WHAT IS IT THAT FEELS?

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXV, Issue 9793, 19 March 1908, Page 1

WHAT IS IT THAT FEELS?

lo the Kdilor. Sir. —What is it that lei.ls--th.-it is, "the sentient entity," thai, in short, is cou- .;, ions': is it the brain, or- is it sonicciiing else: Ilaf-ckd. il judged by isolates.! passages in his works, might' he. thought to be .in doubt, for, while in.'one passage be eays "eonsciousji&ss is -. not an immaterial entity, but a physiological liiiiction of'the-brain," in-another lie calls the brain "the instrument oi conscious--111.55." thus, with strange inconsistency, expressing two opposed views as .both his own; the one view being that. the . brain is the entity that is conscious,, the other and. opposite view being that the brain is inertly an instrument or channel by means of. or ■ through which, impressions I are trnsmitted to. and (ouscinusiiess is produced or arises in, something else. 'Which i.s the true view? Is it the brain, or is it i.omething else that is the sentient, conscious entity, and that remembers': Fspecially what is it that renietnA!l physiologists agree that the eye, tbe uir, tie nerve, etc., are themselves, as insensible as is a wire conveying electricity. That thoy are merely instruments of, transmission or channels through which impression.;, caused by vibrations of the air or eilu-r'or by contact with other substances, are conveyed to the ultimate recipient—be il what it may—in which consequential sensations arise or are produced. Somematerialistic scientists, however, go further, and dogmatically assert that the \ ._. ultimate recipient of these impressions is il,e materia! brain, and that, therefore,-it is the materia], .brain, alone that, hears, sees, feels, and. thinks, is conscious and remembers. ' 'that the brain- is the sole seat of sensation, thought, and memory. Xow. the. question at once arises; Flowcan the material brain alone do all this when we know that tbe matter of-.which it is composed is the subject.of constant change:- How can the brain :. that is piingio-day remember the thinking done by the brain that was milje a year ago, when, fi-oni th? material 'standpoint, the two brains are- wholly diifl'&a-ent: iliebraffl.of to-day being composed of none of those particles'which composed the brain of a year a.go: To quote Hu»b M'Coll: -The mater rial brain with which our ego did its thinking a year ago has already passed clean away," and has been replaced- by f res 11 material. particles forming a new brain with which if does its thinking now." Is it-;not clear tbe.ii that- to account for memory, one must posit something; else in human personality beyond tbe brain? .Something which endures and is constant, something which remains, although the brain changes.' Without positing such a something ete (call it "soul,-" '•spirit." "ego," or what yon will) how mia we account for the fact that you and I to-day kno». r so much of the thinking which you and I performed' with the brains of long ago, -jwy flrt-uflJly non-Bxis-tent ?—T am, etp., j 19th March, lgOß.''