The philosophy of biology . ptor organs exists only in thehigher animal; there are no specialised sense organsin a Paramoecium, for instance, and the whole peripheryof the animal must receiveall these different kinds ofexternal stimuli at specialisation of itsreceptor organs in thehigher animal is ratherthe means whereby theorganism becomes morereceptive of its environ-ment, than the meanswhereby it analyses thatenvironment. This ana-lysis is the work ofanimal. Suppose that we draw a curve AB freehand with asingle undivided sweep of the pencil. By making acertain assumption—that the c
The philosophy of biology . ptor organs exists only in thehigher animal; there are no specialised sense organsin a Paramoecium, for instance, and the whole peripheryof the animal must receiveall these different kinds ofexternal stimuli at specialisation of itsreceptor organs in thehigher animal is ratherthe means whereby theorganism becomes morereceptive of its environ-ment, than the meanswhereby it analyses thatenvironment. This ana-lysis is the work ofanimal. Suppose that we draw a curve AB freehand with asingle undivided sweep of the pencil. By making acertain assumption—that the curve which we drewwas one that might be regarded as cyclical, that is,might be repeated over and over again—^we can subjectit to harmonic analysis. We can decompose it into anumber of other curves {CD, EF, etc.), each of whichis a separate wave rising above and falling belowthe axis OX in a symmetrical manner. If we drawany vertical line MN cutting these curves, we shallfind that the distance between the axis OX and the. Fig. I. the consciousness of the 12 THE PHILOSOPHY OF BIOLOGY main curve AB is always equal to the algebraic sumof the distances between the axis and the other latter we call the harmonic constituents of thecurve AB, supposing them to add up so as to formit. But AB was something quite simple and elementaland its constituents cannot be said to have existedin it when we drew it freehand ; it was only by anartifice of practical utility in mathematical computa-tions that we constructed them. It may be, of course,that the harmonic constituents of a curve had actualexistence apart from the curve itself, but, in the casethat we take, they certainly had not. Now we mustthink of our stream of consciousness in much the sameway. It is something immediately experienced andelementary; it is the concomitant, if we choose so toregard it, of the external processes that go on outsideour bodies. We can investigate it by thinking aboutit, and attending to one asp
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookpublishe, booksubjectbiology
