The Physical Basis of Mind: Being the Second Series of Problems of Life and Mind.Lewes, George Henry
Philosophy
The Physical Basis of Mind: Being the Second Series of Problems of Life and Mind.
Lewes, George Henry
Mind and body; Psychophysiology
11. Idealism and Materialism are equally destructive of Dualism. The
defects of particular idealist and materialist theories we will
not here touch upon; they mainly result from defects of Method. Not
sufficiently recognizing the primary fact testified by Consciousness,
namely, that Experience expresses both physical and mental aspects,
and that a Not-Self is everywhere indissolubly interwoven with Self,
an objective factor with a subjective factor, the idealist reduces
Existence to a mere panorama of mental states, and the Body to a
group in this panorama. He is thus incapable of giving a satisfactory
explanation of all the objective phenomena which do not follow in the
same order as his feelings, which manifest a succession unlike his
expectation, and which he cannot class under the order of his mental
states hitherto experienced. He conceives that it is the Mind which
_prescribes_ the order in Things; whereas experience assures us that
the order is _described_, not prescribed by us: described in terms of
Feeling, but determined by the laws of Things, i. e. the genesis of
subjective phenomena is determined by the action of the Cosmos on our
Sensibility, and the reaction of our Sensibility. He overlooks the
evidence that the mental forms or laws of thought which determine the
character of particular experiences, were themselves evolved through a
continual action and reaction of the Cosmos and the Soul, precisely as
the laws of organic action which determine the character of particular
functions were evolved through a continual adaptation of the organism
to the medium. These immanent laws are declared to be transcendental,
antecedent to all such action and reaction.
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