side 210

(fortsat fra side 209)

 

For example, in our classification I have a concept, 'gopher-genus

Geomys.' Another naturalist has another idea of the limits of the

genus. Our concepts may be equally true but this truth consists in

both cases in the recognition of a Ideological bond. He perhaps

includes more of the segment of evolution or career of the 'gopher

movement ' in nature than I do. The difference is nominal, the agree-

ment is conceptual. We may not say in either case that Geomys is a

real thing but it does in both these cases represent a true concept.

Let the generic limits of Geomys once be set and agreed to, I then

place in the genus an animal proving to belong to another line of

descent, the reference is false. It is a question of relation.

 

It is wrong to say that a concept is only a name. It does exist in

nature as the subjective expression of the truest thing we know and

the most important. It is a 'genetic 'verity. It is a career a doing,

in relation with all doing. It is a teleological verity.

 

But, it may be said, we are only holding a mirror up to nature and

see the trajectory of a flying bird, for example, momentarily depicted

thereon, or we are but exposing a sensitive plate in a telescope and

get only a bright trace thereon. But these illustrations do not go far

enough. In order that the plate may receive the star trace correctly,

the mechanism of the telescope must follow the path of the star.

There must be coordination. So our concept is a conceiving or fol-

lowing of the trajectory of nature. The proof of correctness is exactly

the interaction. Our conceptualism has, therefore, a link to realism

in that only upon the assumption that we are part of the organism

from which the stimulus comes could these correspondences become

intelligible. When we no longer find the trace on our photographic

plate we adjust the movement. The feeling of reality and the con-

viction of truth have their justification in the monistic construction of

organism.                                              C. L. HERRICK.

SOCORRO, NEW MEXICO.

 

(tilbage til C.L. Herricks bibliografi)

 
 
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