The Scientific Basis of National Progress, Including that of MoralityGore, George
Philosophy
The Scientific Basis of National Progress, Including that of Morality
Gore, George
Ethics; Progress; Science
then thrown into it, nothing separates but ice, which comes to the surface.
If we throw in a little anhydrous salt, nothing but the anhydrous salt
separates out, and that sinks to the bottom. But if we throw into it a
crystal of a previous crop of cryohydrate, then nothing but the cryohydrate
separates. In this case also, like evidently excites like only, in
obedience to physical laws. (Addresses, Science Conferences; South
Kensington Museum, 1876; Vol. 2, p. 108). Even two clocks, when hung near
each other, against a board or surface which readily transmits vibrations,
have been known to exhibit, by synchronous action, an apparent sympathy,
which changed their rate of going.
Periodical phenomena, also, brought about by definite causes, occur in
mental, as well as in physical phenomena. In the former we have the
phenomena of sleep, and in the latter, definite causes produce summer and
winter, day and night, the tides, cycles of solar spots, maxima and minima
of magnetic intensity, etc., etc.
Conversely to the manifestation of the principles of {118} inanimate matter
by living bodies and in mental action, so have modern inventions
demonstrated the possibility of the performance by inanimate substances and
apparatuses, of the functions, not only of our bodily organs, (as of
locomotion by the steam engine,) but also of our senses and intellect, and
in some cases, to a degree far surpassing unaided human power. Apparatus,
sensitive to sound, have been constructed, as in the microphone and
singing-flames; others capable of reproducing articulate speech, as in the
phonograph, telephone, etc.; others again sensitive to light, as in the
production of visible images by photography, and reproducing them at a
distance through wires by means of the photophone; the power of indicating
or foretelling future events has also been embodied in instruments called
"tide predictors," and that of evolving inferences has been shewn in
Jevon's "Logical machine."
The various facts mentioned in this chapter prove that mind agrees with the
various forms of physical energy in many essential points, and obeys many
of the same laws or principles. Examine whatever general phenomena of the
mind we may, we can always detect some apparent or real connection of them
with the great principles of inorganic nature; and in order to prove the
dependence of them upon the great principles of science it is not necessary
to show that all such actions are subject to those principles. Until the
whole is explained however, there will always remain mysterious phenomena
to cavil about. {119}
MORAL PROGRESS.
At the present time few competent persons have largely investigated the
fundamental relations of morality to Physical Science, consequently moral
actions are usually considered not to have a scientific basis, and the
doctrine is still extensively taught that some moral phenomena are
essentially supernatural.
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