the central problem which he so suggestively propounds. There are in his system two objective worlds, and therefore two brains; the world (and also, it may be, the brain) apprehended in sense-experience, and the world, including the brain, as scientifically reconstructed in thought. The first as subjective varies not with the brain as a part of itself but with the brain as scientifically conceived.
Spite of all disclaimers,[1] Avenarius’ whole treatment of the relation between consciousness and the brain reveals his secret retention of the extreme parallelist position. In his frequently quoted statement, that the brain is not the seat, organ or supporter, of thought,[2] he rejects the only terms which we possess for defining their connexion. The truth which he seeks to emphasise, namely, that ascription of consciousness to the brain involves confusion of two distinct and contradictory standpoints, is certainly of fundamental importance, but his statement of it is exaggerated, and compares somewhat unfavourably with that which has been given by other writers, as, for instance, by Fechner forty years earlier in his Zend-Avesta.[3] Avenarius’ own term for describing the connexion holding between mind and body, viz., logical functional relation,[4] is only satisfactory if parallelism expresses the ultimate and complete truth; and at the present time there are many signs that even as a provisional working hypothesis it no longer proves adequate to the needs either of physiological or of psychological research. The formula is also open to the serious objection that it exaggerates the kinship of the two parallel series. Avenarius’ contention that the relation holding between them is of the same nature as that between the factors of a mathematical function has no sounder foundation than the quite general analogies derived from his biological interpretation of the vital series. These analogies fail to bridge the gulf which still remains between the purely quantitative attri-
- ↑ Cf. Vierteljahrsschrift, vol. xix., “Bemerkungen,” pp. 13-14, §§ 147-148.
- ↑ “The brain is not the dwelling-place, seat, producer; it is not the instrument or organ, not the supporter or substratum, etc., of thought. Thought is not the inhabitant or commander, not the other half or side, etc., but neither is it a product; it is not even a physiological function, or merely some state of the brain” (Der Menschliche Weltbegriff, § 132). Cf. “Richard Avenarius” by Carstanjen (translated by H. Bosanquet) in Mind, N.S., vol. vi., p. 472; Taylor, Elements of Metaphysics, p. 315.
- ↑ First edition, vol. i., p. 410 ff.; vol. ii., p. 313 ff. Fechner has given a careful statement of the sense in which such terms as seat, organ, etc., may legitimately be applied to define the relation of consciousness to the brain. Cf. vol. ii., p. 345.
- ↑ Cf. Vierteljahrsschrift, vol. xix., “Bemerkungen,” pp. 17-18, §§ 153-156.
