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Directive Action and Life

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

Ralph S. Lillie
Ralph S. Lillie*
Affiliation:
Department of Physiology, University of Chicago
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Extract

When we consider closely any highly integrated vital process, like embryonic development, or animal behavior of the end-subserving or purposive type, we are inevitably impressed with the importance of those special controlling factors, collectively termed “regulative,” which appear chiefly responsible for the unified and finalistic character of the whole sequence of events. These factors are persistent in their influence although they may act intermittently. Without their presence the sequence would soon lose coördination and “run wild,” just as an automobile runs off the road unless occasional compensating touches are given to the steering wheel. They are the factors which give unity and direction to the total process. Generalizing, we may say that in any complex unified process, especially a synthetic one—where the progress is from less to greater complexity—integration seems always to imply or presuppose the operation of regulative factors having the character which we call directive. These keep the sequence of events to a definite course which in the living organism usually terminates in some outcome having special biological significance, or survival value.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 4 , Issue 2 , April 1937 , pp. 202 - 226
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1937

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References

1 Driesch points out that an entelechy need assert its control only intermittently, relying in the intervals upon the automatic physico-chemical processes of the organism (Cf. e.g. Science and Philosophy of the Organism, 1st Ed., Vol. 2, p. 237). Here the entelechy is coping with conditions like those which beset any kind of purposive activity, where, as every observant person is aware, a main part of the controlling action consists in compensating or correcting for casual or random events. Typically the controlling agent lets events take their course and interferes directively only at certain selected places and times.

2 Secondarily, of course, this relational structure may be altered if any component changes its properties or its activity.

3 Just what “inheritance” implies need not be considered in detail here. We may simply note that the term recognizes the existence of some stable condition, transmitted through generations, which has a controlling and directive influence, constant and specific in kind, on the vital synthetic process. This condition ensures that all developing eggs of the same species pass through similar cycles of transformation under similar external conditions.

4 Cf. the description in the 37th chapter of Ezekiel.

5 Incidentally we may note that any other desired sequence could be given to the separate pictures of the film. We have here an experimental confirmation of Hume's contention that there is no necessary connection in the succession of sense impressions through which we know external nature. But the distinction between real causal sequence and mere succession of impressions emerges all the more clearly.

6 I am here making the usual distinction of natural science, and am not considering how far the natural property or activity which we point to when we use the term “vital” is present in latent form in inorganic nature.

7 Cf. my paper, “The Problem of Vital Organization,” Philosophy of Science, 1934, Vol. 1, p. 296.

8 Some such term seems needed to denote the single active events which combine to form larger processes.

9 Existentialization might be a better term than realization, although it is not in the dictionary.

10 Gravitational convergence may be neglected in this case in comparison with the kinetic energy leading to expansion.

11 That is, at some time or another. Sorting and ordering operations may become automatic and unconscious through habit; i.e., the conditions which render such operations possible become stable through repetition; or sorting machines may be invented.

12 The kind of rigidity or constancy which we ascribe to these purely formal conditions is different from that ascribed to physical fact. It is more of the nature of permanent possibility, and requires to be supplemented by something else, i.e. activity, in order to yield the physically real or existent. It is to be noted that permanent possibility requires permanence in the character of the ultimate or foundational reality.

13 The conception of a homogeneous continuum in which natural objects are set and through which they interact corresponds to the older physical conception of an ether.

14 It may.be noted that simplicity and symmetry in the external manifestations of a physical unit are not necessarily a proof of internal simplicity. In its intrinsic character even an atom may be indefinitely complex, but this complexity does not enter directly in determining the type of arrangement formed by groups of atoms, provided the ground plan is simple. Similarly military formations may have a simple lattice-like character, in conformity with the flatness of the parade ground and the uniform shapes and sizes of the soldiers, each of whom is nevertheless a complex individuality.

15 Cf. Bertrand Russell: Outline of Philosophy, eg. pp. 108, 148.

16 Compare A. N. Whitehead: “Nature and Life.” University of Chicago Press, 1934.

17 Cf. the recent address of H. S. Jennings, “Fundamental Units in Biology,” Science, Vol. 84, 1936, p. 445, for a discussion of the general characteristics of genes.

18 Cf. H. J. Muller: “The Gene as the Basis of Life,’ Proceedings of the International Congress of Plant Sciences, 1929, Vol. 1, p. 897.