Psychological Review (volume 16)

Synopsis

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1909. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... 1 Abstract of part of a paper on 'Darwin and the Mental and Moral Sciences' prepared by request for the Darwin Celebration of the American Philosophical Society. 1 See Dewey, Studies in Logical Theory, and Baldwin, Thought and Things or Genetic Logic. Scientific method, therefore, becomes, when the full implications of the matter are thought out, the exhaustive epistemological method; that is, we must hold that there is no method of reaching results to be called truths, which is not found, when genetically considered, to go back to the fundamental processes of experimentation. There is no royal road to truth; no golden rule of revelation or inspiration by which the philosopher can deduce the ' universe and the contents thereof.' The ambitious Naturphilosophie of the last century remained barren and speculative until, through the development of experimental and evolutionary science, it became Naturwissenschaft. But what shall we say of the principles of knowledge itself? Are there no final a priori and absolute tests of truth such as we are accustomed to find in ' identity, ' consistency, ' and ' sufficient reason'? Are there no constructive categories which do not themselves owe their establishment to experiment? As to the categories--here again instrumentalism has its adequate reply; and its reply is strictly Darwinian. These, too, it replies, the categories, are principles which have been saved from numberless possible variations of thought in the course of racial evolution. They represent selections, adjustments to the natural situations which have confronted the mind. They are rules of systematization found useful for thought and experience, for individual knowledge and practice, and for common social belief in the vast stretches of history. The mind has built...