Mind and Living Particles
18 Art. II.? :Author: J. H, WINN, M.D., M.R.C.P., Consulting Physician to the St. George’s and St. James’s Dispensary, &c.
Modern neurologists are guilty of a serious and culpable error in their attempt to explain mental phenomena by a hasty generalisation from the very few facts that are known respect- ing the nature and properties of the ganglionic cells, so exten- sively diffused throughout the cortical substance of the brain. Their hasty and illogical conclusions would have mattered comparatively but little, if the question at issue had reference only to physical science; but when their haphazard speculations tend to shake a belief in the independence of the human mind? a belief that has been upheld by the greatest philosophers both of ancient and modern times?they might surely have paused before enunciating doctrines which, if true, would make man an irresponsible agent, and sap the foundations of morality and religion.
We feel ourselves compelled to refer again to this topic, in consequence of the appearance of an article on ” Mental Physiology,” in the Edinburgh Review for January 1879, in which the writer endorses some of the boldest and most extrava- gant views of the modern school of physiology.
The convolutions of the brain are no doubt connected in some mysterious and, as yet, inexplicable manner with the operations of the mind, but the bold attempt of physiologists to explain them by the same laws as those which regulate the functions of the nervous system, is as fallacious as it is mis- chievous. We will now proceed to examine critically the various points in the article referred to on which we are at issue with the writer.
The terms ” Mental Physiology,” and ” Physiology of the Mind,” adopted by the physiologists, have led to much confusion of thought. The neurologists, by jumbling physics and meta- physics together, have greatly exercised the public mind : they are attempting to revive in a modified form the pseudo-science of phrenology.
The writer in the Edinburgh Revieiu, following in the wake of Gall and Spurzheim, lays it down as an axiom, that in people of strong intellectual character the brain mass is large. Instances can no doubt be adduced of the coincidence of great intelligence with largely developed cerebral convolutions, but the converse holds equally good. Be this as it may ; if it be true, as we hold, that the mind is an entity, a first principle, which acts through the medium of the brain, the size of this organ becomes of comparatively secondary importance. After admitting, with an inconsistency so common with this class of writers, that the so-called operations of the brain have to be submitted to a higher principle, he goes on to observe, that the brain substance itself accomplishes the task of trans- muting the impressions of sense into ideas. The term ” idea ” has been always looked upon by the common consent of man- kind as synonymous with thought, or conception. Without, however, going into metaphysical subtleties, it must be admitted that our ideas are among the highest manifestations of the mind, and as yet it has been found impossible to account for them by any physical laws.
Speaking of the sensory ganglia, he says: ” They take cognisance of sensuous impressions that are sent to them from the outside world, and also of cerebral or mental states that are signalled back to tliem from within “?thus endowing brain cells with the mental faculty of cognisance. He goes on to observe: ” Some physiologists have indeed conceived that an idea is substantially a sense?impression stamped upon the brain-pulp. Others have preferred to consider an idea as a vibration of brain- molecules, called up by an impression of sense. For any practical purpose it is not of material consequence whether either of these hypothetical fancies is adopted, or whether the change is summarily spoken of as a mental state.” We cannot help feeling surprised that a leading journal should coolly tell the public that it matters little if they believe that ideas are merely a vibration of brain-molecules a machine, as it were, managed by a sort of limited liability company of ganglionic cells, who are responsible, and not the individuals themselves, for any evil thoughts which may be produced by the movements of the machinery. The following passages, how- ever, referring to mental operations, are written in a different spirit:?” Scientific men, in sober truth, do not know moie of the forces which they term gravitation, and electricity, and heat, than they know of the operations of the mind. … ” The metaphysical phenomena which psychology deals with are, at any rate, quite as tangible realities as the imponderable fluids, invisible vibrations, infinitesimal atoms, and supersubtle pola- rities of the physical philosophers.” Notwithstanding this admission, the writer goes on to assert that ideas are registered in the brain structure ; and, in support of his opinion, quotes the views of one of the most pronounced materialists of the day, who surmises that the failure of memory in old age is the result of the impairment of the brain structure. No doubt, when man reaches the seventh stage of existence, there is incipient decay of most of the structures of the body, but it is a joeMtio principii (that bane of modern science) to say that the inability to recall ideas depends on the withering away of the nerve threads in close proximity with the ganglionic cells. This author, as quoted by the ” Edinburgh ” reviewer, dogmatically asserts that every impression of sense upon the brain leaves behind it some modification of the nerve element concerned in its function. He elsewhere speaks of mental functions, as if he considered that thoughts were merely secreted by a physiological process. He believes that ideas are so firmly impressed on the molecules of the brain, that of no mental act can it be said that it is ” writ in water.” But if memory were nothing more than the impression of ideas on the molecules of the brain, they would be writ in water, for it lias not yet been shown that the cells of the brain are exempt from that law of constant renewal which generally obtains in the soft tissues of the body. As I wrote in a former article in the Journal of Psychological Medicine” If the brain be of such a perish- able nature, it is incredible that images or ideas impressed by any merely physical process on the cells of the brain could be vividly recalled after a long period of time, when the matter of the very cells which were supposed to have received them had been replaced by new matter.” The writer in the “Edinburgh ” seems, so far, to be of the same opinion, for he says: ” The brain-pulp, upon which the registration of memory is effected, is one of the most evanescent and delicate of the structures of living organisation. Its ganglion-globules are in a state of unceasing change.” He is therefore driven to confess that the only feasible explanation of the marvels of memory, is that the impression ” is retained by some faculty of the intellect, which is independent of physical change.” In the hand-to-hand con- flict between materialism and immaterialism, the side which relies strictly on facts and curbs the imagination must ulti- mately be victorious. The writer, however, in the following- passages, leaves the safe and sober path of inductive reasoning, and gives the reins to his fancy. In referring to the recent experiments of Hetzig, Fritsch, Ferrier, and others, of trying to determine by electricity the centres of motion in the brain, he observes: “There can be no doubt that in these experiments ideas were excited in the brains of the insensible animals by the physical agency of electrical currents. The brain-convo- lutions in reality consist of a number of distinct mind-centres, spread out in a kind of vault over the subordinate centres of nerve-action, which have the charge of consciousness, and are arranged layer above layer.” What a boon this will be to a poor author, who has to cater weekly for the gratification of the public, to find that when his ideas are exhausted he can command a fresh supply by passing electric currents through his brain !
We are far from desiring to underrate the utility of the recent experiments, instituted with a view to discover the cen- tres of motion, but their value has been greatly exaggerated, and we do protest against the notion that physiologists are able, as yet, to localise mind-centres. However, leaving out of the question mental phenomena, which are above and beyond the mere bodily function of motion, we are compelled to reiterate the statement which we made four years ago, that no great neurological fact has been added to our knowledge since the discoveries of Sir Charles Bell and Marshall Hall. The crudities of modern materialistic physiologists have led to great entanglement of ideas, by the introduction of innu- merable new terms to designate their hasty and unwarrantable generalisations. This practice is essentially opposed to the first principles of logical reasoning. The public have of late been informed that a new function of the brain has been discovered, which has been termed ” unconscious cerebration.” If this were true, it would reduce all human beings to mere automata: it simply and most unreasonably implies that thought can be carried on without consciousness?in old-fashioned and intelligible philosophic language, that the higher faculties of the mind can be exercised independently of the mind itself! The writer in the ” Edinburgh ” speaks of this anomalous theory as if it were an established truth, and gives the following contradictory explanation of it. He says it means simply that the human brain is capable of carrying on long trains of mental operations on its own account, when it is once fairly started on the track, and of finally arriving at conclusions which can be received as conscious ideas, although there has been no con- sciousness whatever of the process by which the operation has been conducted.”
Another incomprehensible notion allied to unconscious cere- bration, is, what the advanced physiologists have named icleo- motor actions, involuntarily performed under the direction of ideas. As, therefore, the former relieves us from all responsi- bility as to our thoughts, so the latter exonerates us from all the blame of evil actions. Very comfortable doctrines these for those who desire to follow the bent of vicious inclinations without let or hindrance. The chief facts which rave rise to these theories are those connected with walking, and with the rapid movements of an accomplished musician’s hands; and the singular manner in which a person recalls to his memory a word or thought that seemed utterly forgotten. As regards the first, it is probable that when a command over any particular set of muscles has been obtained, the amount of attention given to the direction of the movements is so small, and the recognition of it so faint, as to escape the memory. The second instance may be accounted for by the laws of mental associa- tion.
The writer in the ” Edinburgh ” draws the following con- clusions from what he considers the recent progress in scientific discovery: That, ” with every expression of a mental state, and with every action of the mind, some structural change occurs in the substance of the brain.” That “the change which occurs in the brain is of a destructive character. A com- plex unstable substance, formed out of the blood and deposited in the brain-globules, is decomposed and destroyed by the agency of oxygen. The nerve-influence and mmcZ-action are energies evolved as a consequence of that decomposition. The brain-pulp is burned by the agency of oxygen, for the production of brain-force.” That, ” the blood circulation both wastes and sustains the brain, and in that way promotes its mental func- tions.” That ” the transmission of nerve-influence and mind- force between the several aggregations of globules, and between globule and globule, is effected by means of a destructive decomposition of the pulp of the nerve-threads which meander about amongst them in all conceivable directions.” We must protest against the acceptance of these hypotheses as absolute truths. Had the question at stake been less mo- mentous than that of the immateriality of the mind, their dissemination might have been of little consequence; but when the issue is so tremendous, it is right that the general public, for whom the editor of the ” Edinburgh ” writes, and who cannot be expected to be familiar with the principles of a recondite and intricate science, should be cautioned against accepting mere speculations as verified facts. In a strictly physiological journal they would be not only justifiable but valuable, as a means of stimulating research.
A brief consideration of the writer’s conclusions will be suffi- cient to show that they are striking examples of the ‘petitio principii fallacy. Neither the writer nor anyone else has demonstrated that with every act of the intellect some structural change occurs in the substance of the brain, that mind-action is the result of chemical decomposition of brain-pulp, or that the transmission of mind-force between the several globules of the brain is effected in the same manner. The brain is confined in a bony case which renders it impossible to watch its vital operations through the microscope; and the dead ganglionic cells, which have been minutely examined, are as different from living ones as a corpse from a living body. In the con- cluding remarks, however, the writer contradicts the opinions here expressed, and shows that, like Professor Tyndall in his better moments, he takes a less material view of the subject. He says: ” An unfathomed abyss still stretches out beyond the most advanced ground won by the adventurous explorations of physiologists… . The moral and intellectual faculties of man belong to a region for which physical science has no lan- guage and no explanation.” Yes; and the foundation on which our faith in the independence of the human mind rests, stands unshaken by the discoveries of modem science.
An interesting and original essay by Dr Daniel Clark, with a novel title?” An Animated Molecule and its Nearest Relatives “* ?has recently been published at Toronto. As it also appeared in extenso in the ” American Journal of Insanity” for October 1878, it would seem as if the author’s views had attracted a considerable amount of attention in his own country, and it is therefore right that they should be fully and fairly discussed in an English journal.
The author has not defined what he precisely means by an animated molecule. The smallest living particle with which we are acquainted is a bioplast, the marvellous properties of which have been revealed to us through the profound and original researches of Professor Lionel Beale; I shall therefore, in my remarks, consider that the term “animated molecule” is synony- mous with bioplast, and signifies the minutest portion of vital matter which the microscope has yet brought to light. The author divides all inquirers who are endeavouring to discover the basis of life, into three classes?the subjectivists, the ob- jectivists, and the eclectics, who seek to learn from every source ” whether a man be a unity, a duality, or a trinity, and what are the relations of this sphinx which is continually propounding so many enigmas for our solution.” He starts with the following premises :?
“First. That it is not in accordance with physiological and pathological facts to call mental phenomena functions of the brain.
” Second. That 110 evidence adduced has satisfactorily es- tablished the localisation of mentality beyond the focal point of nerve-tissue in the basal ganglia of the brain.
An Animated Molecule and its Nearest Relatives. A11 Essay read before the
American Association of Medical Superintendents of the Insane at Washington, D.C., on May 10, 1878, by Daniel Clark, M.D., &c. Toronto, 1878. ” Third. That brain power is not dependent on the size of the organ only, but requires many other conditions to manifest its durability and intensity.
” Fourth. That psychic force correlates to some extent with magnetism, and is probably a higher power of the same substance, and presumably is the most subtle form of material existence known to man.
” Fifth. That this entity exists in the nervous system of all animals and beings possessing this structure, not depending on a molecule for its existence; but, on the contrary, the molecule could have no being without its constructive power. The maker of the molecule necessarily antedates the creation, and manifests the occupancy of the tenement in a series of functions numerous and complicated.
” Sixth. That the intensity and complicity of mental modes, ccateris paribus, do depend on the condition and capacity of the organ, and that the intellectual and moral powers decrease in a certain proportion as the instrument diminishes in efficacy (as a magnet decreases in power according to its size), until only automatic or reflex life remains. In other words, the descending series of psvchism, vitality, electricity, leave in the inverse order to that in which they built up the system, until dust to dust manifests the ultimate elements in their primal form, with only a low grade of cohesive power remaining.
” Seventh. That the different phenomena of mind in health and disease can be explained satisfactorily to my mind, if the views stated be accepted, without leading to illogical con- clusions.
” Eighth. That no appeal has been made to arguments and deductions beyond accepted phenomena, and only by legitimate conclusions drawn from evidence furnished by the senses.” With regard to the first and third of these propositions, we are at one with the author, and the arguments which we adduced in the earlier part of this article will tend to confirm them; but we are opposed to the second and fourth. We do not admit that mentality*?if by that newly coined word the author means capability of mental acts?can be located in any particular part of the brain. Neither can we subscribe to the opinion, that psychic force correlates with magnetism, and is probably a higher power of the same substance. The majority of modern physio- logists, after long and careful experiments, have come to the conclusion that nerve currents and electric currents are not * The word ” mentality ” was first used, we believe, by the late G-. H. Lewes. It does not give additional force to materialistic speculations; and it is not in accordance with sound philosophy to call the power of thinking mentality, nor to say when a man is thinking that he is cerebrating.
identical. Although electric currents have been observed passing along living nerve texture, they are now regarded only as acci- dental, and not of an essential character. It is a mere assump- tion to say that psychic force correlates with magnetism; and we must repeat what we have said in a former treatise, that the word “correlation” is very frequently used in a vague manner to imply that two forces are identical, and to reconcile pheno- mena which have nothing in common. If by ” correlation ” the author means ” correlation of force,” it is perfectly clear that Grove’s doctrine will not support his hypothesis, as not a single instance can be recorded in which psychic and physical forces have been found interchangeable. In the present day it is the practice of many scientific writers to use the terms correlation, evolution, and potentiality, to account for things that they cannot explain. They are used in a sort of hocus-pocus fashion. For instance, if it is asked, How did man originate ??the ready answer is, By evolution. What is life ??The potentiality of atoms. What is mind ??A correlation of magnetic and psychic forces. The energy which animates a living particle is so dis- tinct from any physical force that their mutual convertibility is impossible. Dr Clark himself has justly observed: ” We see organisms of the lowest order multiply their kind by a division of themselves. This inherent power causes these separate parts to have a family resemblance. Each of these has a power to move, to feed, to grow, to multiply, and to have a harmony of action in all its parts. No such complicity of power can be seen in chemical action and affinity ?but we must add, that whilst agreeing with Dr Clark that this inherent power is not the physical result of chemical action, that neither can this vital energy be shown to be the result of electricity or any other physical force, although it may be admitted that electricity, as well as chemistry, acts a subordinate part in the animal economy.
The fifth, sixth, and seventh propositions assume that a psycho-magnetic sort of vitalism, not only produces and presides over the functions of all living animals, but that the phenomena of the mind can be accounted for on the same principle. The eighth, and last, of his premises expresses the author’s belief that his conclusions are strictly in accordance with all that is known of the laws of mental, vital, and physical phe- nomena.
To each and all of these we have already replied by mention- ing facts, which militate against the writer’s views. We will now go on to discuss at greater length the question, whether mind and vital action are both and each of them no more than modifications of electric action.
26 mind and living particles. The striking resemblance between the manner in which messages are communicated by the telegraphic wires and that of the transmission of nerve-influence through living fibres, has led to the conclusion that the two processes are of the same nature. The most recent experiments of physiologists tend to show, that though apparently similar, they are, in truth, of an essentially different character.
At one time an experiment of Gralvani’s was supposed to be conclusive as to the identity of electric and nerve currents. He exposed the nerve of a frog’s leg, and connected two points of the exposed nerve by a piece of curved metal. By this means he detected an electric current through the nerve. Sub- sequently, however, Yolta’s interpretation of the fact was accepted, and generally adopted. He said that the metal was the chief agent in the experiment; and that, when two hetero- geneous bodies are placed in contact, one of them assumes the positive and the other the negative electroid condition. Her- mann and others are convinced that many of the electrical manifestations noticed in nerves and muscles are merely the result of chemical changes; and up to the present time there are no conclusive proofs that vitality and electricity are the same force. Dr Clark has been entirely misled by assuming the accuracy of an experiment of Becquerel’s, on which he has laid great stress. In describing this experiment, he says, that if the nerves of the rheoscopic limbs of two frogs are connected by cotton-wick saturated with water, and the nerve of one is pinched, or any irritant applied, the influence crosses the foreign cotton-wick isthmus and causes contraction of the distal limb. He also states, we think on insufficient grounds, that a ” transmission of nerve-force explains much that is otherwise inexplicable, where there is diffluence or disorganisa- tion of nerve tissue, for even then its power of conveying this agent is not destroyed.” With a view of obtaining the latest and most precise information on two points of so much import- ance as the conveyance of nerve-force through a cotton-wick, or its transmission through a disorganised nerve, I asked Mr. Lowne, the lecturer on physiology at the medical school of the Middlesex Hospital, to give me his opinion on both points. Mr. Lowne has recently been engaged in making original and delicate experiments with regard to the functions of the nervous system ; and his qualifications and attainments are so fully recognised, that he has been appointed Professor of Anatomy and Physiology at the Royal College of Surgeons of England. He has courteously replied to me as follows: ” The nerve- current cannot be passed through such a medium as cotton-wick, even when moistened with chloride of sodium, which would increase its power of conveying an ordinary electrical current. The evidence is exceedingly strong that there is no electrical current in a living nerve except it be injured.”
” If a nerve is severed by a knife, or a portion of it destroyed by disease, the nerve-current is interrupted.”
” If a nerve be cut, and its cut ends carefully applied to each other, 110 nerve-force can pass. Electricity would pass perfectly.”
In the present state of our knowledge, we therefore are not justified in assuming that nerve-force and electrical-force are interchangeable, and we have failed to discover, from Dr Clark’s ingenious speculations, any proof that an animated molecule lias any relatives near or distant. It has been clearly established by the highest authorities, that a living cell is the minutest element in which any signs of life have been discerned. Its vital properties are totally distinct from those of any physical force, and it would scorn relationship, even in the seventieth degree of cousinship, to an electrified atom.
If Dr Clark’s hypothesis will not hold good with respect to vitality, it cannot, a fortiori, explain the operations of the human mind, or, as he terms it, psychism, which has nothing in common with the forces peculiar to matter, and belongs to the higher region of philosophy. Imagination, comparison, judg- ment, and will, cannot be gauged by the laws which govern the different modes of motion. The existence of these mental attributes is proved by our own consciousness; their undying records are indelibly inscribed on the literature, poetry, and art of centuries ; and the innumerable attempts which have been made to explain their nature by materialistic theories have ended in unutterable confusion.
When Dr Clark dismounts from his hobby of psycho- magnetism, his observations on the functions of the brain are sound and well worthy of consideration, and tend to support the arguments in favour of the independence of the human mind. He remarks: ” The results of disease in the physical manifesta- tions of what Fritsch and Hitzig call the psycho-motor centres, present so many exceptions to the generalisations of localisers, that a verdict of not proven must at present be recorded against them.” He refers to the researches of Brown-Sequard and Gintrac, with reference to cases of hemorrhage in the convolu- tions, which prove that convulsions may appear as well on the side of the lesion in the brain as on the other side. He says Hitzig, Ferrier, Carville, Durst, and Nortliangel would persuade us that there is a centre for perception in the cortical substance of the brain. He goes on to observe:?” This is divided, in true phrenological style, into other circumscribed spaces, of dis- tinct mental power. At the same time they tell us that the occipital lobe can be destroyed without producing any effect on the sensibility ; that the convolutions of this lobe, as well as those of the frontal, the insula, those of the internal faces of the hemispheres, and those of the suborbital, do not respond to electrical excitation; and that for the most part, lesions of these have little or no results. They think that ablation of the frontal lobes appears to lessen the activity of the intelligence, and that of the occipital extremity of each hemisphere seems to abolish the appetite. Orchansky, a celebrated pathologist of St. Petersburgh, after numerous experiments on dogs and rabbits, with the electric current, and by vivisection on the motor-centres, candidly states, that the separation of the cortex into motor and non-motor parts rests probable upon an ana- tomical basis only, but is little known. In other words, there is no special cerebral vaso-motor centres, except in intimate relation with the general motor system, this consisting of the cord, central ganglia, and the convolutions, but this tripartite is in mutual relation and subordination. The careful experi- ments of Brown-Sequard go to show that this mechanism of voluntary action does not depend on clusters of brain-cells in one locality, but on the co-ordination of all the cells. The germ of the future therapeutics of brain disease may be indi- cated in the fact that paralysis is not always produced in the destruction or lesion of nerve matter, but often depends upon the influence exerted by disease upon parts at a distance. The supposed motor-centres can be destroyed without any paralysis at all. On the other hand, paralysis may occur in arm or leg, when it was the most anterior or posterior part of the brain? the part furthest removed from the supposed centre of motion? that had degenerated. Paralysis may be quite independent of the destruction of the tissue. It might result from the puncture of the smallest needle.”
I)r. Clark, in reference to an inconclusive experiment ot’ Ferrier’s on the brain of a monkey, quotes a remark of mine, which appeared in the Journal of Psychological Medicine for April 1878. Dr Ferrier removed the whole of the occipital lobes of the cerebrum of a monkey, and then made the wonderful discovery, that its appetite was impaired. He thence inferred that that part of the brain was the seat of the appetite for food. In spite of the exultation of many sanguine neurologists, who imagine that the recent experiments of passing electric currents through the brain are of such great importance, it still will be allowed by every candid observer, that the localisers have not yet proved their theory. Maragliano, one of the most strenuous supporters of these novel views, only ventures to say modestly, that he thinks they will have a tendency towards the discovery of some general truth. Professor Pansch, of Keil, moreover, one of the very latest writers on the subject, is entirely opposed to division of the brain into lobes, and pro- poses that it should be divided into principal convolutions, and these again into smaller sulci, and gyri.
Dr Clark sums up his observations with a hope that they may furnish a small plank of a common platform between sub- jectivists and objectivists, upon which all can stand, with con- sistent adherence to physical facts. The facts which we have brought under consideration in the preceding pages will, we think, suffice to prove that his magnetic plank has no resting place, and that any attempt to bridge over the mysterious region between mind and matter is as hopeless as the endeavour to span the space between our earth and the most distant fixed star.
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