more fully and accurately known than the self. This must be apparent to every one on a moment's reflection. Descriptive psychology, which deals with the self, bulks very small in human thought in comparison with the sciences which deal with the not-self, and the progress of our knowledge in its field has been slight comparatively. Again, the not-self comes earlier into conscious thought than the self, in the history of the child and of the race. In animals, and in children before consciousness of the self arises, there is a consciousness of the external world and a practical knowledge of it. All of which goes to show that our knowledge is more than the synthesizing of our states of consciousness. It is a real knowledge of a real external world, relative no doubt, not to our states of consciousness, but to those facts which we represent by the expressions "ultimate reality" and "absolute truth." Human thought, in its inductions, shows a constant adjustment to the experienced facts of the external world.

For a concrete example of scepticism we may best turn to Kant, its greatest exponent. He is the champion whom every modern thinker must meet. When Kant denied the objective validity of metaphysical ideas, he based his argument principally on the synthetical character of all our mental processes. Upon the material furnished by the senses the mind imposes its own intuitive forms. These forms exist prior to experience. The mental processes which involve them and are shaped by them can teach us nothing as to the source of the material furnished by the senses; that is, as to the nature of things in themselves. Hence our knowledge is necessarily subjective, not objective, which practically means that philosophy must go out of business. That is Kant's position. The intuition of space, as given in his ^Esthetic, is as good an instance as any. For Kant this is an a priori form imposed by the mind. For us it is first a form and later an idea derived by the mind from its experience of a spacial world. I suggest the reasons for holding this view of space, leaving the reader to follow out a similar method of proof for other sides of my general position.

Child psychology, which has grown up since Kant's day, shows us that there is no idea or form of space existing a priori in the human mind. Space perception is acquired by a long process of seeing and touching. The child must learn space, adjust itself to space. This is one of the commonplaces of psychological study today.

We turn also to animal psychology, another relatively new science. Experiments of great interest have been made on new-born chickens and pigs.* At first the evidence of animal psychology appears to contradict that from child life. Space is innate, as Kant claimed for the human mind; the reactions of the animal to distance, direction, size, etc., are instinctive. "In the ways he moves, the directions he takes and the objects he reacts to, the chicken has prior to experience the power of appropriate reaction to facts ... of all three dimensions. "t It makes no difference whether we consider instinct as the product of inherited adjustment, and say, with Romanes, that heredity has done the work for which experience is required in children, or whether, with Professor Loeb, we resolve it into a series of tropisms. In either case this spacial instinct shows the adjustment of animal faculty to a spacial world. In fact, it proves the existence of a spacial world, in very much the same way as the development of the eye organ in living creatures in response to