[272] The reader who is anxious to obtain a working idea of the limits
of knowledge from a scientific point of view had better consult
such pieces of literature as Sir Oliver Lodge’s recent examination
of Haeckel’s _Riddle of the Universe_, Professor Ward’s _Naturalism
and Agnosticism_, Merz’s _History of European Thought during the
Nineteenth Century_, or Verworn’s _General Physiology_ (with its
interesting account of the different theories of the origin of life,
and its admission that after all we know matter only through mind and
sensation). Perusal of the most recent accessible literature upon this
whole subject will reveal the fact that these old questions about the
origin of life and motion, and about the nature of evolution, are still
as unsettled as they were in the last half of the last century. It is
not merely, however, of the actual limits of science at any one time
that we are obliged, as human beings, to think, but of the limits of
science in view of the fact that our knowledge comes to us _in part_,
under the conditions of space and time, and under the conditions of the
limits of our senses and of our understanding. Knowledge is certainly
limited in the light of what beings other than ourselves may know, and
in the light of what we would _like_ to know about the universe of life
and mind.
I do not think that this whole question of the limits of our knowledge
is such a burning question to-day as it was some years ago, there
being several reasons for this. One is that we live in an age of
specialization and discursiveness and “technic.” It is quite difficult
to meet with people who think that they may know, some day, everything,
from even some single point of view. And then the wide acceptance of
the hypothetical or the pragmatist conception of knowledge has caused
us to look upon the matter of the limits of science and knowledge as
a relative one, as always related to, and conditioned by, certain
points of view and certain assumptions. We are not even warranted, for
example, in thinking of mind and matter as separate in the old way, nor
can we separate the life of the individual from the life of the race,
nor the world from God, nor man from God, and so on. See an article by
the writer (in 1898 in the _Psy. Rev._) upon “Professor Titchener’s
View of the Self,” dealing with the actual, and the necessary limits,
of the point of view of Structural Psychology in regard to the “self.”
Also Professor Titchener’s reply to this article in a subsequent number
of the same review, and my own rejoinder.
[273] See Chapter II. p. 35.
[274] Despite what we spoke of in Chapter V. as its “subjectivism,” p.
134.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account