Darwinism And Teleology
But the essential and most characteristic importance of Darwin and his
work, the reason for which he was called the Newton of biology, and which
makes Darwinism at once interesting and dangerous to the religious
conception of the world, is something quite special and new. It is its
radical opposition to teleology. Du Bois-Reymond, in his witty lecture
"Darwin versus Galiani,"(4) explains the gist of the matter. "Les des de
throwing aces. She brings forth not what is meaningless and purposeless,
but in great preponderance what is full of meaning and purpose. What
"loaded" her dice like this? Even if the theory of descent be true, in
what way does it directly help the purely scientific interpretation of the
world? Would not this evolution from the lowest to the highest simply be a
series of the most astonishing lucky throws of the dice by which in
perplexing "endeavour after an aim," the increasingly perfect, and
ultimately the most perfect is produced? And, on the other hand, every
individual organism, from the Amoeba up to the most complex vertebrate, is,
in its structure, its form, its functions, a stupendous marvel of
adaptation to its end and of co-ordination of the parts to the whole, and
of the whole and its parts to the functions of the organism, the functions
of nutrition, self-maintenance, reproduction, maintenance of the species,
and so on. How account for the adaptiveness, both general and special,
without causae finales, without intention and purposes, without guidance
towards a conscious aim? How can it be explained as the necessary result
solely of causae efficientes, of blindly working causes without a
definite aim? Darwinism attempts to answer this question. And its answer
is: "What appears to us 'purposeful' and 'perfect' is in truth only the
manifold adaptation of the forms of life to the conditions of their
existence. And this adaptation is brought about solely by means of these
conditions themselves. Without choice, without aim, without conscious
purpose nature offers a wealth of possibilities. The conditions of
existence act as a sieve. What chances to correspond to them maintains
itself, gliding through the meshes of the sieve, what does not perishes."
It is an old idea of the naturalistic philosophies, dating from
Empedocles, which Darwin worked up into the theory of "natural selection"
through "the survival of the fittest" "in the struggle for existence." Of
course the assumption necessary to his idea is that the forms of life are
capable of variation, and of continually offering in ceaseless flux new
properties and characters to the sieve of selection, and of being raised
thereby from the originally homogeneous to the heterogeneous, from the
simple to the complex, from the lower to the higher. This is the theory of
descent, and it is, of course, an essential part and the very foundation
of Darwin's theory. But it is the doctrine of descent based upon natural
selection that is Darwinism itself.
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Activity Of Consciousness
Naturalism takes refuge in the doctrine of association, when it does not attain anything with its first claims, and applies this theory in such a way that it seems possible from this standpoint to interpret mental processes as having an approximat... Aim And Method Of Naturalism
The aim and method of the strict type of naturalism may be easily defined. In its details it will become more distinct as we proceed with our analysis. Taking it as a whole, we may say that it is an endeavour on a large scale after consistent simp... Autonomy Of Spirit
The aim of our study has been to define our attitude to naturalism, and to maintain in the teeth of naturalism the validity and freedom of the religious conception of the world. This seemed to be cramped and menaced by those "reductions to simpler t... Consciousness Of The Ego
3. This unified self-consciousness is consciousness of the ego. It is only by means of an artificial abstraction that we can leave out of account in the consideration of processes of thought the peculiar factor of personal relationship that absolu... Constructive Criticism
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The new views that have thus arisen have been definitely summarised and clearly contrasted with Darwinism by the botanist Korschinsky. He died before completing his general work, "Heterogenesis und Evolution," but he has elsewhere(55) given an exc... Creative Power Of Consciousness
To this insight into the underivability and pre-eminence of consciousness over the world of external reality there must be added at this stage a recognition of its peculiar creative character. We have here to recognise that consciousness itself cr... Criticisms Of The Mechanistic Theory Of Life
The course of the mechanistic theory of life has been surprisingly similar to that of its complement, the theory of the general evolution of the organic world. The two great doctrines of the schools, Darwinism on the one hand, the mechanical inter... Crities Of Darwinism
Let us turn now to the other side. What is opposed to Darwinism in the biological investigations of the experts of to-day is in part simple criticism of the Darwinian position as a whole or in some of its details, and in part constructive individual... Darwinish In General
Darwinism, which was originally a technical theory of the biological schools, has long since become a veritable tangle of the most diverse problems and opinions, and seems to press hardly upon the religious conception of the world from many differen... Darwinism And Teleology
But the essential and most characteristic importance of Darwin and his work, the reason for which he was called the Newton of biology, and which makes Darwinism at once interesting and dangerous to the religious conception of the world, is somethi... Darwinism In The Strict Sense
It remains for us to consider what is essentially Darwinian in Darwinism, namely, the theory of natural selection as the determining factor in evolution. For, given the reality of evolution and descent, and that transformations from one form to an... De Vries's Mutation-theory
The work that has probably excited most interest in this connection is De Vries' "Die Mutationstheorie: Versuche und Beobachtungen ueber die Entstehung von Arten im Pflanzenleben."(46) In a short preliminary paper he had previously given some acco... Differences Of Opinion As To The Factors In Evolution
The theory of natural selection in the struggle for existence rapidly gained wide acceptance, but from the first it was called in question from many sides. Bronn, who translated Darwin's works into German, was and remained loyal to the idea of a "... Eimer's Orthogenesis
Organisation is due to internal causes. Structural characters crystallise out, as it were. "Orthogenesis," or the definitely determined tendency of evolution to advance in a few directions, is a law for the whole of the animate world. In active re... Evolution And New Beginnings
All this throws an important light upon two subjects which are relevant in this connection, but which cannot here be exhaustively dealt with,--evolution and new beginnings. Let us consider, for instance, the marvellous range and diversity of the c... Feeling
It is in the four attributes here emphasised that the true nature of mind in its underivability and superiority to all nature first becomes clear. All that we have so far considered under the name of mind is only preliminary and leads up to this. ... Feeling Individuality Genius And Mysticism
The four things here mentioned are very closely associated with one another, especially the second and third, as is easily perceived, but the second is rooted in the first. And in the second and third there is already to be discovered a factor whi... Freedom Of Spirit
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We cannot venture to say much about genius and the mystery of it. In it and its creative power something of the spirit, the nature of the spirit, seems to look up at us, as we might think of it in itself and apart from the limits of existence in t... Goethe's Attitude To Naturalism
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Naturalism is also only apparently right in asserting that the mind ages with the body. To learn the answer which all idealism gives to this comfortless theory, it is well to read Schleiermacher's "Monologues," and especially the chapter "Youth an... Lamarckism And Neo-lamarckism
The "Lamarckian" view as opposed to the Darwinian continues to hold its own, and indeed is more ardently supported than ever. On this view, evolution has been accomplished not by a laborious selection of the best which chanced to present itself--a... Machnical Theories Criticism
In attempting to define our attitude to the mechanical theory of life, we have first of all to make sure that we have a right to take up a definite position at all. We should have less right, or perhaps none, if this theory of life were really of... Mind And Spirit The Human And The Animal Soul
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There is then a threefold religious interest, and there are three corresponding points of contact between the religious and the naturalistic interpretations of the world, where, as it appears, they are necessarily antagonistic to one another. Arra... Mysticism
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