Now, when we pass from man to the lower animals, the metakinetic implications become progressively less inevitable and less forcible as the kinesis becomes more dissimilar from that which obtains in the human organism. The only metakinesis that we know directly is our own human consciousness. In terms of this we have to interpret all other forms of metakinesis.
It is unnecessary to go over again the ground that has already been covered in previous chapters, in which we have endeavoured to give some account of what seem to us the legitimate inferences concerning the mental processes in animals. The point on which I wish here to insist is that, outside ourselves, we can only know metakinesis in and through its correlative kinesis. Underlying kinetic evolution, we see that, on the hypothesis of monism, there must have been metakinetic evolution. But of this mental or metakinetic evolution we neither have nor can have independent evidence. Such evolution is the inevitable monistic corollary from kinetic evolution. More than this it is not and cannot be. And only on the monistic hypothesis, as it seems to me, is it admissible to believe in mental evolution,[KH] properly so called.
But does not, it may be asked, the hypothesis of monism, if carried to its logical conclusion, involve the belief in a world-consciousness on the one hand, and a crystal-consciousness on the other? If, according to the hypothesis, every form of kinesis has also its metakinetic aspect, "must we not maintain," in the words of Mr. J. A. Symonds, "that the universe being in one rhythm, things less highly organized than man possess consciousness in the degree of their descent, less acute than man's? Must we not also surmise that ascending scales of existence, more highly organized, of whom we are at present ignorant, are endowed with consciousness superior to man's? Is it incredible that the globe on which we live is vastly more conscious of itself than we are of ourselves; and that the cells which compose our corporeal frame are gifted with a separate consciousness of a simpler kind than ours?" To such questions W. K. Clifford replied with an emphatic negative. "Unless we can show," he said, as interpreted by Mr. Romanes,[KI] "in the disposition of the heavenly bodies some morphological resemblance to the structure of a human brain, we are precluded from rationally entertaining any probability that self-conscious volition belongs to the universe."
I conceive that both parties, opposed as they seem, are logically right; and I venture to think that the terms I have suggested will help us here. Mr. Symonds used the word "consciousness" to signify metakinesis in general; Clifford used it to signify that particular kind of metakinesis which in the human brain rises to the level of consciousness. Not only is it not inconceivable, but it is a logical necessity on the hypothesis of monism, that answering to the kinetic rhythm of the universe there is a metakinetic rhythm; but unless the gyrations of the spheres have some kinetic resemblance to the dance of molecules in the human brain, the metakinesis cannot be inferred to be similar to the consciousness of man.
Similarly, with regard to the supposed self-consciousness of the so-called social organism. Mr. Romanes, in his article on "The World as an Eject,"[KJ] leads up to his conception of a world-eject through the conception of a society-eject—an eject, he tells us, that, for aught that any one of its constituent personalities can prove to the contrary, may possess self-conscious personality of the most vivid character. Its constituent human minds may be born into it, and die out of it, as do the constituent cells of the human body; it may feel the throes of war and famine, rejoice in the comforts of peace and plenty; it may appreciate the growth of civilization in its passage from childhood to maturity.
This, of course, may be so; or it may not. Who can tell? But Clifford was on firm monistic ground when he maintained that, unless the kinesis be similar, we have no grounds for inferring similarity of metakinesis.
The study of kinesis leads us to recognize different kinds or modes of its manifestation. There is one mode of kinesis in the circling of the planets around the sun, another mode of kinesis in the orderly evolutions of a great army, another mode in the throb of a great printing-press; there is one mode of kinesis in the quivering molecules of the intensely heated sun, another in the wire that flashes our thought to America, and yet another in the molecular vibrations of the human brain. All are of the same order, all are kinetic. But they differ so widely in mode that each requires separate, patient, and long-continued study. So is it, we may conclude, with metakinesis. There may be, nay, there must be, many modes. But our knowledge is confined to one mode—that in which the metakinesis assumes the form of human consciousness.
I have been led to discuss this matter in order further to indicate the inevitable limits of our knowledge of metakinetic evolution. Our conclusions may be thus summarized: First, we can know directly only one product of metakinetic evolution—that revealed in our own consciousness. Secondly, the process of metakinetic evolution must be reached, if reached at all, indirectly through a study of kinetic evolution. Thirdly, we have no right to infer a mode of metakinesis analogous to human consciousness, unless the mode of kinesis is analogous to that which is observed in neural processes. And, fourthly, the closer the kinetic resemblance we observe, the closer the metakinetic resemblance we may infer.
The last point we have to notice, and it is by no means an unimportant one, is that, just as the kinetic evolution of the organism must be studied in reference to its kinetic environment, so, too, must the metakinetic evolution of mind be studied in reference to its metakinetic or mental environment.