diff options
Diffstat (limited to '78977-0.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | 78977-0.txt | 1963 |
1 files changed, 1963 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/78977-0.txt b/78977-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9df544e --- /dev/null +++ b/78977-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1963 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 78977 *** + + Symbolism, Its Meaning and Effect + + + + + SYMBOLISM + + Its Meaning and Effect + + BY + ALFRED NORTH WHITEHEAD + + F.R.S., SC.D. (CAMBRIDGE), + HON. D.SC. (MANCHESTER). + HON. LL.D. (ST. ANDREWS), + HON. D.SC. (UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN), + HON. SC.D. (HARVARD AND YALE). + FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE IN + THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE AND PROFESSOR + OF PHILOSOPHY IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY + + BARBOUR-PAGE LECTURES + UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA + 1927 + + New York + THE MACMILLAN COMPANY + 1927 + + Copyright, 1927, + By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. + + Set up and electrotyped. + Published November, 1927. + + _Printed in the United States of America by_ + J. J. LITTLE AND IVES COMPANY, NEW YORK + + + + + DEDICATION + + +These chapters were written before I had seen the Washington monument +which faces the Capitol in the City of Washington, and before I had +enjoyed the experience of crossing the borders of the State of +Virginia—a great experience for an Englishman. + +Virginia, that symbol for romance throughout the world of English +speech: Virginia, which was captured for that world in the romantic +period of English history by Sir Walter Raleigh, its most romantic +figure: Virginia, which has been true to its origin and has steeped its +history in romance. + +Romance does not yield unbroken happiness: Sir Walter Raleigh suffered +for his romance. Romance does not creep along the ground; like the +memorial to Washington, it reaches upward—a silver thread uniting earth +to the blue of heaven above. + +April 18, 1927. + + + + + PREFACE + + +In accordance with the terms of the Barbour-Page Foundation, these +lectures are published by the University of Virginia. The author owes +his thanks to the authorities of the university for their courtesy in +conforming to his wishes in respect to some important details of +publication. With the exception of a few trifling changes the lectures +are printed as delivered. + +These lectures will be best understood by reference to some portions of +Locke’s _Essay Concerning Human Understanding_. The author’s +acknowledgments are due to _Locke’s Theory of Knowledge and Its +Historical Relations_ by Professor James Gibson, to _Prolegomena to an +Idealist Theory of Knowledge_ by Professor Norman Kemp Smith, and to +_Scepticism and Animal Faith_ by George Santayana. + +A. N. W. + +Harvard University, June, 1927. + + + + + CONTENTS + + +CHAPTER I ... 1 + +1. KINDS OF SYMBOLISM ... 1 + +2. SYMBOLISM AND PERCEPTION ... 2 + +3. ON METHODOLOGY ... 5 + +4. FALLIBILITY AND SYMBOLISM ... 6 + +5. DEFINITION OF SYMBOLISM ... 7 + +6. EXPERIENCE AS ACTIVITY ... 9 + +7. LANGUAGE ... 10 + +8. PRESENTATIONAL IMMEDIACY ... 13 + +9. PERCEPTIVE EXPERIENCE ... 16 + +10. SYMBOLIC REFERENCE IN PERCEPTIVE EXPERIENCE ... 18 + +11. MENTAL AND PHYSICAL ... 20 + +12. RÔLES OF SENSE-DATA AND SPACE IN PRESENTATIONAL IMMEDIACY ... 21 + +13. OBJECTIFICATION ... 25 + + +CHAPTER II ... 30 + +1. HUME ON CAUSAL EFFICACY ... 30 + +2. KANT AND CAUSAL EFFICACY ... 37 + +3. DIRECT PERCEPTION OF CAUSAL EFFICACY ... 39 + +4. PRIMITIVENESS OF CAUSAL EFFICACY ... 43 + +5. THE INTERSECTION OF THE MODES OF PERCEPTION ... 49 + +6. LOCALIZATION ... 53 + +7. THE CONTRAST BETWEEN ACCURATE DEFINITION AND IMPORTANCE ... 56 + +8. CONCLUSION ... 59 + + +CHAPTER III ... 60 + +USES OF SYMBOLISM ... 60 + + + + + CHAPTER I + + + 1. _Kinds of Symbolism._ + + +The slightest survey of different epochs of civilization discloses great +differences in their attitude towards symbolism. For example, during the +medieval period in Europe symbolism seemed to dominate men’s +imaginations. Architecture was symbolical, ceremonial was symbolical, +heraldry was symbolical. With the Reformation a reaction set in. Men +tried to dispense with symbols as ‘fond things, vainly invented,’ and +concentrated on their direct apprehension of the ultimate facts. + +But such symbolism is on the fringe of life. It has an unessential +element in its constitution. The very fact that it can be acquired in +one epoch and discarded in another epoch testifies to its superficial +nature. + +There are deeper types of symbolism, in a sense artificial, and yet such +that we could not get on without them. Language, written or spoken, is +such a symbolism. The mere sound of a word, or its shape on paper, is +indifferent. The word is a symbol, and its meaning is constituted by the +ideas, images, and emotions, which it raises in the mind of the hearer. + +There is also another sort of language, purely a written language, which +is constituted by the mathematical symbols of the science of algebra. In +some ways, these symbols are different to those of ordinary language, +because the manipulation of the algebraical symbols does your reasoning +for you, provided that you keep to the algebraic rules. This is not the +case with ordinary language. You can never forget the meaning of +language, and trust to mere syntax to help you out. In any case, +language and algebra seem to exemplify more fundamental types of +symbolism than do the Cathedrals of Medieval Europe. + + + 2. _Symbolism and Perception._ + + +There is still another symbolism more fundamental than any of the +foregoing types. We look up and see a coloured shape in front of us, and +we say,—there is a chair. But what we have seen is the mere coloured +shape. Perhaps an artist might not have jumped to the notion of a chair. +He might have stopped at the mere contemplation of a beautiful colour +and a beautiful shape. But those of us who are not artists are very +prone, especially if we are tired, to pass straight from the perception +of the coloured shape to the enjoyment of the chair, in some way of use, +or of emotion, or of thought. We can easily explain this passage by +reference to a train of difficult logical inference, whereby, having +regard to our previous experiences of various shapes and various +colours, we draw the probable conclusion that we are in the presence of +a chair. I am very sceptical as to the high-grade character of the +mentality required to get from the coloured shape to the chair. One +reason for this scepticism Is that my friend the artist, who kept +himself to the contemplation of colour, shape and position, was a very +highly trained man, and had acquired this facility of ignoring the chair +at the cost of great labour. We do not require elaborate training merely +in order to refrain from embarking upon intricate trains of inference. +Such abstinence is only too easy. Another reason for scepticism is that +if we had been accompanied by a puppy dog, in addition to the artist, +the dog would have acted immediately on the hypothesis of a chair and +would have jumped onto it by way of using it as such. Again, if the dog +had refrained from such action, it would have been because it was a +well-trained dog. Therefore the transition from a coloured shape to the +notion of an object which can be used for all sorts of purposes which +have nothing to do with colour, seems to be a very natural one; and +we—men and puppy dogs—require careful training if we are to refrain from +acting upon it. + +Thus coloured shapes seem to be symbols for some other elements in our +experience, and when we see the coloured shapes we adjust our actions +towards those other elements. This symbolism from our senses to the +bodies symbolized is often mistaken. A cunning adjustment of lights and +mirrors may completely deceive us; and even when we are not deceived, we +only save ourselves by an effort. Symbolism from sense-presentation to +physical bodies is the most natural and widespread of all symbolic +modes. It is not a mere tropism, or automatic turning towards, because +both men and puppies often disregard chairs when they see them. Also a +tulip which turns to the light has probably the very minimum of +sense-presentation. I shall argue on the assumption that +sense-perception is mainly a characteristic of more advanced organisms; +whereas all organisms have experience of causal efficacy whereby their +functioning is conditioned by their environment. + + + 3. _On Methodology._ + + +In fact symbolism is very largely concerned with the use of pure +sense-perceptions in the character of symbols for more primitive +elements in our experience. Accordingly since sense-perceptions, of any +importance, are characteristic of high-grade organisms, I shall chiefly +confine this study of symbolism to the influence of symbolism on human +life. It is a general principle that low-grade characteristics are +better studied first in connection with correspondingly low-grade +organisms, in which those characteristics are not obscured by more +developed types of functioning. Conversely, high-grade characters should +be studied first in connection with those organisms in which they first +come to full perfection. + +Of course, as a second approximation to elicit the full sweep of +particular characters, we want to know the embryonic stage of the +high-grade character, and the ways in which low-grade characters can be +made subservient to higher types of functioning. + +The nineteenth century exaggerated the power of the historical method, +and assumed as a matter of course that every character should be studied +only in its embryonic stage. Thus, for example, ‘Love’ has been studied +among the savages and latterly among the morons. + + + 4. _Fallibility of Symbolism._ + + +There is one great difference between symbolism and direct knowledge. +Direct experience is infallible. What you have experienced, you have +experienced. But symbolism is very fallible, in the sense that it may +induce actions, feelings, emotions, and beliefs about things which are +mere notions without that exemplification in the world which the +symbolism leads us to presuppose. I shall develop the thesis that +symbolism is an essential factor in the way we function as the result of +our direct knowledge. Successful high-grade organisms are only possible, +on the condition that their symbolic functionings are usually justified +so far as important issues are concerned. But the errors of mankind +equally spring from symbolism. It is the task of reason to understand +and purge the symbols on which humanity depends. + +An adequate account of human mentality requires an explanation of (i) +how we can know truly, (ii) how we can err, and (iii) how we can +critically distinguish truth from error. Such an explanation requires +that we distinguish that type of mental functioning which by its nature +yields immediate acquaintance with fact, from that type of functioning +which is only trustworthy by reason of its satisfaction of certain +criteria provided by the first type of functioning. + +I shall maintain that the first type of functioning is properly to be +called ‘Direct Recognition,’ and the second type ‘Symbolic Reference.’ I +shall also endeavour to illustrate the doctrine that all human +symbolism, however superficial it may seem, is ultimately to be reduced +to trains of this fundamental symbolic reference, trains which finally +connect percepts in alternative modes of direct recognition. + + + 5. _Definition of Symbolism._ + + +After this prefatory explanation, we must start from a formal definition +of symbolism: The human mind is functioning symbolically when some +components of its experience elicit consciousness, beliefs, emotions, +and usages, respecting other components of its experience. The former +set of components are the ‘symbols,’ and the latter set constitute the +‘meaning’ of the symbols. The organic functioning whereby there is +transition from the symbol to the meaning will be called ‘symbolic +reference.’ + +This symbolic reference is the active synthetic element contributed by +the nature of the percipient. It requires a ground founded on some +community between the natures of symbol and meaning. But such a common +element in the two natures does not of itself necessitate symbolic +reference, nor does it decide which shall be symbol and which shall be +meaning, nor does it secure that the symbolic reference shall be immune +from producing errors and disasters for the percipient. We must conceive +perception in the light of a primary phase in the self-production of an +occasion of actual existence. + +In defence of this notion of self-production arising out of some primary +given phase, I would remind you that, apart from it, there can be no +moral responsibility. The potter, and not the pot, is responsible for +the shape of the pot. An actual occasion arises as the bringing together +into one real context diverse perceptions, diverse feelings, diverse +purposes, and other diverse activities arising out of those primary +perceptions. Here activity is another name for self-production. + + + 6. _Experience as Activity._ + + +In this way we assign to the percipient an activity in the production of +its own experience, although that moment of experience, in its character +of being that one occasion, is nothing else than the percipient itself. +Thus, for the percipient at least, the perception is an internal +relationship between itself and the things perceived. + +In analysis the total activity involved in perception of the symbolic +reference must be referred to the percipient. Such symbolic reference +requires something in common between symbol and meaning which can be +expressed without reference to the perfected percipient; but it also +requires some activity of the percipient which can be considered without +recourse either to the particular symbol or its particular meaning. +Considered by themselves the symbol and its meaning do not require +_either_ that there shall be a symbolic reference between the two, _or_ +that the symbolic reference between the members of the couple should be +one way on rather than the other way on. The nature of their +relationship does not in itself determine which is symbol and which is +meaning. There are no components of experience which are only symbols or +only meanings. The more usual symbolic reference is from the less +primitive component as symbol to the more primitive as meaning. + +This statement is the foundation of a thoroughgoing realism. It does +away with any mysterious element in our experience which is merely +meant, and thereby behind the veil of direct perception. It proclaims +the principle that symbolic reference holds between two components in a +complex experience, each intrinsically capable of direct recognition. +Any lack of such conscious analytical recognition is the fault of the +defect in mentality on the part of a comparatively low-grade percipient. + + + 7. _Language._ + + +To exemplify the inversion of symbol and meaning, consider language and +the things meant by language. A word is a symbol. But a word can be +either written or spoken. Now on occasions a written word may suggest +the corresponding spoken word, and that sound may suggest a meaning. + +In such an instance, the written word is a symbol and its meaning is the +spoken word, and the spoken word is a symbol and its meaning is the +dictionary meaning of the word, spoken or written. + +But often the written word effects its purpose without the intervention +of the spoken word. Accordingly, then, the written word directly +symbolizes the dictionary meaning. But so fluctuating and complex is +human experience that in general neither of these cases is exemplified +in the clear-cut way which is set out here. Often the written word +suggests both the spoken word and also the meaning, and the symbolic +reference is made clearer and more definite by the additional reference +of the spoken word to the same meaning. Analogously we can start from +the spoken word which may elicit a visual perception of the written +word. + +Further, why do we say that the word ‘tree’—spoken or written—is a +symbol to us for trees? Both the word itself and trees themselves enter +into our experience on equal terms; and it would be just as sensible, +viewing the question abstractedly, for trees to symbolize the word +‘tree’ as for the word to symbolize the trees. + +This is certainly true, and human nature sometimes works that way. For +example, if you are a poet and wish to write a lyric on trees, you will +walk into the forest in order that the trees may suggest the appropriate +words. Thus for the poet in his ecstasy—or perhaps, agony—of composition +the trees are the symbols and the words are the meaning. He concentrates +on the trees in order to get at the words. + +But most of us are not poets, though we read their lyrics with proper +respect. For us, the words are the symbols which enable us to capture +the rapture of the poet in the forest. The poet is a person for whom +visual sights and sounds and emotional experiences refer symbolically to +words. The poet’s readers are people for whom his words refer +symbolically to the visual sights and sounds and emotions he wants to +evoke. Thus in the use of language there is a double symbolic +reference:—from things to words on the part of the speaker, and from +words back to things on the part of the listener. + +When in an act of human experience there is a symbolic reference, there +are in the first place two sets of components with some objective +relationship between them, and this relationship will vary greatly in +different instances. In the second place the total constitution of the +percipient has to effect the symbolic reference from one set of +components, the symbols, to the other set of components, the meaning. In +the third place, the question, as to which set of components form the +symbols and which set the meaning, also depends on the peculiar +constitution of that act of experience. + + + 8. _Presentational Immediacy._ + + +The most fundamental exemplification of symbolism has already been +alluded to in the discussion of the poet and the circumstances which +elicit his poetry. We have here a particular instance of the reference +of words to things. But this general relation of words to things is only +a particular instance of a yet more general fact. Our perception of the +external world is divided into two types of content: one type is the +familiar immediate presentation of the contemporary world, by means of +our projection of our immediate sensations, determining for us +characteristics of contemporary physical entities. This type is the +experience of the immediate world around us, a world decorated by +sense-data dependent on the immediate states of relevant parts of our +own bodies. Physiology establishes this latter fact conclusively; but +the physiological details are irrelevant to the present philosophical +discussion, and only confuse the issue. ‘Sense-datum’ is a modern term: +Hume uses the word ‘impression.’ + +For human beings, this type of experience is vivid, and is especially +distinct in its exhibition of the spatial regions and relationships +within the contemporary world. + +The familiar language which I have used in speaking of the ‘projection +of our sensations’ is very misleading. There are no bare sensations +which are first experienced and then ‘projected’ into our feet as their +feelings, or onto the opposite wall as its colour. The projection is an +integral part of the situation, quite as original as the sense-data. It +would be just as accurate, and equally misleading, to speak of a +projection on the wall which is then characterized as such-and-such a +colour. The use of the term ‘wall’ is equally misleading by its +suggestion of information derived symbolically from another mode of +perception. This so-called ‘wall,’ disclosed in the pure mode of +presentational immediacy, contributes itself to our experience only +under the guise of spatial extension, combined with spatial perspective, +and combined with sense-data which in this example reduce to colour +alone. + +I say that the wall contributes _itself_ under this guise, in preference +to saying that it contributes these universal characters in combination. +For the characters are combined by their exposition of one thing in a +common world including ourselves, that one thing which I call the +‘wall.’ Our perception is not confined to universal characters; we do +not perceive disembodied colour or disembodied extensiveness: we +perceive _the wall’s_ colour and extensiveness. The experienced fact is +‘colour away on the wall for us.’ Thus the colour and the spatial +perspective are abstract elements, characterizing the concrete way in +which the wall enters into our experience. They are therefore relational +elements between the ‘percipient at that moment,’ and that other equally +actual entity, or set of entities, which we call the ‘wall at that +moment.’ But the mere colour and the mere spatial perspective are very +abstract entities, because they are only arrived at by discarding the +concrete relationship between the wall-at-that-moment and the +percipient-at-that-moment. This concrete relationship is a physical fact +which may be very unessential to the wall and very essential to the +percipient. The spatial relationship is equally essential both to wall +and percipient: but the colour side of the relationship is at that +moment indifferent to the wall, though it is part of the make-up of the +percipient. In this sense, and subject to their spatial relationship, +contemporary events happen independently. I call this type of experience +‘presentational immediacy.’ It expresses how contemporary events are +relevant to each other, and yet preserve a mutual independence. This +relevance amid independence is the peculiar character of +contemporaneousness. This presentational immediacy is only of importance +in high-grade organisms, and is a physical fact which may, or may not, +enter into consciousness. Such entry will depend on attention and on the +activity of conceptual functioning, whereby physical experience and +conceptual imagination are fused into knowledge. + + + 9. _Perceptive Experience._ + + +The word ‘experience’ is one of the most deceitful in philosophy. Its +adequate discussion would be the topic for a treatise. I can only +indicate those elements in my analysis of it which are relevant to the +present train of thought. + +Our experience, so far as it is primarily concerned with our direct +recognition of a solid world of other things which are actual in the +same sense that we are actual, has three main independent modes each +contributing its share of components to our individual rise into one +concrete moment of human experience. Two of these modes of experience I +will call perceptive, and the third I will call the mode of conceptual +analysis. In respect to pure perception, I call one of the two types +concerned the mode of ‘presentational immediacy,’ and the other the mode +of ‘causal efficacy.’ Both ‘presentational immediacy’ and ‘causal +efficacy’ introduce into human experience components which are again +analysable into actual things of the actual world and into abstract +attributes, qualities, and relations, which express how those other +actual things contribute themselves as components to our individual +experience. These abstractions express how other actualities are +component objects for us. I will therefore say that they ‘objectify’ for +us the actual things in our ‘environment.’ Our most immediate +environment is constituted by the various organs of our own bodies, our +more remote environment is the physical world in the neighbourhood. But +the word ‘environment’ means those other actual things, which are +‘objectified’ in some important way so as to form component elements in +our individual experience. + + + 10. _Symbolic Reference in Perceptive Experience._ + + +Of the two distinct perceptive modes, one mode ‘objectifies’ actual +things under the guise of presentational immediacy, and the other mode, +which I have not yet discussed, ‘objectifies’ them under the guise of +causal efficacy. The synthetic activity whereby these two modes are +fused into one perception is what I have called ‘symbolic reference.’ By +symbolic reference the various actualities disclosed respectively by the +two modes are either identified, or are at least correlated together as +interrelated elements in our environment. Thus the result of symbolic +reference is what the actual world is for us, as that datum in our +experience productive of feelings, emotions, satisfactions, actions, and +finally as the topic for conscious recognition when our mentality +intervenes with its conceptual analysis. ‘Direct recognition’ is +conscious recognition of a percept in a pure mode, devoid of symbolic +reference. + +Symbolic reference may be, in many respects, erroneous. By this I mean +that some ‘direct recognition’ disagrees, in its report of the actual +world, with the conscious recognition of the fused product resulting +from symbolic reference. Thus error is primarily the product of symbolic +reference, and not of conceptual analysis. Also symbolic reference +itself is not primarily the outcome of conceptual analysis, though it is +greatly promoted by it. For symbolic reference is still dominant in +experience when such mental analysis is at a low ebb. We all know +Aesop’s fable of the dog who dropped a piece of meat to grasp at its +reflection in the water. We must not, however, judge too severely of +error. In the initial stages of mental progress, error in symbolic +reference is the discipline which promotes imaginative freedom. Aesop’s +dog lost his meat, but he gained a step on the road towards a free +imagination. + +Thus symbolic reference must be explained antecedently to conceptual +analysis, although there is a strong interplay between the two whereby +they promote each other. + + + 11. _Mental and Physical._ + + +By way of being as intelligible as possible we might tacitly assign +symbolic reference to mental activity, and thereby avoid some detailed +explanation. It is a matter of pure convention as to which of our +experiential activities we term mental and which physical. Personally I +prefer to restrict mentality to those experiential activities which +include concepts in addition to percepts. But much of our perception is +due to the enhanced subtlety arising from a concurrent conceptual +analysis. Thus in fact there is no proper line to be drawn between the +physical and the mental constitution of experience. But there is no +conscious knowledge apart from the intervention of mentality in the form +of conceptual analysis. + +It will be necessary later on to make some slight reference to +conceptual analysis; but at present I must assume consciousness and its +partial analysis of experience, and return to the two modes of pure +perception. The point that I want to make here is, that the reason why +low-grade purely physical organisms cannot make mistakes is not +primarily their absence of thought, but their absence of presentational +immediacy. Aesop’s dog, who was a poor thinker, made a mistake by reason +of an erroneous symbolic reference from presentational immediacy to +causal efficacy. In short, truth and error dwell in the world by reason +of synthesis: every actual thing is synthetic: and symbolic reference is +one primitive form of synthetic activity whereby what is actual arises +from its given phases. + + + 12. _Rôles of Sense-data and Space in Presentational Immediacy._ + + +By ‘presentational immediacy’ I mean what is usually termed +‘sense-perception.’ But I am using the former term under limitations and +extensions which are foreign to the common use of the latter term. + +Presentational immediacy is our immediate perception of the contemporary +external world, appearing as an element constitutive of our own +experience. In this appearance the world discloses itself to be a +community of actual things, which are actual in the same sense as we +are. + +This appearance is effected by the mediation of qualities, such as +colours, sounds, tastes, etc., which can with equal truth be described +as our sensations or as the qualities of the actual things which we +perceive. These qualities are thus relational between the perceiving +subject and the perceived things. They can be thus isolated only by +abstracting them from their implication in the scheme of spatial +relatedness of the perceived things to each other and to the perceiving +subject. This relatedness of spatial extension is a complete scheme, +impartial between the observer and the perceived things. It is the +scheme of the morphology of the complex organisms forming the community +of the contemporary world. The way in which each actual physical +organism enters into the make-up of its contemporaries has to conform to +this scheme. Thus the sense-data, such as colours, etc., or bodily +feelings, introduce the extended physical entities into our experience +under perspectives provided by this spatial scheme. The spatial +relations by themselves are generic abstractions, and the sense-data are +generic abstractions. But the perspectives of the sense-data provided by +the spatial relations are the specific relations whereby the external +contemporary things are to this extent part of our experience. These +contemporary organisms, thus introduced as ‘objects’ into experience, +include the various organs of our body, and the sense-data are then +called bodily feelings. The bodily organs, and those other external +things which make important contributions to this mode of our +perception, together form the contemporary environment of the percipient +organism. The main facts about presentational immediacy are: (i) that +the sense-data involved depend on the percipient organism and its +spatial relations to the perceived organisms; (ii) that the contemporary +world is exhibited as extended and as a plenum of organisms; (iii) that +presentational immediacy is an important factor in the experience of +only a few high-grade organisms, and that for the others it is embryonic +or entirely negligible. + +Thus the disclosure of a contemporary world by presentational immediacy +is bound up with the disclosure of the solidarity of actual things by +reason of their participation in an impartial system of spatial +extension. Beyond this, the knowledge provided by pure presentational +immediacy is vivid, precise, and barren. It is also to a large extent +controllable at will. I mean that one moment of experience can +predetermine to a considerable extent, by inhibitions, or by +intensifications, or by other modifications, the characteristics of the +presentational immediacy in succeeding moments of experience. This mode +of perception, taken purely by itself, is barren, because we may not +directly connect the qualitative presentations of other things with any +intrinsic characters of those things. We see the image of a coloured +chair, presenting to us the space behind a mirror; yet we thereby gain +no knowledge concerning any intrinsic characters of spaces behind the +mirror. But the image thus seen in a good mirror is just as much an +immediate presentation of colour qualifying the world at a distance +behind the mirror, as is our direct vision of the chair when we turn +round and look at it. Pure presentational immediacy refuses to be +divided into delusions and not-delusions. It is either all of it, or +none of it, an immediate presentation of an external contemporary world +as in its own right spatial. The sense-data involved in presentational +immediacy have a wider relationship in the world than these contemporary +things can express. In abstraction from this wider relationship, there +is no means of determining the importance of the apparent qualification +of contemporary objects by sense-data. For this reason the phrase ‘mere +appearance’ carries the suggestion of barrenness. This wider +relationship of the sense-data can only be understood by examining the +alternative mode of perception, the mode of causal efficacy. But in so +far as contemporary things are bound together by mere presentational +immediacy, they happen in complete independence except for their spatial +relations at the moment. Also for most events, we presume that their +intrinsic experience of presentational immediacy is so embryonic as to +be negligible. This perceptive mode is important only for a small +minority of elaborate organisms. + + + 13. _Objectification._ + + +In this explanation of Presentational Immediacy, I am conforming to the +distinction according to which actual things are _objectively_ in our +experience and _formally_ existing in their own completeness. I maintain +that presentational immediacy is that peculiar way in which contemporary +things are ‘objectively’ in our experience, and that among the abstract +entities which constitute factors in the mode of introduction are those +abstractions usually called sense-data:—for example, colours, sounds, +tastes, touches, and bodily feelings. + +Thus ‘objectification’ itself is abstraction; since no actual thing is +‘objectified’ in its ‘formal’ completeness. Abstraction expresses +nature’s mode of interaction and is not merely mental. When it +abstracts, thought is merely conforming to nature—or rather, it is +exhibiting itself as an element in nature. Synthesis and analysis +require each other. Such a conception is paradoxical if you will persist +in thinking of the actual world as a collection of passive actual +substances with their private characters or qualities. In that case, it +must be nonsense to ask, how one such substance can form a component in +the make-up of another such substance. So long as this conception is +retained, the difficulty is not relieved by calling each actual +substance an event, or a pattern, or an occasion. The difficulty, which +arises for such a conception, is to explain how the substances can be +actually together in a sense derivative from that in which each +individual substance is actual. But the conception of the world here +adopted is that of functional activity. By this I mean that every actual +thing is something by reason of its activity; whereby its nature +consists in its relevance to other things, and its individuality +consists in its synthesis of other things so far as they are relevant to +it. In enquiring about any one individual we must ask how other +individuals enter ‘objectively’ into the unity of its own experience. +This unity of its own experience is that individual existing _formally_. +We must also enquire how it enters into the ‘formal’ existence of other +things; and this entrance is that individual existing _objectively_, +that is to say—existing abstractly, exemplifying only some elements in +its formal content. + +With this conception of the world, in speaking of any actual individual, +such as a human being, we must mean that man in one occasion of his +experience. Such an occasion, or act, is complex and therefore capable +of analysis into phases and other components. It is the most concrete +actual entity, and the life of man from birth to death is a historic +route of such occasions. These concrete moments are bound together into +one society by a partial identity of form, and by the peculiarly full +summation of its predecessors which each moment of the life-history +gathers into itself. The man-at-one-moment concentrates in himself the +colour of his own past, and he is the issue of it. The ‘man in his whole +life history’ is an abstraction compared to the ‘man in one such +moment.’ There are therefore three different meanings for the notion of +a particular man,—Julius Cæsar, for example. The word ‘Cæsar’ may mean +‘Cæsar in some one occasion of his existence’: this is the most concrete +of all the meanings. The word ‘Cæsar’ may mean ‘the historic route of +Cæsar’s life from his Cæsarian birth to his Cæsarian assassination.’ The +word ‘Cæsar’ may mean ‘the common form, or pattern, repeated in each +occasion of Cæsar’s life.’ You may legitimately choose any one of these +meanings; but when you have made your choice, you must in that context +stick to it. + +This doctrine of the nature of the life-history of an enduring organism +holds for all types of organisms, which have attained to unity of +experience, for electrons as well as for men. But mankind has gained a +richness of experiential content denied to electrons. Whenever the ‘all +or none’ principle holds, we are in some way dealing with one actual +entity, and not with a society of such entities, nor with the analysis +of components contributory to one such entity. + +This lecture has maintained the doctrine of a direct experience of an +external world. It is impossible fully to argue this thesis without +getting too far away from my topic. I need only refer you to the first +portion of Santayana’s recent book, _Scepticism and Animal Faith_, for a +conclusive proof of the futile ‘solipsism of the present moment’—or, in +other words, utter scepticism—which results from a denial of this +assumption. My second thesis, for which I cannot claim Santayana’s +authority, is that, if you consistently maintain such direct individual +experience, you will be driven in your philosophical construction to a +conception of the world as an interplay of functional activity whereby +each concrete individual thing arises from its determinate relativity to +the settled world of other concrete individuals, at least so far as the +world is past and settled. + + + + + CHAPTER II + + + 1. _Hume on Causal Efficacy._ + + +It is the thesis of this work that human symbolism has its origin in the +symbolic interplay between two distinct modes of direct perception of +the external world. There are, in this way, two sources of information +about the external world, closely connected but distinct. These modes do +not repeat each other; and there is a real diversity of information. +Where one is vague, the other is precise: where one is important, the +other is trivial. But the two schemes of presentation have structural +elements in common, which identify them as schemes of presentation of +the same world. There are however gaps in the determination of the +correspondence between the two morphologies. The schemes only partially +intersect, and their true fusion is left indeterminate. The symbolic +reference leads to a transference of emotion, purpose, and belief, which +cannot be justified by an intellectual comparison of the direct +information derived from the two schemes and their elements of +intersection. The justification, such as it is, must be sought in a +pragmatic appeal to the future. In this way intellectual criticism +founded on subsequent experience can enlarge and purify the primitive +naïve symbolic transference. + +I have termed one perceptive mode ‘Presentational Immediacy,’ and the +other mode ‘Causal Efficacy.’ In the previous lecture the mode of +presentational immediacy was discussed at length. The present lecture +must commence with the discussion of ‘Causal Efficacy.’ It will be +evident to you that I am here controverting the most cherished tradition +of modern philosophy, shared alike by the school of empiricists which +derives from Hume, and the school of transcendental idealists which +derives from Kant. It is unnecessary to enter upon any prolonged +justification of this summary account of the tradition of modern +philosophy. But some quotations will summarize neatly what is shared in +common by the two types of thought from which I am diverging. Hume[1] +writes:—“When both the objects are present to the senses along with the +relation, we call _this_ perception rather than reasoning; nor is there +in this case any exercise of the thought, or any action, properly +speaking, but a mere passive admission of the impressions through the +organs of sensation. According to this way of thinking, we ought not to +receive as reasoning any of the observations we may make concerning +_identity_ and the _relation_ of _time_ and _place_; since in none of +them can the mind go beyond what is immediately present to the senses, +either to discover the real existence or the relations of objects.” + +The whole force of this passage depends upon the tacit presupposition of +the ‘mind’ as a passively receptive substance and of its ‘impression’ as +forming its private world of accidents. There then remains nothing +except the immediacy of these private attributes with their private +relations which are also attributes of the mind. Hume explicitly +repudiates this substantial view of mind. + +But then, what is the force of the last clause of the last sentence, +“since ... objects?” The only reason for dismissing ‘impressions’ from +having any demonstrative force in respect to ‘the _real_ existence or +the relations of objects,’ is the implicit notion that such impressions +are mere private attributes of the mind. Santayana’s book, _Scepticism +and Animal Faith_, to which I have already referred, is in its earlier +chapters a vigorous and thorough insistence, by every manner of +beautiful illustration, that with Hume’s premises there is no manner of +escape from this dismissal of identity, time, and place from having any +reference to a real world. There remains only what Santayana calls +‘Solipsism of the Present Moment.’ Even memory goes: for a +memory-impression is not an impression of memory. It is only another +immediate private impression. + +It is unnecessary to cite Hume on Causation; for the preceding quotation +carries with it his whole sceptical position. But a quotation[2] on +substance is necessary to explain the ground of his explicit—as distinct +from sporadic implicit presuppositions—doctrine on this point:—“I would +fain ask those philosophers, who found so much of their reasonings on +the distinction of substance and accident, and imagine we have clear +ideas of each, whether the idea of substance be derived from the +impressions of sensation or reflection? If it be conveyed to us by our +senses, I ask, which of them, and after what manner? If it be perceived +by the eyes, it must be a colour; if by the ears, a sound; if by the +palate, a taste; and so of the other senses. But I believe none will +assert that substance is either a colour, or sound, or a taste. The idea +of substance must, therefore, be derived from an impression of +reflection, if it really exist. But the impressions of reflection +resolve themselves into our passions and emotions; none of which can +possibly represent a substance. We have, therefore, no idea of +substance, distinct from that of a collection of particular qualities, +nor have we any other meaning when we either talk or reason concerning +it.” + +This passage is concerned with a notion of ‘substance,’ which I do not +entertain. Thus it only indirectly controverts my position. I quote it +because it is the plainest example of Hume’s initial assumptions that +(i) presentational immediacy, and relations between presentationally +immediate entities, constitute the only type of perceptive experience, +and that (ii) presentational immediacy includes no demonstrative factors +disclosing a contemporary world of extended actual things. + +He discusses this question later in his ‘Treatise’ under the heading of +the notion of ‘Bodies’; and arrives at analogous sceptical conclusions. +These conclusions rest upon an extraordinary naïve assumption of time as +pure succession. The assumption is naïve, because it is the natural +thing to say; it is natural because it leaves out that characteristic of +time which is so intimately interwoven that it is natural to omit it. + +Time is known to us as the succession of our acts of experience, and +thence derivatively as the succession of events objectively perceived in +those acts. But this succession is not pure succession: it is the +derivation of state from state, with the later state exhibiting +conformity to the antecedent. Time in the concrete is the conformation +of state to state, the later to the earlier; and the pure succession is +an abstraction from the irreversible relationship of settled past to +derivative present. The notion of pure succession is analogous to the +notion of colour. There is no mere colour, but always some particular +colour such as red or blue: analogously there is no pure succession, but +always some particular relational ground in respect to which the terms +succeed each other. The integers succeed each other in one way, and +events succeed each other in another way; and, when we abstract from +these ways of succession, we find that pure succession is an abstraction +of the second order, a generic abstraction omitting the temporal +character of time and the numerical relation of integers. The past +consists of the community of settled acts which, through their +objectifications in the present act, establish the conditions to which +that act must conform. + +Aristotle conceived ‘matter’—ὑλγ—as being pure potentiality awaiting the +incoming of form in order to become actual. Hence employing Aristotelian +notions, we may say that the limitation of pure potentiality, +established by ‘objectifications’ of the settled past, expresses that +‘natural potentiality’—or, potentiality in nature—which is ‘matter’ with +that basis of initial, realized form presupposed as the first phase in +the self-creation of the present occasion. The notion of ‘pure +potentiality’ here takes the place of Aristotle’s ‘matter,’ and ‘natural +potentiality’ is ‘matter’ with that given imposition of form from which +each actual thing arises. All components which are _given_ for +experience are to be found in the analysis of natural potentiality. Thus +the immediate present has to conform to what the past is for it, and the +mere lapse of time is an abstraction from the more concrete relatedness +of ‘conformation.’ The ‘substantial’ character of actual things is not +primarily concerned with the predication of qualities. It expresses the +stubborn fact that whatever is settled and actual must in due measure be +conformed to by the self-creative activity. The phrase ‘stubborn fact’ +exactly expresses the popular apprehension of this characteristic. Its +primary phase, from which each actual thing arises, is the stubborn fact +which underlies its existence. According to Hume there are no stubborn +facts. Hume’s doctrine may be good philosophy, but it is certainly not +common sense. In other words, it fails before the final test of obvious +verification. + + + 2. _Kant and Causal Efficacy._ + + +The school of transcendental idealists, derived from Kant, admit that +causal efficacy is a factor in the phenomenal world; but hold that it +does not belong to the sheer data presupposed in perception. It belongs +to our ways of thought about the data. Our consciousness of the +perceived world yields us an objective system, which is a fusion of mere +data and modes of thought about those data. + +The general Kantian reason for this position is that direct perception +acquaints us with particular fact. Now particular fact is what simply +occurs as particular datum. But we believe universal principles about +all particular facts. Such universal knowledge cannot be derived from +any selection of particular facts, each of which has just simply +occurred. Thus our ineradicable belief is only explicable by reason of +the doctrine that particular facts, as consciously apprehended, are the +fusion of mere particular data with thought functioning according to +categories which import their own universality in the modified data. +Thus the phenomenal world, as in consciousness, is a complex of coherent +judgments, framed according to fixed categories of thought, and with a +content constituted by given data organized according to fixed forms of +intuition. + +This Kantian doctrine accepts Hume’s naïve presupposition of ‘simple +occurrence’ for the mere data. I have elsewhere called it the assumption +of ‘simple location,’ by way of applying it to space as well as to time. + +I directly deny this doctrine of ‘simple occurrence.’ There is nothing +which ‘simply happens.’ Such a belief is the baseless doctrine of time +as ‘pure succession.’ The alternative doctrine, that the pure succession +of time is merely an abstract from the fundamental relationship of +conformation, sweeps away the whole basis for the intervention of +constitutive thought, or constitutive intuition, in the formation of the +directly apprehended world. Universality of truth arises from the +universality of relativity, whereby every particular actual thing lays +upon the universe the obligation of conforming to it. Thus in the +analysis of particular fact universal truths are discoverable, those +truths expressing this obligation. The given-ness of experience—that is +to say, all its data alike, whether general truths or particular sensa +or presupposed forms of synthesis—expresses the specific character of +the temporal relation of that act of experience to the settled actuality +of the universe which is the source of all conditions. The fallacy of +‘misplaced concreteness’ abstracts from time this specific character, +and leaves time with the mere generic character of pure succession. + + + 3. _Direct Perception of Causal Efficacy._ + + +The followers of Hume and the followers of Kant have thus their diverse, +but allied, objections to the notion of any direct perception of causal +efficacy, in the sense in which direct perception is antecedent to +thought about it. Both schools find ‘causal efficacy’ to be the +importation, into the data, of a way of thinking or judging about those +data. One school calls it a habit of thought; the other school calls it +a category of thought. Also for them the mere data are the pure +sense-data. + +If either Hume or Kant gives a proper account of the status of causal +efficacy, we should find that our conscious apprehension of causal +efficacy should depend to some extent on the vividness of the thought or +of the pure intuitive discrimination of sense-data at the moment in +question. For an apprehension which is the product of thought should +sink in importance when thought is in the background. Also, according to +this Humian-Kantian account, the thought in question is thought about +the immediate sense-data. Accordingly a certain vividness of sense-data +in immediate presentation should be favourable to apprehension of causal +efficacy. For according to these accounts, causal efficacy is nothing +else than a way of thinking about sense-data, given in presentational +immediacy. Thus the inhibition of thought and the vagueness of +sense-data should be extremely unfavourable to the prominence of causal +efficacy as an element in experience. + +The logical difficulties attending the direct perception of causal +efficacy have been shown to depend on the sheer assumption that time is +merely the generic notion of pure succession. This is an instance of the +fallacy of ‘misplaced concreteness.’ Thus the way is now open to enquire +empirically whether in fact our apprehension of causal efficacy does +depend either on the vividness of sense-data or on the activity of +thought. + +According to both schools, the importance of causal efficacy, and of +action exemplifying its presupposition, should be mainly characteristic +of high-grade organisms in their best moments. Now if we confine +attention to long-range identification of cause and effect, depending on +complex reasoning, undoubtedly such high-grade mentality and such +precise determination of sense-data are required. But each step in such +reasoning depends on the primary presupposition of the immediate present +moment conforming itself to the settled environment of the immediate +past. We must not direct attention to the inferences from yesterday to +today, or even from five minutes ago to the immediate present. We must +consider the immediate present in its relationship to the immediate +past. The overwhelming conformation of fact, in present action, to +antecedent settled fact is to be found here. + +My point is that this conformation of present fact to immediate past is +more prominent both in apparent behaviour and in consciousness, when the +organism is low grade. A flower turns to the light with much greater +certainty than does a human being, and a stone conforms to the +conditions set by its external environment with much greater certainty +than does a flower. A dog anticipates the conformation of the immediate +future to his present activity with the same certainty as a human being. +When it comes to calculations and remote inferences, the dog fails. But +the dog never acts as though the immediate future were irrelevant to the +present. Irresolution in action arises from consciousness of a somewhat +distant relevant future, combined with inability to evaluate its precise +type. If we were not conscious of relevance, why is there irresolution +in a sudden crisis? + +Again a vivid enjoyment of immediate sense-data notoriously inhibits +apprehension of the relevance of the future. The present moment is then +all in all. In our consciousness it approximates to ‘simple occurrence.’ + +Certain emotions, such as anger and terror, are apt to inhibit the +apprehension of sense-data; but they wholly depend upon a vivid +apprehension of the relevance of immediate past to the present, and of +the present to the future. Again an inhibition of familiar sense-data +provokes the terrifying sense of vague presences, effective for good or +evil over our fate. Most living creatures, of daytime habits, are more +nervous in the dark, in the absence of the familiar visual sense-data. +But according to Hume, it is the very familiarity of the sense-data +which is required for causal inference. Thus the sense of unseen +effective presences in the dark is the opposite of what should happen. + + + 4. _Primitiveness of Causal Efficacy._ + + +The perception of conformation to realities in the environment is the +primitive element in our external experience. We conform to our bodily +organs and to the vague world which lies beyond them. Our primitive +perception is that of ‘conformation’ vaguely, and of the yet vaguer +relata ‘oneself’ and ‘another’ in the undiscriminated background. Of +course if relationships are unperceivable, such a doctrine must be ruled +out on theoretic grounds. But if we admit such perception, then the +perception of conformation has every mark of a primitive element. One +part of our experience is handy, and definite in our consciousness; also +it is easy to reproduce at will. The other type of experience, however +insistent, is vague, haunting, unmanageable. The former type, for all +its decorative sense-experience, is barren. It displays a world +concealed under an adventitious show, a show of our own bodily +production. The latter type is heavy with the contact of the things gone +by, which lay their grip on our immediate selves. This latter type, the +mode of causal efficacy, is the experience dominating the primitive +living organisms, which have a sense for the fate from which they have +emerged, and for the fate towards which they go—the organisms which +advance and retreat but hardly differentiate any immediate display. It +is a heavy, primitive experience. The former type, the presentational +immediacy, is the superficial product of complexity, of subtlety; it +halts at the present, and indulges in a manageable self-enjoyment +derived from the immediacy of the show of things. Those periods in our +lives—when the perception of the pressure from a world of things with +characters in their own right, characters mysteriously moulding our own +natures, become strongest—those periods are the product of a reversion +to some primitive state. Such a reversion occurs when either some +primitive functioning of the human organism is unusually heightened, or +some considerable part of our habitual sense-perception is unusually +enfeebled. + +Anger, hatred, fear, terror, attraction, love, hunger, eagerness, +massive enjoyment, are feelings and emotions closely entwined with the +primitive functioning of ‘retreat from’ and of ‘expansion towards.’ They +arise in the higher organism as states due to a vivid apprehension that +some such primitive mode of functioning is dominating the organism. But +‘retreat from’ and ‘expansion towards,’ divested of any detailed spatial +discrimination, are merely reactions to the way externality is +impressing on us its own character. You cannot retreat from mere +subjectivity; for subjectivity is what we carry with us. Normally, we +have almost negligible sense-presentations of the interior organs of our +own bodies. + +These primitive emotions are accompanied by the clearest recognition of +other actual things reacting upon ourselves. The vulgar obviousness of +such recognition is equal to the vulgar obviousness produced by the +functioning of any one of our five senses. When we hate, it is a man +that we hate and not a collection of sense-data—a causal, efficacious +man. This primitive obviousness of the perception of ‘conformation’ is +illustrated by the emphasis on the pragmatic aspect of occurrences, +which is so prominent in modern philosophical thought. There can be no +useful aspect of anything unless we admit the principle of conformation, +whereby what is already made becomes a determinant of what is in the +making. The obviousness of the pragmatic aspect is simply the +obviousness of the perception of the fact of conformation. + +In practice we never doubt the fact of the conformation of the present +to the immediate past. It belongs to the ultimate texture of experience, +with the same evidence as does presentational immediacy. The present +fact is luminously the outcome from its predecessors, one quarter of a +second ago. Unsuspected factors may have intervened; dynamite may have +exploded. But, however that may be, the present event issues subject to +the limitations laid upon it by the actual nature of the immediate past. +If dynamite explodes, then present fact is that issue from the past +which is consistent with dynamite exploding. Further, we unhesitatingly +argue backwards to the inference, that the complete analysis of the past +must disclose in it those factors which provide the conditions for the +present. If dynamite be now exploding, then in the immediate past there +was a charge of dynamite unexploded. + +The fact that our consciousness is confined to an analysis of experience +in the present is no difficulty. For the theory of the universal +relativity of actual individual things leads to the distinction between +the present moment of experience, which is the sole datum for conscious +analysis, and perception of the contemporary world, which is the only +one factor in this datum. + +The contrast between the comparative emptiness of Presentational +Immediacy and the deep significance disclosed by Causal Efficacy is at +the root of the pathos which haunts the world. + + ‘Pereunt et imputantur’ + +is the inscription on old sundials in ‘religious’ houses: + + ‘The hours perish and are laid to account.’ + +Here ‘Pereunt’ refers to the world disclosed in immediate presentation, +gay with a thousand tints, passing, and intrinsically meaningless. +‘Imputantur’ refers to the world disclosed in its causal efficacy, where +each event infects the ages to come, for good or for evil, with its own +individuality. Almost all pathos includes a reference to lapse of time. + +The final stanza of Keats’ _Eve of St. Agnes_ commences with the +haunting lines:— + + ‘And they are gone: ay, ages long ago + Those lovers fled away into the storm.’ + +There the pathos of the lapse of time arises from the imagined fusion of +the two perceptive modes by one intensity of emotion. Shakespeare, in +the springtime of the modern world, fuses the two elements by exhibiting +the infectiousness of gay immediacy:— + + ‘... daffodils, + That come before the swallow dares, and take + The winds of March with beauty; ...’ + + (_The Winter’s Tale_, IV, iv, 118-120.) + +But sometimes men are overstrained by their undivided attention to the +causal elements in the nature of things. Then in some tired moment there +comes a sudden relaxation, and the mere presentational side of the world +overwhelms with the sense of its emptiness. As William Pitt, the Prime +Minister of England through the darkest period of the French +Revolutionary wars, lay on his death-bed at England’s worst moment in +that struggle, he was heard to murmur, + + ‘What shades we are, what shadows we pursue!’ + +His mind had suddenly lost the sense of causal efficacy, and was +illuminated by the remembrance of the intensity of emotion, which had +enveloped his life, in its comparison with the barren emptiness of the +world passing in sense-presentation. + +The world, given in sense-presentation, is not the aboriginal experience +of the lower organisms, later to be sophisticated by the inference to +causal efficacy. The contrary is the case. First the causal side of +experience is dominating, then the sense-presentation gains in subtlety. +Their mutual symbolic reference is finally purged by consciousness and +the critical reason with the aid of a pragmatic appeal to consequences. + + + 5. _The Intersection of the Modes of Perception._ + + +There cannot be symbolic reference between percepts derived from one +mode and percepts from the other mode, unless in some way these percepts +intersect. By this ‘intersection’ I mean that a pair of such percepts +must have elements of structure in common, whereby they are marked out +for the action of symbolic reference. + +There are two elements of common structure, which can be shared in +common by a percept derived from presentational immediacy and by another +derived from causal efficacy. These elements are (1) sense-data, and (2) +locality. + +The sense-data are ‘given’ for presentational immediacy. This given-ness +of the sense-data, as the basis of this perceptive mode, is the great +doctrine common to Hume and Kant. But what is already given for +experience can only be derived from that natural potentiality which +shapes a particular experience in the guise of causal efficacy. Causal +efficacy is the hand of the settled past in the formation of the +present. The sense-data must therefore play a double rôle in perception. +In the mode of presentational immediacy they are projected to exhibit +the contemporary world in its spatial relations. In the mode of causal +efficacy they exhibit the almost instantaneously precedent bodily organs +as imposing their characters on the experience in question. We see the +picture, and we see it with our eyes; we touch the wood, and we touch it +with our hands; we smell the rose, and we smell it with our nose; we +hear the bell, and we hear it with our ears; we taste the sugar, and we +taste it with our palate. In the case of bodily feelings the two +locations are identical. The foot is both giving pain and is the seat of +the pain. Hume himself tacitly asserts this double reference in the +second of the quotations previously made. He writes: “If it be perceived +by the eyes, it must be a colour; if by the ears, a sound; if by the +palate, a taste; and so of the other senses.” Thus in asserting the lack +of perception of causality, he implicitly presupposes it. For what is +the meaning of ‘_by_’ in ‘_by_ the eyes,’ ‘_by_ the ears,’ ‘_by_ the +palate’? His argument presupposes that sense-data, functioning in +presentational immediacy, are ‘given’ by reason of ‘eyes,’ ‘ears,’ +‘palates’ functioning in causal efficacy. Otherwise his argument is +involved in a vicious regress. For it must begin again over eyes, ears, +palates; also it must explain the meaning of ‘by’ and ‘must’ in a sense +which does not destroy his argument. + +This double reference is the basis of the whole physiological doctrine +of perception. The details of this doctrine are, in this discussion, +philosophically irrelevant. Hume with the clarity of genius states the +fundamental point, that sense-data functioning in an act of experience +demonstrate that they are given _by_ the causal efficacy of actual +bodily organs. He refers to this causal efficacy as a component in +direct perception. Hume’s argument first tacitly presupposes the two +modes of perception, and then tacitly assumes that presentational +immediacy is the only mode. Also Hume’s followers in developing his +doctrine presuppose that presentational immediacy is primitive, and that +causal efficacy is the sophisticated derivative. This is a complete +inversion of the evidence. So far as Hume’s own teaching is concerned, +there is, of course, another alternative: it is that Hume’s disciples +have misinterpreted Hume’s final position. On this hypothesis, his final +appeal to ‘practice’ is an appeal against the adequacy of the then +current metaphysical categories as interpretive of obvious experience. +This theory about Hume’s own beliefs is in my opinion improbable: but, +apart from Hume’s own estimate of his philosophical achievement, it is +in this sense that we must reverence him as one of the greatest of +philosophers. + +The conclusion of this argument is that the intervention of any +sense-datum in the actual world cannot be expressed in any simple way, +such as mere qualification of a region of space, or alternatively as the +mere qualification of a state of mind. The sense-data, required for +immediate sense-perception, enter into experience in virtue of the +efficacy of the environment. This environment includes the bodily +organs. For example, in the case of hearing sound the physical waves +have entered the ears, and the agitations of the nerves have excited the +brain. The sound is then heard as coming from a certain region in the +external world. Thus perception in the mode of causal efficacy discloses +that the data in the mode of sense-perception are provided by it. This +is the reason why there are such given elements. Every such datum +constitutes a link between the two perceptive modes. Each such link, or +datum, has a complex ingression into experience, requiring a reference +to the two perceptive modes. These sense-data can be conceived as +constituting the character of a many-termed relationship between the +organisms of the past environment and those of the contemporary world. + + + 6. _Localization._ + + +The partial community of structure, whereby the two perceptive modes +yield immediate demonstration of a common world, arises from their +reference of sense-data, common to both, to localizations, diverse or +identical, in a spatio-temporal system common to both. For example, +colour is referred to an external space and to the eyes as organs of +vision. In so far as we are dealing with one or other of these pure +perceptive modes, such reference is direct demonstration; and, as +isolated in conscious analysis, is ultimate fact against which there is +no appeal. Such isolation, or at least some approach to it, is fairly +easy in the case of presentational immediacy, but is very difficult in +the case of causal efficacy. Complete ideal purity of perceptive +experience, devoid of any symbolic reference, is in practice +unobtainable for either perceptive mode. + +Our judgments on causal efficacy are almost inextricably warped by the +acceptance of the symbolic reference between the two modes as the +completion of our direct knowledge. This acceptance is not merely in +thought, but also in action, emotion, and purpose, all precedent to +thought. This symbolic reference is a datum for thought in its analysis +of experience. By trusting this datum, our conceptual scheme of the +universe is in general logically coherent with itself, and is +correspondent to the ultimate facts of the pure perceptive modes. But +occasionally, either the coherence or the verification fails. We then +revise our conceptual scheme so as to preserve the general trust in the +symbolic reference, while relegating definite details of that reference +to the category of errors. Such errors are termed ‘delusive +appearances.’ This error arises from the extreme vagueness of the +spatial and temporal perspectives in the case of perception in the pure +mode of causal efficacy. There is no adequate definition of +localization, so far as what emerges into analytic consciousness. The +principle of relativity leads us to hold that, with adequate conscious +analysis, such local relationships leave their faint impress in +experience. But in general such detailed analysis is far beyond the +capacity of human consciousness. + +So far as concerns the causal efficacy of the world external to the +human body, there is the most insistent perception of a circumambient +efficacious world of beings. But exact discrimination of thing from +thing, and of position from position, is extremely vague, almost +negligible. The definite discrimination, which in fact we do make, +arises almost wholly by reason of symbolic reference from presentational +immediacy. The case is different in respect to the human body. There is +still vagueness in comparison with the accurate definition of immediate +presentation; although the locality of various bodily organs which are +efficacious in the regulation of the sense-data, and of the feelings, +are fairly well-defined in the pure perceptive mode of causal efficacy. +The symbolic transference of course intensifies the definition. But, +apart from such transference, there is some adequacy of definite +demarcation. + +Thus in the intersection of the two modes, the spatial and temporal +relationships of the human body, as causally apprehended, to the +external contemporary world, as immediately presented, afford a fairly +definite scheme of spatial and temporal reference whereby we test the +symbolic use of sense-projection for the determination of the positions +of bodies controlling the course of nature. Ultimately all observation, +scientific or popular, consists in the determination of the spatial +relation of the bodily organs of the observer to the location of +‘projected’ sense-data. + + + 7. _The Contrast Between Accurate Definition and Importance._ + + +The reason why the projected sense-data are in general used as symbol, +is that they are handy, definite, and manageable. We can see, or not +see, as we like: we can hear, or not hear. There are limits to this +handiness of the sense-data: but they are emphatically the manageable +elements in our perceptions of the world. The sense of controlling +presences has the contrary character: it is unmanageable, vague, and +ill-defined. + +But for all their vagueness, for all their lack of definition, these +controlling presences, these sources of power, these things with an +inner life, with their own richness of content, these beings, with the +destiny of the world hidden in their natures, are what we want to know +about. As we cross a road busy with traffic, we see the colour of the +cars, their shapes, the gay colours of their occupants; but at the +moment we are absorbed in using this immediate show as a symbol for the +forces determining the immediate future. + +We enjoy the symbol, but we also penetrate to the meaning. The symbols +do not create their meaning: the meaning, in the form of actual +effective beings reacting upon us, exists for us in its own right. But +the symbols discover this meaning for us. They discover it because, in +the long course of adaptation of living organisms to their environment, +nature[3] taught their use. It developed us so that our projected +sensations indicate in general those regions which are the seat of +important organisms. + +Our relationships to these bodies are precisely our reactions to them. +The projection of our sensations is nothing else than the illustration +of the world in partial accordance with the systematic scheme, in space +and in time, to which these reactions conform. + +The bonds of causal efficacy arise from without us. They disclose the +character of the world from which we issue, an inescapable condition +round which we shape ourselves. The bonds of presentational immediacy +arise from within us, and are subject to intensifications and +inhibitions and diversions according as we accept their challenge or +reject it. The sense-data are not properly to be termed ‘mere +impressions’—except so far as any technical term will do. They also +represent the conditions arising out of the active perceptive +functioning as conditioned by our own natures. But our natures must +conform to the causal efficacy. Thus the causal efficacy _from_ the past +is at least one factor giving our presentational immediacy in the +present. The _how_ of our present experience must conform to the _what_ +of the past in us. + +Our experience arises out of the past: it enriches with emotion and +purpose its presentation of the contemporary world: and it bequeaths its +character to the future, in the guise of an effective element forever +adding to, or subtracting from, the richness of the world. For good or +for evil, + + ‘Pereunt et Imputantur.’ + + + 8. _Conclusion._ + + +In this chapter, and in the former chapter, the general character of +symbolism has been discussed. It plays a dominant part in the way in +which all higher organisms conduct their lives. It is the cause of +progress, and the cause of error. The higher animals have gained a +faculty of great power, by means of which they can define with some +accuracy those distant features in the immediate world by which their +future lives are to be determined. But this faculty is not infallible; +and the risks are commensurate with its importance. It is the purpose of +the next chapter to illustrate this doctrine by an analysis of the part +played by this habit of symbolism in promoting the cohesion, the +progress, and the dissolution of human societies. + +Footnote 1: + + ‘Treatise’, Part III, Section II. + +Footnote 2: + + Cf. Hume’s ‘Treatise’, Part I, Section VI. + +Footnote 3: + + Cf. _Prolegomena to an Idealist Theory of Knowledge_, by Norman Kemp + Smith, Macmillan and Co., London, 1924. + + + + + CHAPTER III + + + _Uses of Symbolism_ + + +The attitude of mankind towards symbolism exhibits an unstable mixture +of attraction and repulsion. The practical intelligence, the theoretical +desire to pierce to ultimate fact, and ironic critical impulses have +contributed the chief motives towards the repulsion from symbolism. +Hard-headed men want facts and not symbols. A clear theoretic intellect, +with its generous enthusiasm for the exact truth at all costs and +hazards, pushes aside symbols as being mere make-believes, veiling and +distorting that inner sanctuary of simple truth which reason claims as +its own. The ironic critics of the follies of humanity have performed +notable service in clearing away the lumber of useless ceremony +symbolizing the degrading fancies of a savage past. The repulsion from +symbolism stands out as a well-marked element in the cultural history of +civilized people. There can be no reasonable doubt but that this +continuous criticism has performed a necessary service in the promotion +of a wholesome civilization, both on the side of the practical +efficiency of organized society, and on the side of a robust direction +of thought. + +No account of the uses of symbolism is complete without this recognition +that the symbolic elements in life have a tendency to run wild, like the +vegetation in a tropical forest. The life of humanity can easily be +overwhelmed by its symbolic accessories. A continuous process of +pruning, and of adaptation to a future ever requiring new forms of +expression, is a necessary function in every society. The successful +adaptation of old symbols to changes of social structure is the final +mark of wisdom in sociological statesmanship. Also an occasional +revolution in symbolism is required. + +There is, however, a Latin proverb upon which, in our youth, some of us +have been set to write themes. In English it reads thus:—Nature, +expelled with a pitchfork, ever returns. This proverb is exemplified by +the history of symbolism. However you may endeavour to expel it, it ever +returns. Symbolism is no mere idle fancy or corrupt degeneration: it is +inherent in the very texture of human life. Language itself is a +symbolism. And, as another example, however you reduce the functions of +your government to their utmost simplicity, yet symbolism remains. It +may be a healthier, manlier ceremonial, suggesting finer notions. But +still it is symbolism. You abolish the etiquette of a royal court, with +its suggestion of personal subordination, but at official receptions you +ceremonially shake the hand of the Governor of your State. Just as the +feudal doctrine of a subordination of classes, reaching up to the +ultimate overlord, requires its symbolism; so does the doctrine of human +equality obtain its symbolism. Mankind, it seems, has to find a symbol +in order to express itself. Indeed ‘expression’ is ‘symbolism.’ + +When the public ceremonial of the State has been reduced to the barest +simplicity, private clubs and associations at once commence to +reconstitute symbolic actions. It seems as though mankind must always be +masquerading. This imperative impulse suggests that the notion of an +idle masquerade is the wrong way of thought about the symbolic elements +in life. The function of these elements is to be definite, manageable, +reproducible, and also to be charged with their own emotional +efficacity: symbolic transference invests their correlative meanings +with some or all of these attributes of the symbols, and thereby lifts +the meanings into an intensity of definite effectiveness—as elements in +knowledge, emotion, and purpose,—an effectiveness which the meanings +may, or may not, deserve on their own account. The object of symbolism +is the enhancement of the importance of what is symbolized. + +In a discussion of instances of symbolism, our first difficulty is to +discover exactly what is being symbolized. The symbols are specific +enough, but it is often extremely difficult to analyse what lies beyond +them, even though there is evidently some strong appeal beyond the mere +ceremonial acts. + +It seems probable that in any ceremonial which has lasted through many +epochs, the symbolic interpretation, so far as we can obtain it, varies +much more rapidly than does the actual ceremonial. Also in its flux a +symbol will have different meanings for different people. At any epoch +some people have the dominant mentality of the past, some of the +present, others of the future, and others of the many problematic +futures which will never dawn. For these various groups an old symbolism +will have different shades of vague meaning. + +In order to appreciate the necessary function of symbolism in the life +of any society of human beings we must form some estimate of the binding +and disruptive forces at work. There are many varieties of human +society, each requiring its own particular investigation so far as +details are concerned. We will fix attention on nations, occupying +definite countries. Thus geographical unity is at once presupposed. +Communities with geographical unity constitute the primary type of +communities which we find in the world. Indeed the lower we go in the +scale of being, the more necessary is geographical unity for that close +interaction of individuals which constitutes society. Societies of the +higher animals, of insects, of molecules, all possess geographical +unity. A rock is nothing else than a society of molecules, indulging in +every species of activity open to molecules. I draw attention to this +lowly form of society in order to dispel the notion that social life is +a peculiarity of the higher organisms. The contrary is the case. So far +as survival value is concerned, a piece of rock, with its past history +of some eight hundred millions of years, far outstrips the short span +attained by any nation. The emergence of life is better conceived as a +bid for freedom on the part of organisms, a bid for a certain +independence of individuality with self-interests and activities not to +be construed purely in terms of environmental obligations. The immediate +effect of this emergence of sensitive individuality has been to reduce +the term of life for societies from hundreds of millions of years to +hundreds of years, or even to scores of years. + +The emergence of living beings cannot be ascribed to the superior +survival value either of the individuals, or of their societies. +National life has to face the disruptive elements introduced by these +extreme claims for individual idiosyncrasies. We require both the +advantages of social preservation, and the contrary stimulus of the +heterogeneity derived from freedom. The society is to run smoothly +amidst the divergencies of its individuals. There is a revolt from the +mere causal obligations laid upon individuals by the social character of +the environment. This revolt first takes the form of blind emotional +impulse; and later, in civilized societies, these impulses are +criticized and deflected by reason. In any case, there are individual +springs of action which escape from the obligations of social +conformity. In order to replace this decay of secure instinctive +response, various intricate forms of symbolic expression of the various +purposes of social life have been introduced. The response to the symbol +is almost automatic but not quite; the reference to the meaning is +there, either for additional emotional support, or for criticism. But +the reference is not so clear as to be imperative. The imperative +instinctive conformation to the influence of the environment has been +modified. Something has replaced it, which by its superficial character +invites criticism, and by its habitual use generally escapes it. Such +symbolism makes connected thought possible by expressing it, while at +the same time it automatically directs action. In the place of the force +of instinct which suppresses individuality, society has gained the +efficacy of symbols, at once preservative of the commonweal and of the +individual standpoint. + +Among the particular kinds of symbolism which serve this purpose, we +must place first Language. I do not mean language in its function of a +bare indication of abstract ideas, or of particular actual things, but +language clothed with its complete influence for the nation in question. +In addition to its bare indication of meaning, words and phrases carry +with them an enveloping suggestiveness and an emotional efficacy. This +function of language depends on the way it has been used, on the +proportionate familiarity of particular phrases, and on the emotional +history associated with their meanings and thence derivatively +transferred to the phrases themselves. If two nations speak the same +language, this emotional efficacy of words and phrases will in general +differ for the two. What is familiar for one nation will be strange for +the other nation; what is charged with intimate associations for the one +is comparatively empty for the other. For example, if the two nations +are somewhat widely sundered, with a different fauna and flora, the +nature-poetry of one nation will lack its complete directness of appeal +to the other nation—compare Walt Whitman’s phrase, + + ‘The wide unconscious scenery of my land’ + +for an American, with Shakespeare’s + + ‘... this little world, + This precious stone set in the silver sea,’ + +for an Englishman. Of course anyone, American or English, with the +slightest sense for history and kinship, or with the slightest +sympathetic imagination, can penetrate to the feelings conveyed by both +phrases. But the direct first-hand intuition, derived from earliest +childhood memories, is for the one nation that of continental width, and +for the other nation that of the little island world. Now the love of +the sheer geographical aspects of one’s country, of its hills, its +mountains, and its plains, of its trees, its flowers, its birds, and its +whole nature-life, is no small element in that binding force which makes +a nation. It is the function of language, working through literature and +through the habitual phrases of early life, to foster this diffused +feeling of the common possession of a treasure infinitely precious. + +I must not be misunderstood to mean that this example has any unique +importance. It is only one example of what can be illustrated in a +hundred ways. Also language is not the only symbolism effective for this +purpose. But in an especial manner, language binds a nation together by +the common emotions which it elicits, and is yet the instrument whereby +freedom of thought and of individual criticism finds its expression. + +My main thesis is that a social system is kept together by the blind +force of instinctive actions, and of instinctive emotions clustered +around habits and prejudices. It is therefore not true that any advance +in the scale of culture inevitably tends to the preservation of society. +On the whole, the contrary is more often the case, and any survey of +nature confirms this conclusion. A new element in life renders in many +ways the operation of the old instincts unsuitable. But unexpressed +instincts are unanalysed and blindly felt. Disruptive forces, introduced +by a higher level of existence, are then warring in the dark against an +invisible enemy. There is no foothold for the intervention of ‘rational +consideration’—to use Henry Osborn Taylor’s admirable phrase. The +symbolic expression of instinctive forces drags them out into the open: +it differentiates them and delineates them. There is then opportunity +for reason to effect, with comparative speed, what otherwise must be +left to the slow operation of the centuries amid ruin and +reconstruction. Mankind misses its opportunities, and its failures are a +fair target for ironic criticism. But the fact that reason too often +fails does not give fair ground for the hysterical conclusion that it +never succeeds. Reason can be compared to the force of gravitation, the +weakest of all natural forces, but in the end the creator of suns and of +stellar systems:—those great societies of the Universe. Symbolic +expression first preserves society by adding emotion to instinct, and +secondly it affords a foothold for reason by its delineation of the +particular instinct which it expresses. This doctrine of the disruptive +tendency due to novelties, even those involving a rise to finer levels, +is illustrated by the effect of Christianity on the stability of the +Roman Empire. It is also illustrated by the three revolutions which +secured liberty and equality for the world—namely the English +revolutionary period of the seventeenth century, the American +Revolution, and the French Revolution. England barely escaped a +disruption of its social system; America was never in any such danger; +France, where the entrance of novelty was most intense, did for a time +experience this collapse. Edmund Burke, the Whig statesman of the +eighteenth century, was the philosopher who was the approving prophet of +the two earlier revolutions, and the denunciatory prophet of the French +Revolution. A man of genius and a statesman, who has immediately +observed two revolutions, and has meditated deeply on a third, deserves +to be heard when he speaks on the forces which bind and disrupt +societies. Unfortunately statesmen are swayed by the passions of the +moment, and Burke shared this defect to the full, so as to be carried +away by the reactionary passions aroused by the French Revolution. Thus +the wisdom of his general conception of social forces is smothered by +the wild unbalanced conclusions which he drew from them: his greatness +is best shown by his attitude towards the American Revolution. His more +general reflections are contained first, in his youthful work _A +Vindication of Natural Society_, and secondly, in his _Reflections on +the French Revolution_. The earlier work was meant ironically; but, as +is often the case with genius, he prophesied unknowingly. This essay is +practically written round the thesis that advances in the art of +civilization are apt to be destructive of the social system. Burke +conceived this conclusion to be a _reductio ad absurdum_. But it is the +truth. The second work—a work which in its immediate effect was perhaps +the most harmful ever written—directs attention to the importance of +‘prejudice’ as a binding social force. There again I hold that he was +right in his premises and wrong in his conclusions. + +Burke surveys the standing miracle of the existence of an organised +society, culminating in the smooth unified action of the state. Such a +society may consist of millions of individuals, each with its individual +character, its individual aims, and its individual selfishness. He asks +what is the force which leads this throng of separate units to coöperate +in the maintenance of an organised state, in which each individual has +his part to play—political, economic, and Æsthetic. He contrasts the +complexity of the functionings of a civilised society with the sheer +diversities of its individual citizens considered as a mere group or +crowd. His answer to the riddle is that the magnetic force is +‘prejudice,’ or in other words, ‘use and wont.’ Here he anticipates the +whole modern theory of ‘herd psychology,’ and at the same time deserts +the fundamental doctrine of the Whig party, as formed in the seventeenth +century and sanctioned by Locke. This conventional Whig doctrine was +that the state derived its origin from an ‘original contract’ whereby +the mere crowd voluntarily organised itself into a society. Such a +doctrine seeks the origin of the state in a baseless historical fiction. +Burke was well ahead of his time in drawing attention to the importance +of precedence as a political force. Unfortunately, in the excitement of +the moment, Burke construed the importance of precedence as implying the +negation of progressive reform. + +Now, when we examine how a society bends its individual members to +function in conformity with its needs, we discover that one important +operative agency is our vast system of inherited symbolism. There is an +intricate expressed symbolism of language and of act, which is spread +throughout the community, and which evokes fluctuating apprehension of +the basis of common purposes. The particular direction of individual +action is directly correlated to the particular sharply defined symbols +presented to him at the moment. The response of action to symbol may be +so direct as to cut out any effective reference to the ultimate thing +symbolized. This elimination of meaning is termed reflex action. +Sometimes there does intervene some effective reference to the meaning +of the symbol. But this meaning is not recalled with the particularity +and definiteness which would yield any rational enlightenment as to the +specific action required to secure the final end. The meaning is vague +but insistent. Its insistence plays the part of hypnotizing the +individual to complete the specific action associated with the symbol. +In the whole transaction, the elements which are clear-cut and definite +are the specific symbols and the actions which should issue from the +symbols. But in themselves the symbols are barren facts whose direct +associative force would be insufficient to procure automatic conformity. +There is not sufficient repetition, or sufficient similarity of diverse +occasions, to secure mere automatic obedience. But in fact the symbol +evokes loyalties to vaguely conceived notions, fundamental for our +spiritual natures. The result is that our natures are stirred to suspend +all antagonistic impulses, so that the symbol procures its required +response in action. Thus the social symbolism has a double meaning. It +means pragmatically the direction of individuals to specific actions; +and it also means theoretically the vague ultimate reasons with their +emotional accompaniments, whereby the symbols acquire their power to +organize the miscellaneous crowd into a smoothly running community. + +The contrast between a state and an army illustrates this principle. A +state deals with a greater complexity of situation than does its army. +In this sense it is a looser organization, and in regard to the greater +part of its population the communal symbolism cannot rely for its +effectiveness on the frequent recurrence of almost identical situations. +But a disciplined regiment is trained to act as a unit in a definite set +of situations. The bulk of human life escapes from the reach of this +military discipline. The regiment is drilled for one species of job. The +result is that there is more reliance on automatism, and less reliance +on the appeal to ultimate reasons. The trained soldier acts +automatically on receiving the word of command. He responds to the sound +and cuts out the idea; this is reflex action. But the appeal to the +deeper side is still important in an army; although it is provided for +in another set of symbols, such as the flag, and the memorials of the +honourable service of the regiment, and other symbolic appeals to +patriotism. Thus in an army there is one set of symbols to produce +automatic obedience in a limited set of circumstances, and there is +another set of symbols to produce a general sense of the importance of +the duties performed. This second set prevents random reflection from +sapping automatic response to the former set. + +For the greater number of citizens of a state there is in practice no +reliable automatic obedience to any symbol such as the word of command +for soldiers, except in a few instances such as the response to the +signals of the traffic police. Thus the state depends in a very +particular way upon the prevalence of symbols which combine direction to +some well-known course of action with some deeper reference to the +purpose of the state. The self-organisation of society depends on +commonly diffused symbols evoking commonly diffused ideas, and at the +same time indicating commonly understood actions. Usual forms of verbal +expression are the most important example of such symbolism. Also the +heroic aspect of the history of the country is the symbol for its +immediate worth. + +When a revolution has sufficiently destroyed this common symbolism +leading to common actions for usual purposes, society can only save +itself from dissolution by means of a reign of terror. Those revolutions +which escape a reign of terror have left intact the fundamental +efficient symbolism of society. For example, the English revolutions of +the seventeenth century and the American revolution of the eighteenth +century left the ordinary life of their respective communities nearly +unchanged. When George Washington had replaced George III, and Congress +had replaced the English Parliament, Americans were still carrying on a +well-understood system so far as the general structure of their social +life was concerned. Life in Virginia must have assumed no very different +aspect from that which it had exhibited before the revolution. In +Burke’s phraseology, the prejudices on which Virginian society depended +were unbroken. The ordinary signs still beckoned people to their +ordinary actions, and suggested the ordinary common-sense justification. + +One difficulty of explaining my meaning is that the intimate effective +symbolism consists of the various types of expression which permeate +society and evoke a sense of common purpose. No one detail is of much +importance. The whole range of symbolic expression is required. A +national hero, such as George Washington or Jefferson, is a symbol of +the common purpose which animates American life. This symbolic function +of great men is one of the difficulties in obtaining a balanced +historical judgment. There is the hysteria of depreciation, and there is +the opposite hysteria which dehumanises in order to exalt. It is very +difficult to exhibit the greatness without losing the human being. Yet +we know that at least _we_ are human beings; and half the inspiration of +our heroes is lost when we forget that _they_ were human beings. + +I mention great Americans, because I am speaking in America. But exactly +the same truth holds for the great men of all countries and ages. + +The doctrine of symbolism developed in these lectures enables us to +distinguish between pure instinctive action, reflex action, and +symbolically conditioned action. Pure instinctive action is that +functioning of an organism which is wholly analysable in terms of those +conditions laid upon its development by the settled facts of its +external environment, conditions describable without any reference to +its perceptive mode of presentational immediacy. This pure instinct is +the response of an organism to pure causal efficacy. + +According to this definition, pure instinct is the most primitive type +of response which is yielded by organisms to the stimulus of their +environment. All physical response on the part of inorganic matter to +its environment is thus properly to be termed instinct. In the case of +organic matter, its primary difference from inorganic nature is its +greater delicacy of internal mutual adjustment of minute parts and, in +some cases, its emotional enhancement. Thus instinct, or this immediate +adjustment to immediate environment, becomes more prominent in its +function of directing action for the purposes of the living organism. +The world is a community of organisms; these organisms in the mass +determine the environmental influence on any one of them; there can only +be a persistent community of persistent organisms when the environmental +influence in the shape of instinct is favourable to the survival of the +individuals. Thus the community as an environment is responsible for the +survival of the separate individuals which compose it; and these +separate individuals are responsible for their contributions to the +environment. Electrons and molecules survive because they satisfy this +primary law for a stable order of nature in connection with given +societies of organisms. + +Reflex action is a relapse towards a more complex type of instinct on +the part of organisms which enjoy, or have enjoyed, symbolically +conditioned action. Thus its discussion must be postponed. Symbolically +conditioned action arises in the higher organisms which enjoy the +perceptive mode of presentational immediacy, that is to say, +sense-presentation of the contemporary world. This sense-presentation +symbolically promotes an analysis of the massive perception of causal +efficacy. The causal efficacy is thereby perceived as analysed into +components with the locations in space primarily belonging to the +sense-presentations. In the case of perceived organisms external to the +human body, the spatial discrimination involved in the human perception +of their pure causal efficacy is so feeble, that practically there is no +check on this symbolic transference, apart from the indirect check of +pragmatic consequences,—in other words, either survival-value, or +self-satisfaction, logical and Æsthetic. + +Symbolically conditioned action is action which is thus conditioned by +the analysis of the perceptive mode of causal efficacy effected by +symbolic transference from the perceptive mode of presentational +immediacy. This analysis may be right or wrong, according as it does, or +does not, conform to the actual distribution of the efficacious bodies. +In so far as it is sufficiently correct under normal circumstances, it +enables an organism to conform its actions to long-ranged analysis of +the particular circumstances of its environment. So far as this type of +action prevails, pure instinct is superseded. This type of action is +greatly promoted by thought, which uses the symbols as referent to their +meanings. There is no sense in which pure instinct can be wrong. But +symbolically conditioned action can be wrong, in the sense that it may +arise from a false symbolic analysis of causal efficacy. + +Reflex action is that organic functioning which is wholly dependent on +sense-presentation, unaccompanied by any analysis of causal efficacy via +symbolic reference. The conscious analysis of perception is primarily +concerned with the analysis of the symbolic relationship between the two +perceptive modes. Thus reflex action is hindered by thought, which +inevitably promotes the prominence of symbolic reference. + +Reflex action arises when by the operation of symbolism the organism has +acquired the habit of action in response to immediate sense-perception, +and has discarded the symbolic enhancement of causal efficacy. It thus +represents the relapse from the high-grade activity of symbolic +reference. This relapse is practically inevitable in the absence of +conscious attention. Reflex action cannot in any sense be said to be +wrong, though it may be unfortunate. + +Thus the important binding factor in a community of insects probably +falls under the notion of pure instinct, as here defined. For each +individual insect is probably such an organism that the causal +conditions which it inherits from the immediate past are adequate to +determine its social actions. But reflex action plays its subordinate +part. For the sense-perceptions of the insects have in certain fields of +action assumed an automatic determination of the insects’ activities. +Still more feebly, symbolically conditioned action intervenes for such +situations when the sense-presentation provides a symbolically defined +specification of the causal situation. But only active thought can save +symbolically conditioned action from quickly relapsing into reflex +action. The most successful examples of community life exist when pure +instinct reigns supreme. These examples occur only in the inorganic +world; among societies of active molecules forming rocks, planets, solar +systems, star clusters. + +The more developed type of living communities requires the successful +emergence of sense-perception to delineate successfully causal efficacy +in the external environment; and it also requires its relapse into a +reflex suitable to the community. We thus obtain the more flexible +communities of low-grade minds, or even living cells, which possess some +power of adaptation to the chance details of remote environment. + +Finally mankind also uses a more artificial symbolism, obtained chiefly +by concentrating on a certain selection of sense-perceptions, such as +words for example. In this case, there is a chain of derivations of +symbol from symbol whereby finally the local relations, between the +final symbol and the ultimate meaning, are entirely lost. Thus these +derivative symbols, obtained as it were by arbitrary association, are +really the results of reflex action suppressing the intermediate +portions of the chain. We may use the word ‘association’ when there is +this suppression of intermediate links. + +This derivative symbolism, employed by mankind, is not in general mere +indication of meaning, in which every common feature shared by symbol +and meaning has been lost. In every effective symbolism there are +certain Æsthetic features shared in common. The meaning acquires emotion +and feeling directly excited by the symbol. This is the whole basis of +the art of literature, namely that emotions and feelings directly +excited by the words should fitly intensify our emotions and feelings +arising from contemplation of the meaning. Further in language there is +a certain vagueness of symbolism. A word has a symbolic association with +its own history, its other meanings, and with its general status in +current literature. Thus a word gathers emotional signification from its +emotional history in the past; and this is transferred symbolically to +its meaning in present use. + +The same principle holds for all the more artificial sorts of human +symbolism:—for example, in religious art. Music is particularly adapted +for this symbolic transfer of emotions, by reason of the strong emotions +which it generates on its own account. These strong emotions at once +overpower any sense that its own local relations are of any importance. +The only importance of the local arrangement of an orchestra is to +enable us to hear the music. We do not listen to the music in order to +gain a just appreciation of how the orchestra is situated. When we hear +the hoot of a motor car, exactly the converse situation arises. Our only +interest in the hoot is to determine a definite locality as the seat of +causal efficacy determining the future. + +This consideration of the symbolic transference of emotion raises +another question. In the case of sense-perception, we may ask whether +the Æsthetic emotion associated with it is derivative from it or merely +concurrent with it. For example, the sound waves by their causal +efficacy may produce in the body a state of pleasurable Æsthetic +emotion, which is then symbolically transferred to the sense-perception +of the sounds. In the case of music, having regard to the fact that deaf +people do not enjoy music, it seems that the emotion is almost entirely +the product of the musical sounds. But the human body is causally +affected by the ultra-violet rays of the solar spectrum in ways which do +not issue in any sensation of colour. Nevertheless such rays produce a +decided emotional effect. Also even sounds, just below or just above the +limit of audibility, seem to add an emotional tinge to a volume of +audible sound. This whole question of the symbolic transfer of emotion +lies at the base of any theory of the Æsthetics of art. For example, it +gives the reason for the importance of a rigid suppression of irrelevant +detail. For emotions inhibit each other, or intensify each other. +Harmonious emotion means a complex of emotions mutually intensifying; +whereas the irrelevant details supply emotions which, because of their +irrelevance, inhibit the main effect. Each little emotion directly +arising out of some subordinate detail refuses to accept its status as a +detached fact in our consciousness. It insists on its symbolic transfer +to the unity of the main effect. + +Thus symbolism, including the symbolic transference by which it is +effected, is merely one exemplification of the fact that a unity of +experience arises out of the confluence of many components. This unity +of experience is complex, so as to be capable of analysis. The +components of experience are not a structureless collection +indiscriminately brought together. Each component by its very nature +stands in a certain potential scheme of relationships to the other +components. It is the transformation of this potentiality into real +unity which constitutes that actual concrete fact which is an act of +experience. But in transformation from potentiality to actual fact +inhibitions, intensifications, directions of attention toward, +directions of attention away from, emotional outcomes, purposes, and +other elements of experience may arise. Such elements are also true +components of the act of experience; but they are not necessarily +determined by the primitive phases of experience from which the final +product arises. An act of experience is what a complex organism comes +to, in its character of being one thing. Also its various parts, its +molecules, and its living cells, as they pass on to new occasions of +their existence, take a new colour from the fact that in their immediate +past they have been contributory elements to this dominant unity of +experience, which in its turn reacts upon them. + +Thus mankind by means of its elaborate system of symbolic transference +can achieve miracles of sensitiveness to a distant environment, and to a +problematic future. But it pays the penalty, by reason of the dangerous +fact that each symbolic transference may involve an arbitrary imputation +of unsuitable characters. It is not true, that the mere workings of +nature in any particular organism are in all respects favorable either +to the existence of that organism, or to its happiness, or to the +progress of the society in which the organism finds itself. The +melancholy experience of men makes this warning a platitude. No +elaborate community of elaborate organisms could exist unless its +systems of symbolism were in general successful. Codes, rules of +behaviour, canons of art, are attempts to impose systematic action which +on the whole will promote favourable symbolic interconnections. As a +community changes, all such rules and canons require revision in the +light of reason. The object to be obtained has two aspects; one is the +subordination of the community to the individuals composing it, and the +other is the subordination of the individuals to the community. Free men +obey the rules which they themselves have made. Such rules will be found +in general to impose on society behaviour in reference to a symbolism +which is taken to refer to the ultimate purposes for which the society +exists. + +It is the first step in sociological wisdom, to recognize that the major +advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies +in which they occur:—like unto an arrow in the hand of a child. The art +of free society consists first in the maintenance of the symbolic code; +and secondly in fearlessness of revision, to secure that the code serves +those purposes which satisfy an enlightened reason. Those societies +which cannot combine reverence to their symbols with freedom of +revision, must ultimately decay either from anarchy, or from the slow +atrophy of a life stifled by useless shadows. + + + + + ● Transcriber’s Notes: + ○ Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_). + ○ Footnotes have been moved to follow the chapters in which they are + referenced. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 78977 *** |