Page:Philosophical Review Volume 3.djvu/124

 

L'évolutionnisme physique. Louis Weber. Rev. de Mét., No. 5, pp. 226-252.

The conception of Evolution is derived from the conception of History; it is the conception of the history of a series of simultaneous multiplicities or states of the world. It is based on two metaphysical hypotheses: (1) that of non-relativity in the sphere of quantity, for it is assumed that the universe is a real and finite whole, and constituted by a definite number of elements; (2) that real substances give a permanent background to the series of phenomena. The second is contrary to the tendencies of modern science, which everywhere seeks to substitute the law of phenomena for their substantial basis. Hence Evolutionism, by providing a history as an explanation instead of a purely descriptive account, recalls the ancient cosmogonies, and reëstablishes a metaphysical hypothesis which science was progressively abandoning. But it remains to be seen whether physical Evolutionism is able to combine without contradiction the two conceptions of phenomena (1) as instances of a non-temporal law, and (2) as phases of a real Becoming or Evolution. According to (1), the successive events can only be integral repetitions expressive of the same law, and can contain nothing new. It is a complete physical determinism, which declares that what is, has been, and will be hereafter. (2) The idea of Evolution, on the other hand, resting as it does on the biological facts of an individual's history, contains the ideas of becoming what a thing was not, of a change that does not return on itself, and of an undetermined future that escapes prevision. And that these two ideas are really incongruous appears even in Herbert Spencer's evolutionism, who admits the idea of an unchanging law in the shape of the persistence of Force. This idea compels him to regard the universe as a closed, conservative (and consequently finite) system, and to substitute an oscillatory rhythm for definite change. Evolution, therefore, has to be supplemented by a reverse process of Dissolution, and change becomes merely apparent. Spencer himself partly sees this, but thinks he can escape by the assertion that though the successive evolutions are the same in principle, they are never the same in their concrete result. But the latter reservation is illogical. We have to choose between a denial of the principle of the Conservation of Energy and a denial of Evolution. This proves that no cosmogony can be constructed on the basis of a science like mechanical physics, of which the laws are timeless, and take no