Psychologists rarely concern themselves to any extent with these
matters; they deal mainly with their outgrowths,--emotions,
instinct, intelligence and will. We are at once beset with
difficulties which are resolved mainly by ignoring them. In such
a book as this we are not concerned with the fundamental nature
of these divisions of the mental life, we must omit such
questions as the relation of instinct to racial habit, or the
evolution of instinct from habit, if that is really its origin.
Again I must repeat that we shall deal with these as organic, as
arising in the sensitized individual as a result of environmental
forces, as manifestations of a life which is as yet--and perhaps
always will be--mysterious to us. We shall best consider these
manifestations of mental activity as an interplay of the
reactions of stimulation, inhibition, choice, organizing energy,
and not as separate and totally different matters. We shall see
that probably emotion is one aspect of reaction to the world,
while instinct is merely another aspect; that intelligence is a
cerebral shift of instinct, and that will is no unity but the
energy of instincts and purposes.
Before we go farther we must squarely face a problem of human
thought. Man, since he started reflecting about himself, has been
puzzled about his consciousness. How can a person be aware of
himself, and what identifies and links together each phase of
consciousness? There is an enormous range of thought on this
subject: from those who identified consciousness as the only
reality and considered what the average person holds as
realities--things and people--as only phases of consciousness, to
those who, like Huxley, regard consciousness as an
"epi-pbenomenon," a sort of overture to brain activity and having
nothing whatever to do with action, nothing to do with choice and
plan, so that, as Lloyd Morgan points out, "An unconscious
Shakespeare writes plays acted by an unconscious troupe of actors
to an unconscious audience." The first extreme view, that of
Berkeley and the idealists, nullifies all other realities save
that of the individual thinker and reduces one to the absurdities
of Solipsism where a man writes books to convince persons
conjured up by himself and having no existence outside of
himself; the other view nullifies that which seems to each of us
the very essence of himself.
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.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account