Читать книгу Contemporary Mind - Some Modern Answers - J. W. N. Sullivan - Страница 10

IT is possible that the problem of human immortality is a pseudo-problem. For if the mind is independent of time and space the notion of infinite duration obviously does not apply to it. For most of us, however, the notion that time is unreal is no more than a very occasional and vague intuition. To our normal consciousness the question of immortality remains a definite and important problem.

The question of man’s cosmic significance is felt to be bound up with this question of immortality. Even if man be not immortal it is nevertheless possible, of course, that he forms an essential part of some eternal scheme. But our longing for a final harmony could not be met by such a scheme. To know that our life has a meaning, but that we shall never know the meaning, does not meet the kind of interest we take in the matter. It does, in truth, still leave our lives meaningless to us. If we regard all life as working towards some future harmony, then it is clear we must be present to witness the harmony. Otherwise we have been merely “manure,” to use Dostoevsky’s phrase. Thus, life cannot possess the sort of transcendent significance we are interested in unless we are immortal.

I would like to remark here how crude this way of envisaging the problem seems to be compared with the mystic solution. If we are to suppose some future harmony towards which all things are moving, at what date are we to suppose this harmony to be attained? Supposing we are immortal, how long do we exist before partaking of the harmony? And if it be said, as the Christian religion seems to say, that the harmony already exists (Heaven), and that death is our introduction to it, then when may we suppose it to have come into existence? It seems evident that the harmony must be supposed to be located either at the beginning or at the end of time, that is, outside time altogether. This would agree with the mystic assertion that life is justified now, and that the notion of time is irrelevant. The mystic vision, it would then appear, is a timeless vision. It is possible only when freed from the insistent space and time that limits the normal consciousness. This seems to be in accordance with the descriptions of their experience given by various mystics.

Assuming, however, that time is a reality, what are we to say about the question of human immortality? If we regard the mind as an aspect of the body, as being one form of its activities, then, of course, immortality is out of the question. We can only raise the question of immortality if we regard the mind as capable of existing independently of the body. This hypothesis is less easy to entertain than it was formerly. Our present physiological knowledge shows a much closer correlation between mental states and bodily changes than was before suspected. Both intelligence and character can, it appears, be fundamentally affected by suitable operations on the body. Even if these results lead us to believe that an indissoluble connection exists between mind and body, we are not thereby compelled, of course, to accept materialism. We are not forced to believe that the mind is identical with the body, or with any part of it. Indeed, the reduction of mind to matter remains as unintelligible as it ever was. But this fact is of no value for the hypothesis of immortality if we suppose that the nature of the mind-body connection, whatever it may be, is such that the mind cannot exist independently of the body. As there is nothing that forces us to make this assumption, we will not make it, but will consider what can be said for and against the hypothesis of human immortality on a priori grounds.

An argument against human immortality, which C. D. Broad, in his magnificent book on The Mind and its Place in Nature, rightly says has great influence on feeling, is the apparent random, wasteful, careless manner in which human beings come into the world. Besides the fact that so many human beings come into the world so casually, the result of a passing caprice or, perhaps, of a drunken frolic, we have to consider those that are born dead, are born idiotic, or horribly malformed. We have also to consider such indefensible abortions as Siamese twins and worse monsters. It would seem that, at best, Nature is utterly indifferent, and operates entirely without regard for human notions of beauty and dignity. It is difficult to believe that the slobbering and misshapen idiot, bom of a drab in a ditch, is animated by an immortal soul.

The first part of this argument, that based on the casual way in which many human beings come into the world, need not have much weight with those who believe that life forms part of some great scheme. For we do not know what unimaginable combination of forces and events may have been necessary to produce what seems to us a casual incident. Also, we cannot argue the triviality of an effect from the apparent triviality of its cause. A forest fire may be started by a casual match. We could also suppose that the apparent cause is only part of the real cause. The physical coupling of two human beings, whether casual or deliberate, may be only part of what is required for the creation of a new mind. But the second part of the argument, that based upon the apparent unworthiness of so many human beings to survive, has wider ramifications. For if we deny immortality to some human beings, where are we to draw the line? If a certain level of intelligence and character is necessary for survival, how do we know what this level is? Might it not be that no human mind has yet appeared which reaches the required level? And if we adopt the other alternative and say that all human beings are immortal, where again are we to draw the line? It would appear that we must include not only the least developed races now existing, but also primitive man. Thus we would be led by insensible gradations to include the higher apes and, finally, shell-fish, microscopic organisms, and plants. The conclusion seems to be absurd.

Dr. Broad, who has given careful attention to this argument, thinks that there is very little in it. The argument, put simply, has three forms, (1) Oysters are not immortal; (2) We pass, by a series of insensible gradations, from oysters to men; (3) Therefore men are not immortal.

Now, in the first place, however gradual the transition from oysters to men may be, it must be admitted that there is a very great difference between these two ends of the chain. Men differ, in very important respects, from oysters. Now are those characteristics of oysters which make us deny them immortality characteristics which differentiate oysters markedly from men? If they are, then the argument from continuity proves nothing, for it is the differences that are important. Now when we reflect on our reasons for denying immortality to oysters we shall find, Dr. Broad thinks, that they are concerned with aspects where the oyster is markedly non-human. We may instance the feebleness of the oyster’s mind, the poverty of his spiritual nature, the apparent triviality of his earthly destiny. It is because of these differences from his human successor that we are inclined to deny immortality to the oyster. The fact that there is continuity between the oyster and man, therefore, is quite compatible with the assertion that men are immortal and that oysters are not. If we accept this assertion, then the utmost the argument from continuity can do is to make us doubtful of the immortality of some intermediate types. We might hesitate, for example, about kangaroos.

The direction of the argument from continuity can, of course, be reversed. We can argue from the probable immortality of man to the less probable immortality of the oyster. The apparent absurdity of this argument seems to spring, not only from the characteristics of oysters, but also from their numbers. It is felt that the survival of every living creature is unlikely, if only on the ground that such vast numbers would be involved. But, as Dr. Broad says, we have no reason to suppose that the universe is conducted according to the Law of Parsimony. Indeed, we have very good evidence that it is not. The progress of astronomy was hindered by the fact that the Copernican theory, when its consequences were looked into, required the stars to be separated from one another by enormous distances. Astronomers of that day, unconsciously deriving their notions of the probabilities from farming considerations, could not believe that such a great waste of space was incurred. We now know that such notions of probability afford no clue to the structure of the universe. Nature shows no disposition to avoid large numbers.

There seems to be no conclusive argument against the immortality of man. Are there any good arguments for it? We may dismiss the arguments based on metaphysical principles and on ethical considerations, since it is generally agreed that they have failed. The immortality of man cannot be established on a priori grounds. We have to ask, therefore, whether there is any empirical evidence for it. This is a difficult question to answer, for we find, when we come to examine the evidence that has been put forth, that our estimate of it is influenced by notions of probability that may be altogether irrelevant. Many of the messages supposed to be received from discarnate spirits at spiritualistic séances, for instance, seem so crude, undignified, and downright silly, that they seem to bear evidence of their falseness on their face. Quite apart from other considerations, we reject them without further examination. But it may be that our notions about the spirit world are altogether too exalted. It may be that the shock of death reduces even the greatest human minds to a condition of relative imbecility, that an educated man forgets practically all he knows, and that a great poet becomes indistinguishable from the more insipid composers of Christmas card verses. The evidence adduced by spiritualists, if we take it seriously, certainly seems to point to this conclusion, and if we reject this evidence it must be on a priori grounds. We must be convinced that the universe is not as evil, or, at least, as imbecile, as the spiritualists would have us believe. But it is difficult to find any grounds that would justify this conviction. Why should we assume that the nature of the universe is consonant with our higher aspirations? We know, from our experience, that these aspirations are often defeated. There is sufficient evil in the world to make us doubt whether the general trend of things is towards good. Millions of men, for thousands of years, have found it perfectly consonant with their experience of the way the universe is governed to suppose that a hell forms part of its constitution, that an eternity of torment is part of the Divine economy. In comparison, the spiritualistic revelations are almost consoling. An eternity of happy imbecility is surely to be preferred to the intelligent appreciation of undying torments.

Dr. Broad, on the basis of his reading and of certain personal experiments in psychical research, is inclined to believe that there is a future life and that it is an imbecile form of existence. He supposes that there is a psychic factor which, in combination with a living organism, forms a mind. The psychic factor alone is not a mind, although it possesses mental characteristics. This psychic factor does, in some cases at any rate, survive bodily death. We can explain the really well-attested results of psychical research, Dr. Broad thinks, by supposing that disembodied psychic factors attach themselves temporarily to living brains—say the brains of mediums. A psychic factor thus becomes an element of a temporary mind. This temporary mind will have some of the characteristics of the medium and some of the characteristics of the mind of which it once formed part in life. This will explain the puzzling fact that so many communications from alleged discarnate minds, while revealing characteristics that belonged to those minds in life, also reveal characteristics which obviously belong to the medium.

The hypothesis of a psychic factor is put forward by Dr. Broad as the minimum hypothesis necessary to explain certain psychic phenomena. Alleged discarnate spirits are, he points out, singularly reticent about their present surroundings and activities. Such information as they give on these points is so extraordinarily silly that it obviously comes from the medium. It would seem that whatever survives death is something incapable of further experience. Its memory, on the other hand, seems to be unimpaired. Thus it has mental characteristics, but it is not what we call a mind. Dr. Broad thinks that the established facts of psychic research warrant this hypothesis, but that they do not compel us to go beyond it.

In order to accept Dr. Broad’s theory it is obviously necessary to overcome our desire to believe in a future life which is better than our present life. No one can derive consolation from the idea that he will persist as a psychic factor, for the most part completely inanimate, but perhaps, for brief intervals, able to manifest certain memories when attached to the brain of some medium. There is little to choose between this kind of survival and complete annihilation. From the point of view of our hopes and aspirations we should have to decide that the universe is a very disappointing affair. And if we do this, why should we not go further and accept the whole spiritualistic revelation of a spirit world where they smoke cigars, take dogs for walks, and play practical jokes? Why attribute all such information to the silliness of the medium? What ideal of beauty, of dignity, are we still clinging to, and what is our justification for clinging to any such ideal? How can we say what statement is probable, or not probable, about such a universe? It is, of course, perfectly reasonable to say that there is a future life, but that our desires afford no clue to its nature. Then every conceivable hypothesis as to its nature becomes equally probable. It must be admitted that our experience of life, surveyed reasonably, lends equal support to any hypothesis.

Yet we do not, in fact, regard all hypotheses as equally credible. The hypothesis that the universe is ruled by a wholly beneficent creator presents grave difficulties, but it is less incredible than the hypothesis that it is ruled by a malignant devil. Yet we do not arrive at this conclusion from some sort of statistical survey of experience. It would be impossible to maintain that the happiness of the world outweighs its suffering. Our feeling that good is more fundamental in the universe than is evil is not the product of experience. It is a conviction that is arrived at intuitively. And this conviction can persist through much suffering, even when the suffering appears to be quite gratuitous and meaningless. This fact is surely significant.

Much of the greatest art in the world, that which most moves us, owes its ascendancy over us to this conviction. In such works suffering is present, sometimes profound suffering, but it has been transmuted. It has, in some sense, been justified. Out of evil has come good. And it is to be observed that the effect of such works is not to be described as merely consolatory. It would be much more true to say that they bestow understanding. We agree, for the time being, that suffering has here received a final resolution. It has been related to something more fundamental than itself.

This quality in great art is probably not unconnected with the mystic vision. It is probable that the peculiar state of awareness that is communicated by some great art is of the same kind as the mystic revelation. Under the influence of such art we dwell, temporarily, in a region where all our questions are answered or, rather, where they no longer exist. Such art seems to be, in itself, a justification of life. I believe that this is not an illusion. I believe that such art does spring from a level of understanding or awareness akin to that of the mystic. Perhaps the clearest examples of art of this magnitude are to be found in music and, in particular, in the later music of Beethoven. This music, as we see from the sort of references that are made to it, probably does convey, to many people, a state of awareness that we can only call mystical. In discussing this question, therefore, we may confine ourselves to the example presented by this music, since the issues involved are perhaps more clearly presented here than anywhere else.